A Losing Victory

Part 1 - A Foundation of Lies

Killing a beast is tough.

Killing a human is brutal.

Pretending to be a man is downright insane.

With a wince, Sarai Nightborn drew the old, worn bandages tighter around her chest. Tug after tug sent uncomfortable and sharp pain through her chest and down her spine, each pull hiding her feminine curves that little bit more. The ache of such things dulled a little by the familiarity of routine. It was in this routine that she lost herself in during these early hours as the sun was only just beginning to grace the sky with its presence.

Calloused, dirty fingers tied off the bandage in a few deft movements, proceeding to pull on the usual leather and cloth attire that made up the armour of brotherhood footmen. Such attire that had - in her early months - drawn out a deep disappointment in her. Where was the shining plate she had so often heard about in the tales? Adorned by the brave, fearless and powerful when charging forward into battle.

Fodder have no place in childish stories.

She figured she should feel honoured, as a swordsman of the brotherhood. Most of the recruits were given spears and clubs, while the more trained and experienced were given swords. An action that she could appreciate from the perspective of a superior, but had to bite down her annoyance at from the perspective of a soldier.

Sarai had to grudgingly admit, however, that there were perks to pretending to be a man. Such a thing done as she sat on the cold ground in her tent, reaching forward to lace and tie her boiled leather boots. Boots! Such things were far beneath the likes of a noblewoman to wear. Gods, but are they practical! A faint smirk forming on her lips at the prospect of running bodily into a battle whilst tripping and stumbling over the posh and fancy slippers she had once worn. Her only hope at that point would have been her opponents dying of laughter.

The cry of a distant horn snapped her out of her reverie as her chin tilted up, listening intently. The brotherhood used specific horn calls to refer to specific things and... Three short bursts. She couldn't help but grin, butterflies fluttering to life in the cage of her stomach.

They were going to battle.

In a rush, she trimmed her already short hair with the blade of her small skinning knife before tying in a small royal blue feather among her short locks; her lucky charm.  After dusting her face with dirt, she stood and strapped her sword belt in place. The weight was comfortable and familiar against her hip, relaxing her. It was nothing special, of course, just a simple sabre of polished steel with worn leather grip. Simple though it was, she had grown up with it. Now, it was an extension of her arm and felt as light as a feather.

A brief glance at herself in the shattered fragment of a mirror she kept nearby left her satisfied as she stood, tucking her metal helmet under her arm before stepping out onto the worn down paths that connected different sections of the war camp. She was nothing special in her current state; short cropped black hair dirtied from many moons without cleaning, a rounded face and lean body mostly hidden in her current ill-fitting attire. She was just like any other scraggly, unwashed swordsman. 

What made her stand out were her stunningly bright, golden eyes.

In Terras, eyes were a denotion of rank. Bestowed at birth by the strange and secluded monks of The Order, setting a person in a social class for all to see. Gold was reserved for the higher class noble families and instantly set Sarai apart from the brown and grey eyed men she fought beside; Commoners, peasants and farmers. Such a thing would have usually had her forced away from such manual tasks as fighting, but this was an army. With the aid of luck and no few amount of miracles, she had avoided most of the higher ranking officers in her time here. That left only the lower ranking officers who assumed she was a bastard or an outcast sent to die. In her first days she had been sarcastically dubbed 'King', a name spat and hissed with more venom than a viper. After all, she represented everything these men hated: Snide, uptight rich folk.

She didn't bother to correct them.

~~~

The battlefield was far from how stories portrayed it. Here there were no glittering lines of armoured knights leading thousands of soldiers in neat, precise rows and columns. Here the men gathered in indistinct groups of others in their designation. The swordsmen to the side, spear-men in front, rear guard at the back with the foot soldiers in the middle. The horses would only come in later if they were needed - something she didn't predict they would be.

However, the Army's lack of organisation paled in comparison to their foes; The Che'tai. Primitive men of the north, even from here she could see they had no order or discipline. From what she had read, they fought in a barbaric style, seeking victory in numbers alone with weapons usually consisting of spears and clubs.

Brutes

Sarai allowed her mind to sink into a state of calm calculation, one that helped her relax before a battle. The scent of sweat, urine and leather ignored as she focused on taking deep breaths.

I will excel.

I will live.

I will win.

The single, terrifying call for war echoed over the soon to be dead grassland. 

It was time to die.