by Reynard_of_Bogenhafen
Sigmarziet 2489-
My reputation once a source of great fame, is now my greatest flaw. Judge Daegerfell has forced my hands, no longer can I ply my trade in peace. Travelling deep into the mountains I have met many ‘interesting’ new characters. The wagon train took us through Axe-bite pass and now to my destination. Parravon. The place stinks of city filth and the earthy musk of the peasantry. I have been seeking work these few weeks, Thankfully the affair of Muchenheim has not reached the keen ears of the gossips, my name has. Even here in this land of chivalry, my name is spoken with both admiration and fear.
-from the travel diary of Errol Fey.
‘I’ve seen it in snakes.’ He whispered. ‘This temperature slows them, the snow slows their blood.
A bad business, catching vipers along the banks of the Aver, the warmer months were hell. Yet come the winter, and it was a job worth thrice the risk.’
The knight listened to Him. He had heard tales of this man, this monster-hunter. He was a grizzled, stringy sinewed character well into his middle years. He wore a studded leather jerkin, and badly greased dark moustache. His head was shaved, hiding what would have otherwise been a baldness most embarrassing to a man of his calibre. Reynauld de Parravon listened to that rough gravelled voice with unwavering concentration. He had eyes that spoke of horrors faced, and bested with naught but cold steel and a great deal of cunning.
The worn naked blade that sat on the table between them was no threat, simply a reminder of business. It was deemed unmanly to ask a peasant advice. Yet here he was. That blade had witnessed more combat and far more years than the knight who gazed at it, listening to it wielders words.
‘I’m guessing this is your errantry.’ It didn’t seem like a question, more a statement, but the silence that followed Reynauld felt the need to fill.
‘The slaying is mine to undertake, of course, I would just welcome your assistance.’ The man nodded at the knight’s words.
‘Tell your men we ride in the morning.’
The young knight felt his eyes widen in awe, knightly composure lost. He hid it well by swilling wine in his steel goblet and draining it quickly. The giddiness that played through his mind was welcomed, offered a bed and made comfortable for the night. Reynard removed his leather glove and proffered his hand to the imperial sitting in front of him.
‘’Til dawn then, Monsieur Fey’
‘’Til dawn, Knight! Sleep easy, and find yourself a woman for the night.’
Reynauld jerked back as if slapped.
‘Hold your impertinence well sir. Offence might well be taken in this country. You aren’t in your empire anymore!’
‘Do what you will then, sir, for tomorrow we hunt dragon-kin.’
There were fifteen in all and the going was slow. The snow was deep as a man’s boot, and it crunched like bone under the tramp of solid hobnailed boots. The men were dirty, little more than farmers given spear and shield. Five had with them bows almost as old as they themselves were. The armour was ragged but well used. None had the same as another. The only thing they had in common were flat blue shield shaped pieces of fabric stitched to either their arms of chests. Reynauld sat above them on his prancing war-steed. He was armoured in half-plate, he clearly could not afford full plate as was the normal attire of all the knights Errol had seen in the empire. It was a good thing he reflected. Most of them ended up on their backs with a halberd thrust into their guts whilst their own steed crushed them to death.
Reynauld turned in the saddle. He heard the grim chuckle emit from the ravaged throat of the monster slayer. He was a strange sight on his slim dun mare, a cicatrices’ ruff shielded his ears from the savage winter chill. His armour was not of metal rings and steel plate, but doubled leather and studs. For a monster slayer he didn’t look like a man who valued protection. The mare struggled through the snow like a dwarf through stone with naught but his bare hands. She struggled, but pulled through. She was laden with thick leather bundles, weapon hafts showed from the ends. Torches, and a battered old shield were strapped directly within Errol’s reach. The slayer noticed the knight’s attention, he merely smiled sadly and lowered his head to the howling wind. The great fang like peaks of the grey mountains defied them as the struggled on.
Urie was dead. He had perished from the cold, frozen in his stupor. The wine skin had staggered off in the night to relieve his self, and awoke an icicle. Reynauld felt the dominating glare of the monster slayer upon him, watching for his reaction. Weighing him up like a prize fighter his challenger. The men had taken to slayer, he was a man of little honour, as were they, peasants all, but valuable men all and reliable as well.
‘Bury him, a small service and we press on.’
He felt Fey’s gaze lift, and was satisfied, he had passed some test. For good or ill, he was uncertain. Yet he had passed…
The fang peak beckoned to them, Errol could smell the lizard. Its filth and the decaying corpses of its prey. He had heard tales of beasts such as these as intelligent monsters, great sentient beings. He had found no such truth in his travels. He had met but two other dragons in his time. The first as a child, watching the beast as it flew overhead screaming out a mighty cry that he would never forget. It had destroyed a village south of the village Grunberg, his home, and it returned to its lofty peak bloodlust sated. Three weeks later a man followed it, armoured like a beetle with his glowing silver plate. A mighty lance in hand and the mark of the knights templar on his shield. Errol never saw him alive again, now did he see the dragon.
