What More Could One Wish For?

"There are too many..."

She'd said it. The thought that was on every mind, the whisper, on every tongue, the doom rolling over the field of death and despair. It was known by all, felt by all, tasted in the tangy bitterness of the dust blown from the desert many miles to the north, stirred up, by thousands of tramping, booted feet. Horror rolled over them in waves, their "army" their pitiful defense. Three Hundred. Three hundred warriors defended the Fortress of Dagrsold. Three hundred against the untold horde, against the unnumbered thousands, perhaps millions out there, chanting, stamping their feet, screaming to some dark god, or to death itself perhaps, asking that it welcome them and their enemies with equal voracity.

The death of hope is a bitter thing, a sour sludge that ekes it's way to the back of the throat, only to hang there, dangling like a noose, swaying back and forth, creaking with the weight of overburdened dreams, slowly and painfully gasping for breath. It can drain the life, the vigor out of the bravest of souls; can turn brave men into quivering, sobbing puddles of flesh, screaming for death. We belabor under the delusion that tomorrow will be brighter to such an inexhaustible extent that, when we look to the eastern sky and see only blood dripping from a mortally wounded celestial sentinel, it is as if our very soul gasps in horror and clutches at its vitals in a doomed attempt to quell the rising tide of agony. We are fools, all of us. We say we know with such certainty that justice, goodness, truth will emerge from the daily struggle of life's toil triumphant, that the darkness of night, must, inevitably end in the emergence of a bright new day, that soon, never now, but always soon, the storm clouds of persecution, and imperfection will no longer pour down their wrath upon the shining fields of Utopia. What utter fools. Looking out upon those fields, seeing death and every hell there ever was slavering to tear to pieces any defenders of innocence, she shook her head at the folly of the "goodly" races. Why fight? Why toil? Why struggle? In the end the dust claims all, both the just and the unjust, to do battle simply increases the discomfort of an already excruciating existence.

As these epiphanies passed behind her eyes, she turned to look at her companions, her friends, her strengths in such times, and searched their faces for hints of doubt, hints of the despair that she sensed rising up to wash her from the wall. To her left, she saw Vergull, the mind-flayer, his tentacled face impassive and unreadable as always, clutching his staff with pale green fingers. Though his physiognomy was entirely unreadable, the telepathic waves lashing out from him were anything but. Terror, panic, horror all emanated from him, inadvertently sending the troops into disarray. His tentacles twitched feebly, as though they could not grasp the enormity of the forces allied against them. He must've felt her gaze upon him, for he turned, slowly, tearing his large, black eyes away from the multitude, and locked them to hers. He shook his head, a slow, ponderous swaying motion, his tentacles swinging back and forth like a bell tolling the death of courage. She nodded, once, tersely, to signal her understanding. She knew exactly what he was feeling, exactly why his normally bright eyes had lost their luster. This was it. The end. The final curtain. As if some great cosmic author had come to this particular page in their journey and, in a great wrath, slashed his quill across it in a resounding Fin, and thus ended the world.

Further still along the wall was Rina, her large, powerful frame as taught as a bowstring. Her fingers clenching and unclenching around the hilt of her greatsword, its leather creaking under the duress of her powerful grip, her biceps rippling like stirred quicksand. The skin about her mouth and eyes twitched uncontrollably, her bright gold eyes darting back and forth. She was a caged animal, a cornered beast. Oh, no doubt she would take many a screeching enemy hurtling to the abyss on the edge of her heavy blade, but, in the end, it would be to no avail, to no purpose, a few leaves in a forest. The Reaper had come this night, and he would breach all defenses. Rina was a creature of fields and rolling plains, able to run the stretch of 20 leagues in a day without stopping for food or rest. Being trapped behind the thick walls of a fortress, surrounded on all sides by an uncountable legion of enemies was an especially exquisite form of torture for her. She had gone past the realm of all conscious thought, of anything beyond savage instinct, her mind was that of a warg, ringed in on all sides by brutal hunters. She would fight, and she would die, because she must. To take any other action was so contrary to her nature, she couldn't even entertain it. As soon as an enemy was within sword's reach, she would explode into action, to her ultimate doom. There would be, nay, could be no consultation with her. It would be the equivalent of trying to reason with a ravening beast. Nothing but pain could come from it.