A/N
I think I should say now that I've been looking forward to introducing Jarod in this fic for a very long time because he is an extremely important character. You might even say that he is one of the main characters. You may notice that Jarod acts differently in this fic and he may seem OOC, but well... we're not to RD yet.
I have actually begun writing some of the RD portion, at least a first draft. Just needed a change of pace in my writing. I am currently debating whether or not I should release a little teaser, say 1000 words or so.
Disclaimer: Not. Mine.
Chapter 24
Pyrrhic
Daein hit us hard – I knew that – but I did not realize how bad it was until I got back to camp and the wounded started coming in. The reserve commander estimated seven hundred casualties. Out of only two thousand men committed to the assault, that made for a fantastically high casualty rate. It was even worse in the unit I fought with; a quick headcount revealed we were down to forty men; we started with one hundred.
Whoever was in command of the defense force, he was smart and creative. He must have figured out that he could never hold the wall, so he did not even try. Instead, he left a token defense on the wall with instructions to retreat before they could suffer any heavy losses, all to lure a large portion of our force into the kill zone he'd set up in the dale. Worse yet, he left snipers in concealed positions to hit our army where it really hurt; our command structure. The shots that took out the captain I was with were not random, and he was not the only officer taken down at the outset of battle; hundreds of men were streaming back into the camp leaderless and in disarray. It was barely one day into the war, and we were already a bloody mess.
I wandered into the first medical tent in a daze, looking through the many wounded with dread and asking after my friends. No one seemed to know where anyone was, but they all agreed on one thing; a lot of the Greil Mercenaries had been in the dale with Boyd. Wounded men covered the ground in the tents, and the sweet smell of honey-soaked bandages mixed with the odor of blood, cauterized flesh and excrement to blanket the area in a stomach-turning stench. Each tent or seemed worse than the last, filled with bleeding men lying about wherever the healers could find room, screaming and crying. Healers and priests tended their patients by the flickering light of torches and braziers, but there just weren't enough of them to keep up with the throng of wounded that grew with each passing moment; it seemed that for every bandaged soldier that was carried out, another corpse was added to the growing pile out behind the camp.
An impatient growl drew my attention to the far side of the tent. There, General Ike was pushing away a determined priest despite the nasty arrow wound in his arm.
"Dammit, I'll be fine!" he insisted, snapping off the arrowhead himself and tossing the shaft aside. "Heal the ones who need it!"
The priest reluctantly backed away, grumbling about stubborn Crimeans as he brushed by me to tend other wounded. I figured Ike would know where to find people, so I approached the General and offered as deep a bow as I could manage.
"My lord," I greeted Ike, drawing a frustrated groan from the general. "Sorry, Ike. You were targeted too?"
"Yeah, sort of. An old comrade was one of the marksmen taking out our officers; I think that's why the arrow's in my arm and not my heart," Ike grunted as he tore a strip of cloth off his cloak to bind the wound. "Not that he'd ever admit it," he added with a grimace as he tied the cloth tightly around his arm. With that out of the way, he paused to take in all the wounded and dying men. "Goddess, how could this have already gone so badly?" he said, looking blankly at the aftermath.
"If this is what victory feels like, I don't want to try defeat," I added. Ike snorted dryly, his laughter lacking any real mirth.
"Another victory like this one and we'll lose the war," he said. He shook his head sadly. "We're in bad shape; most of the officers in the attacking force are dead, and now I've been hearing rumors about desertion." He looked over at me and opened his mouth to say something, but did a double take as he noticed the battered state of my armor. "You look terrible! I thought you were back in the camp."
"I was at the East gate with one of the reserve units," I explained. Ike's eyes instantly lit up with recognition.
"You secured the retreat," he said with an appreciative nod. "It looked bad up there."
"Not like in the dale," I gulped, shuddering as I remembered the rain of arrows shredding helpless soldiers. "Not even close. Hey, have you seen Boyd? He hasn't come back with any of the wounded yet."
"He was in the dale too? I didn't see him!" Ike replied, his expression turning to one of shock and dread. "I'm going back out there!"
"Lord Ike!" Elincia's voice called. We both looked over to see the princess approach dressed in a simple, bloodstained dress and bearing a healing staff. "You cannot leave; your wounds must be tended!"
