The harsh sting of sand and fierce, gusting wind on her face brought clarity to the Lieutenant's mind as she turned her gaze to slowly survey the pair of militia units under her command. Twenty Blood Spears, proud in their black cloaks, stood in ranks behind their Sergeants. These light infantry soldiers would bear the brunt of the attack she knew was shortly coming, clad just in cuirbouilli armor, with jade-emblazoned shields and weapons in hand; but they'd meet it prepared by a daily training regimen that sifted out the weak and left only the strong of body and heart.

Still, the Lieutenant worried as she paced a few steps. Nothing on her expression or in her tall, firm posture betrayed any emotion but calm determination to her soldiers, and yet she knew that some would undoubtedly not return from this battle--and the imminent loss of loyal young men and women pained her. "But we've all sworn our lives and deaths to the Highlord," the Lieutenant reasoned with herself, under her breath. She twitched the edge of her jade-shouldered black dustcloak back to reveal the polished gleam of silt-horror armor as she stopped to again look over her units, knowing that the fine figure she cut was an inspiration to those under her.

Raising her dragon-etched, obsidian-bladed axe high above her head to shake it, the Lieutenant pitched her voice over a sudden scream of wind which whipped tendrils of her own night-dark hair into her face. "Blood Spears!" she addressed the soldiers. Tension was evident on each face as they stared at her, weapons gripped tightly. "Remember you are the steel blade in the Highlord's hand! You are His Arm, and you will not fail!"

A cry to the Highlord lifted from the soldiers, and they beat their shields in response to their commander. As their shouting echoed in the dusty street, now abandoned by everyone but militia, fools, and those with no refuge, a familiar mind sought the Lieutenant's. "Gith spotted, Miner's and Commoner's, press in from your position and hold the road, order of the Captain," was the message abruptly relayed by the Senior Adjunct before he broke the link. "Thank the Highlord I don't have his job today," the Lieutenant thought, briefly amused, before shouting orders to her Sergeants. "The gith are coming, fall in!"

They engaged the gith after a hurried march west along the winding street, the units abreast to fill the relatively narrow span between sagging mudbrick buildings. With a full unit of soldiers to each side, shields raised in a line to neatly deflect blows, the Lieutenant charged amidst the enemy. In Allanak, where combat prowess was taken into account for promotions, the top officers were also the best warriors, and it was her duty and joy to lead the fight.

Had her thoughts not been keenly focused on the battle, the Lieutenant's senses would have been overwhelmed by the stench of sewer-soaked gith, the baleful red glare of the sun directly overhead, the guttural snarls of the enemy, and the clang of weapons and shields as blows began to fall. With short, sharp strokes of her axe, she struck again and again at the enemy around her, facing off with two or three at a time as waves of gith assaulted the militia line. Her movements settled into a methodic rhythm of blocking and parrying gith spears and swords, the motions requiring nothing but the instinct gained by ten years of soldiering. One of the yellow-skinned gith before her swung its club hard at her wrist, apparently aiming for a disarming hit, but before the blow could connect she easily twisted her hand and sent its weapon flying back through the enemy ranks. As an expression of surprise crystallized on the gith's face, the Lieutenant continued the quick arc of her axe and sunk a vicious chop into its neck. A hot spray of blood spattered across her bronzed cheek, and the gith crumpled. Striding over the body, the Lieutenant merely picked a new foe and set to work.

With lesser but still effective expertise, the soldiers to her right and left advanced alongside as she led them deeper into the Commoners' Quarter against the gith. The absurdity of fighting a battle against thousands of these disgusting creatures within the walls of her own beloved city--for her own territory!--did not prick the Lieutenant's mind at this moment, though it had weighed heavily for the past month, as gith forays up through the sewer pipes and into the city increased. All that lay before her now was the certainty that the war was finally here, and it had to be won.

A sudden, sharp twang caught the Lieutenant's attention through the din of battle; a noise she'd been dreading. Clattering dully to the packed earth of the road, a wooden arrow narrowly missed the Sergeant to her right. Harsh yells in gith-tongue from what seemed to be their leaders rang in the street, and the horde of gith scrambled backwards clumsily as more arrows, and then spears, began to fall toward the militia line.

