Legacies of light

Three hours earlier

Φ At 700 hours a team of beastkin moves into the forest and stealthily assassinates many of the humans who lie there, and as they do the Lúcogadh army moves through the forest on a predetermined path.

By 1100 hours, they have all escaped the forest, and with one hundred calvary twenty chariots, and around five thousand infantry. This group quickly moves from where they are and makes haste towards the humans' castle at the most northwestern point of the land.

By 1120 hours, they have alerted the humans of their presence and they are some small human forces come and try to block them. But due to them all being composed of infantry, the Chariots are sent to deal with them.

The general of the army, Ruán Ó Lúcogadh, shouts, “Now dispatch ten chariots to quickly deal with them.”

Ten chariots are dispatched, which include two heavy chariots one ridden by Setanta and his allies.

Φ Feeling nervous, I hear Setanta say, “Since we are one of the heaviest with the most mass, we will break through the front while the lighter ones go towards the sides.”

“Right!” I say very energetically to hide my unease. Looking towards my sister, I see she also has a very worried face, so I say, “Everything will be alright.”

“I know,” she says looking straight ahead. Her focus is incredible but despite all of that she still looks very worried

Right now, I need to be strong for myself, and also for her. I turn my head to face forward, but as I do I see an arrow move towards my face so fast that I don’t even have time to panic. I am going to die.

But as it comes towards me it is knocked away by Setanta who says, “Don’t worry, just focus.”

Feeling a hefty amount of fear vanishing, I enter a state of intense focus and with my sister, we go forward.

Φ By 1125 hours the first skirmish begins. The humans shoot arrows at the chariots but they either miss or are knocked away by the warriors riding them.

four of the eight small chariots move to each flank, while the remaining four and the two heavy chariots break through the front.

The chariots easily trample the humans, but as some of the humans fall they try to take down the horses of the lighter chariot and manage to slightly wound their horses.

But in mere minutes these humans are utterly devastated.

Φ Looking at the trampled bodies, my focused expression turns into that of a smile, and I say, “We did it.”

Setanta asks, “How were your first kills?”

“I can’t believe we did it, I had some doubts but we really managed to move forward and win. Sister we really are amazing.”

As I turn my head to face my sister, I notice she is staring intensely at the bodies, and says, “Yeah, I never expected it would be so easy for so many to die.”

From one of the other chariots, we hear, “More small human groups are coming so let us take them out before they reach our main unit.”

“Right!” We say back.

Φ At 1335 hours the chariots proceeded to destroy small human units which have panicked and have decided to try and attack the main army. This disruption stopped the small human units from joining up as one allowing the main army to move uncontested.

At 1622 hours, the main Lúcogadh army was faced with a human army of triple the size. So, they formed up and prepared to engage.

Both of the infantry face each other, and at both flanks of each army, the calvary rests. Soon the cavalry moves forward, and try to outmanoeuvre each other but eventually end up engaging one another.

The Lúcogadh riders are utterly superior and dominate the humans, but due to the large amount of riders, they are unable to break through fast enough.

During this skirmish, the beastkin army moves to meet the humans, who shoot volleys of arrows towards them, but they are ineffective due to the beastkin dodging, knocking them away or just having to thick skin.

But then from the back of the human lines, something gets flung towards the beastkin; giant stones. As the infantry struggle to understand what is going on, the humans cheer and look at their prized possession, a catapult.

On the right flank of his army, Ruán says, “Is that a catapult? The humans who had such technology are in the East. If this goes on they could end up hitting the luibh beads and set off an explosion, we need to get to the catapult now.”

Ruán understanding the dire situation they are in starts to encourage his men to fight harder, and the beastkin who are getting pelted by the catapult moves forward to face the humans who are on slightly elevated ground.

Some beastkin move to protect the explosive from the ranged assault and end up separate from the main army. But they get help from the remaining chariot units to get away safely.

Yet the damage the catapults are doing on the beastkin is more than they were imagining. The returning chariot units including Setanta, look onto this state, and hitting the back of Ibar Setanta says, “I have a plan.”

After he informs his plan to his charioteers they break away from the rest of the chariots and start heading towards the battle between the calvary on the right flank.

The leader of this small chariot unit shouts, “STOP!”

But they ignore him and keep moving forward, and eventually when they reach a close enough distance Setanta and Ferdiad hold the extra spears in their chariot in their hands.

Setanta says, “Sorry.” Then he and Ferdiad throw the spears as hard as they can and pierce the human horses, through this ranged support Ruán is able to break through the right flank.

As the cavalry heads to destroy the catapult, Setanta goes to ram straight into the left flank of the enemy army, and as he does that the remaining chariots follow suit.