"But-"
"No buts, Lord Ike. I will send someone to look for Boyd," she cut him off, taking his arm and leading him away.
"Milady, I could-" I started, but Elincia took one look and me and shook her head.
"You should remain here. I will send Sir Kieran," she ordered firmly, steering Ike away by his good arm. "Now come, Lord Ike, my tent is not far. I will see to your wound personally."
Ike made some frustrated noises, but offered no real resistance as she steered him away. No doubt he would say it was just loyalty, but I couldn't help feeling there was something going on there… not that either of them would ever admit it. Shaking my head, I resumed my search of the hellish mess that was our army, and hoped that Boyd had just stayed in the dale to help get the wounded out. That sounded like something he would do.
One soldier nearby tried to sit up, but gave a strangled cry and fell back onto the ground. A healer cursed and told the man to lie back until he could be treated, but he just wouldn't calm down and kept struggling and panicking. I started to walk past, but the soldier grabbed my arm.
"P-please, ye gotta-" he gasped before crying out in pain again. There was a blood-soaked sheet covering his legs, and judging by the iron grip he had on my arm he was in a good deal of pain. I noticed the emblem on his armor; he was one of Numida's soldiers, the same ones who'd held the eastern gate with me. I had no clue who he was, but after that battle my mind screamed "comrade!" I couldn't just walk away.
"HEY!" I yelled at the healer. "Can't you give him something for the pain?"
The man turned an exhausted look my way. "We ran out of vulneraries half an hour ago, and we need all the staves for closing wounds. Next supply convoy comes in tomorrow, so he'll just have to grit his teeth and bear it like everyone else." The soldier – Aw hell, he's not even out of his teens – latched onto my arm again, and pulled me closer.
"I-I know you. You were up there with me, at the gate," the soldier gasped.
"Yeah, that's right. Lay back now, okay?" I said as calmly as I could. I tried to recall anything useful about bedside manner, but it was no use; that was from a past life, and a completely different person. Just try to be comforting. "You're gonna be fine," I reassured him.
"NO! Please!" the soldier gasped. "Don't let them take it!" he pleaded, his fingers scrabbling at my armor.
"Hey, you're safe here!" I insisted, thinking he was confused or hallucinating. "We're in camp, they're gonna take care of you. Just try to relax."
"M-m-my leg- AGHHH!" he screamed as more agonized spasms wracked his body. He gripped my arm desperately. "Don't. Let them. Take. My leg!" he finally gasped.
I patted him reassuringly on the shoulder. "I'll take a look, see how bad it is," I said, just to calm him. Surely amputation isn't necessary when they have healing magic... right? Taking a few deep breaths to steady myself, I reached down and lifted one side of the sheet just enough to check on his leg. It took all I had not to vomit right there.
"W-well?" he asked. "It's gonna be okay, right?" The healer came over and gave me a sad look; below the knee there was hardly any leg left to salvage. The bones were utterly mangled, and all along the back of his calf the flesh had been stripped away from the bone and now hung loose, attached only down near the ankle. Someone had tied a tourniquet above the knee to keep him from bleeding out, but it was clear the kid would never walk again.
"It has to go," the healer said grimly, quiet enough that the soldier could not hear. "Hold him down, will you?"
I replaced the sheet, nodded, and placed my hands firmly on the kid's shoulders. A sturdy page came over and held his legs, and the boy's eyes went wide with fear as he realized what was happening.
"NO, PLEASE!" he cried, fighting to sit up. The healer came back with a sharp knife, and the boy fell back sobbing onto his cot. The healer pulled back the sheet and went to work, drawing more screams from the poor kid.
"It's already gone, there's nothing there to save," I lied in an attempt to comfort him, but the kid just kept fighting and straining to look at his legs, growing more frantic with each passing moment.
"Distract him," the healer grunted, and I did my best to oblige.
"Don't look at it; you don't wanna see th- HEY! Look at me! Okay? Focus on me." The soldier whimpered as the knife sawed away at something solid and his grip on my arm tightened, but he did as I said. "What's your name?"
"M-Marcus. Everyone just calls me Mark," he replied.
