It was something we'd done many times, Gruna, my sacred battle brother, and I. But again, it was something we'd rarely done, for the circumstances have changed. The warmongering civilized folk kept attacking. And we would not forsake our ways.
And so, we stalked through the woods in the dawn of light, reminding each other to keep our eyes on the swivel as we near the border of the Vrurians.
"The cowards probably have wizards. Many of them. Probably." Gruna whispered low.
"No probably, Thorotna." I laughed grimly. "So let us be quick."
Saying no more, Gruna turned to lean into a nearby tree and allow the snow to fall over him. Blending him into the environment to permit him a hide in which to provide overwatch. I had no such luxuries. Only a close look around Gruna's blind spot before turning my attention to the tree.
However, instead of a cluster of bees in the hole of a tree, there was only wood that splintered once an arrow suddenly hit home where my head had once been.
Oh, how I wished the hive was present at that moment. For, even while cold, our Path- our wrath would liven the bees. It would enrage them. Their stings would act to strengthen our own. But alas, there were none.
For a coward who struck from the shadows, however, there was plenty in reserves for that. Enough to get us through without any poisonous stings.
Weapons drawn, we put ourselves back to back and spun slowly, scanning the white-topped forest for our opponents. Equal parts eager and desperate were we to see them, for the darkness grew deeper with each passing moment, and if they truly possessed wizards, we were at the disadvantage.
Instead of any magic, however, arrows sailed through the night and from opposing directions, to sink their tips deep into our hides.
Groaning in anger, I broke the arrow shaft at once, leaving the tip embedded in my thigh. Beginning a song to Viltramas, I then turned to Gruna and faltered as I saw him still leaning against the tree, his fist clenched before his neck where it held an arrow shaft. A shaft impaled deeply into the tree behind him.
I knew then that it was a battle of time. Our wrath would keep us from bleeding out. But not entirely. So, with unbridled fury, my song to Viltramas rose to a rippling wave of heat. Gruna began gurgling, singing himself as he unimpaled himself from the tree before he took up stride beside me, searching and scanning the forest in hopes of finding something to hurl our weapons into.
Two more arrows came from the left. Then from the right a second later. Easily they were dodged or blocked. Harder were the frustrations they carried.
"Cowards!" We screamed in unison. But only I edged further. "Show yourself! Have you no honor?"
A condescending laugh was the only reply. One that seemed to fall from all directions, echoed through the forest as if it were alive and filled with malice.
"There is no honor in war."
An owl suddenly halted us as it appeared to our front. It was small. Black as the night itself but with a white, heart-shaped face and black legs that seemed to be made of metal. And those eyes, like a sea of stars contained in an infinite pit of despair.
It hopped forward and grew twice larger. The darkness that had been growing deepened tenfold, making the endless trees and the brightened snow seem distant and dim.
It stepped forward and grew larger still. Man-sized but with long, winged arms held out to pin an elaborate cane to the ground. Supporting its stature as it leaned ever-forward to tower its neck impossibly high over our frames.
"Sorcerous beast!" Gruna lashed out. And I, behind him.
The last thing I saw was a feathered hand waving, pitting everything around me in darkness. Leaving, in the end, only my wrath to sing in the eternal night.
***
"We have to tell the Chieftain at once."
Perhaps it was the round of stings we'd been subjected to before venturing out here. If one ever looked back on this day, they would say we saw the tracks heading towards the encampment and simply came to a logical conclusion. But we were aware of our folly.
It was us seeing two great battle brothers, Gruna and Thorotna, covered in arrows and frozen blood, that did it. Their weapons were dry and cold from the lack of battle. Yet their faces were contorted in equal parts fear and rage. An undeserving death for ones as mighty as they.
This could not stand. And so, we knew it was time to ensure Vruria knew to stray from our lands.
My fury was such that I remembered not the journey to the hall of mead. Nor did I remember our arrival or our telling of what we found. My mind only registered the familiar contortion of wrath on every barbarian present.
It was greater than I had ever seen. The rage of over 900 barbarians was verily tangible. Vibrating the mead hall with such an intensity so as to threaten its collapse. Buzzing the air so loud as if it demanded to be heard by all the Mazi Council.
The swarms were released in droves, but still honoring the traditions. Scorpions flew from their cages first, plummeting their curled barbs into the flesh of the heartiest of men. Then came those from the tribes of Bee and Wasp, injecting their wrath-inducing cocktails before the songs to Viltramas and the marching of boots and the clanging of metal on metal melded with the buzzing seamlessly.
We marched through that cold night without fear, as an unstoppable force. Even as their dozen or so ballista and cannons pierced or blew apart the ground before the standard bearer, we marched. Even as their hundreds of archers rained fire from the skies, we stormed. Even as the hundreds of calvary flanked and the hundreds more infantry formed a line, we charged.
Even though we were outnumbered almost three to one, we sang gloriously to the Gods of Conquest and War throughout the battle.
I felt the surge of fiery blood rush through my body as I made contact with a man in pretentious armor. So afraid of a deadly blow he was, and so angered by the fact of my brothers being felled by such cowardly beings was I, that the veil of red threatened to consume all around me.
However, I mastered the wrath within me long ago. And thus my great sword was dropped upon the head of that hated Vrurian with all my fury, crumpling them under their precious armor. And with a scream that morphed into a heated buzzing noise, I brought my great sword down again, implanting them into the dirt before I turned, swinging, felling Vrurians with my brothers until the field of white grew more and more littered with the bodies of the dead.
I cut down another and saw the ballista and cannons destroyed and in flames. My lapse cost me a gash across the back and I swung without hesitation, throwing a woman dressed in armor into the brush before my sword came to a halt.
Too late, was it, for I retrieved the blade from the newly formed crevasse with a sickening crunch and a vengeful curse to the Vrurians for subjecting women to battle.
My second lapse cost me a cold prick from behind.
Again, I spun at once, finding purchase on nothing- seeing nothing. Feeling only another piece of cold metal wedge between my ribs before my throat ran hot.
I tried to shout and only heard the splatters of liquid. I looked down and saw blood gushing onto my chest. I was... confused. Empty. Dead. And yet I could feel myself laying in the cold fields, falling into the most pervasive darkness one could imagine.