This was a piece I wrote for a competition at Mod Realms, where you had to write a short story based on, or at least inspired by, a given screenshot. I thought I would share it with you. It's not my best work, and the ending is quite rushed (I finished and posted it pretty much right before the deadline), but whatever. Anyhow:
All That Glitters
Rain poured from the dark night sky, falling across hill and valley, drenching the land that was quiet but for the splash of rainwater, and the hooves of a single horse beating across the sodden grass. The rider came on through the mist of the night, a young man, his features obscured by the thick hood of his cloak, urging his grey pony onwards. The black clouds hid the moon from view and there was no light to guide his path, only the grey smudge in the distance that was the Swadian city of Uxhal. Seeing the shape of buildings as he crested a rise in the ground, the horseman’s face showed relief beneath his hood. “At last,” he breathed, pausing but a moment as he rode on.
Leaning back in his oaken chair in the corner of an Uxhal inn, Bhorovda closed his eyes, listening to the sounds of the inn through his old ears, one of the few things about him that had not dulled in his old age. An inn is all about sound. It is the sound of people, full of singing and gossip, the scrape of chairs and the clack of beer mugs. He grew tired of seeing the same walls each day, the same tables, the same smoky haze and drunken dancing. The tankard before him was long empty, and he sat back to rest. His mind was full of memories still and it was only these that kept him from going insane, living such a dull life. He listened to the voices around him. Some of these men he had bounced on his knees as children, or enjoyed the awe of their wide eyes as he showed them his old pitted and notched blade. They had gathered around to hear tales of his past. Now they ignored him, an old relic himself, and shouted their own boastful tales of their future, all the while drinking themselves into senselessness. Where did it all go wrong?
There was no heroism or bravery in these times, Bhorovda thought. Armies were made of drafted levies, criminals and unwilling volunteers, with a select few professional soldiers who fought for gold, not glory. He remembered the blare of trumpets and the stirrings of hope at the Siege of Dhirim, when he had sallied out with the rest to fight or die against the Khergit cavalry and their Rhodok allies. Many had fallen on that grim day, collapsing to the battlefield like gruesome pincushions from some nightmare. But yet more had lived to take the battle to the foe. The Rhodok infantry in the centre had broken at the charge of a thousand knights and heavy cavalry, lances splintering against shields, maces pounding at fleeing skulls. His own lance had taken a crossbowman full in the chest, and stuck, so that he had been thrown from the saddle. It was told that a total of fewer than three hundred of the enemy alliance had escaped that bloody clash, the demoralised Khergits withering beneath the Swadian assault. Such memories, they floated through the mind of the old veteran now. The heroic souls had gone in these times, wasted in old age or lost unto death.
Where had been the bravery the year before, when the constable of Rindyar castle had surrendered the keep to a Khergit invasion? Where had been the bravery in the cold-blooded murderer who had struck down King Varl in the dead of night? What brave deeds would be sung of lords and kings who danced and feasted in gilded halls, while their weary armies trudged on through blood and bogs? Bhorovda shook his head slightly, as if to cast out the thoughts his mind always seemed to drift toward. It would not do to work himself up over this. Spilt milk, after all, cannot be un-spilt.
Turning his attention back to the tavern, he heard one voice rising above the others, one he did not recognise. A stranger, then. He opened his eyes. The voice belonged to a dark man at the far end of the room, his skin near black in shade, his long hair tied back in a tail, and his handsome face draped in a wide grin. Bhorovda did not fail to notice the curved scimitar hanging from the belt around his coat, nor the way he walked, as one used to riding. Then he remembered. He had seen the man ride into town at about midday, seated upon a fine white stallion. It surprised him that he had forgotten the incident so soon, for it had been no small commotion at the gatehouse earlier. It was not a common occurrence to have a Khergit ride to the gate, bold as brass, and demand entry. Bhorovda had not been able to catch all the details, nor the man’s name, from the typical game of Geroian Whispers that had flowed through the watching crowd, but he was certainly no hostile soldier, or he would not have gained entry.
Nor would he have been so readily accepted by the townspeople, who gathered around him now in admiration as he frolicked amongst them, relating some poetic saga of his adventures with weapon and women. A boastful fellow, it seemed, but if his words were truth, perhaps there was the bravery in this land, in freelancers like these. As he mused on this, Bhorovda sensed someone standing beside his table, and he turned. Before him stood a tall shaven-headed man, not long since a boy, cloak draped tightly around him, and hood thrown back. He was drenched from head to foot.
“Heavens, lad, don’t tell me you’ve been out in that?!” Bhorovda exclaimed, gesturing at the doorway, which was creaking shut. The stranger smiled, as a drop of rainwater gathered on the tip of his nose, falling in a drip to splash on the table. “I take it you have, then.”