Again, instinctive reaction forged from years of combat experience took over. Sensing an arrow flying toward her, the Lieutenant raised her shield and batted it away; the next arrow she struck from the air with her axe. The Private to her left, in his first real fight since taking the black, was helpless against the onslaught of missiles. He screamed shrilly as an arrow caught in his thigh, a sound which was abruptly cut off as a spear *thunked* into his neck. Eyes gone blank, the soldier toppled forward, his life's blood seeping out onto the threatened ground of his birth city.

Time seemed to lengthen, arrows and spears hissing slowly toward the Lieutenant's line, in the moment of mental pause that it took for her to consider the only two possible options: Advance, or retreat. Faced with missiles, without cover, light infantry had no other course of action but to change the distance between themselves and the attackers. To stand in place was to let the enemy cut her units down at will; and retreating to leave the Commoners' Quarter open to gith pillage was absolutely not acceptable. "Forward!" she shouted at her Sergeants, and rushed toward the disarrayed line of gith warriors, sunlight glinting off the freshly-blooded obsidian blade of her axe. Their motion no longer arrested by the hang of time, missiles rattled to the road behind the Lieutenant's force as she and her soldiers ferociously pressed the attack, becoming enveloped in the heat of battle again.

Minutes, hours, maybe a day later--she knew little except the primal, triumphant feeling of being covered head-to-toe in smears of gith blood--the Lieutenant screamed a furious, wordless war-cry as the few remaining gith broke their line, turned, and scurried away like jozhal. Enemy bodies littered the street; though the gith were individually tough, their unsophisticated, tribal methods of war were no match for the training and strategy of the Highlord's soldiers. Still, as she turned, panting for breath, the Lieutenant saw that her force was not without losses. Another Private had fallen to gith missiles before the distance could be breached, and a Corporal had been lost to the blades of a group of four gith. But there was no moment to spare for mourning them or moving their bodies; it was those who were alive but wounded who needed attending now.

As the Sergeants assessed the condition of the soldiers, medics assigned to the units moved amongst their companions, quickly wrapping bandages around wounds to staunch bleeding. Though she had learned over the years the basic techniques of bandaging on the battlefield, the Lieutenant did not move into the ranks to treat the soldiers; those assigned to that job needed the satisfaction of putting their expertise to work for their fellows. Watching the deft motions of the medics' hands, the Lieutenant allowed a brief feeling of pride to swell her chest. There'd be no need for any of -her- troops to be submitted to treatment by the water wigglers stationed at the field hospital at Meleth's, not today.

Then, the Lieutenant found her attention caught by a young Corporal whose face had paled under the usual dark tone of his skin, and whose eyes were wide and fixed on some distant, unseen thing. Shaking arms were crossed over his body and his fingers clutched at the black armbands he wore as rank insignia, as if that might stop the trembling. Stepping around a few soldiers to move to the young man's side, the Lieutenant leaned in. "Something wrong, Corporal?" She kept her voice low and warm; the question was for him only. Slowly, he focused on his commander, mouth hanging open for a moment before he found words to respond. "I tried, sir, I tried t' save 'er, but there was too many on 'er, an' I couldn't pull 'em off fast enough," he choked out. Clearly stricken, he turned his stare to the still form of the fallen Corporal, her brunette hair darkly matted with drying blood from the sword wound which had cleaved her helmet and head.

In a flash, empathetic sadness threatened the Lieutenant's composure; how often had she felt this same regret at her inability to protect a companion? No matter how good a soldier was, there would be failures. It was never possible, in the brutal rush of battle, to be everywhere or even to see everything as it happened. But that knowledge was cold comfort, and wouldn't help the living Corporal manage the loss of his unit-mate right now.

Gripping his shoulders, the Lieutenant shook the Corporal gently, her green eyes boring intensely into his brown ones as he met her gaze. "Corporal," she firmly addressed him. "You did what you could. We need you here right now. The war's not over yet, and you've got a job to do. You hear me?" After a moment's blank stare, the Corporal heaved a breath and nodded. "Aye, sir," he rasped. Nodding in return, the Lieutenant stepped back, still watching him, and squared her shoulders into a taut military posture. Unconsciously, the young Corporal mimicked his commander's posture as he gathered himself.

"Blood Spears! Prepare for the next engagement!" the Lieutenant shouted as she pivoted on a black-booted foot to face the setting sun, grip flexing on her axe. The solid weight of the gore-coated weapon in her hand was a reassuring reminder that victory surely belonged to the Highlord's Arm. Her soldiers took up positions again, and then a tense silence befell them as dark figures appeared on the road ahead, silhouetted against the angry red of sunset. The gith were coming.