Maxwell

Such Haukes, Such Hounds

Wait for him to reply to your post. I've only covered one room he ran through, and said nothing about its placement, except that he's moved past it.

Such Haukes, Such Hounds

The frozen mud crunched as corpses hit the ground all across the courtyard, their comrades already screaming for reinforcements as the defenders fled in every which direction. And reinforcements they would have, as soldiers soon poured out of every doorway. With the battle won, there was nothing to keep the occupied away from the castle grounds, and even Ghantian priests and magi emerged onto the battlefield, to ward their men and see to the wounded. By some divine mercy, the fighting was still too disorganized for proper formations, and confusion kept the officers from mounting anything resembling an effective pursuit, and men damn near trampled one another trying to figure out who exactly they were supposed to be fighting. Through windows in the castle itself, faces could be seen staring blankly at the chaos below, perhaps wondering if they should be alerting someone higher up as to what was happening. The two women had dove over the wall before anyone had become quite clear on what was happening, choosing the company of hibernating leeches in the frozen moat over that of blades and spears up above. Never the less, soldiers with more initiative were already starting to encircle the one enemy that remained in plain sight, spears and shields and arrows leveled at the white, wolf-like thing on the wall, as bold men came up the staircases, onto the wall and advanced on the anan.

A sudden stench assaulted Sir's nostrils when the Drungr woman heaved herself over the battlements. The sudden sound of shattering ice and the smell of the moat's stagnant water - too subtle for human nostrils at this distance - told him what had happened as surely as if he had seen it. A second splash told him Riven had gone the same way, and his own options were dwindling. Dozens of enemies were trying to surround him, tightening the proverbial noose with every step. Not only that, but behind the lines of spear-wielding soldiers, men glowing with magic were reaching down and pulling the fallen back on their feet, good as new. There were enemies inside the castle too, he knew, having been there himself, which meant arrows could be coming out of those high windows at any time. To make matters worse, the unmistakable scent of his master's sweat and blood trailed in from somewhere nearby. King Erasmus had not been a slouch when it came to personal combat - he was strong enough to hold a wagon upright while they replaced its wheel, and could offer fair sport to the best of his knights, but even he could not hope to stand against this many. With Riven out of sight, the still-haphazard rain of projectiles began to move toward Sir.

Inside the castle, the smell of blood was everywhere. The screams of the dying had stopped by now, or they would have been drowned out by the screams of rage and the barking of officers trying to restore order. Word was spreading upward far slower than outwards, and that was fortunate - anyone who had witnessed the onslaught of the Ghantian commander and his cronies would have known to fear his wrath. As court warlock Roderick fled through the corridors of the castle, the stomping of boots behind and above him mixed with the general din of combat until he had no idea where from the enemy would come. His own footfalls were impossible to make out amidst all the noise, but as he passed by an open door, a sound rose from below that silenced all the others. He was right above the royal dungeon, its armoured door hanging off one hinge, and through the door came a jubilant chant that would have raised the hairs on anyone's neck. The Ghantians were not going to release common murderers or thieves, of course, but there had been a full season of war, and court hearings and executions had been a low priority next to ensuring the survival of the realm. These were people kept under the watchful eye of all the knights of the court, behind magical wards the city jailors could only dream of, nobles and generals to be ransomed, and rebel leaders whose grand and public deaths would reinforce faith in the rule of Erasmus. Roderick only saw the broken door for a moment as he rushed past the room, but it gave him an entire new reason to run for his life from castle Altranor. If those wards were undone and the dungeons emptied, it would not matter how many lives he had.

There had been no message in or out of the city in over a week - no mundane messages, at any rate. It was difficult to say whether the wizards' attempts at communication succeeded, especially since the city college had shut its gates as soon as the invading army arrived. It was not entirely unexpected; organizations as important and as mercenary as the wizard academy were often spared in these conflicts. It had been many, many centuries since the academy in Altranor city itself had been threatened in such a way, but its headmaster and archwizards had refused to participate in the war. All magi who wished to lay down their lives for king Erasmus had been let out, and the gates had been closed. There was no time to wage a civil war against the city's own wizards, so the ivory towers of the academy remained unmolested by Erasmus' men as well as the Yellow Raven's. The temples were the same - aside from some that remained defiant or that were particularly hated by either of the three invading kingdoms, the houses of the gods were allowed to keep their treasures, and to serve as sanctuaries for the commoners. It was a certain bet that many merchant houses with contacts in Soven and Ghant would stay standing, as well. Some careless individuals had even been heard gloating in the days before the final assault, that there would soon be a lucrative market for buyers of war-spoils in Altranor. At the current rate, it seemed that such predictions would come true.