"Where you from, Mark?" I asked, forcing down the bile rising in my throat.
"Gwaren. It's a small town, just south of Crimea," he explained. He cringed as the knife sawed through something solid, but he kept talking after a second. "My parents run an inn, an' I used to help'em cook an' bake afore I joined th' army."
"Sounds nice," I replied. Peaceful. "You're going back there, Mark, I promise. Just hold on a little longer." Surely the army will have no use for a one-legged soldier, I told myself, hoping that I hadn't just made an empty promise to the poor kid.
Mark nodded weakly, and for a moment I believed it would be okay. Suddenly the healer cursed and called for help; the improvised tourniquet had let go, and now blood was pumping from the severed limb. Mark's eyelids started to droop.
"Hey, stay with me bud! Don't go to sleep!" I cried, shaking his shoulders to keep him conscious. A priest rushed over and staunched the flow of blood while the healer tightened a new tourniquet. As soon as the bleeding had slowed a bit, the healer discarded his knife and grabbed a cauter from a nearby brazier.
"No time to do it properly, we'll close it now and stitch'im up properly later," he explained. Mark was still clinging to consciousness, so I got his attention again.
"Mark, this is going to hurt, but I'm right here. You're gonna live, I promise," I whispered to him. The healer pressed the red-hot cauter against the stub. Mark's eyes closed, and I hurriedly put two fingers to his neck – carotid, at least I could remember that much. He had a pulse, weak but steady. The healer bound the stump with a cloth bandage that smelled strongly of honey, and then motioned for a few men to carry the boy out on a stretcher. Almost immediately another wounded soldier was brought in to take his place.
"He'll be okay, right?" I asked.
"If the wound stays closed and clean we'll stitch it up in the morning, apply a healing salve and send him back with the supply convoy," the healer answered.
"And if it doesn't?" I asked, knowing full well what the answer might be.
"Odds are he'll get a fever and die. Nothing more we can do now." And with little more than a helpless shrug the healer was gone, off to deal with the next crisis.
I resumed my walk through the tent, looking for any sign of my friends and noting grimly that several badly wounded men had a dark 'X' marked on their foreheads. I knew enough about triage to guess at what that meant, and the fact that no one moved to help them was ample proof; these men were lost causes. I was about to leave – I was of little use here and it was getting increasingly difficult to stay composed – when suddenly Zihark was right there in front of me.
"Oh good, you're still alive. Come with me. Quickly," he said, his ashen face making my heart drop. "It's Boyd."
Numbly I followed him, not daring to ask a question for fear of getting bad news. It almost felt like if I avoided getting any bad news, I would find my friend alive and well, laughing at how worried I'd been and bragging about how Daein would have to try a lot harder if they wanted to bring him down. I clung to that hope as we approached another tent, tried to persuade myself that the flurry of activity and the healers coming and going were for someone else, that my friend was alive and well. All those hopes were dashed when Zihark showed lifted the flap and I saw Boyd.
Boyd, once so strong and boastful, seemingly invincible, was always the last one I expected to see like this; but there he lay pale and still, barely clinging to consciousness as priests worked feverishly to heal his many wounds. Just a few feet away from where Boyd lay Oscar had one arm wrapped firmly around a sobbing Rolf while his other hand grasped his brother's. Beth was nearby as well, trying very hard not to cry.
I broke my silence, unleashing a torrent of questions at the priests, begging and pleading and even threatening them, whatever it took to heal my friend, to keep him alive. After several annoyed glances from the healers Beth came over and steered me away, muttering comforting words to calm my hysteria.
"There's nothing we can do," she choked out as she tried to get me to sit.
I was just starting to calm down when Boyd's eyes suddenly rolled back into his head and he lost consciousness. The healers started yelling and redoubled their efforts, Rolf buried his face in Oscar's chest, Beth dropped my arm and rushed back over, but I shrank back. It was all too much for me; I couldn't take any more. Aimlessly I stumbled out of the tent, shame and grief and horror and countless other emotions threatening to tear me apart if I didn't let them out. I just had to get away, somewhere, anywhere where no one could see me. I staggered into a small stand of trees just outside the camp and fell to my knees, retching until all I could manage were dry heaves. Then I just sagged back against a tree and cried.
