A Daemon-Horn Blade Ch. 13

He then shut his eyes and his ragged bloody breathing stopped, and the old man was at peace. Gwenda, with tears to her eyes tried to regain her feet to avenge him, but her wounds were too great. The Foole and Ashburn were now both at her side, and moments after the Lore-Master poured a few drops from a small glass bottle into her lips, she fell into unconsciousness.

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The battle ended abruptly about noontime, when Rowan looked up to find that no living foe faced him. The field outside the town was strewn with just the dead, and the remaining soldiers of the Regiment. Slowly, he allowed his sword to shut off its flame, and he collapsed into an exhausted heap onto the ground as he sheathed his sword. In the distance, he could see the round cheerful face of a rider, undoubtedly Boyle, riding up to greet him. From the size of the cavalry force that was following him, they had taken but very slight casualties, and from the looks of things they indeed performed their mission well, to prevent as many reinforcements as possible from arriving. Only parts of a few war-bands had survived, and joined at the end of the battle, but long after their presence would have been critical or decisive.

From the looks of the battlefield, most of the dead were indeed Boar-Men. Today, over eight hundred Eorfleode had thrown themselves haphazardly against a wall of steel, and fared far the worst of it. Still, nearly a hundred soldiers of the regiment, brave men and women both, had fallen, never again to arise. Most of the rest were wounded to various degrees, and only a lucky few walked away from the bloody field and abattoir of death without even a minor wound. Some would have wounds too great for them to ever bear arms again, but all of them, each and every one, would proudly remember this battle and their courageous stand to the very end of the days. To say that 'I was there at Ruromel with Rowan!' was to be the very mark and pinnacle of bravery and courage in the long years to come. Even during later battles where the odds were even greater against them, and the fighting ever more terribly desperate, it was this battle that they remembered with the greatest pride. Largely untrained men and women, led by a pair of young lads, a young woman and a Foole, had defeated and annihilated a mighty host of savages that had outnumbered them nearly three to one.

This was the first moment that the survivors actually began to really believe in Rowan, and the survival of the Duchy, and their faith in him only grew from that time forward.

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Boyle and Loren had indeed enjoyed great success with their interdiction of the reinforcements attempting to cross the river. Bodies by the hundreds were floating down the river and they littered the countryside and riverbank . It had been a slaughter as the eighty-four cavalrymen and archers emptied their quivers into the helpless and defenseless creatures, allowing relatively few to escape to join their equally doomed fellows.

Not convinced that the town was entirely yet out of danger, Rowan ordered that the cavalry now go patrol in groups all around the town to the distance of several leagues, so that they could be certain that no more war-bands were roaming the area. Their report later in the evening confirmed that the region was now secure, and the regiment could settle into the town securely for awhile to rest and recover.