He sette sege, forsothe to say, To Harflu towne with ryal aray; That toune he wan and made afray That Fraunce shal rewe tyl domesday. Deo gratias!

King Henry's armor was covered in rust. His gilded arm harness had splotches of it all over. His legs looked like they'd been left in a shed for ten years. His crowned great bascinet was brown.

It had been two days since his failure at Agincourt, and no matter how far the English army marched, the grey clouds overhead never seemed to go away. Every so often, a light drizzle would fall on them and remind Henry of his failure. Rain led to rust. Rust which seemed to be the manifestation of the rot in his soul.

Henry's royal pages were too busy to scrub off rust from Henry's armor. They were acting as couriers for the seemingly impossible task of keeping the English marching columns together. It wasn't just Henry's armor. The whole of the English army seemed to be a mass of rusty brown. There simply wasn't time for anyone to take care of their armor between the rapid marches and constant foraging expeditions. So the rust stayed.

Because Henry had failed.

The English army was conducting a forced march back to Harfleur. It was the only place they could flee to since Calais was now blocked by the heathen army. That same army had also detached a contingent to pursue the English, so King Henry had ordered a breakneck pace in order to outrun them. Of course, the English army had already been marching at a breakneck pace since before Agincourt which meant that every man was tired and the horses were exhausted.

And that only added to the fact that they were starving, wet, cold, and they'd just lost a battle to the forces of Satan which may well destroy Christendom as a result of their defeat.

Henry knew he should have died on the battlefield. He'd been ready for it. He'd intended to.

But that was not God's will.

So instead King Henry rode down the English column, encouraging men to continue on. His armor was rusty, but his surcoat displaying the quartered royal arms of England and France was still bright. Men perked up to see their king. Henry spoke to them as he went down the column, from the noblest knights to the poorest archers. He asked their names and where they were from. He praised their efforts and courage.

But most of all, Henry told men of the righteousness of their cause. He told them that they were fighting the very forces of Satan himself. He reassured that this retreat was only temporary, so that they could gather more of God's willing soldiers to drive the demons back into hell. He announced that they had not failed at Agincourt, even when deep in his heart Henry knew they had.

Henry reinvigorated in other men the very spirit that he himself had lost. He had to. Because he was the King of England and France, and he could not let himself wallow in his misery.

The army was better for it.

Henry rode down the column and finally reached the end of it. Sir John Cornwall, perhaps the greatest knight in England, was leading the rearguard. He had a hundred men-at-arms and five hundred archers to prevent the heathens from attacking the English on the march. Every man was mounted. They were the picked men of the army.

Sir John bowed in his saddle when Henry approached, as did the other men in his immediate vicinity. "Your majesty," the knight greeted.

"Sir John," Henry returned. "Is the enemy giving you any trouble?"

"None, your majesty. Most of their men are on foot, so we gain a little distance every hour we move." Sir John smiled broadly with his teeth. "They have cavalry, but it isn't worth much. Some of the lads ambushed their forward scouts a little ways back and sent them packing. They haven't tried to press us since then."

"Good," Henry said, forcing himself to match Sir John's smile. "Be careful back here. I'd rather not lose anymore Englishmen if it can be avoided."

Sir John kept his smile and replied, "No need to worry about us, your majesty. The heathens can't touch us." But then he walked his horse closer to Henry, out of earshot of the other men, and his face suddenly lost its smile. "Though I am a bit concerned about the dragon," he whispered, jutting his chin toward a point in the sky. "You can't see him just now. The rider likes to keep his distance during the day; I think he's afraid of our longbows. But he's watching us, and every so often another dragon will come to replace him."

"They're keeping a constant watch on where we're marching?" Henry murmured.

Sir John nodded. There was a spark of fear in his eye. "No matter how fast we move or where we go, they'll always know where to find us."

The military implications were… immense. But Henry shook his head and said, "That doesn't matter for now. We can still outrun them, so the plan doesn't change. We just need to reach Harfleur."

Sir John gave the slightest nod. Then he backed his horse from Henry and loudly said, "I've been meaning to ask, your majesty, when's the next time we'll have a dinner with some meat in it? The lads and I could do with a proper meal."