“Aye.” The newcomer turned his gaze to the man Bhorovda had been watching, and his eyebrows visibly arched as he observed.
“An interesting specimen, that one,” said Bhorovda, as the specimen in question headed towards the stairs with a pale young woman leaning on his shoulder.
“Aye,” came the answer once more. “I must confess, I would not have expected such a man to be so educated. He speaks in Old Calradic verse, not the crude rhymes of most roaming poets. But then, he looks to be more than any poet.” From his former silence the rush of words came like a flood from the newcomer’s lips.
“Old? Calradic?” Bhorovda replied, “You need look no further than myself, for that.” He laughed, and the younger man joined him, eyes still bright beneath his damp visage. “For my own part, I have never had a care for such things as poetry in my life. But you look like someone who has grown in a noble’s court or other such life. Or perhaps you are of lineage yourself?”
“Not in the normal sense. But we are all of us of lineage, are we not? The difference is simply that some do not carry their own banner before them, but the banner of another”
“Ah, indeed,” Bhorovda agreed. “But I am forgetting my manners. They call me Bhorovda.”
“I am Rufus,” the man replied amicably, taking a seat opposite his new acquaintance. He threw off his waterlogged cloak, revealing his liveried tunic beneath, of azure with an argent fesse, topped by the unmistakable double-headed eagle Bhorovda knew so well.
He blinked in recognition. “Why!” he said in surprise, “you did not say you were de Voulier’s man!” He had already decided he liked this confident young stranger, but to know he served the same lord as he himself once had pleased him immensely.
Rufus nodded. “Aye, Lord de Voulier is my master. It is an errand of his that brings me south from Derchios. I have a message for Lord Herfor, at Tevarin. But no sane man could continue in weather like this, I tell you. I was hardly sure I would make it this far, truth be told. Ah well, you never get anywhere if you’re afraid of a few dangers.” He tossed forth these remarks as if they were but idle chatter, though Bhorovda knew that Rufus could well have been killed riding in such conditions, had fortune not ridden at his side.
“So then, how fares old de Voulier? I served him in my youth, from younger than even you, I’d say, and fought beside him at Dhirim. My, if ever there was a lion among men, he was the one.” He chuckled. Rufus smiled grimly.
“You had not heard? The old lord passed from us a full four months ago, struck suddenly by an illness. I wonder that the news has not travelled this far yet. It is his son I now serve, though all say he is the spitting image of the lord you knew.”
The news came as a shock, though it was not truly surprising. De Voulier must have been approaching eighty winters, Bhorovda realised, well on in years. And yet he had not considered that he might have died, remembering the man as he had been in his prime, not as a grizzled elder such as himself. Another passes, he thought. Soon there would be none who remained from the Calradia he knew. And it was not just the people who were changing. Years ago, such news would have arrived in mere weeks, if not less. Perhaps it had simply slipped his notice, but it was unlikely. It seemed to him the whole order of the land was breaking down.
“So you were at Dhirim?” Rufus asked, breaking Bhorovda from his reverie. “The Siege of Dhirim? My grandfather fought and died at that battle.”
“I am sorry.” Rufus passed off the condolence, accepting it with a smile, but waving his hand to show he did not need sympathy for a man he never knew. Bhorovda nodded and spoke again. “Your grandfather, you say? By the hills, that makes me feel old! Strange how time passes. I remember that broken field better than the breakfast I ate this morning. Threescore and eight years it has been, since I was born in Hanun to a blacksmith and a merchant’s daughter. In all those years since I entered this bloody world and my body was wrapped in a rough woollen blanket, that one day at Dhirim stands out in my mind.”
*****
The Vaegir stood trembling among a field of Calradian dead, his blade crimson with a slick of blood and dirt. His limbs ached from the wounds he had received, though his thick mail had protected him for the most part from any grievous harm. Unfortunately, the same could not be said for those lying slain upon the ground. Skulls had been pounded beneath the hooves of charging horses. Vulnerable flesh had been ripped to the bone by the barbed arrows of the deadly Khergit archers. Everywhere the earth was thick with arrows and crossbow bolts, tattered banners lifting weakly in the light wind. Bhorovda breathed deeply, trying to rid himself of the battle urge as the heat of combat still coursed through his veins.
This was it, then. Victory. At six and twenty years old, this was Bhorovda’s first taste of full scale battle, beyond small skirmishes and raiding parties on unprotected caravans. He had expected to feel something more, though he wasn’t sure what exactly. Pride, perhaps. Exhilaration. But all he felt now was a weary longing to collapse to his knees and lie amongst his fallen brothers and enemies, and a feeling of intense relief. There was no sadness, yet nor was there joy, for the numbness of the blood-soaked melee delayed any such emotions.