"Adam?" a small voice asked from behind me, startling me. I hurriedly tried to pull myself together, unwilling to let someone else see me this way. "Just came ta check on ye."
"I-I'm fine," I replied hastily, wiping the last few tears away and clearing my throat before turning around. It was Nephenee. Much to my relief, she appeared unscathed.
"Boyd's... I heard-" she managed, her voice as choked as mine. I tried to respond, but the lump in my throat turned my words into little more than a few stuttered syllables. Neph came over and gave me a hug. "He'll be okay. Boyd's tough."
I hugged her back, too tired and sad to care that things had been awkward because of something as trivial as a kiss; I was just grateful to still count her as a friend. She suddenly pulled back though, a horrified look on her face.
"I-I'm sorry, too soon?" I asked.
"Adam, ye're bleeding!" she exclaimed, pointing to my arm. Sure enough, my right arm was slick with blood, though I had yet to really notice any pain. No wonder Elincia ordered me to stay with the wounded; I'm one of them. Strangely, I didn't really care that I'd been injured, I just felt... numb. "C'mon, let's get ye to a healer."
"No!" I said, remembering the tents full of wounded. "I'm not dying, and there's not enough healers. I-I'll be fine. I should go back and be with Boyd... in case-"
"No, ye won't be fine," she countered, pulling me along by my good arm. "It's gotta be cleaned at least. C'mon, I know yer tent's not far."
I followed her to my tent, and with her assistance removed the blood-stained surcoat and chainmail hauberk. I had a shallow gash along my lower back from a partially deflected stab, and the blood on my arm had come from a cut to the shoulder I'd taken at the start of the battle; the chainmail held up under the blow, but nonetheless several links had been forced through the padded leather underneath and were embedded in the muscle. We had to peel the armor off my arm – not a pleasant process – and pick a few broken links out by hand. While I cleaned the wounds with some melted snow, Nephenee tore strips off an old cloak to make bandages.
"Neph," I finally said as I wrapped one of the makeshift bandages around the cut on my back. "About Sienne-"
She looked away. "Ye don't need ta talk about it if ye don-"
"Look, I don't care about what happened." That got her attention. "We were drunk and made a stupid mistake, but I don't want that to change anything. Can we just, I dunno, put it behind us, forget it ever happened? I just want to be friends again."
For a second her face was unreadable, but she smiled and nodded. "Okay, right, it, um, it never happened then." Hurriedly, she added "An' we never stopped bein' friends... it'd take more'n that."
Despite everything that had happened that day, I let out a relieved sigh and allowed myself a small smile. "Thanks, Neph, and... sorry for avoiding you."
"No worries, as ye say," she replied, tossing me a blanket. "Here, ye should rest an' let that heal; I'm gonna go see if Kezhda's come back yet."
I nodded and pretended to lay back for her benefit, but as soon as she was gone I got up and made my way back to Boyd's tent. Whatever happened, I realized that I needed to be there for him. It was the least I could do for the friend who'd kept me alive and in good spirits through so much.
Three days after the battle at Tor Garen we were camped inside Daein's borders, though admittedly not very far. After the pyrrhic victory no one wanted to stay at Tor Garen any longer than we had to, but we still needed time to sort out the wounded and the dead. Most of the army spent the first day after the battle unloading supplies from the latest convoy, sending those too injured to continue fighting (including Mark, to my relief) back to Begnion on the empty convoy, and burying the dead. The rest of the army spent the day thoroughly scouting the mountain pass and the plains beyond it, making sure the clever Daein commander had no other traps planned. On the second day, we marched through the pass and broke camp here, on a rocky, defensible cluster of hills just a short march from the pass. It was hardly penetrating deep into Daein territory as the invasion plan had called for, but at least it made it seem like we were on schedule.
The Royal Knights, like several units who'd borne the brunt of the Daein attack, were down to half strength. Now, that really only meant there were two of us instead of four, but Ike wanted to free up the pegasus knights of the Holy Guard for scouting duty. Ike's solution? Assign a heavily depleted unit to each of the remaining knights, thereby keeping a decent force at Elincia's disposal (he gave up trying to convince her to keep us all close for protection. Delightfully stubborn, that Elincia), and to recognize a few of the units who held the line at Tor Garen. Kieran was given sixty mounted men-at-arms who fought with him and Boyd in the dale, and I got assigned the forty spearmen who fought with me at the wall. I was still unsure whether I should be excited about having a wee little command, or shitting my pants.
