Table of contents for Themes of Eternity
“Here they come again!” Cortix cried. His eyes were bloodshot and his hair was ruffled. His armor was beginning to rust, and he smelt like a pigsty. He hadn’t had any decent sleep for five days.
Neither had we.
It was the fifth day of the new goblin offensive, and I hoped it would be over soon. Looking around, I could see the weary members of my unit picking themselves up and hastily getting into battle formation. It had been raining for three days, and the ground below the fort was covered in low-lying fog. Perfect time for a sneak attack. Except for the fact that we had a diviner on our side who could tell when they were coming and give us enough warning to prepare.
You would think that after eighteen sorties the gobs would give up.
But when you knew you couldn’t die, I guess even goblins would get brave enough to attack a stockade guarded by heavily-armed soldiers. Or so the theory went, anyway. Some people believed that they were just too stupid to know when to quit.
A faint rustle sounded through the mist, and immediately my battle instincts took over. Two arrows went flying through the air, and were met with a shriek of pain. One down…
Realising their cover had been blown, the goblins gave a roar and charged forward. We mowed them down as fast as we could, shooting arrow after arrow at the vague figures darting around in the mist. All too soon, they were raising ladders to breach the ramparts and climbing fast.
A ladder landed near me. I hastened to push it off, but was met by a hail of stones and arrows, preventing me from getting close. On the other side of the ladder, Kilsay was hit in the neck and fell off the wall. I wondered if that scar on his left arm would disappear this time, when he came back tomorrow. Robert and I had a bet on it. You never returned exactly the same. Sometimes a scar would disappear, sometimes a lock of hair would be gone, sometimes old wounds would reappear. Every time you died and resurrected again, your body would be just a little different, though your mind would be the same. Robert and I had bets on how everyone would look the next time they came back. Kilsay’s scar was big money.
Damn. I had let myself get distracted in the middle of the fight. The lack of sleep was beginning to tell on me. Already, the first goblin had ascended the ladder and was charging at me with his scimitar. I quickly drew my sword and blocked a strike that would have swept my head off. The goblin growled at me and bared his teeth. His breath stank of alcohol.
It was the wine, of course. The whole tribe was insanely addicted to wine. Whenever their supplies began to run low, they would mount punitive raids on the winery to get a few casks. Every raid, they managed to steal just a little bit more, enough to continue their drunken revelries.
Vesine and Latis had been safely evacuated a long time ago, when we first got word that the goblins were on the prowl again. Caladak only contained the garrison now. And we had been fighting for five days straight, through day and night raids. Glydoc knows when it would stop. Probably only when the chiefs decided that they had enough to last them until the next month or so.
I drew my dirk with my free hand and tore a hole in my goblin’s guts. That snarl of ferocity quickly changed into astonishment, then disbelief, and then slumped into defeat. I kicked the corpse off the rampart. It would disappear by the end of today, anyway. Bloody, useless drunks, fighting a meaningless war to get more liquor. I spat at the falling body.
That cost me. Before I could recover, I saw another scimitar flashing down at my face from the goblin that had come up after the first. It was too late to dodge, so I braced myself to take it. A line of fire drew itself deep across my face into my skull.
Ouch. That’s going to hurt tomorrow, I thought as I died. There was no regret, no sense of loss, merely resignation. Death no longer had any meaning for me. It was nothing but one of a hundred experiences that made up a soldier’s life, a facet of that kaleidoscope of futile battles in an endless war. I die today, but tomorrow I shall live once again.
Tomorrow, the meaningless cycle will begin anew.
