Private Tales Cut Your Teeth

[Cato]

"Should've just bloody shivved myself," cursed Cato, loud enough for anyone in earshot. Blood dripped from cut near his ribs and another on his left arm. Luckily neither were too deep but that wasn't likely to last long. He only had to look up to see a bunch of cunts hungry for his head. Glancing down to the corpses at his feet, the mercenary responded with a vicious grin; half dumb-confidence, half spite. Pretty much all one could do in this particular predicament.

He wasn't entirely sure where things had gone wrong but knew it ended with them getting fucking ambushed. They hadn't even got to the meeting point and bloody half the hired hands were already eating with the worms. Clearly someone had a mind to make sure this contract ended before it could even start. Cato was going to give a new smile to the enterprising bastard who came up with this little plan.

"Seems that scar was well-earned." The younger lad stood to his left and had said nary a word until now. Didn't mean fuck all to Cato. He was still standing, and that's what mattered. The mercenary captain looked around and counted eight swords with nearly twice as many ready to cut them down. Shit odds but not any worse than his usual dice.

Cato was about to shout orders when one of the eight finally cracked and charged forward.

"Fucking hells."

Asher Vanak-Duth

 

[Asher Vanak-Duth]

Asher's head was empty of a lot of things, but his limbs remembered this. How to push off a blade come from nowhere, how to fight for ground, how to hack away until there was clear space between us and them.

A lot of us had fallen, to get here. Zesed was on the ground, an arrow sticking out of his eye. Meirro and Fearn had taken down a few of the ambushers together, but they ended up on the ground, too. Genevre's blood soaked into the soil at Asher's feet. He was mindful not to let his boots suck into the black dirt. Might trip him up.

Eight swords circled. The mercenary captain spoke. To him, maybe because he was nearest.

"Axe to the head. Cost a whole lot to stitch up," Asher explained, voice flat, breath even. The long road of his two-handed blade led to the nearest threat. "Can't afford another one."

Nobody nearby had any axes, but there were about two dozen swords and spears and clubs, which would hurt just as much. The captain and what was left of their company might've stood a chance, but Moshe, one of their eight, got nervous and ran early. The space they'd fought so hard for closed in rapidly, and fell to clamor and blood again.

Asher's blade came up, slick, and cut through the shoulder of a man, heavy. He kicked away another, and threw the attacker's swing off balance. Steel fell, and someone else gutted them from behind. There wasn't enough room to maneuver. Us and them got all mixed up and hard to track. One moment, he was at an ally's back, the next he was dodging club-swing and dagger-stab from dizzying directions.

He raised his sword, cut and cleaved a limb. He needed find the captain again and make space, again. And soon, before they lost somebody else.

 

[Cato]

"Few can," he muttered as everything went to shit. Steel rang as Cato deflected an incoming blade. He lashed back with a quick strike of his own, sending the man to earthen floor. Blood-slicked hands struggled for grip as he set himself for the next bastard who wanted his head. His dual blades worked in unison to fend off a large fucking flail. Weren't many who used them these days but they could be bloody dangerous. Getting stabbed was one thing; half your skull being caved in was something else entirely. An experience that Cato was keen to avoid.

The mercenary captain fought like a man possessed, or really one who just didn't want to fucking die. He'd done the flail-wielding cunt but watched as another two took his place. Cato quickly sheathed his short blade, gathering mana to himself as he did so. The other bastards probably thought he was too tired and charged.

A wave of telekinetic energy slammed into them, practically ripping them out of their boots. The commotion caused a momentary lull in the chaos, allowing his remaining few to regroup. There weren't that many to start and even less now. Six. Six bloodied and unyielding swordhackers still stood. Cato would've swore if he had the energy. The blood-loss was starting to catch up with him and the last spell hadn't done him any better.

He turned to see that damned ugly bastard at his side and for some reason, it brought a grin to the mercenary's face. "Seems we've got the gods' luck, eh Axehead?" Not that Cato believed in any of those cunts. He sighed. "Like to say I got a plan that'll give us a chance..." The rest didn't need to be said. Miracles didn't happen in this business. You just needed to take as many of the bastards with you before finding the dirt.