The assignment came with a nasty catch, though; I had to take lessons on strategy and tactics from Soren. I spent years studying ancient battle tactics back home, but I quickly learned that applying them was... difficult. In the little scenarios that we ran, I often proved too cautious, a failing I resolved to rectify before we could meet Daein on the field of battle again. The fact that it was with that condescending little shit Soren teaching me certainly didn't help, but at least I hadn't punched him... yet. Nonetheless, the lessons helped me cope with the stress of having even such a tiny command.
"Well, you stupid meathead," I said as I sat next to Boyd. "Guess who they gave the command of Numida's men to? That's right, me!" I grinned and nudged him playfully in the shoulder. "Oh, don't look at me like that! Someone had to step up while you're slacking off in here!"
"Honestly, though, people are telling a lot of stories about what you did. You know what they're calling you, man?" I asked my friend. "Boyd the Great! I know, you've been spreading that one around yourself, but that stunt you pulled at Tor Garen made everyone believe it. You earned it this time... man, did you ever earn it."
No response came; not that I expected any. I grasped his hand. "Look, what I'm trying to say is that you don't need to worry now. Thanks to you, hundreds of soldiers made it out of that dale. You saved the army, and now I'm gonna lead... well, forty of them. The point is, I've got it from here – we all do – so you just rest up and get better."
Boyd gave no indication that he'd heard me; just lay still in his cot as he had for the past couple days. The healers said he might be able to hear us, so we kept someone at his side as often as possible to make sure he wasn't alone although no one knew when he would wake up. Some of the healers said he might never, but I refused to believe that. He was Boyd; death didn't apply to him, he was tougher than it.
Boyd was hardly the only casualty of the battle. Final figures for the battle were five hundred and thirty dead, and two hundred and forty-eight too wounded to continue with the army. Nearly half of those still standing had suffered minor wounds. Of the Greil Mercenaries and Royal Knights, five of us were down, counting Boyd. Makalov died fighting next to Boyd, and Marcia's pegasus was shot out from under her when she tried to save him; given time she would recover from her wounds, but her brother's death hit her hard. There was no telling when she would rejoin the Royal Knights, but Daeins would do well to steer clear of her when she finally did. Titania was unhorsed by a lance; one lung collapsed and she had more broken ribs than intact ones, but she was still alive. Astrid was one of the last to be wounded, shot by an opportunistic archer while she was pulling some of the wounded to safety during the Daein retreat. Thankfully, none of the Earthlings suffered any serious wounds.
Booted footsteps sounded on the frozen ground outside the tent; that would probably be Jarod. I sighed, and squeezed Boyd's hand. "I have to go now, but Oscar will be here soon. You take as long as you need, just... don't keep us waiting too long. I still wanna have that drink with you when this is all over."
With some difficulty I got up to leave, collecting myself, clearing the moisture from my eyes and taking care not to show any sign of sadness; grieving openly would only hurt morale and make me seem distracted, and I needed the men to feel they could trust this foreigner to lead them. Once again displaying a stoic facade, I stepped out of the tent and into the chill winds of the Daein highlands. To my surprise I found Al and Matt outside the tent instead of Jarod, and they looked very concerned.
"Matt," I greeted the newcomer with a nod. I still did not know him very well – he mostly kept to himself – but I'd trained with him a few times just to improve my hand-to-hand skills, and he seemed like a good guy. I seemed to recall him being assigned as one of Ike's retainers with so many of the Mercs out of commission. Al was in some light, leather armor and had her bow and spear slung across her back; she'd been working with the scouts, making sure the lands around the camp were clear of the enemy. "Al, back from scouting already?"
"We need to talk," Al said tersely, waving me back into the tent. I complied, though I was a little confused by her tone.
"What's going on? You guys look pretty tense..." I said cautiously. Matt was the last one in the tent, and he did a quick check before closing the flap as though to make sure the coast was clear.
"Jarod's here," Al said grimly.
