The Vampire & Her Witch

”Shields together! Shields Together,” Sir Carwyn Belvin yelled as he prodded his horse into a full gallop. ”Beware the archers! For the Hounds!”

Carwyn wasted no time waiting for his men as he charged toward the flat tailed demon archers. He clutched his shield with one hand and in the other, he tightened his grip on the short, wooden handle of a horseman’s flail. At the end of the wooden rod, an iron chain the length of his forearm connected to a smooth, iron ball that the young knight had already begun to spin as he rounded the bend in the road.

Lying low against his horse’s neck, Carwyn relied on the speed of his charge to evade the arrows streaking at him. His vision narrowed as he glimpsed an archer who had advanced too far forward in the hopes of landing a better shot, straying close enough to the road to strike as Carwynn charged by. In one smooth motion, he lifted his shield into place to protect his left side and head while his feet and knees prodded his trusted companion to run down the startled demon who had clearly never faced a charging horse in battle.

The flail spun even faster as he charged, leaning to the side in his saddle as he swung at the demon’s unarmored head. The startled creature cried out in surprise, dropping its twisted bow and trying to dodge out of the way. Unfortunately for the demon, it underestimated Carwyn’s reach by nearly a foot, and that mistake cost the archer his life.

-CRUNCH-

A sickening sound filled the air and bright red blood, shattered teeth along with bits of wet, thicker things sprayed into the air in a gruesome crimson rain as Sir Carwyn’s horse thundered past, breaking past the demons and rounding another curve in the road to vanish from sight as a storm of black-fletched arrows came whistling at him from behind.

”The Hounds! The Hounds!” Carwyn’s men cried behind him as they charged into battle, using the distraction of his charge to close the gap with the archers. With ten of them marching side by side in two rows of five soldiers, they intended to form an anvil, pinning the savage monsters in place for Carwyn to hammer against on his returning charge, trapping the monsters between them.

Few of them had ever seen a demon, and the ones they had seen were all pathetic scavengers, cast out of their homes and preying on human villages to survive through the winter. They were nothing like the organized and well-equipped demons they faced now, but that didn’t change the discipline that Sir Carwyn and his father before him had drilled into the men who pledged to protect their village. Now, with shields in hand, they advanced as one, ready for Sir Carwyn’s next charge to crush the demons against their wall of shields and the points of their spears.

It didn’t take long for the archers to adjust their tactics, turning their bows from futile shots at the mounted knight charging away from them to focus their fire on the approaching formation of lightly armored men. Arrows slammed into shields with a heavy -THUNK- and one man cried out in pain as a skilled archer managed to fire through a gap between shields.

Blood flowed from his shoulder, and the arm that held his spear went numb, dropping his weapon as the injured limb dangled uselessly at his side. Still, he held his position, keeping his shield in place to cover himself and his neighbor as they advanced rapidly on the demons.

Some of the flat tailed demons darted backward, keeping the distance open as they continued to loose arrows from their strangely twisted bows, while others dropped their bows in favor of long, curved knives, suitable for carving flesh and bone the way their claws carved wood. Even they retreated, however, as the three serpentine demons wearing knightly armor and strangely plumed helms pressed forward onto the roadway.

”Krujauni anqan iktu iliyu! Rujon, plet kuloj niš tu!” the demon with the green plumage in his helm shouted as it slithered onto the road to face in the direction that Sir Carwyn had ridden. Already, the sounds of thundering hooves echoed off the dirt road as the knight began his second charge while his men faced off against the armored demons.

Seeing the demon-knight on the road before him, Sir Carwyn’s expression became grim, and he cursed himself for riding into battle without a lance or at least a long sword. Against common bandits and highwaymen, the flail should have been more than enoug,h and even against the cat demons of Airgead Mountain, he shouldn’t have been at a great disadvantage. But who would have thought that he’d have to fight against another knight, a demon knight no less?

”A man can’t always choose his battles, son,” his father had told him when he asked if he should join in Lord Owain or Lord Liam’s wars over the summer. ”Given enough time, a man’s battles will find him. Fight the ones you have to and never run from them, but never seek out a battle you do not need to fight.”

”You have a woman now, and a child soon,” the aging knight said. ”Your shield bears the family coat of arms for a reason. Your shield is for them, and after them, it’s for this village. If the war against the demons ever comes to us, then raise your arms against them. Until it does, treasure the days of peace you have, they’ll be over soon enough.”

You were right, Father, Carwyn thought as he charged the demon knight. The shield he carried was there to protect his wife and unborn child, and after them, the men under his command today. If he wanted to keep anyone safe, he had to defeat these demons before they could turn back on the village, where there were no protectors strong enough to stop them.

It was a hopeless charge, he realized as he gazed at his unflinching foe. At best, he would be able to defeat one of the demon knights before the others dragged him down. But hopeless or not, Carwyn thought, his battle had found him, and it was time to fight it to the end.