Henry smiled, a genuine smile this time. Because, of course, Sir John was part of Henry's military council, and he already knew that English foragers had brought in a herd of cattle just that morning. In fact, he was one of the few men in the army who knew.

"The foragers got lucky today," Henry announced just as loudly. "Tonight will be a great feast!"

A sudden cheer rose from the men in the rearguard. And like that, morale was up again.

Nat Miller saw white smoke rising from beyond the treeline in front of him and knew he was correct. There was a village there. Had to be. And a village meant food.

He signaled to his men to ride forward with him. Nat's command was twelve men, all archers mounted on rounceys, because men-at-arms were too noble for this kind of shit. They were foragers, a fancy word the lords liked to use to hide what they really did. Really they were thieves. But Nat didn't mind. He'd done far worse.

They rode through the treeline slowly, avoiding brambles and branches. Once through, Nat saw a dozen thatched buildings laid out along a dirt path that led to a well. A few strips of field were deeply plowed for sowing winter crops. Smoke rose from the chimneys in a couple homes. Other than that, there wasn't much to see. It was barely a village.

That was good, though. A century of English invasions meant that bigger French villages were often fortified with wooden palisades and rudimentary militias. Small villages were far easier targets.

"If any of you die here, I'll piss on your corpses," Nat told his men. "Don't die to some peasant with a pitchfork."

He always gave great speeches.

Oliver Shields said nothing but drew his sword and started forward. Andy Waller snickered. Nat rolled his eyes, and they all went forward as well.

The Norman villagers didn't see them until it was far too late.

Nat's men rode straight to the well and dismounted, tying their horses to it and drawing whatever hand weapons they had. Nat didn't bother with his bow since he didn't want to waste any shafts. Instead, he drew his arming sword in one hand, a good piece of steel worth two month's pay. He didn't bother with his buckler either; peasants usually didn't fight back.

Only then did some of the villagers come out to see what was going on. They'd been eating lunch in their homes, taking a break from plowing the fields.

Nat walked up to the closest one. He was an older man, and he seemed to be the only leadership the village had.

"Why are you here?" the old man asked in Norman French. "There is no need for violence. We are good subjects of King Henry."

Nat shrugged. "Eh, sorry messire, but I reckon when French soldiers come by you also happen to be good subjects of King Charles." He pointed with his sword at the other villagers. "Tell them that if they cooperate we'll just take their food. Otherwise things get messy."

The old man began to protest, and Nat rolled his eyes. With a lazy cut, he killed the old man where he stood.

A younger man screamed. The others fled into their homes.

Nat looked back to his men. "You know the drill," he said in English. "But no messing around. We haven't got time for it. I'd like to be back with the main column before the heathens get here."

The archers went to work immediately. They'd all learned how to forage effectively on the march to Agincourt. It was an invaluable skill for soldiers to have.

Pairs of men moved to different houses and began kicking in doors. They went for the best looking houses first. One man would go through the front of a house while the other went through the back. That way they'd catch anyone trying to flee with their valuables and either put them down on the spot or force them to cough up any hidden stores. Food would go in sacks on the horses. Gold and silver would 'vanish' into pouches and bags. Anything else wasn't worth the weight of carrying it. Then they'd move on to the next house and repeat.

Quick, brutal, and effective.

Nat broke open the front door of a thatched house while Andy Waller went for the rear. Inside were a man and a woman, a newly married couple if Nat had to guess. They were filling a basket with various items. The man had a woodcutting axe in his hand, so Nat put his sword into the peasant's belly.

That caused the woman to flee. She scrambled away from Nat, but she only managed a few paces before she ran into Andy Waller with his falchion. Andy stepped forward, roughly forcing the woman back toward the main hall.

Nat crouched to wipe his sword on the man's corpse. He looked up at the woman. She was staring at her dead husband, shock mixed with terror plastered all over her face.

"Don't worry, dear," Nat said, standing, "this should be quite simple. All you have to do is tell us where we can find what we're looking for, and we'll let you run off to some other village. Then you can put all of this behind you, and you can look to making a better future." Nat saw the tears in her eyes and shrugged. "Or you can wallow in your misery. I don't really care. But either way, you're going to tell me what I want."

