A signal flag waved above him as he returned ahead with a grunting sigh. Punching his head, he was ready to mount the hill and slay his commanders but had no power over his heart and stupidity in his mind to do so. The lieutenant general composed himself and gave himself a brief minute to think even when the troops of the headquarters were furiously trying to gain his attention and response. It had to be done no matter how long he delayed the inevitable for.
“Blades, unsheathe!” Žižka reluctantly commanded, swinging his sword to his side and swallowing his pride.
Soldiers stood unbelieving that there was still another fight to come. As panic started to befall them, the sanest captains and sergeants yelled for them to quicken their bodies and steel their resolve. Slinging their rifles on their backs, they trembled, drawing their swords, ringing as their blades were escaped from their sheathes. Unprepared, many had never fought in a melee, with those who have partaken in bar and sport squabbles the veterans of the sorry army. When the enemies became whole of shape again behind the clearing scene, their visions began to grow faint edging towards a drop into death.
Shaking his head, Žižka pointed his sword at the Summer Lion among his men who had not shifted, “Advance!” It was repeated across the front, pressing onward their march following the beat of drums at a steady pace into cursed uncertainty.
Arminius drew his saber, whose blade was not reflected by the sunless sky. “Stay behind me.” As the regiment began to move, he reminded Julien.
Keeping behind, Julien tried to steady his breath, but oddly, his nervousness did begin to deteriorate. The faces of his companions were fearless, yet he knew that the squad with whom he trained was no different than himself, they marched without a sense of deceit in their conviction that was rubbed onto him. With reason, they advanced, for not a thing that was as complicated as peace, but to simply survive and to protect their homes. Like the boy before him. Arminius had no dread. No peaceless air of concern. Julien then asked himself why he should fear anything when his comrades did not. That became his reason to forget his fears as they moved nearer the enemy lines. The smog thinned and past the shoulder of his allies, the Confederates’ faces came into view. Their rifles were aimed at them and it took no longer than a second to discharge rows of flashes by the rank. Bullets pelted and ripped, whipping through the advancing forces like a blade on a sand bag. The levies were spurred on by their memories of their past lives as they continued into their suicide. Half way down and half way to go. In no man’s land, they were already fifty paces in. The lieutenant general lashed his reins and kicked with his stirrups, punishing his steed to trot with his loyal soldiers beside starting to run. Ushering a war cry, a thunder of footsteps rolled into a charge and the current of the army hastened. The Rus shelved their rifles on their backs and bore their sabers. Regiments upon regiments, they came out of the treeline and defended themselves with a great wall of blades. At twenty paces near, Žižka sped his horse into a gallop and his eifer glowed in the steel of his hand cannon. Some troops sprinted as others jogged out of breath. At ten paces to, the faces of their foes became clearer as the Rus braced themselves against the craze of the Bohemer rushing towards them. The smoke had cleared out entirely, and on the last pace, their edges of steel met. Clashing, swords pierced and slashed. Outlying gunshots rang out and bodies collapsed. Their corpses tripped the next arriving whose faces were sprayed with the blood of their comrades before meeting their fate.
Some dozen paces behind, Codrington gave a cry of bloodlust and charged as his century followed him mindlessly into the fray with a rush of excitement to kill and avenge their own. But Arminius slowed down, and his squad seeing their younger brother’s hesitation, came to a stop. The seven were stilled as troops avoided and bumped past them. Unsure of his process of thought, all eyes turned to Arminius who had caused a revival of their doubts.
Looking back and forth in confusion, Lev wondered what he had spotted or realized and asked what everyone sought to ask, “What?”
A petal of daisy had been trampled and fused into the earth beneath him as he held his head downward in contemplation, hiding the potential of his shame in his selfishness of wanting to do. Only when he raised his head did his closest comrades know what he desired.
“Do you trust me?” Arminius returned with a question of his own.
Doubting no more, Arber and Alexandria turned themselves to form a perimeter around their allies as Miklós guarded the center vanguard. Lev and Gin drew themselves inward, wanting to apprehend what his great plan was. Kept under protection, Julien saved himself from the troubles of battle but still held an ever watchful eye on the frontlines in case it shifted. Among the seven, one understood everything.
