Explore lesieur

You must understand, it was quite some time ago. Long enough now that people have changed, drifted on, died, even. The space of years can do many things to a story. At a time, then, that while back, there were differing sects of knights and orders and bands operating as they did; some under the auspice of a noble, some sworn to the king, others in service of a church and faith, still others rampant and roaming as errant hedge warriors without a master. Various walks of life risen to meet the monster, the invader, and the political squabble with martial mettle and metal. Men and women fighting afield. Many of them are with us no more, or have been replaced after injury, or have become someone else. Our own little slice of the woods had a few knights who chose to be christened by the colors of their armor, rather than their house, role, responsibility, or faith, and I served with one of the ten, before she fell away to madness and marauding massacre. These they were, of their day:

To observe him, he was a swarthy, heavily bearded man with a shaved head and sailing earrings, marked by missing fingers, teeth, and a good few dozen tattoos. He wore knives and cooking utensils all over his person, alongside various tools, and a few instruments over his chef's apron and heavy shirts. Although usually hidden by his attire, one of his legs was made completely out of wood, a prosthetic to replace a limb severed long ago. It resembled nothing so much as a doll's leg, carved with surprising intricacy, though stumpish and ill fitted, as though made for someone broader and smaller. His priest could not be seen through the candlelight. "Twere years ago now, lass, afore ya were old enough to widdershins about on yer own, let alone t' drink. The rollin' of decades sits upon it like the 'eavy fog of yestereve's storms abating breaths. In that besquandered day an' time, ol' Jack were nimble, oh aye, Jack were quick, Jack had him his legs an' could get o'ver any ol' mast, let

One would be forgiven, no doubt, for believing that the knight was among the undead, between the sheer degree of physical trauma endured and her eerie, unremitted silence. If, of course, that towering, frightful figure was ever brought low to earth enough to prise off the helmet and reveal the flesh beneath in the first place, to bear witness to the tragedies writ large across it. Or if one chanced a rare glimpse at human endeavors, quite out of character for the seeming spectral hulking helmed horror. Yet there one would have it, in such an instance. Breathing, blinking, perhaps in the discomfited lack of decorum of unconsciousness drooling even, like an injured human, or rather, despite the prodigious bulk, height, and aura, as an injured human. One of better breathing and significantly more heft than most, but human all the same. Exploring that which one must then title a face, it was a thing of tatters and raggedness. Long years had dulled but never hidden the scars from the