To her credit, the woman put on a brave face. She wiped her tears and looked Nat in the eye. "There's grain and vegetables in the cellar," she spat. Then she looked back at her husband's body. "We have nothing else."

Nat gave her a thin smile. "Now that's all well and good, but I don't really believe you. So what we're going to do is I'll have a look around while Andy here watches you. And if I find something you didn't tell me about then I'll have Andy practice some swings on you with that falchion of his."

Nat nodded his head at Andy Waller who grinned with all his teeth.

"He needs the practice. And I don't like being lied to." Nat met the woman's eye again. "I don't think it'll be a very clean death, unfortunately. Lots of hacking. So, before I go looking, is there anything you'd like to tell me about?"

The woman looked from Nat to Andy then back to Nat again. Finally she admitted, "There is a small purse with some money beneath our bed. The floorboard is loose; you'll have to pry it with something."

"Was that so hard?" Nat chuckled. He looked to Andy Waller and said, "Watch her."

It only took a few minutes of searching for Nat to find the loose floorboard. He pried it out with his sword and, true to her word, there was indeed a coin purse inside. For good measure, Nat took a look around to see if anything else was hidden in the house. There wasn't, at least not that Nat could find.

He returned to the main hall where Andy Waller was softly rubbing his thumb along the spine of his falchion. There was a perverse look on Andy's face. The woman glared at Nat as soon as he walked in.

"Let her go," Nat sighed, holding up the coin purse. In Norman French, he said, "You're free to leave. Don't get caught by any of the others; they might not let you off so easily."

The woman didn't so much as blink before she was running from the house. Nat watched her sprint into a thicket of brush before she disappeared from view.

Andy Waller was civilized enough to try to hide his disappointment. "What'd she get us, boss?" he asked with only a tinge of whininess.

Nat dumped the purse onto a table. There were a handful of silver écus which Nat split evenly between them. He put his share in the kidney pouch on his belt while Andy Waller slipped his coins into a bag hanging around his neck.

Technically they were only supposed to steal food from the Normans, who were legally subjects of King Henry. But no one really noticed when some peasant's silver went missing, and no one was going to rat on him when they were doing it too. So far only one man had been hanged for it, and he'd stolen from a church which was stupid because King Henry wanted God on their side. If he'd stolen from peasants like Nat did then no one would have cared.

"Go grab the food from the cellar," Nat ordered.

Andy Waller grumbled, "Eh, where are you going?"

"To make sure no one's got a stick up their ass," Nat snapped. "Now get going!"

"Yeah, yeah, got it boss," Andy Waller muttered.

Nat heard him start mumbling to himself as soon as Nat turned for the door.

Outside, the archers were busy seizing what they could from the other peasants. Two men were chasing chickens through someone's garden. Edwin Brewster was hauling a pig he'd slaughtered on his back. Oliver Shields had a peasant's blood on his sword.

"Don't forget the grain!" Nat roared as he walked through the village. They were, after all, here for food, not loot.

A man was on his knees in front of Oliver Shields with tears running down his face. Beside him was a dead woman who Oliver had made a sloppy mess of with his sword. The man was begging in French for mercy, and Oliver Shields was busy counting coins he'd taken off of the woman's body while occasionally looking down at the poor man.

"Oi, Nat!" Oliver Shields shouted, "What's this one saying?"

Nat walked over and stood over the kneeling peasant. "He's saying you're a lazy bastard who needs to go do some real work for once in his fucking life, and that you'd better start moving grain before you get clobbered," Nat spat.

Oliver Shields looked down at the peasant, slightly confused. "He really said all that?"

"Crucified Christ, how do you even get out of bed each morning?" Nat muttered. He shook his head. "Get moving, numbskull!"

The peasant was still begging, so Nat put his sword into him to make his point. Nat looked expectantly at Oliver Shields, and the archer finally figured out what he was supposed to be doing. Nat watched for two moments as Oliver Shields scurried off into a cellar to haul grain. Then he stabbed the peasant again, because he wasn't quite dead from the first time.