Such Haukes, Such Hounds

Nemasaire: I'm not sure what you're asking, but I wasn't going to do rounds. Anyone is free to post when they feel like it, and I was planning to do likewise, fleshing out the world and your surroundings if I have nothing better to do.

Despite my description of it, you don't have to worry about dying from an infection just from touching the moat (though a normal person would probably catch ebola just from looking at it) - your plot relevance protects you. ;P

I think I was gonna say something else, but I guess I'll just edit it in later if I remember it then.

Such Haukes, Such Hounds

Agreed. I don't think anyone should feel pressured to hone their posts to perfection - I sure haven't been going over mine with a fine-toothed comb, and I don't plan to. I also don't plan to make 10+ paragraph posts, so no one has to feel pressured to do that either. ;P

Such Haukes, Such Hounds

I'm getting a kind of pretentious vibe from some of these posts. I don't wanna point fingers, not because I don't want to be rude, but because I want everyone to be paranoid about it. ;P It's a hard line to tread, since it's supposed to be an emotional experience for the characters, and popular culture doesn't offer much inspiration for that sort of thing, that isn't ridiculous - I'm pretty sure I've crossed the line too, even though I'd like to think my writing has an air of self-awareness to it. This is a good thread - one of the best I've seen - but we've been congratulating each other a whole lot, and I don't want it getting to anyone's head. Least of all my own.

I'll be posting too, at some point in the near future. Any character that tarries behind is gonna get a flame lit under their ass, mark my words.

Such Haukes, Such Hounds

*Snerk*, when I describe the ogres as ten-foot dwarves, that's not really what I had in mind. But honestly, why not? I can think of at least one Scotsman who'd make a great ogre.

Guys, you don't have to put so much effort into your posts. You're making me look bad here. ;P

Such Haukes, Such Hounds

Reading my posts again, I think I've been more negative than necessary today. Sorry about that, I'll have to watch out for it.

You never know what might be important, heh, but colour schemes are not. Make it whatever you like.

Such Haukes, Such Hounds

Acrolith said And like you said, most would be required to own and practice in the use of a bow or some other form of weapon

What I said was that only England did that. And since the vast majority of your workforce are peasants already, getting more of them would require you to recruit them from outside your country. It's not like today, where you have 10% of the population sitting around praying for work.

I would also think that peasants with pikes three times their own length are the last people you send into a city - much less a castle - but I wasn't going to say anything. However, if you want there to be peasant levies running around, that's much more important than what's realistic or not. Just don't have them make up the majority of the armies of anything - I don't want to dip too far into the grimdark bucket. I play Warhammer for that.

Such Haukes, Such Hounds

Vassals also face the problem of sending their main source of income to inevitable death in a war. Conscription probably happens now and then, when the need is dire, but it's not a sustainable method of waging war. Many lords could conceivably hire out their excess soldiers as mercenaries to lords closer to the border, who can put them to lucrative use against monsters and warlords. Yet another reason why the king had such a hard time getting his armies together in time to repel the invaders.

Such Haukes, Such Hounds

As far as I know, the only real-world country (in Medieval Europe, which is what I'm basing these countries on by default) that had everyone practise every year was England, and that was just with the bow. Altranor herself has a reasonably large army of professional soldiers, but the main fighting force comes from all the vassals who are required to provide fighting men and equipment in times of war. There's never been a shortage of eager young recruits with dreams of gold and glory, but if additional soldiers are needed on short notice, there's always mercenaries and - if the need is exceptionally dire - adventurers.

Of course, the fantasy elements of the setting muddles things a bit. A church might decide that your war coincides with the will of their god, and offer the services of their templars and priests. An ogre farmer has neither the lack of fighting skill nor the morale problems of a human, and are very tempting to draft - although that still turns an income into an expense - and wizards tend to be either commissioned officers or mercenaries. If your ruler happened to have a friendly relationship with a dragon (of which the Fanged Island has mercifully few), you would have an incredible terror weapon available, and so on.

Now, I'm not a historian by any stretch of the imagination, so I could certainly be wrong. These are the assumptions I'm running with, though.