These are the days that I am loathe to speak of. Therefore, I shall be direct and to the point.
The trolls of the Hinterlands, in those days, were ten times as numerous, far more organized, and every measure as barbaric as they are, now.
And I, now an ordained Battle Priest of the Ordo Drakus, was assigned to the ranks of a Dwarf by the name of Brassbelly, exactly as the Dark Lady had prophecied unto me.
Brassbelly was a likeable enough Dwarf, as Mercenary Commanders went. An officer of the sort who demanded strict discipline and rewarded either the fulfillment or lack of that quality swiftly and fairly. His bravery was well known throughout the ranks, and his men apparently had some measure of respect for him. He was known for standing at the vanguard of the formation, where the loud laughter of his battle joy could be heard even above the clamor and shouting of the first few ranks.
In the beginning, We were based out of Aerie Peak, and ran regular patrols into the south central regions of the Hinterlands in an attempt to attrit the local numbers and to ascertain the movements of larger formations between the fortified cities. These patrols were often carried out in force, with rows of well armored men and dwarves marching in file flanked and preceeded by Night Elf scouts.
In theory, all should have proceeded by the textbooks: we would engage in numerous small actions and, if faced with an overwhelming force, fall back to Aerie Peak and call for reenforcements. In theory, since the trolls nearly always lost in battles involving near equal numbers, our losses should have remained light and our actual engagements limited to short, vicious battles.
In theory, anyhow.
The textbooks, you see, failed to account for local wildlife, which tended to consist mainly of an extremely clever variety of wolf whose favored hunting habits included stalking formations and picking off any who found themselves even slightly seperated from the larger body. Scouts, foraging parties, even those who paused on march to relieve themselves...these tended to simply disappear until their bones were recovered.
Neither did the textbooks count on boobytraps.
Oh, yes. The 'barbaric' trolls were quite adept at a form of magical trap that they scattered liberally throughout the Highlands. It involved a sharpened stick, smeared with their own dung, typically, or with poisons extracted from the local plantlife. A patch of ground would seem perfectly harmless and solid until trod upon- but once stepped upon, it would be as if the very ground would thrust the stinger into the bottom of the offending foot. And as one's first instinctive reaction when stung in the sole is to sit down, there would be other spikes waiting for that, as well.
Warriors cover their bodies in mail and plate, but the soles of their feet are offered no such protection.
Much time was spent dealing with these afflictions. Often, there were a score of these or so, a day. Perhaps half of the unfortunates lived. And needless to say, the psychological impact was considerable.
This, I tell you only that I may lay the scene for what is to come. The water has been poured into the vessle, so to speak.
Of what would come to float in that water, I shall speak of later- but suffice to say for the moment that their names were Sharkfyn, and Friar Daltry.
And now, I am prepared to tell you more. Far, far more.
Against this backdrop of random carnage, the days passed for perhaps a season, until the early snows began to fall upon the Hinterlands. Those at the Peak were well comforted, gathered about their bonfires in their watch houses and barracks. Those in the troll cities were no doubt just as cozy, reveling in their slow bleed of our ranks and in the preparations for their own bloody form of winter festival. During that time, when the Witherbark were preparing for thier customary mass offerings to their Sun Gods as appeasment for a return of the spring, many more of our numbers would tend to disappear in the middle of night. Small patrols, listening posts, and foraging parties, these were perhaps the most dangerous duties at that time. Moreso than the straightforward battle.
Yes, the Hinterlands in that season became something of a vice that squeezed the last drops of hope and happiness from any who ranged the ice and snow of those woods. But Brassbelly was adept at lifting morale when it sank too low, so that desertion was a mitigated factor, and I had my Dark Lady to comfort me during the worst moments. The rest of them, well...I suppose they suffered what they were forced to suffer.
Many weeks of this passed. We were tattered, tired, but we were paid. So onward we pressed until we finally received word that we were to reenforce a larger body for an engagement near the eastern cliffs. It seemed that another force had landed on the beaches below for an assault on a major Witherbark stronghold called 'Jintha'alor', and that we would be needed to cut off a smaller village just north of that city in order to prevent the movement of reenforcements to the overlooking cliffs and to give our own forces free access to the road once they reached the top from their beachheads below.
And so, at this point in time, there we were. On the road, south of a place known as Skulk Rock, two hundred of our men led by Brassbelly, pitched against some six hundred trolls who had come out to meet us and prevent our movement to the eastern cliffs.
The healers, we were arrayed in the third and fourth ranks, alternately casting and resting, rotating and waiting, doing our best to keep the worst of the worst cases from dying. A difficult task...the Witherbark favored poisons, so that an apparently unwounded warrior might suddenly drop with no warning. The chaos was indescribable...a roar of steel and pain smothered over with the smell of feces and salt. When our ranks charged, there was a mighty press, and even in the deeper ranks we were smashed from behind as the lines halted, writhed, and surged forward again. When the arrows came, priests as well as soldiers fell, and their bodies were crushed beneath the wall of fighters undulating into the field from behind.
Oh, it was a mighty chaos. A perfect chaos! Even as I bled and sweated and grew certain that I would die there, I felt Skassax descend upon me, covering me, murmuring to me. My spirit swelled, and onward we pressed!
I casted, casted until I could cast no more, laughing at the hell around me, before slipping into a secret place for rejuevenation while the wall of metal clad bodies carried me forward. And then, when I had the strength, more lives were preserved by mine own hand so that they might slay for the pleasure of the Dark Lady.
Events progressed in this manner until we nearly reached the Overlook. Then, the trolls, with us in the front of them and the landing forces behind them, began to break and run.
O, but it was glorious! Even Brassbelly could not contain the beast that we had unleashed upon the Witherbark! The juggernaught came unhinged, men and elves and dwarves howled like wolves as they fell into persuit of the routed trolls! Even I, knowing that the wounded behind us were already crushed by their own comrades in the surge, retrieved my pathetic wand and joined in the slaughter.
And this is how we chased the Witherbark survivors to the south, to the gates of the city that the landing force was tasked to assault.
In those few hours, during the lull between bloody victory and the reorganization of our forces to integrate with the main assault force that was to storm the walls, that is when many important events took place. One of them most surprising.
I was there, and I saw it all.
Brassbelly, after speaking to a detachment from the landing force near a camp fire, turned his back on a young woman while the rest of her companions were walking away. The woman glanced about her, saw that no one was looking at either her or Brassbelly...save for myself, who she did not seem to notice...and rammed a dagger into the back of his neck. The woman then stepped into the dancing shadows cast about by the fire, and seemed to fade away.
And that was how Brassbelly, beloved Captain of the Aerie Raiders, bled his life out into the snow.
Of this, I shall speak more later.