Thirty minutes later, the archers rode away with heavily laden sacks slung over the backs of their horses. The village behind them was no longer a real village. Any of the peasants who'd survived the English were quick to flee with whatever was left behind. They would seek refuge at the nearest town and burden the population there with their poverty. Perhaps some would eventually return to reclaim their village, but it would be years before they could make such an effort.

Meanwhile, Nat and his men returned to the marching English army. They handed off all of their grain and poorer foodstuffs to royal officials, but they kept the best for themselves and their friends.

That night, after the army had stopped to set up camp, fifty archers gathered to feast on beef with brown bread from their 'official' rations supplemented with fresh pork courtesy of Edwin Brewster's efforts in the village. It was a nice change of pace after days of starving after Agincourt.

Of course, they weren't exactly in the clear either. The next morning, they were on the move again. A few hundred of the enemy's cavalry tried to overrun Sir John Cornwall's rearguard at noon, only to be shot down by English arrows and scattered with a charge by English men-at-arms. It was an easy victory, but it reminded the army that they were still running from the enemy.

The following two days, they made good progress through Normandy and marched over the Somme on a good stone bridge. Word had spread faster than the army that there was a demonic army at Agincourt, so the French no longer harassed or blocked their marching. Local lords simply let them go past. Many offered fealty and begged them for protection.

Good as that seemed for the King's ambition to rule France, it was bad for everything else. The new rumor was that the French army had retreated in the wrong direction, north towards Calais rather than south to Rouen. Seeing that, the heathen army had split itself with a smaller contingent going to chase the English to Harlfleur while the rest trapped the French at Calais. That meant the rest of France didn't have its royal army protecting it, and the French lords knew it.

Nat, of course, didn't give a rat's ass about the fears of the French lords. All that mattered to him was that the roads were clear, and Norman villages were free to plunder.

He led another foraging expedition with three times the men he'd led before. They found a Norman village a little ways off of the marching road and fell on it ruthlessly. The peasants here were a little more prosperous than their distant neighbors, and Nat's men all got a little bit richer. Then they left the survivors to suffer their newfound poverty and went back to the army.

After dinner, Oliver Shields led Nat through the dark to a small fire they'd set up a bit away from the main camp. Andy Waller was there and a man called Richard Glover too.

Andy put a cup of wine in Nat's hand. They sat, backs propped against a fallen tree.

"Didn't want to share it with everyone," Oliver explained. He held up a barrel of good French wine.

"Smart," Nat replied, raising his cup.

They spent the night drinking. At some point, Richard Glover left for bed and Oliver fetched Edwin Brewster to replace him. The barrel wasn't that big, but if they didn't finish it that night, they'd have to leave it before marching tomorrow. Everyone drank deeply.

"Why're you always such a bastard to us?" Oliver Shields asked, fairly late into the night.

Nat thought of a dozen answers before he replied. When he did, he just shrugged his shoulders and said, "I need people to listen."

Three days more of marching, and the English army had decisively outrun their pursuers. The dragon was still in the air, but Sir John Cornwall's rearguard wasn't being harassed anymore, so Nat was sent with some of his archers to find where the enemy was. He never found them, and neither did the other dozen scouting parties the King had sent. All Nat saw was distant smoke; the heathens were looting Normandy just like the English, only they burned the villages they passed through whereas the English only stole from them.

Regardless, the King didn't slow the pace. It took a few more days, but they reached Harfleur to the cheers of the men.

Everyone was hurried through the walls, and the men were put to work immediately. The walls of Harfleur had been repaired with fresh masonry, so the King got to work preparing for a siege. Ships were sent to England requesting reinforcements and supplies. Norman peasants were put to work redigging ditches which had been freshly filled in at the end of the last siege. Nat and the archers went foraging every day. They swept the countryside for food twice over. Then they swept the countryside for wood, rope, bricks, nails, and a dozen other minor things useful in sieges.

All the while, the heathens' dragon watched them from the sky.

