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Aeraie

Aeraie

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The King is Dead Story Contest
Darkest Secrets Story Contest


Post 1: Information
Post 2-7: Sir Snyder3
Post 8-10: Yrolg

29-Sep-2012 05:05:43 - Last edited on 02-Oct-2012 00:34:14 by Aeraie

Aeraie

Aeraie

Posts: 9,100 Rune Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile
--------------------- Sir Snyder3 ----------------------
1st Place (tied), The King is Dead Story Contest

Alexander, Crown Prince of the Empire, sat on his warhorse, looking out from his vantage point high in a mountain pass over the kingdom he had once seen as an immovable rock of stability. His army streamed past, totaling some 50,000 militia spears and 6,000 heavy cavalry, returning from campaign in the far North; a campaign that had ended prematurely due to the breathless report of a haggard courier.

The king, his father, was dead: murdered, so it seemed, by his younger brother John.

“I never thought you wanted the throne so much, brother,” he thought. “I never thought you would do this.”

Alexander took up the reigns of his horse and galloped down the slope, his personal cavalry guard following, purple banner emblazoned with the royal Lion Rampant snapping in the wind.

The room resounded with three knocks. Prince John looked up as the guards opened the massive doors and Duke Ferdinand stepped through. As John started to rise, the duke began without preamble:

“My lord, I bring terrible news.”

“Surely it—“

“Your father has been assassinated.” John simply collapsed back into his chair. “The killer was caught, and…interrogated. He confessed. Alexander sent him.”

“WHAT?!?” Normally John was the most soft-spoken of the Royal Family, but when his ire was raised, he could be truly fearsome.

“It seems he thought he could use the army to crush any challengers and claim the throne.”
“I refuse to believe that.”

The duke approached. “My lord, you must take action. Tell the people before your brother can sway them. Raise the levies to meet his army. Declare him a traitor and take the crown yourself.”

John opened and closed his mouth several times, but no words would come forth. Finally, he said, “Very well. Do it.”

29-Sep-2012 05:05:48 - Last edited on 02-Oct-2012 00:09:48 by Aeraie

Aeraie

Aeraie

Posts: 9,100 Rune Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile
Ferdinand bowed and left swiftly. As soon as he was sure the doors were firmly shut, John let his head fall to the desk and wept openly.

“I just don’t understand it! It’s not like my brother!” Alexander stalked his command tent, and his generals shrank back from his rage. Holding the edict and staring at his own portrait, his anger built until he crumpled the parchment and hurled it across the tent. “John would never declare me a traitor, much less kill our father. It’s not like him!” Alexander repeated.

“Your highness, please, calm down.” It was his trusted second, Baron Edward. “Whether or not it was your brother, clearly someone has an eye on the throne. They’ve accused you of attempting to use the army to seize the crown; perhaps you should. I know for a fact it was not you, but whoever it is, they mean this Empire ill.”

“I will not fight my brother.”

“You may have to.”

The army had advanced through a remarkably normal countryside until their movement had met that of the Royal couriers. The people grew skittish; after all, the man who had their monarch murdered was marching by with an army at his back.

A scout stumbled into the command tent. His boots were caked with mud kicked up by his horse’s flailing hooves. The poor beast must have been ridden to the edge of its life. He saluted. “Your highness, I have seen troops marshalling, both spearmen and knights. It seems Duke Ferdinand leads it.”

A puzzled look crossed Alexander’s face. “Who called them?”

“Prince John, sir. Only, he’s calling himself king now.\"

Alexander waved the man out, and then closed his eyes. Without opening them, he spoke to his generals. “Ready your men to march. It seems we will have to fight after all.”

John and Ferdinand sat side-by-side on stunning warhorses. Thousands of troops stood deployed before them.

“How many?” John asked.

29-Sep-2012 05:18:13 - Last edited on 02-Oct-2012 00:10:10 by Aeraie

Aeraie

Aeraie

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“About 30,000 spearmen. Almost 10,000 knights, though. Apparently they turn out better for an internal, political threat than an external one.”

“40,000. It will have to be enough.” John turned his horse and rode away.

The armies met just west of the crossroads of Swynwall. John had chosen this ground to maximize the advantages he held. The Greenspring River, slow and meandering, turned the ground soft. His left rested here, trusting to the muck to negate Alexander’s greater heavy infantry line. Farther east, where the ground became firmer, John’s massive cavalry force waited for battle. The road swung by the river and through the battleline, and fog would conceal the army until it was too late. Here John would fight his enemy—his brother.

Alexander swore as the nervous-looking courier waited. “Are you certain?” he asked.

“Yes, my lord. Some of the vanguard have already engaged John’s army.”

