Regina in the battlefield

“Captain, are you feeling well?” The man asking was Regina’s Lieutenant, Andrei, a man in his forties, battle-hardened with enough scars to prove it. Regina was sitting on top of a flat rock from which she could witness the battlefield in which they had fought, the sun was setting but there was still enough light to witness the hundred or so corpses that had tainted the beautiful emerald green with crimson red, soldiers, from her side, walking through the corpses to find riches and wounded allies, any possible prisoners would suit them well too as ransoms had become quite expensive during the war.

“Under the weather, that’s it”

“No, that’s not it and I can see it in your eyes, you have that stare” Regina was lost in the battlefield, she kept admiring it but not in an aesthetical fashion, simply she could not understand what transpired the moment she had ordered the charge, something she had only heard about and remembers great heroes would often come out alive from, hers almost wasn’t the case. The charge began, heavy cavalry rolled through the battlefield, the enemy had archers and swordsmen, some axe men too, but no cavalry at all, they had just landed and were bound to pillage the countryside but she would not allow, not on her watch, the horses ran full speed ahead, the smell of horses, leather, metal, sweat, everything was perceivable, her right arm held a lance and on her left side hung a serrated axe, L’Enfant terrible, the terrible child, she called it, and nothing more, her bow now useless but not depreciated and never a believer of shields, not until what transpired that day, they dropped into the enemy, her lance piercing one of them completely but breaking in the process and an unseen throwing axe cutting her off the horse and into the ground, she reacted quickly but her back hurt, it hurt like never before, and with axe in hand, her horrid spawn, she started to cut through, one after another, all falling down to the might of such a terrible weapon, while taking care on all sides and from the horses, who twice almost stepped on her, until there was nothing more standing but them… at least what was left of them; for the second time in her life she had seen death and evaded it “So… what now?”

“Make camp, we’ll pick up the loot and sell it once we reach the next town, today we rest and eat plenty”

“What about the ship?”

“Burn it”

“We could use it to get to the next town”

“None of us know how to drive a ship and if they use oars it may be even worse, I don’t think there are enough of us left to make it halfway through before succumbing to the sea”

“That is true; we could save part of it though”

“Get the sails down, cut some wood to make a fire or two then look around to see if there is anything of value in that ship, once done burn it, those are my orders and they are final”

“As you wish Captain”