Militia spilled from the gates of Chetraesho as Ottokar rode close enough to make out individual faces. He reined in his horse, and glanced up at an optimistic arrow whistling overhead. A quick count and some rough guesswork suggested they were outnumbered, and badly. He turned and began riding back to the camp, unhurried.
The tarbains and housecarls of Kolkyre were hardened, trained for long campaigns on short rations. They were the only bastion hoding the siege while the Battle Inkallim and Castillans refreshed their supplies. For all this, they were not afraid. If they fell, then that was their Fate. Or they would stand fast, and in their lack of fear of the Last God, they would drive back the heathen masses.
As Ottokar approached, Oclire rose and swung himself into the saddle. Otto jerked his head towards the approaching soldiers.
"Perhaps two for one."
"Good odds." Oclire smiled tightly. He raised his voice to a thunderous bellow, "Move out!"
All over the camp, the well-oiled war machine swung into action. The peltasts rose from where they'd been seated in groups around campfires to spread into a staggered screen ahead of the inbound foe. Ranks of infantry in scale marched down the muddied lanes of the camp, heavy maces resting on their shoulders. Crossbowmen cocked their weapons, and longbowmen drew arrows from their quivers.
Around Oclire, the housecarls of the Roarin Blood drew in close. They might die today, but their lives would be dearly bought. Around them, arrows began to fall as the Flambards' archers opened the combat. In seconds, the air was filled with screams as Oclire's men fell and arrows tore through the ranks of Gwenys's soldiers in turn.
With a roar, the sortie force began its charge towards the besiegers. The peltasts stood their ground long enough to whip off a volley of javelins, and fell back to the line. Shields snapped up and formed an iron wall of men, women and weapons. The Hooded God stalked the ranks, waiting to gather the fallen.
Battle was joined. In the space of seconds, entire ranks of infantry fell. The attackers paid in blood for every shield that dropped from the wall, but they had far more blood to pay with than Oclire had shields. The deaths were apalling, both sides fighting with a fanaticism that demanded death before retreat.
The wall broke, and fell back. Archers took up sticks or stabbed with arrows, filling in the gaps in the wall. Oclire's housecarls waded in, swords rising and falling. Ottokar coldly trampled the bodies on the field - living and dead, friend and foe.
Cavalry thundered through, and the wall broke again. Still, no soldiers from either side would flee. The besiegers fell back again, and Oclire took the line, cutting through joints and stabbing with deathly efficiency. A halberd glanced off his armour, and he carved it in half.
The wall broke, and remained broken. The shields were scattered through the forest, useless. The hands to hold them were dead, gone to the final embrace of the Last God. Three remained on the field: Ottokar, Margolf, and Oclire. A cavalryman rode down Margolf, and Ottokar and Oclire fell back, and back.
The wicked spike on a halberd punched through Oclire's armour like a knife through thin paper, and he glanced down at it with an expression of mild distaste. As another struck him, his expression changed to a terrifying grin as he chuckled. "Such is Fate, eh?" He coughed, spitting blood, and with a last spasm of strength hacked off the hand of the first to wound him.
The light faded from the world as Oclire walked the last few steps of his Black Road to meet the god he had served all his life. The only god not to abandon the world. The Last God.
"From death is life. My feet are on the Road. I know not pride."