After four days of preparation, Nat was assigned to one of the forward outposts. He was there to watch for the enemy. They were led by Sir John Cornwall who had, of course, volunteered for the most dangerous task available to him. Sir John had two hundred archers and two hundred men-at-arms. He put them in a patch of trees so that the dragon wouldn't see them. Nat didn't know about the others, but he certainly hadn't volunteered for this. Too much danger and too little reward. His opinion didn't matter much, though, so he was with Cornwall's forward force.

For two more days, all they did was sit, waiting for the enemy to come. Nat was bored, but he couldn't relax either because he knew the enemy could appear at any time, and then they'd be in the thick of things. So he waited, constantly on edge, and did nothing.

But then Richard Glover spotted the heathen vanguard while taking a piss, and everything happened at once.

Sir John's men-at-arms crept to pre-planned positions, and the archers got into their places on either end of the road. On one side, half the archers were covered by the foliage of a thick forest. On the other side, Nat and the rest of the archers ducked behind a thin ridgeline.

Ahead of them, heathen cavalrymen rode forward in a loose column. There were lightly armored men behind them, carrying small shields, javelins, slings, and light bows. Nat could hear more men, but they were further back along the road.

Nat took a breath then nocked a steel bodkin.

When the leading heathen was just past their position, Nat stood from the ridgeline.

He drew back to his ear. Picked his target. Loosed.

And then he roared, "As quick as you can, boys!"

Marius Co Pictor liked to share danger with his men. It was, after all, the best way to gain loyalty.

A leader who understood and endured the same hardships as those under him was much more likely to be followed than one who led from the rear. Marius's men had to know that he wasn't wasting their lives unnecessarily. For that, Marius had to lead from the front.

It made his men like him too. The Imperial Army was an unwieldy beast at best. It was composed of dozens of professional legions from across the Empire, all of which had an inherent distrust of the auxiliary forces that accompanied them and the unprofessional nobility who led them. Marius was a professional officer. His father had been noble in name alone, and Marius had risen up the ranks through merit. Now he was a legion legate, one of two in the invading Imperial Army. He was the bridge between the professional soldiers and the noble prince who led them. That meant he needed to be trusted. Men needed to obey without second thought. He needed to be liked.

So Marius chose to share the danger. At the moment he had command of a third of the Imperial Army, thirty thousand men, in pursuit of the barbarians headed south. His fellow legate, Caeso El Petasius, was with Prince Zorzal and the rest of the army, chasing the larger barbarian force to the north. That meant Marius had an independent command for once.

His command was good quality, though not everything he'd hoped for. The bulk of it was made of Imperial legionaries, well trained and well equipped, but slow for a pursuit. He had them marching with the baggage. Ahead of the legionaries were five thousand skirmishers, light troops who were better at rapid advances and covering rough terrain. With them, he placed his five thousand cavalrymen who lacked the shock power of Imperial knights but also were not as quick or mobile as light cavalry.

The cavalry and the skirmishers formed the vanguard of his army, mostly because they were the only ones quick enough to keep up with the retreating barbarians. That, of course, meant that his vanguard often outran his main column but it was an acceptable risk. If all else failed, he could have the vanguard retreat to the main body and rely on his three scout wyverns to keep contact with the barbarians.

At the moment, keeping with his policy of sharing danger, Marius was riding forward with his staff to join the vanguard. It was necessary, he assured himself, and it meant that he could temporarily ignore the logistical nightmare he was in.

It truly was absurd. The baggage train of the Imperial Army was dozens of miles long with cart horses, supply wagons, pack mules, donkeys, carts full of tents and cook pots and food and wine. His men were strung out along what could be barely called roads, really more dirt paths, which clearly had never been expected to support a functioning professional army. Occasionally, they would find stone roads, but they were always centuries old, built by some long defunct empire which could no longer support such infrastructure.

To further complicate things, they were moving through an evidently barren landscape. There were few people in this land called France. The population was so small that Marius's troops could not rely on forage alone even though the land itself was clearly fertile. Either the people here were so barbaric that they lacked the techniques to sustain a larger populace, or some great catastrophe had occurred recently. A disease or a great war, perhaps.

Regardless, there was little for the Imperial Army to steal. Whatever villages dotted the countryside, the barbarian army always got to them first. Marius's men could only scavenge whatever little was left behind.