The second was a beast he put to death in a small town in the border princes, it leapt into the town unaware of the trap laid for it. Vixen, his mare had been set upon it. He tightened his grip on his sword. They were so close he could feel its foetid breath on his flesh. He shivered.
He turned vixen away from the peak and led them deep into the pine forest they had been trekking past for days now. Reynauld didn’t question his motives. Which was wise, the knight had learned to trust him, thankfully.
This was a beast of the forest, he had learned this swiftly. There was dragon spoor on the ground, its shape indicating a descent of no more than three feet, as opposed to a thirty feet drop. The remains of hand had been contained within. Its ring denoted that Urie, for all his drinking and excess had not gone to waste. This dragon was on rough pickings, it dug up graves for a meal. Worse still, it must have passed them in the night. Errol sighed. He dismounted, and took apart the leather bundles, rods and binding fell into the dank pine needles that lay inches thick on the ground. The peasants watched him with complete attention. He constructed his bolt thrower swiftly, mounting it on his saddle with the ease of a man who had done this a thousand times before. Vixen swung her narrow head at him and nickered quietly. The beast must be close. Her ears twitched. Reynauld looked askance at the slayer, the brutish imperial silence him with an aged finger.
The troupe crept further through the twisting pine labyrinth, silent as Urie in his grave. The smell was now, quite noticeable. You could smell dragon over the worst of Reynauld’s pig farmers. They came upon it in a hollow, his rut hole errol reflected. Not many dragons leave the comfort of their stony crags nearby, but this was a young buck, young was a reflective term, chances are this brute had been around since the time of the elves. He was thirty metres long, tawny wings and hide, a long scaled snout, and a profuse horn stabbing from atop both his slit nostrils. His eyes were closed in deep slumber. It had eaten, now it slept. Errol motioned the peasant around it, each spearmen crept into position quickly and silently, the archers drew back a safe distance. Vixen shook her flank, Errol glanced swiftly at the beast, drawing her into position. He noticed with horror his first mistake…
This beast slept not!
Its nostrils widened at the scent of man flesh and raised its head slowly, lethargically. The slayer had been correct, cold slowed it. Errol loosed the bolt strung tightly with a mighty twang; it pierced the scales of its side rich dragon blood spilled down its side.
Suddenly it was as if the blanket of silence had been lifted from the forest, the dragon roared out in pain. The Bretonnian’s responded, the archers loosed blinding volleys at the creatures eyes, but it came towards them biting, gnashing, and clawing. Its mighty tail lashed out like a three foot wide iron whip, smashing down cunning spearmen from assailing its rear. Vixen bolted to safety, leaving Errol standing with his battered shield and his long blade. It had no name, no magic abilities. It was just a sword, forged in the Riek, and wielded by an aged hand.
Reynauld charged, full bolt through a pine row, lance lowered, teeth gritted, barding and blazon flapping in his own wake. He was a tornado thrown from the sea of chivalry and righteous fury that was his family gene pool. His lance bit deep into the chest of the beast, its languid neck jerked him from his saddle. He rolled clumsily in his half-plate, retrieving his shield and struggling to draw his own blade. The fall had bent its blade by the smallest degree, it rasped coldy as it was drawn. The dragon regarded him with its lizard slit gaze, drawing back on its haunches. Errol dove aside, knowing in his heart what was to come. The scaly cheeks puffed, and Reynauld braced himself, the paragon of faith and honour steeled himself for death incarnate. The fire roared at him, burning his hair, and his caparison. He screamed but held himself firmly beneath his kite shield. The flame died down, but Reynauld rose, rushing the dragon and stabbing swiftly at his creamy under side. Errol snatched up a longbow. He knew this would grate at the knight for the rest of his life. The dragon was bleeding to death, and was in its final throws. Whilst sir knights pranced about slashing the belly, Errol took a steady aim. The dragon caught his eye just as he loosed the shot. They both knew, man of flesh and creature of cold fury, that it was over. The arrow soared across the glade with a slowed speed, but it struck swiftly and hard right into the beasts slitted eye. So many arrows had pierced its hide, some were broken from the dragons lashings, but this was the end. The barbed tip entered its brain and killed it out right. Reynauld drove his blade deep into the beasts bile filled stomach. The beast started to topple and knight leapt from its death throes casually.
‘I have done it,’ he gasped, ‘I have killed the terror of Grimierre!’
Errol merely nodded, searching for Vixen.
‘Well done sir knight, you are a dragon slayer now.’ Errol muttered over his shoulder. The fool would credit himself for the slaying till the day he died. In every retelling for years to come Errol was sure that he would get no mention, nor would the use of such an ignoble weapon he mused as he caught Vixen by the reins. He laughed loudly in the silence that had come over the forest once more… which was the ignoble weapon in the knight’s true eye, himself or the bolt thrower?
‘Pierre le chasseur de dragoons, he was a friend and a fool. Most knights are. He fought one dragon too many…he was eaten by Sjarg of the eighth peak. A dragon I would later come to know quite intimately.’
-From the travel diary of Errol Fey…