First through the breach, he slew the first figure to charge out of the dusty gloom at him. It was done easily enough. A quick sidestep and slash cut below the breastplate and hacked through the man down to the hip bone. He went sprawling and screaming onto the pile of rubble that used to be part of the city's walls.
The next one he could see a bit better. A young man, wide-eyed and fuelled with adrenaline. Probably his first battle. Probably conscripted when the city was first besieged. The mercenary had only to deflect a clumsy spear thrust and bring his sword singing back across the haft to cut the young soldier's throat so deep his head almost came clear off.
Behind the mercenary his company was pouring through the breach and falling upon the exhausted and diseased defenders. Any pretence of battle lines had devolved into a ferocious, lop-sided melee. But that's the kind of fight you want, as a mercenary. An easy one.
The third one was a woman. Older. Her helmet and its crest marked her out as a captain. So perhaps she was someone worth paying a mite more caution towards, given that she might have had more than her fair share of training.
She lasted longer than the other two. Actually blocked his first flurry of cuts with her shield. Her returning strike with her mace was a mistake though. He cut neatly across her wrist and the mace clattered to the floor with a spurt of blood. In pain and desperation, she threw out her shield in a wide arc at him, which he had to lean to avoid. It gave her the moment she needed to pull the dagger from her belt.
Her grip was limp and slick with blood. She tottered as the blood trickled out down her forearm, as she attempted to stand firm against his circling. He danced one way, feinted, and came up the other side. Her shield tracked his movements, held up close to guard her body. He hated shields. Slowed everything down. Even the inevitable.
He waited a moment more, then delivered a hard kick to the front of the shield. If the strength had not been bleeding from her wrist, perhaps she'd have stayed on her feet. As it was, she clattered to the floor on her back, like an upturned beetle, and so for the mercenary, sticking her in the gut was as simple as spearing a chunk of meat on a fork.
He left the captain to die gurgling on the streets of her city. His men were busy mopping up the last of the defenders at the breach. It wasn't fair. They outnumbered the defenders, they were far better trained and armed, and they were well fed and rested. The city stood no chance. But then, if it were fair, he wouldn't be doing it.
Paddy Dobson
22nd September 2022