Goldwater Family/Wolfram/Az Zarqua
Alyssa Kingsley
Today was supposed to be the weekly festival day. The day that the inhabitants of all the nearby villages gathered and exchanged their goods and coins, shook hands, spoke with each other, shared meals, and enjoyed the graces and of community and each other's company. That's what she had been told by the last remaining officials who had joined the Perdan encampment upon the arrival of the Queen and her knights and lords.
The encampment stood in the edge a little valley that held some of the nearby villages, tents and soldiers spilling out from between two hills at the valley's entrance. A good place for a watch, to keep the people safe. She thought as she had given the order. She had taken a walk up one of the hills while her personal tent was being set up and to stretch her legs from the long ride from the Capital. Upon the hill, overlooking the valley and the villages beyond the Perdanese camp, she spotted a lone figure standing vigil at the top of the hill while the last lights of day began to cross over the horizon. As she approached she recognized him instantly as Ulric Hawk, the true lord of this place. He bowed respectfully as she approached and she allowed him the gesture. She joined him as together they watched the little figures move about in the village below. Like little bugs furiously building their own little colony in the dirt. They watched in silence as a banner pole was raised, a makeshift banner raising up humbly in the distance. Alyssa swallowed.
"There's a voice in my head, my lord." She said quietly.
In her periphery she could see Ulric Hawk turn his head as she read some concern in his eyes. Alyssa did not take her own from the scene down below, her face a mixture of somberness and determination as she continued.
"It says 'You did this'. The voice is a man's, from long ago. Words he said to a little girl as she cringed when he took a step towards her, bottle in hand." Her mouth twitched slightly as she hesitated before resuming. "Whenever I see tragedy or misfortune, I hear that voice in my head. Especially when I know it's right. But even when I know it's wrong, for some reason those words still come to my mind.
"I hear it right now, watching that meager pole being raised. It's yelling at me. Screaming. 'You did this'. And this time, I cannot tell if it is right or wrong."
Silence filled the air as she paused again and turned to look up at the lord beside her. Her voice raised a little bit as she continued on with a hint of determination.
"But I have come to realize that perhaps it does not matter if it is or not. It is just a ghost, after all. One that I have let haunt this realm for far too long. It is you, I must listen to, Lord Ulric." She nodded down to the Perdanese camp, nightfires beginning to be set. "And it is the lords and knights down there." Bright blue eyes wandered through the valley towards the nearby village. "And in some ways, even those poor folk who charge blindly and fearfully into the valley of darkness. Crying out for someone to protect them, where we could not." We are here now, frightened lambs.
She lifted her palm to show Lord Ulric, showing him a small well-healed and barely visible scar near the bottom. "Do you remember this? Before the eve of battle against the North? The ritual knife you gave me? I still have it in fact. I recall at the time that ritual seemed so strange to me, the mixing of blood. But I understand it now, I think. The connection, that our blood is not ours alone. That we are never alone in our fear of what could happen if we fail, or if we make a mistake. That we stand together as one people. One blood. One Lion. Perdan."
A gentle wind swept over the hill down into the valley, blowing the loose ponytail below her golden crown over her shoulder.
"You are not alone, Ulric. None of us are. And they down there are not abandoned from our thoughts and hearts either. Just as I was not alone. I only thought that for the whisper of a ghost. We will return."
Silence hung briefly between them as she finished and looked up at Ulric with a glimmer of hope in her eyes. Exchanging a few more quiet words until the booming blast of a warhorn sounded from beyond the canyon. A single bellow marked the arrival of friendly troops, though with the sun setting, Alyssa could not make out the emblem in the night.
"Another lord has arrived, I am going to go to meet them." She turned to head back down the hill before pausing and holding out her hand, palm with the little scar at the bottom.
"Will you follow me, Ulric Hawk?"
Wolfram Goldwater
"The royal knights, m'lord." The man at arms closest to Wolfram sat back down in his saddle, straightening his cloak.