"Oh good, I've been waiting for him," I replied. I got blank, amazed stares in response.
"You realize who that is, right?" Matt asked incredulously.
"Yeah, it's Jarod. He's a sergeant in the company Duke Numida sent; looks like I'll be fighting alongside him for the foreseeable future," I explained. What are they on about? "You guys've met him, then?"
"That's Jarod! As in, the Jarod, the bad guy in Radiant Dawn!" Al exclaimed. "You played the game, right?"
"Well I played the first one... never got a Wii, though," I explained. Al frowned and shook her head at me. "Are you sure about Jarod? It could just be that he has a common name, I mean he's a pretty decent guy."
"He looks exactly the same," Matt said, as though it were damning evidence. I laughed.
"There are over ten thousand people in camp; I bet I could find a lookalike of just about anyone," I countered.
"With the same name?" Al asked, rolling her eyes.
"Maybe it's a common name!" I shot back, knowing full well what a weak argument it was but still unwilling to believe what they said. Jarod was good person... wasn't he?
"It's him, I'm sure of it!" Matt exclaimed. "Look, I know we agreed not to use our knowledge to mess with events, but that doesn't mean we should cozy up to the wrong people; trust me, Jarod's bad news."
"We don't know for sure-" I started.
"Same general plot, same bad guys," Al pointed out. "Look, I know Boyd's coma has you pretty shook up-"
"I'm fine," I cut in tersely. Al just raised an eyebrow doubtfully.
"-but you need to think clearly here, Adam. Do the words 'complete sociopath' ring any bells? This guy is dangerous," Al insisted. Matt nodded his agreement.
"Look, even if he is who you say he is, I'm working with him now and that's just the way it is. If I see him turning into a psycho killer I'll let you know, but until then let's not go throwing accusations around!" I replied gruffly, brushing by the two of them and leaving. They would be angry, no doubt, but I could not afford to be paranoid about any of the men I would be fighting with. Our lives would depend on our cohesion. Outside, Jarod had finally arrived. I hoped he had not overheard anything that was said, that would lead to a terribly awkward conversation: So yeah, these are my friends and they think you're gonna turn into the personification of evil. Nice to meet you. Great, just great!
"Sergeant," I greeted the man standing just outside the flap. Fortunately, he gave no indication that he overheard anything and followed me away from the tent. I could feel my friends' disapproving gaze on my back, but there was really nothing I could do about it.
"Sir," Jarod replied in turn. "Looks like we'll be fighting together again."
"It does," I said, keeping my tone even despite my nervousness. He was – at least from what I had seen – far more qualified than me for command, and I worried he would resent Ike's decision. "Alright, I'm gonna come right out and say it; if you have any issue with me being in command, sergeant, let's hear it now."
"None, sir," he replied without missing a beat.
"Really, none?" I asked with a raised eyebrow. "You didn't want to be promoted?"
"And who would take my place? You saw the men; they're well trained, but most have never seen combat before. This is the first time I've been to war, and unlike you I've never fought Daein before. You, on the other hand, well, like me you've fought beside the men and they know you won't run from a fight or hide in the back. You're not from Begnion, but I guess you'll do... for now at least," he offered. With a superior smile, he added "Besides, a sergeant deals with the hard parts anyway; you just have to tell us where to go and what to do, I'll worry about how to accomplish it. Basically, I'm the one who needs to be competent."
I let out a mirthless laugh at his comment, then inquired "Well if you've never been to war before, then how did you get your rank, sergeant?
"I saw some action against raiders from Kilvas. I survived a few engagements, so they promoted me," Jarod explained with a helpless, self-deprecating shrug. "Everything I know about leading soldiers, I learned from watching the captain and well... he's dead now, so I guess it's up to us to pick up where he left off." Jarod's fist clenched at his side, the only sign he let show of his anger. I pretended not to notice; losing a mentor had to be hard. "At least you have experience fighting Daein."
I almost said 'not much more than you do,' but stopped myself short of that stupid mistake; if he had some faith in me, who was I to shatter his illusion? "Kilvas, eh?" I asked instead, remembering the Kilvas corsairs that helped Daein at sea. "Nasty opponents. You know any good ways of fighting them?"