The Crown Prince shook his head. “Tell my generals. Deploy for battle, my knights on the left.” Both rode away in opposite directions.

As the fog lifted, two armies were revealed, facing off against one another. Alexander sat at the head of 6,000 heavy horse, looking out over a much greater enemy cavalry force. He prayed, “May God forgive me for what I am about to do,” then turned to the trumpeter who followed him like a puppy. “Sound the advance.”

John sat on a horse opposite his opponent. “Please brother,” he thought. “Don’t do this.” A trumpet sounded from the enemy line, and the mass of men and metal began to grind forward. King John, ruler of the Empire, rode forward at the head of the largest cavalry force his kingdom had ever seen. There were tears in his eyes.

29-Sep-2012 05:18:18 - Last edited on 02-Oct-2012 00:10:29 by Aeraie

Aeraie

Aeraie

Posts: 9,100 Rune Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile
The mud did what it was supposed to. Alexander’s spearmen were worn out and disrupted, and therefore did not shatter John’s outnumbered infantry as they would have on better ground. Still, these men were veterans who had ground through the crucible of combat before, facing untried militia. The cavalry advanced simultaneously. John’s line vastly overlapped Alexander’s, but Alexander’s seasoned warriors pushed their way through in compact masses, wheeling back into confused enemy formations.

A great roar rose from the infantry battle as men physically shoved one another back, spears lashing out, seeking and finding flesh to tear. The eastern end of the battlefield was a mill of horses and men, some living, some dead, and some in between. John began to wheel the units furthest to the right back inward, seeking to envelop his enemy, but a squadron of Alexander’s cavalry smashed into their flank, throwing the entire line into disarray. John blindly hacked with his saber, swinging his shield more for the sake of tradition than any effective attempt at self-preservation. Soon he had lost track of everything; the battle became a whirl of color and shouts and faces and screams of men and horses. One thing was clear, however: his horsemen, despite their superior numbers, were losing, succumbing to the greater experience of the enemy horse.

He located his standard-bearer, who had somehow managed to stay near his king. “Sound the withdrawal, my own squadron only,” John shouted over the din of battle.

As the notes rang out, John extricated himself from the fighting. His standard followed, waving as a rallying point for his own knights. From this point behind the lines, he could clearly see the bulges being forced into his infantry line, the sheer chaos of his cavalry.

29-Sep-2012 05:18:24 - Last edited on 02-Oct-2012 00:11:10 by Aeraie

Aeraie

Aeraie

Posts: 9,100 Rune Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile
More answered the call than he expected. Those of John’s squadron who were dead, unable to hear the order, or unable to withdraw from battle accounted for only about forty of his original hundred. John watched as the men quickly reformed their ranks, slotting into line without having to be ordered to do so. John scanned the waving swords and spears and banners, searching for…

He found it: the unmistakable silver-on-purple lion of the Crown Prince. His brother was there. Pointing at it, he commanded his trumpeter to sound the charge, and rode directly toward that standard, sixty of the best horsemen in the Empire at his back.

The slaughter soon began in earnest.

The charge gained impetus as it advanced, more of John’s cavalry joining it as they realized that here a concentrated effort was being mounted, not a small, isolated, desperate melee. Alexander’s knights reeled from its ferocity. Once again, John plunged into that surreal whirlwind. He barely registered the distance covered by his mount’s long strides. Once again, his sword licked out almost of its own accord, rending flesh.

They were amongst Alexander’s personal cavalry. John stabbed one man in the face, seeking his brother. Soon, he sighted the richly decorated but functional armor the Crown Prince wore. Even as he watched, a knight struck Alexander through the shoulder with a lance. John’s brother slid from his saddle.

John dismounted and walked to the man he had grown up with. As Alexander struggled to his feet, John whispered “I’m sorry” and buried his sword into his brother, up to the hilt.

As blood bubbled from Alexander’s lips, he gasped out, “Why? Why did you kill our father?”

“I—I thought you did,” was John’s stunned reply.

29-Sep-2012 05:18:36 - Last edited on 02-Oct-2012 00:11:39 by Aeraie

Aeraie

Aeraie

Posts: 9,100 Rune Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile
He never heard, over the clash of weapons and thunder of hooves, the man approaching from behind. He never felt the spear that contemptuously brushed through his armor and pierced his heart. He never saw Duke Ferdinand turn over his body with a toe, making sure both princes were dead.

As Ferdinand lifted the crown from John’s bloodied brow, the word of Alexander’s death was already spreading like wildfire, his army melting away, leaving a trail of cast-off weapons and shields. John’s army, too exhausted to pursue, simply collapsed on the spot. Everything had gone according to plan.