Wolfram carefully overlooked the camp, sprawling across the valley about a mile in front of them. "The Queen."
"Aye. And a lot of them, too. Two, maybe three hundred judging by the campfires."
They have been travelling through the region through the past few days, sending out scouting parties and acting as a show of force. Searching for southern barbarians, that not even once came within their grasp, within their sight. All was quiet until this evening, when they came across the tracks of a large party, following them into this valley. Although the sun already set some time ago, the endless darkness still unsuccesfully battled with the day's last light, making the retinue clearly visible against the horizont. Distant sounds and commotion hinted that the soldiers, sitting around the fires, already noticed the group of armed riders towering against the darkening sky. "Orders, m'lord?"
"Follow me and raise the banner. Not that it would matter much, it will be dark before we get there. And sound the horn."
One by one, the riders spurred their horses and made their way to the waking up camp.
Ulric Hawk
It was a somber affair as Ulric Hawk went to his private estate. It was a humble log cabin, surrounded by acres and acres of woods. It was simple, small, and where he came to escape the harsh reality. He had his men wait in the village, this was something he was going to have to do by himself. He opened the door, and looked at his home. The place he could escape the trials and tribulations of war, the weight of command, the horrors of war. It was here that he found peace, where he could listen to the birds, enjoy the animals, hunt the woods by himself, and think back to his childhood in Valldir. Maybe that was why he was so drawn to Az Zarqua and its people, they were hardy and survivors just like the harsh land he grew up.
He walked room to room, taking it in one last time. He only took his most personal belongings, everything else he would leave, and hope the place was not looted and ransacked, and that perhaps it would just be forgotten, another story lost to time.
As he left his residence, he looked back one last time.
Moving on, he headed back to the Perdan encampment where Queen Alyssa and the Perdan Knights who came south to defend the land from the scouting of Yssrgardian raiders.
Ulric was atop the hill, looking out upon Az Zarqua when he heard Queen Alyssa speak behind him.
He listened to her words, and smiled when she showed the scar on her palm. He remembered that night well, when he shared his tradition from Valldir. It was before Bescanon, which Ulric always considered Queen Alyssa's greatest military achievement and he was glad to have fought in that battle, for that was a story that would never die.
"Will you follow me, Ulric Hawk?"
"I will my Queen. Thank you for marching with me one last time to Az Zarqua. It means a lot to me, and I know it still means a lot to these people."
Ulric followed Queen Alyssa away from the hill.
Wolfram Goldwater
Clinging of chainmail and iron hooves echoed through the camp as the riders passed through, the scarce light from campfires and torches bouncing off of their hauberks and helms, pinned to the saddles. Black cloaks and tabarts, decorated with small Goldwater coats of arms, gave a mysterious look to these rough men, often scarred and used to the hardships of soldiering and mercenary life. They rode through the amassing crowds of perdanite knights and soldiers until they found an emptier spot between the camps of the royal knights and soldiers of the young Baillivus. There the men dismounted their horses and raised the black and golden banner of Sir Wolfram,marking the spot where their camp would soon stand. Some soldiers exchanged a few words with the nearby standing squires of Her Majesty's knights, while the rest began to raise tents and prepare dinner. Fresh racks of lamb hanging off of their saddles, which until recently belonged to an unfortunate local farmer, would soon be roasted above their campfires.
Wolfram stood amidst all this, overlooking his men with a content smile in his tired face.
Alyssa Kingsley
Alyssa allowed herself to be briefly escorted by the marshal down the hill, holding onto his arm as they stepped down the slope in the dark back towards the camp. She released him upon reaching the bottom, where two Royal Whiteguards silently took up positions behind them, the only sound they gave the clanking of their plate armour as they followed The Queen and the Marshal back into the camp proper. Knights and soldiers bowed respectfully to them as she passed, torchlight glimmering off the golden circlet of her position.