Chuckling, he approached the frontline and tapped the ground with the tip of his saber, finding a weak point in the soil before his blade was stabbed through the earth and was rooted, standing upright. “How much are we bettin’?” Colt held out his hands into a platform and smirked.
Arminius took a look at Julien who carried an expression of concern. But before he could utter a note, his comrade had dashed off, escaping the hands of his friends who tried to catch him. Whose movement was so sudden, he threw the squad stumbling before they admitted their defeat of realizing his plan. Stepping onto Colt’s hands, Arminius braced himself with a breath and was launched, with a burst of strength, into a leap that shot him higher than any could jump, over the backs and heads of soldiers who could not bother themselves with a single peculiarity of a flying lancer whose details were darkened by the intense shadows of the new overcast skies. The fight on the ground continued and from the view of a bird, he watched his allies from. But as he soared, the lancer knew that gravity would eventually return him from the air where he did not belong. Priming his saber, he aimed his blade at a chosen target as a bolt of lightning snapped across his eyes. Swiftly, Arminius made his landing and spun about with a cloak of dust. The Rus, startled, stood back, and a footman who had heard a disturbance turned his head, sensing that somehow, an enemy was behind him. Before he found who the infiltrator was, a blackness severed his sight. His head seemed alleviated of any weight and with the remaining vision that his nerves could bother to message, he stared as his world spun. Separated from his neck with a clean strike, there was no pain. Only after death did his blood gush like a fountain as his comrades were thrown into a rage. They charged as the rear ranks began to take notice of the lancer. Blades and barrels aimed at him. In the lead, a corporal felt the sharp end of steel pierce his neck with its edge running down his back. The weight of the attacker dislodged its saber and tore the soldier’s head from his spine. Landing from the heavens onto the two corpses beheaded, Colt grinned maniacally as his lust for blood excreted from his pores. Their backs were against each other between enemy lines and atop two they felled. They had two hundred thousand more to bury. That was their only thought then. The thought of children of fiends. One turned his blade toward the throats of circling troops, eager to dance to a warrior’s song. Another opened his defense to lure the thoughtless men overreaching themselves. But he was a soldier with guilt.
Vestige XI
Extract from The Lands of the Bohemer Crown, Pt. VI
The New Age Kingdom: The Melting of the Crown, Ch. I
Born in the filth of the slums, the young boy was raised by wasted fools, drunken criminals, and abusive environs. He murdered those he held immature vendettas against and fled into the forests of the country at an age before his teens. Matyáš was a highwayman, bandit, and a ruffian prince of the people whose name was feared and loved. His monopoly of crime had its connections run even into the deep heartlands of Bawaren, built on river raids and attacks on caravans. But his ambition grew too vast, too quick. When Matyáš attempted to sack the estates of the noblemen of the capital, Kasurg, he and his band of criminals were captured; his village razed; his people slaughtered. Yet, the Crown saw his worth and recruited him into its ranks, earning him the name Žižka. The nobles were thrown into dispute; the court in disarray. All for the sake of this lowborn who rose to their standing because he made his living by robbing them of their wealth. It was a cruel joke that the Crown sought to entertain but entertain this young man did.
Before the outbreak of the Third Calamity, the ‘Robber Baron’ Žižka led a campaign into Lechen that bested even old Warneńczyk. The unconventional tactics that he had adopted in his youth in the forests of Bohemen struck a magnificent victory on the northern border and forced his adversary to concede territories that expanded the Crown’s lands by as much as twenty-four leagues. But his frantic career was soon ended by duty.
His participation in the Third Calamity was more a prison sentence than anything else. Needing to heed orders from superiors and nobles who outranked and despised him was a torture but he kept himself composed to entertain the stupidity of the regime. Many were fooled in these ensuing years, truly believing that he was a loyal hound to the Crown. But what happens when you bring a child into your fold with they knowing that you beheaded all those they cared for? The Crown and their nobles were toyed with since the beginning.
— Otto Kafka
