Usual disclaimer, I don't own Wheel of Time and all that jazz.
Spoiler Note: These events take place after books 1 and 2, highly suggested you read those first.
The Wheel of Time turns, and Ages come and pass leaving memories that become legend, legend fades to myth, and even myth is long forgotten when the Age that gave it birth comes again. In one Age, called the third Age by some, an Age yet to come, an Age long past, a wind rose in the broken mountains called World's End. The wind was not the beginning, there a neither beginnings nor endings in the turning of the Wheel of Time, but it was a beginning.
South the wind blew leaving the snow trapped mountains towards a land where winter was going or gone. South into the land of Arad Doman, wet with melting snow it blew past where armies camped on opposite banks of the flooded River Dhagon to the River Akuum, Arad Doman's southern border, where the wind crossed onto the brown grasslands of Almoth Plain.
The wind blew down the village's central street to whip men's cloaks into their faces and pulled at the heavy white banner at the head of a large column of soldiers. The banner bore a serpent like creature with 4 claws of gold. A copy of the banner seen over the skies at Falme on Toman Head. There, in the skies above the city a man proclaiming himself the Dragon Reborn had fought the Dark One. It was said that the Dragon's rebirth would break the nations of the world, it had certainly broken Alomth plain.
Tarabon and Arad Doman had squabbled over the plain since the fall of Almoth some five hundred some odd years before, rarely coming to open blows for it. The Dragon's rebirth, and the thousands proclaiming for him brought their respective armies flocking to the plain like bees after honey. Winter had frozen all the armies into camps, but the spring thaw was heating the plains to a boil, with armies of the Dragon's followers plunging Arad Doman and Tarabon into full civil wars. They still managed to field several large armies against each other as they battled for control of the plains and the Whitcloaks occupying it, occasionally sweeping up bands of Dragonsworn unlucky enough to get in their way.
Lord Captain Thane Stykle was trying to prevent that happening to him. At least three Taraboner armies had marched north with the first thaw to trap him in his winter quarters. He would angle North and East linking up with the other Dragonsworm armies near the DarkWood and escape the enemies he knew were in front, and behind hoping to trap him along the muddy back roads.
They might even succeed Thane thought looking at the flyspeck village that showed not the least sign of prosperity. The houses resembled run down shacks with barns and pig sheds up against the houses looking not much sturdier. It did not help that the only inn in the village was a pile of charred timbers and a blackened chimney. Some fellow there had upset the wrong people, a costly mistake when the penalty for denying the Dragon's rebirth was often death.
The forge still stood, a low open building with rows of tools necessary for the blacksmithing trade. Several of Thane's men were swarming over the building already unloading more equipment and lighting a fire in the cold forge. The biggest man Thane had ever met approached him as he dismounted from his horse. Arms like ship's ropes his name was Tryston Farrey with the title Chief Armourer. A job of grave importance for Thane's ill-equipped army.
Farrey bowed as much as his size would allow, though there was not an ounce of fat on him. "My Lord, the local blacksmith is still here, though not pleased to see us."
Thane could not help but smile to himself at the 'my lord,' the words sounded too good to his ears. "Bring the man here." He said in his deep cold voice. As cold and hard as a Kandori winter he though to himself, yet after the winter they'd seen, everyone of them had a right to sound cold.
Farrey straitened and pushed back his mop of greasy black hair. "Yes my Lord," he said motioning to a pair of his assistance to bring the smith forward.
To equip his soldiers, few of whom had ever seen a sword much less a breastplate, the Dragonsworm had swept up every blacksmith and anvil they could find, and still they lacked proper armament.
The man brought before him was skinny and hollow eyed, not the sort of man to be mistaken for a blacksmith. "Tell me your name."
The man seemed to stare past Thane, with his sunken eyes. But he said, "Brayde Warr," then paused a second too long, "my lord."
"And do you believe in the Dragon's rebirth master Warr? He who breaks all bonds and ends all covenants. Will you join us in his service and find new life in your trade?"
Warr just stood there dumbly, Thane was afraid for a moment the man would sick up, but he nodded slowly, then more vigorously. "Yes, yes I will, my lord."
"Good," Thane dismissed the new Dragonsworn and turned to Farrey. "We'll rest here an hour, do what you can then take everything. Have someone secure you another cart."
The large man bowed smoothly, "As my lord commands." Thane mounted his horse and rode through the village to the dirt field at its center. Ferray was a capable man, who never let a moment be wasted in the continues battle he fought against time and the army's wanderings. As he constantly reminded Thane, a blacksmith couldn't work on the march.
If only everyone of Thane soldier's was a capable as Ferray, he would have two thousand fewer things to worry about. The men were split into four companies of around five hundred. Undertrained, undisciplined men just as likely to turn to banditry as fight in the name of the Dragon Reborn. One of the company commanders, Captain Mirk Lystar, drew his horse alongside Thane's.
He wore a bright white cloak and the burnished armor of the Children of the Light, with a golden sunburst stitched on the left breast. The former Whitecloak tried to look down his crooked Ghealdaner nose at him, but found Thane was too tall. Looking away across the decrepit village he said, "the village is secure sir, no sign of resistance. We wont need longer then an hour at most before we can head on."
"Very good Captain, place your men in a screen a mile or so to the north, find a good hill," he looked at the dark clouds obscuring the sun and keeping the day in perpetual twilight. "Or a maybe a good strand of trees will be better, this weather wont last till nightfall."
Saluting hand to chest, the former Whitecloak departed without a word. Lystar commanded the Heavy Cavalry, their best equipped unit of lancers who did their best to resemble a Whitecloak legion. Their leader was smart and capable, crafting them into an effective fighting unit, but untrustworthy. Dragonsworn were by definition fanatical but the former Whitecloaks were fanatical, zealous, and dangerously competent.
Two other former Children of the Light had seen that service to the light came by following the Dragon Reborn ad they each commanded a company as Captains. The fourth was a Taraboner by the name of Styfan Marsh. He'd been a Bannerman in the Taraboner army, and was the highest ranking professional soldier to join their ranks. With nobody more capable to take the position, Marsh received several promotions and commanded Thane's 'heavy infantry,' until he could find someone better.
The 'heavy infantry,' was the result of Thane's and Marsh's foolish attempts to arm peasants with polearms and call them pikes. A packed formation of Pikemen was lethal to charging enemy cavalry, but only usable if the soldiers could be trusted not to break ranks and flee. Marsh's men had never been given that chance and thus their unit was the most ill-equipped.
They were good and frightening the locals as they tore apart houses and sheds looking for hidden stores. They rarely harmed anyone-Thane had expressly forbidden that- but they were not gentle and any armed man would appear fierce. Some however found the backbone to complain, and Thane became their prime target.
"You monster!" a women with dirty hair shouted at him from her yard. Several of Thane's men were carrying sacks of food from her house to a nearby cart while another led a thin horse from its stable. "Why are you doing this to us?" the women shrieked. Thane rode on without pausing, but the women's voice haunted him long after she stopped screaming.