Walking away from the carnage and twirling the crown in his hand, the Duke was already planning how he would spin John\'s glorious death in bitter combat with his traitorous brother. He spoke to himself. “King Ferdinand. Has a nice ring, doesn’t it?”

29-Sep-2012 05:18:41 - Last edited on 02-Oct-2012 00:12:03 by Aeraie

Aeraie

Aeraie

Posts: 9,100 Rune Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile
---------Yrolg---------
1st place, Darkest Secrets

IN THE MOUNTAINS AND THE VALE

To my cherished Emmeline--

As the cold wind whisks its dreadful path, I cannot help but to think that this isolation is an event of my own creation, and from this assume the writhing pain of responsibility. When my mind drifts its way as the clouds high above, inexorably overlooking the forlorn scene, and ventures back to the execrable night when at last I recognized the inevitable, my body shudders beyond the cold. It never was the purpose to escape – to abscond the life of happiness and appreciation that I had enjoyed. Yet however easily I escaped the toil of that life, it becomes every day the less possible that I escape contemplation that what I did was wrong, and that I, by this action, have revoked the privileges of your love. And you sits in my mind, my beloved Emmeline, cooing your sweet forgiveness every night but for that I forsake it in the knowledge that with the morning sun shall come the dreadful sorrow of my secret.

Just as the rocks tumble from the vast canyon walls and shatter upon the soft floor below, the boulders of my guilt tumble through my consciousness and shatter upon the fragile figure of my soul. Through years of separation from those very souls I sought to protect, I have known that it is a malady of my own creation, so that when first my palpitating heart calmed and my mind returned to its rationalization, I knew I was a coward. But is it not the place of a coward to do such things to those he loves?

29-Sep-2012 05:18:50 - Last edited on 02-Oct-2012 00:20:10 by Aeraie

Aeraie

Aeraie

Posts: 9,100 Rune Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile
As these boulders batter my fading happiness, I cannot justify these thoughts. If I truly am a coward I should relish in the complacency of the previous life, titillate myself with the knowledge that my happiness was derived from mere association with the bliss of others. No matter the vacuous sentiment, which belied my veneer to the unremitting dolor of its true nature, inevitably I conclude, in this doleful cogitation, that I was the betrayer. Through my cowardice I had become the pariah, desperate for a realization of the perfidious façade, that betrays his kin for the sake of personal satisfaction. Indeed, I was the boulder tumbling down from on high and crushing her with a wanton wrath of pride and arrogance. And like Niobe, I am now but a weeping stone on the mountain, seeing only as Apollo’s last arrow soars ever closer to my last hope.

From this my evanescing soul can wrench no happiness, this much is true. Never passes a day when my thoughts diffuse the agony, and never a thought is had that subtracts from the sum of my pain. But they serve as a distraction – a focus for my consciousness outside the realm of suffering, so that I may, at times, reserve appreciation for the fact that though the pain is shared, I bear my secret alone. It is a solace from utter woe to adjudge some benefit from the pain I have inflicted. So I think these things as the sunlight, which itself is a mere allusion to the life it might otherwise provide, cascades upon the frigid air each morning, never daring to utter my thoughts for fear they would come true. And the somber silence remains unbroken.

29-Sep-2012 05:18:57 - Last edited on 02-Oct-2012 00:20:41 by Aeraie

Aeraie

Aeraie

Posts: 9,100 Rune Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile
The sun makes its way across the red rock canyon, its cold light elucidating the secrets of the mountain’s shadows in a ridicule of my own frustrations. How cruel that their secrets shall be known whereas my own, as my sorrow, fill my empty bosom! O! How my heart weeps for the memory of bygone days. The sun does not beam its effulgent probes without the eyes of the dear Emmeline staring through to my heart; the moon does not end its heavenly reprise without the guilt of knowing that what I did — who I am — is insufferable.

Just as the glory of God must aright be espied by the solitude of contemplation, so too must the tribulations of sin be endured by the solitude of regret. Thus I sit atop Mt Sipylus, shivering in the whisking wind and looking out upon the canyons my sorrows have forged, desperate for an appreciation of all that I behold in separation from a previous life. I regard the dark crevices, hoarding their secrets from the bright winter sun, and the red valleys extending off into the horizon; I descry, in the distance, the vagarious herds in their relentless grazing, and lament my heart’s separation from you. My cloak throws its tatters into the squall of the mountaintop’s erratic breathing, and my knees they ache from the hard stone upon which they are perched. But it is a kind pain, a physical pain, and I relish in the falseness, the hollow discomfort of it.

29-Sep-2012 05:19:50 - Last edited on 02-Oct-2012 00:21:00 by Aeraie

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