Of course, that meant every ton of food they ate had to be moved over these insufficient roads, through the Gate, all the way from the nearest Imperial supply base at Italica.

Getting supplies through the Gate was another issue. By its nature, the Gate was only so wide, and that meant that it made for a horrible chokepoint for the Imperial baggage train. Imperial wagons could only be fitted three abreast at any time. That greatly restricted how much they could bring through, and if a cart broke while in the gate, as they often did, everything had to be halted while wagoneers fixed the problem. And the Gate wasn't exactly in an ideal place for hauling supplies either. On one side was Alnus Hill where men and horses had to drag heavy carts up a slope that had no Imperial road because, until recently, it had had no real significance. On the other side was the muddy field called Agincourt where wagons would literally sink into the mud and have to be hauled out by dedicated teams to the sorry excuse for a road network this barbaric world had.

Marius took a deep breath. Logistics had never been his favorite military exercise. Absolutely vital, yes. But nonetheless stressful and immensely difficult.

He and Caeso had assumed that the army would have been able to utilize local supplies for their invasion of this world. Now it was apparent this world was too poor, and everything would have to be brought in.

To feed ninety thousand men with supply lines like these…

And not to mention potential reinforcements…

A task for another day.

So instead, Marius rode for the vanguard. He'd been hoping that they could force an engagement against the barbarians and end this pursuit once and for all, but recent news wasn't good. Wyvern riders had reported that the barbarians were sheltering in a fortress off the coast, and that meant a siege.

Still, the barbarians were out foraging for supplies. If the vanguard was quick, they could trap part of their army outside the walls before the siege began.

Marius came into sight of the advance guard after an hour of riding. As usual, the vanguard had outrun the main body, and the tribune in charge had an advance guard riding out front to screen his force.

One of the cavalry officers had spotted Marius's staff and rode to greet him. The man saluted from the saddle and bowed his head deeply.

"We weren't expecting you, legate." He removed his plumed helmet, revealing a full head of blonde hair. "Lars Zeno, at your service, sir."

Marius gave him an easy smile and spoke kindly, "No need for any of that, Lars; we're all Saderans here. How are your men faring out here?"

"We've had no contact for several days now. I believe that the…" a cry sounded from the advance guard, and Lars trailed off.

Both Marius and Lars turned to see what was happening. A man had fallen from his horse. The other cavalry men were backing away.

There was something sticking out of the fallen man. An arrow.

A distant voice shouted, "As quyk as ye kan, boyes!"

Suddenly there was a storm of arrows falling on the advance guard. A dozen men were shot from their saddles in a moment. Then another dozen more, seconds later. Fifty barbarian knights emerged from hiding to block the road. Behind the cavalry, fifty more barbarians charged into the midst of the Imperial skirmishers and started hacking men down.

Lars put his helmet back on. "Apologies, sir," he said, before galloping towards the ambush, not waiting for acknowledgement.

Marius watched for five seconds before deciding that his rank wasn't enough to stop him from joining the fight. He grinned and looked around at his staff. None of them were on warhorses, but he'd fought with them for years now, and every one of them was as good as a Northerner on horseback.

"Arm!" Marius commanded. "Shields and helmets!"

They weren't prepared for a fight, of course, but each man had a shield bearer to carry his gear on the march. Noble boys were summoned forward carrying shields and helmets for their masters. Marius's shield bearer was twelve years old, a senator's son named Gaius. He looked fairly ridiculous sprinting forward with an oval shield as tall as him, but Marius nodded at him politely. Gaius handed over his helmet then offered his shield.

Marius took the shield in his left hand. As he did, Marius saw Lars's cavalry panic and break. They galloped through the skirmishers, trampling lightly armed men even as they desperately tried to hold off the barbarian knights. Immediately, the barbarians' focus shifted, and their archers started dropping arrows onto the Imperial skirmishers.

Marius looked around. "They're good," he commented to his staff. "If they're really good, they'll have cavalry to cover them. And cavalry could only…"

Marius watched as a hundred mounted barbarian knights crested the ridgeline their archers had been hiding behind.

They formed a solid wedge, cutting off the skirmishers from Marius's staff. Behind them, their dismounted knights and archers continued to slaughter the Imperial skirmishers.

