Autumn, 1331

The troops fought in an unceasing nightmare. With the sun shrouded by smoke and flame, the day faded into a seemingly perpetual twilight. Kolyma had by now been completely destroyed in the fighting, its thick walls reduced to rubble with hundreds of its defenders buried with it. But the survivors kept fighting, holed up in small bunkers, piles of debris or behind mounds of earth or bodies, the later of which continued piling up. The battle was an incessant, unceasing carnage of death, flashes of blades and sprays of blood interspersed with hails of arrows and the dull thunderous smash of an onager stone sending up splinters of wood and brick and shreds of flesh and bone. In this maelstrom both Tassurians and Auxians died quickly and brutally: in all likelihood, a fresh soldier thrown into combat would be dead by the end of the hour. Yet this horror continued, for everyone knew that it was to be decisive: if Pyror Hill fell, Caldern would also fall. Anhake correspondingly continued to feed his troops into the meat grinder and -though he had other plans- General Dodge did the same. Walls, trenches and bunkers were lost, retaken, then lost again as more and more units were thrown into the slaughter. The great redoubt changed hands no less than fourteen times in rapid succession, and every single member of Captain Cushing's crews fell standing by their siege engines, the last engineer dying as he launched a ballista payload of metal shards straight into a charging mass of enemy soldiers.

Yet slowly, step by step, the Auxian center fell back, ceding walls and trenches draped with the dead of both sides. With the redans falling, the Srean’s Corps wheeled left, unhinging the last defenders of Koylma from the rest of the Auxian defenses. Encouraged, the battered survivors of Breum’s forces surged forward yet again. Trudging over the walls-now more barricades of flesh than wood, earth and stone-the disorganized mass of Trasgu seized the great redoubt yet again. At only one-fourth their pre-battle strength, Viller and his comrades, now joined with a half-dozen intermingled units, gamely prepared for the inevitable counterattack, but this time none came. Finally the Tassurian banner flew unopposed over the ruins of Kolyma.

Covered in dust, dirt, and blood-his own as well as that of his enemies- the battered infantryman sat down on a large stone to rest after the titanic struggle for the fort. Viller's naginata was notched and slick with ichor, and as the Trasgu caught his breath and reoriented himself he tossed his weapon aside to pick up a less damaged replacement lying abandoned nearby. However Viller's respite was brief; only a few minutes later a Trasgu officer the footmen had never met before charged forward with nagamaki raised in the air.

‘What are you all waiting for? The city walls are still ahead of us! We must take them before they regroup!’

Mechanically Viller got back to his feet and joined with tens of thousands of his equally bloodied and exhausted comrades to cheer before renewing their assault upon the human capital.

***

“Dodge has finally ordered us to prepare for battle.” Logan announced as he walked back into the courtyard with his weapons and armor. Mera stretched and nodded in reply.

“Very well.”

Already equipped in his half-plate mail, the Forester pulled out the leather saddle custom made by a royal saddle maker to comfortably fit both a dragon and an armed and armored rider. Mera loafed and watched with some amusement as Logan hitched the saddle up onto the dragon’s back. The two of them had been practicing for a few days and had finally gotten to a point where Mera wasn’t tossing the more heavy-set colonel off every time he took flight and the Forester wasn’t choking the dragon or straining his back with the additional weight. Logan threw the leather tree over the trapezius of Mera’s back, then rounded the long girth over the dragon’s serrati and buckled it in, doing the same for the surcingle over the wyrm's pectorals. After giving the saddle a short shake to test for stability, the Forester hung his bow and quiver of arrows onto his own back and buckled his sword and scabbard onto his belt. As the dragon leaned down on one side, Logan clambered onto the reptile’s arm and shoulder, straddled over to sit on the wool seat surrounded by a wood cantle and pommel, then placed on a safety harness before firmly placing his feet into the stirrups. Finally Mera picked up the Forester’s awlpike and handed it to him.

At that point Logan came to a realization. The original plan had been for the Forester to pick off any enemy generals that may come within his sight. After observing the ongoing battle and as he eyed his weapon looking like a twig in the dragon’s paws, Logan suddenly felt like a fool. The awlpike was not long enough to even pass Mera’s head, and was too unwieldy for the colonel to use in any useful manner fighting the sea of enemy forces on the battlefields below.

“Wait. What can I do with this? Combat stretches as far as the eye can see and I don’t think I can hit anything with it.” The Forester grumbled. “May as well use the bow. Otherwise I may as well be as useful as a sack of grain.”

“You give moral support.”

Logan laughed. Mera smiled, before turning serious again.

“Just keep an eye out for things that may attack me from behind, and keep those buggers off me.”

Logan strapped his awkpike so that it hung loosely on the saddle, angled so that it would not jab into the back of the dragon’s head. The Forester then double checked that everything was correct, and satisfied, patted Mera on the back.

“Guess we are ready for anything now.”

“Good.”

The two veteran warriors, human armored and now armed, dragon crouched and ready to charge, stared at the castle gate, awaiting the call to join the fight. Comrades in arms, formerly torn by conflicting interests, now reunited for a common cause.

Whatever the outcome, win or lose, they would be there together. There was a certain comfort in that.

There was a long pause as the two waited for further commands. Doubtlessly the other dragons of Mera's Squadron situated in the outer bailey and gryphon forces had prepared as well, just waiting for Mera to lead. The din of combat echoed off the stone walls surrounding the bailey. But no orders came.

Finally, the great wyrm asked. “What now? Do we attack?”

Logan shrugged. “No. I guess we can wait some more.”

---

Johnny Cash-The Man Comes Around

From  Shamerli! Thanks!