Asher Vanak-Duth

 

[Asher Vanak-Duth]

Suddenly there was that space that they had so desperately been fighting for, brought on by a burst of some telekinetic magic. Useful. Dangerous, too, if one got caught on the wrong side of it. Asher made a note not to zone out around his new boss, if he could do that kind of stuff without so much as a warning.

Asher was panting through his teeth, so he didn't have the energy to scowl at the new nickname the Captain adorned him with.

If I die here, he's not gonna remember my name, the thought rang through him, bitter but sobering. It steeled the grip on his sword. No one will go back and tell Wend what happened to me.

Easy solution, that. He simply wouldn't die yet.

"Sorry, boss..." Asher said. He sucked in a big breath and held it, to slow his heart and let him talk. Let it out with cooling temper. "...but you must've noticed. They got no archers left. You know what that means--"

He slid one foot back. Looked for an opening as their attackers regrouped. Found it. Then Asher turned tail, and ran.

Cato

 

[Cato]

"Oh you dumb cu-" swore the mercenary as the other began to run in the opposite direction. Cato couldn't blame the man for wanting to run, but he was still going to shiv the scarred bastard if he caught up. Aye, there were no archers but most of their group was still spent. There were some problems you couldn't just outrun. Yet good ole' Cato found himself not a few steps behind Axehead.

Cato didn't hate it like some in the 'Shields, specially the Second. He wasn't a soldier and neither were the rest of his lot. Still, took either a madman or proper balls to make that call.

The mercenary swore as he plunged through all manner of fucking foliage. His litany was so extensive that he almost missed the telltale whistle. "Down!" he called to those around. Cato tossed himself to the ground as arrows whizzed over his head, surprised screams providing some satisfaction. He stood, blades drawn, to find there were no more pursuers remaining.

"This your fucking idea of a quiet meeting?" he yelled at the singular mounted man. Man was just a Baron but he stood tall on that steed. Cato was of a mind to drag him down but thought better of it. The Baron's men stepped forth from the shadows, ready to brook no offense.

"An unfortunate miscalculation captain..."

Asher Vanak-Duth

 

[Asher Vanak-Duth]

Asher found himself leading the pack through the woods. He really hoped he was leading, and not fleeing from a freshly estranged employer, anyway.

Coward that he was, his path was sure through the wood. He knew about low-hanging branches and slippery patches in the moss and not to step down too hard on the other side of a downed log on account of the tree wells that snapped ankles and ended lives early.

He didn't see the archers cloaked in underbrush, though. It was the captain's call and a wrenching fear in his gut that got him ducked behind a tree in time.

And it was one of the captain's men that pulled him back out of cover after it was all said and done. Asher's cloak was grabbed up by a broad, calloused hand, and his eyes ran up the length of that arm to a broad, ruddy face.

"You must be askin' to get gutted, boy, with a move like that. Those damn nerves of yours could've been the end of us -- hey! Are ya listening?"

Asher was not. His pale eyes had wandered down to the ground some ways off, where one of their pursuers crawled through the ferns, arrows sticking out of his shoulders and back.

"Look at me when I'm talkin' to you!"

The arrows' fletchings were white and yellow, the colors of the Baron's men. At the crawling man's side was a quiver with one arrow left unused. It was the only color on him, gear as unassuming as any woodland hunter's. But it took time to re-fletch arrows, and that one - that one was white and yellow.

"The people who attacked us. They look like they don't want to look like anyone, huh?" Asher mused. "Got the same arrows, though."

"What the fuck are you talking about?" The captain's man loosened his grip on Asher, confusion flicking across hard features, softening them none.

Asher remained passive. He twisted some in the merc's grasp to look at the captain up ahead, and the Baron who sat tall upon his horse. Not to mention the steely men who stood a line between the two. "We didn't get hired for a coup, did we?"

Cato