"We're going to have to do better than this," Marius said as the last man in his staff finally took his shield. He drew his sword. "But that's for later. With me!"

Marius's staff formed a diamond to face the barbarians' wedge. Marius took the forward point, and he justified to himself that he was only doing so because it was easier to maneuver the formation from the front.

The excitement he felt said otherwise, though.

They went forward. Across from them, the barbarians started forward as well.

About fifteen seconds into their charge, Marius realized that he was attacking into a force that outnumbered his staff. And that, however barbaric the enemy was, they were wearing some very impressive steel armor. Better than Marius's armor. And Marius's staff weren't on warhorses.

The two forces crashed together at a gallop. Instantly, the two men next to Marius were gone, and his shield was smashed into pieces. One of the barbarians' heavy lances had shattered the face on impact. Marius had to drop it, and suddenly he was in a whirling cavalry melee with only his sword in hand.

He went sword to sword with a barbarian covered in steel plate. The barbarian's longsword was a foot longer than Marius's spatha, but Marius had fought against worse odds. He got his left hand against the barbarian's elbow and pushed while he rang the man's helmet with a strong cut with his spatha. But, quick as a viper, the barbarian walloped Marius across the face with a steel fist, and Marius's riding horse began backing, uncertain how to respond to the shift in weight. Marius seized his horse's reins, throwing another cut at the barbarian while steadying himself. It slid off his armor. The barbarian cut back, forcing Marius to parry high and sending reverberations through his whole arm.

"Seinte George and Engelond!" the barbarian roared.

"Emroy take you!" Marius cursed back.

He got his left hand on the barbarians wrist, and he started twisting it to break his grip. Marius's riding horse was smaller than the barbarian's warhorse, but she was game, and she backed from the warhorse while Marius twisted. The barbarian's horse bit at Marius's, but for a moment Marius was able to bash his pommel into the barbarian's visor twice. It must have dazed him, because suddenly Marius was able to strip his sword from his hand, and it clattered to the ground.

The barbarian went for his dagger, a long bladed thing with a wicked point. Marius tried to grapple for it only to be punched square in the jaw by the barbarian's free hand. He lashed out with his spatha in retribution, scoring a hard cut across the barbarian's armored wrist.

Suddenly, the barbarian turned his horse and began cantering away. The whole of the barbarian knights were riding away from the engagement, and Marius could only sag back in his saddle and watch them go.

Blood was dripping down his face. He'd been hit twice by the barbarian's steel fists, and each hurt like hell.

Gaius came up with the rest of the shield bearers to help their masters. He picked up the barbarian's dropped sword and tried to hand it to Marius, but Marius swatted it away.

"The enemy's sword, sir!" He tried to hand it to Marius again. "It's an omen of victory from the gods!"

Marius spat. But the rest of his staff took up chanting, "Victory!" even as the shield bearers started to collect the bodies of fallen masters.

Word quickly spread through the army that they'd been victorious against the barbarians. They'd held the field, so technically that made it a victory, but Marius didn't feel very victorious. The enemy's ambush had killed a hundred cavalrymen and twice as many skirmishers. He'd lost a dozen members of his staff, men who'd fought through hell and back in Falmart only to fall in this backwards world. And for all that, his men found the bodies of eight barbarians. The worst part was that their knights had clearly only charged Marius's staff to cover the rest of their ambushing force as they broke contact. They knew what they were doing, and at least someone on their side was a professional.

That night, as Marius was nursing new bruises in his tent and Imperial legionaries were starting the construction of a siege camp around the fortress locals called Harfleur, Gaius came to him with the sword again.

"The sword, sir," he offered once more. "To show your victory over the barbarians."

Marius shook his head.

"I don't know what kind of barbarians these people may be," Marius sighed, "but they don't look like barbarians to me."

Ah, logistics. Everyone's favorite military pastime.

Anyways, not much to say here. I'm enjoying writing this story so far, but as always I'm eternally busy. Chapters will come out sporadically, and they probably won't be as long as Terror Belli, Decus Pacis's chapters. Please do review. It's a great motivation to write more.