Φ As I move forward countless bodies are trampled beneath the feet of our horses, and chariots. Before the number of humans, we rode over was small, but now we are in an area packed densely with humans so the amount of blood, and body parts flying is incomparable.

But worse than that is the fact that it becomes so much easier for humans to stall our horses. Before they are crushed. Many humans try to strike at our chariot.

So Ferdiad and Setanta try their hardest to knock them away. They both move around the chariot and stab all those who try to do such things, through the head and kill them, they even make sure to block any attacks coming for me and Laeg, this all allows our chariot to move unfettered.

My body feels warm, my arms feel light, and I can feel my heart pumping blood faster and faster. While on this bloody battlefield, I smile and say, “This is amazing!”

Then turn to my sister who is in a hyper-focused state, yet she also looks sad as she controls the chariot with me.

Φ At 1845 hours the battle has come to an end, and the beastkin proceeds to move away from the field.

At 2110 hours the beastkin reach an area where they can rest, and there they decide to set up a base of operations and prepare for the next day. The generals go over their strategy for the next day, while the soldiers party.

Φ Leaning against a tree I look towards all of the soldiers enjoying themselves and hear them scream, “WE HAVE BESTED OUR ENEMIES TODAY, AND THE ONES WHO CONTRIBUTED THE MOST ARE OUR YOUNG MASTER'S LEGS!”

Picking up Ibar, one of the Faoláin soldiers puts him on his shoulders and says, “On their chariot, these kids lead our young lord to crush countless enemy soldiers, the most on the battlefield. And hear this, it was their first-ever battle!”

The soldiers scream, and then on the man's shoulders, Ibar looks proud. So, he plays along and shouts, “IBAR MAC FERGAL OF HOUSE FAOLÁIN STANDS STRONG!”

The men all start to scream proudly but some remain quiet. This army is made up of both Faoláin and Lúcogadh men mainly, with member Céilús being in charge of the explosive. So I am sure they didn’t take too kindly to that.

Ibar says, “Yet let’s not forget it is only due to the strength of the Lúcogadh that we were even able to find an opportunity, our glories today stand for both houses!”

Soon all of the men from the Lúcogadh’s join in and get into the celebration with everyone else. Setanta and Lugh made efforts to attack the Lúcogadh so I have been worried if bad blood was still held, but it seems everything will go well.

Looking around, I notice that Laeg is nowhere to be found. So I move around and try to find her.

Φ Squatting over a lake, I void my stomach of its contents then wipe my mouth saying, “You’re so pathetic.”

From behind me, I hear Ferdiad's voice say, “Feeling a little sick?”

Turning around, I see he is holding some water out for me to grab, so I do and say, “Yeah, it seems today was heavier than I had first thought.”

Squatting beside me, he says, “Ibar is having a good time, spreading his name out there, doing what both of you wanted.”

“It’s good, makes it far easier for us to reach our goals. Though I am surprised Setanta is not out there.”

“He is currently in the general's meeting preparing for tomorrow's battle.”

“I am surprised he even had the patience to sit down and stay like that.”

“There is a good chance that many beastkin will die tomorrow,” worry fills my face at the utterance of these words.

“The humans were vastly more prepared and organized than we had first suspected, and despite most of their armies being away, they should still have a sizeable garrison. Setanta wants to make sure that as many of us will return to Gorias as possible, so he is doing his best.”

Looking down into the water, I say, “Are you used to this Ferdiad.”

“What do you mean?”

“War and death are you used to this,” I say staring at him.

He makes a worried expression when he sees my face, then says, “I guess sort of. During my childhood, I faced many near-death experiences, and had to see things I didn’t want to so in all honesty was simply an escalation of that.”

I laugh a little, then say, “Hearing you say all of that makes me feel weak because my mind is simply going crazy after today.”

“Do you feel for the humans? Many beastkin tend to feel like that at the start but further education can show you it is pointless.”

“No, it isn’t that. Today it was incredibly easy for countless bodies both human and beastkin to pile up in mere seconds, and when I think about that happening to all of us I feel scared.”

“I am sorry, I guess me and Setanta are not doing a good enough job making you feel safe on the battlefield.”

“That’s not true, both of you are trying your best. It is just that-.”

“Just that what?”

“I have always had a good sense of my surroundings and environment, that’s what enables me to be so good at controlling my horses, but during my time on that battlefield, everything felt like an uncontrollable black storm. It felt that no matter what kind of skill you have luck is the only thing stopping you from dying a horrid death.”

I stand up and say, “Sorry about this I didn’t mean to say all of these depressing words.”

Ferdiad tries to say something, but I just run away, and as I do I picture the faces of Ibar, Setanta, and Ferdiad lying on the ground dead.