Watching the captain scramble for the ladder with the halberd wielding woman close behind Festus walked to the broken parapet. Looking toward the base he scanned the ground to look for the splattered remains of the barbarian’s corpse, but couldn’t find any trace of it except for the dark circle of blood where the body made the impact and what appeared to be drag marks in the soil.
Moving towards the inner wall Festus saw a wave of defenders from the southern reaches of the fort as they made their way towards the north gate. The northern wall was also swarming with movement as archers continuously released hundreds of dark shafts into the attacking hordes and soldiers armed to the teeth with a huge variety of weapons ran down the stairs to bolster the wall of defenders positioned around the open gate.
Acting upon the captain’s orders, Festus swung onto the ladder and slid down, quickly reaching the floor. He then fought through the gathering crowd and made his way to the gatehouse. Lying just inside the entrance was the corpse of a young soldier, a deep stab wound at the base of his neck. Thrown across the room was what appeared to be his weapon, the grip was darkened with traces of blood. Festus held his glaive in front of him as he carefully moved up the stairs, heading towards the mechanism that would hopefully allow him to lower castle gate before the Barbarians could charge through it.
Reaching the top of the gatehouse, Festus was greeted by a darkened room. He moved to one of the torches hanging from the walls of the stairwell and headed in. The glow of the flames managed to pierce the strange darkness that had settled over the room and revealed the gates mechanisms to the soldier. Jogging towards it, Festus inspected the machinery; “Now let’s see what we have hear…” He let out a sigh of relief. “Thank the gods, I can understand this, wouldn’t want to have come all this way just to learn that.”
After carefully placing his glaive against the wall and hanging the torch from a wall bracket, Festus deciding on the leaver he believe would close the gates and tried to pull it. His efforts however were futile. As soon as he pulled back the wooden handle had snapped. Raising the base into the light revealed that the wood had been burned and cut at the base, making it very fragile when putting force on it. Shocked, Festus continued to stare at the wood for a few seconds before trying to piece together a new plan.
Grabbing the base of the lever Festus yanked it out and threw the ruined object behind him. Then, grabbing his glaive, he jammed the butt of his handle into the hole he just created. Pulling on his glaive, Festus forced the impromptu leaver to slowly creak its way back. With an echoing click, his glaive stopped and the gate began working in reverse. Happy with his handiwork, Festus turned around to leave only to be struck by a large hand that leapt from the darkness.