Slowly, Bhorovda made his way to join the remainder of the victorious Swadians. He wondered what his father would have thought, had he still lived, to see his bastard son, a Vaegir by blood, in such a place, and as he was. His fellows were cheering, and raising loud chants in honour of their triumph. Was it all a show? Did they feel the same as he did within? Bhorovda had no inkling, but joined in the celebration nonetheless. He was celebrating his own survival, if nothing else.
The cheers grew louder as Lord de Voulier himself approached. Their commander was huzzaed and praised with shouts of acclamation, which he accepted with a modest smile, holding his great war helm under his arm. He displayed not an inch of pain at the wound that gashed his side, chain links hanging loose at the tear. It must have been a beast of a man who had swung the blade, but he was more than matched by the young lord’s iron will. Without a single grimace, he addressed his men, speaking to many by name, extolling their feats of arms. Bhorovda’s dull demeanour swelled with pride as de Voulier commended him for his brave fighting after being unhorsed, surrounded as he had been. Bhorovda subconsciously massaged a small wound high in his back at reminder of this. He looked back; de Voulier was still speaking. His arm was raised to point at a saddled destrier some yards off, and Bhorovda realised it was own. There were jibes from other soldiers at Bhorovda’s lack of care, though all in good humour. He smiled weakly, his own humour returning but slowly, surrounded so with destruction.
“Men cried out that we were doomed,” de Voulier shouted, throwing his voice so that the furthest soldier might hear him. “They cowered and hid, they looked to the blue skies for help. But today, let them see what you have done. Let them count the foe’s dead, and then let them say again that you had not the strength for this fight! Before you lies the shattered remnants of the greatest threat to face Swadia in over a hundred years.” De Voulier’s voice rose to a yell, the army cheering at his words. He held his hands high. “Raise high your banners and cheer, noble soldiers, for this glory shall be yours forever! You may tell your children, and your grandchildren, of this day, and all will know of your bravery and courage! Come with me, and we shall tell all of what you have done today. Of your victory! Of your bravery! Of your honour, and your glory!”
The sound of the army was a roar across the battlefield, thousands of voices screaming their assent. Bhorovda’s heart billowed as his voice joined the multitude, cheering for all it was worth, with all the strength that remained, red in the face as the army of Swadia proclaimed their glorious victory.
*****
“Aye, it stands out,” Bhorovda continued. It was a glorious day, Rufus,” Bhorovda near sang, as well as his aged voice might. “And for what? For cowards to throw it all away at the creeping of a mouse. What true man fears battle, when only glory awaits him?” Before Rufus could answer, another voice joined them.
“There is no such thing as a glorious death.” Both men, young and old, turned to see another, the dark Khergit from earlier, but now with a certain quietness in place of the frivolous air. “Forgive me for interrupting; it is not my place. But I tell you, there is no glory in death. My own father died in battle, fighting your people. I hold no grudge against Swadians for that, but against my foolish father in leaving to seek glory and leaving his newborn babe at home, and a young wife with no help or hand to raise me. Glory is for the living, for those who by freak of fortune survive. Many men go to war. Few return home glorious. In the depths of their jubilant falsehood, their hearts weep for their losses.”
Rufus spoke quietly, his voice an audible whisper. “Where did your father die?”
“At Dhirim. Why?” The man was oblivious to the rest of the conversation and could not understand the sudden tension in Bhorovda, his knuckles tightening. Rufus too was ill at ease, but his face was calm. He held out a hand to grasp the old man’s arms as he rose to his feet, trying to restrain him. He watched in horror as he saw the old blade at Bhorovda’s side, his eyes swimming with memory. Before he knew it the two men stood facing one another, sword and scimitar drawn, the Khergit pulling his weapon to guard at this crazed old man who took such offence. The inn stood still, no man or woman daring to move.
“No!” cried Rufus. “You risk your life once more, for a debt long settled by the blood of all our brothers and fathers. Listen to his words; there is no glory in death. You live in your memories, old man, you are bitter in your false glory." His hand shook as Bhorovda stood with sword before him, eyes biting into the Khergit’s face. “Where is the bravery in bitter revenge? Where is the bravery in a sword drawn in anger? Will they sing of brave Bhorovda, who took up his rusty sword and brawled in a smoky tavern? Far braver to put aside the past, to put aside your weapon and know that the debts are done."
Bhorovda’s shoulders sank in resignation, his grip on the sword hilt slipping, until it clattered on the cold flagstones, a harsh metallic clang that broke the tension. Grief overrode him and he collapsed to his knees. He wept. He wept for his lost brothers and comrades. He wept for the hollow victory so full of death. He wept for the false glory he had held to for so long.
In the streets and in the hills, the rain fell.