The two and her knights made their way back to the royal pavilion, surrounded by dozens of sturdy tents and sturdy knights. As she led the marshal to the meeting tent and asked for some subtle wine and supper to be brought she spotted several of her staff and one of her knights speaking animatedly with some soldiers dressed in black with a familiar golden stripe upon their crest. She knew this crest well, though not the man who brought it here.
Alyssa's lips turned to a line and she furrowed her brow at what clearly seemed to be a dispute. "Lord Marshal, I shall return shortly, please make yourself at home."
Resting her hand idly upon the pommel of the sword hanging at her hip, she crossed the campsite towards the white-caped knight of her royal company.
"Mydame." Alyssa said to the armoured knight as she approached. "What is the issue here?"
"Your Majesty!" The knight replied with some surprise as she immediately fell to her knee. "These mercenaries are setting their camp up too close to the royal encampment. War Doctrine demands that additional campsites be constructed in outer rows extending from the middle, not in the middle of the greater encampment, and certainly not nearly overlapping with nobles of higher rank, and absolutely not with the Queen herself."
Alyssa watched the soldier in black who scratched his beard. "Mydame is correct. In the effort to maintain order and quick rallying or retreat lines, campsites should not be set up so haphazardly. Your lord might want you to keep that in mind in the future, soldier." She motioned for her knight to rise to her feet as she continued. "But we are not at war today, and thus the War Doctrine, while followed generally out of habit and preparedness does not specifically apply. The Peace Doctrine mentions only that camps should be set up neatly and separate from other troops. So long as you do that, your company may set up where it is convenient. Mydame, please organize any assistance Lord Goldwater's company may require. And you soldier, please inform Lord Wolfram that I wish to meet with him in the meeting tent."
The knight saluted and the soldier returned to his camp as the Queen dismissed them both. She made a quick stop to her personal pavilion, changing out of her riding leathers into a lighter white shirt and black trousers, and re-setting her crown before returning back to the meeting tent, the two guards out front saluting her with another clank of gauntlet to plate as she passed by them through the flap of the tent.
A staff member was pouring a glass of wine for Lord Ulric, who sat at the right side of the table's head, and setting the table for a light supper.
"Lord-Marshal, I am blessed with your patience, thank you. Lord Wolfram Goldwater should be joining us soon, I hope that is alright. Though I knew Lord Jacelyn, I have not yet met his brother. I should be interested to find out what sort of man the younger Goldwater is." Alyssa said gracefully as she took her seat next to the Marshal, and the two of them chatted as they awaited for the Queen's guest.
Wolfram Goldwater
"To have a home, Your Majesty, is among the greatest blessings one could earn and I can at last count myself among those who reached it. I do not spend much time in the walls of Foxburg, but the lands still have its place within my heart."
Wolfram sat on the offered chair and without hesitation reached for the roasted duck. "If you'll forgive me, Your Majesty, My Lord, I haven't eaten in two days," he added while chewing one of its thighs.
"To have a home is a blessing, and it has been for more than a decade that I couldn't have mine. I was framed, with no evidence I might add, but my dear father, may his soul rest in peace, wouldn't hear of it. 'Go seek glory elsewhere', he said. 'And don't come back until you've shown you're good for something."
The hint of sarcasm and irony in his voice could hardly be overheard, as he turned his eyes to the exit, as if he wanted to pierce the tent's walls and look out into the darkness.
"My brother knew of everything. But he already had his head full of dreams and ideas, dreams of mighty knights and strong castles, and I didn't fit into those dreams. He said nothing, when I was accused, he said nothing, when I left Foxville with only a handful of followers and had to fight every day for ten years to earn my living. I haven't spoken with him since. He fulfilled his dreams of heroes of old and valour, but his foolish and careless soul led him to his death," Wolfram stopped to breathe and let out a quiet and ironical chuckle "How the tables have turned. One of us had to die to let the other live."