Jarod nodded as he considered the question. "I know of a few tactics that worked well," he replied after a minute. "Expecting Kilvas to show up?"
"It's a possibility; they were with Daein a few months ago," I said, weighing the options for drilling the men in my head. After the battle, they clearly needed to work on unit cohesion too. "I'll get you to teach rest of the unit what you know when time allows, but for starters let's work on the shieldwall; it didn't last long into the engagement..."
We walked off discussing and debating ways to drill the troops and improve unit cohesion (and hopefully the survival rate). He had a lot of good ideas and advice; hopefully, he would not turn out to be what Al and Matt thought he was.
A/N
Review Responses
MarkKrisRobin: Sadly, I can't answer your question about whether Jarod and Adam will be enemies because spoilers, but I have plans. Muahahahahahaha.
godofmadness43: Oh, is it ever.
nekuromansa000: Happy New Year to you too! You raise some good points about armor, and it is something that's left me scratching my head more than once. I will do my best to answer your questions, and apologize in advance for the sheer length of my ramblings.
Steel plate armor is of course extremely expensive, and everything I have read about medieval armies indicates that heavy plate and other such arrow-proof armors tended to be for the nobility and knights, as well as men-at-arms in the late Middle Ages (all cavalry), and even then there is evidence (such as at Agincourt) that longbows can penetrate the thinner armor on limbs at fairly long range. Steel plate armor became common in the late middle ages, but then we're also getting into the time of primitive firearms, which don't fit in the FE universe. As a captain is still a fairly low rank within the army, and this one was in the infantry, I assumed that he would really only be able to afford chainmail or thin wrought-iron plate which is far more vulnerable to arrows, and the common soldiers are likely only able to afford some form of light mail or hardened leather. The use of plate armor in FE artwork tends to be a little puzzling, as even the lowest male soldier has plate mail on, but the Holy Guards just have a little plate of metal over their upper chest. I'd chalk that up to weight restrictions of flying units, but then there's the wyvern knight armor... and the mounts are the same approximate size... And then, of course, there is the absurd pauldrons you mentioned on the Generals. Ha, can you imagine trying to wear those, let alone walk and fight?! How would one lift their arms, or even stand for that matter? And then try taking those off after a battle... heh, anyone helping them would be in danger of getting squished. Yes, they will be smaller in this fic, although I think I will keep the Black Knight's kit the same. After all, he is supposed to be uber-imposing and just so much better than everyone else. What was I saying? Oh, yes, arrows penetrating armor. Well considering this is set in a medieval-esque land, I assume the Daein longbowmen were using bodkin points on their arrows, whose narrow points and focused energy have proven effective even against chainmail, but are only deadly against plate armor at a close range. Basically, where the force of a broadhead can be absorbed by several links, the bodkin will only strike a few, thereby giving it a much better chance at punching through and making a shish kebab of the soldier underneath. And a sling bullet is of course going to make a gnarly mess of someone if it strikes an unarmored area. Simple but wicked weapon, always wished they had it in FE.
The shields... well, to form a shieldwall the Begnion soldiers would need either a Roman-style scutum, a Norman style kite shield, or those massive wooden roundshields carried by Norse warriors. Personally, I would tend towards the kite shields, as it saw widespread use in the Middle Ages. My OC used a roundshield, which is lighter and better for hand-to-hand combat, but not as good against arrows. The captain's shield was more like a Spartan shield, but most soldiers will not be equipped in that style.
As for battle tactics, I just hope that I can do a half decent job of portraying them. I have studied tactics for fun since I was a child, and I have always been a big fan of guys like Alexander, Gaius Julius, Pyrrhus of Epirus, and of course Hannibal Barca. For medieval tactics, I have been looking at the Black Prince (he used flanking longbows to blindside the French, shooting their horses out from under them and neutralizing their cavalry), and of course men like William Wallace and Lywellyn the Last, who resisted English conquest with varied success but great tactics and leadership. This Wahington fellow, though... Since Tellius Fan mentioned it, I have read up on him just a little (just wikipedia, no books yet; haven't had time to go to the library, but I mean to as soon as I get the chance) and he is very impressive. Should I get the time, I will try to analyze his strategy/tactics and see if they can be incorporated into the fic.