Letters from War
posted by Jasonmrc on 14th September 2009, at 6:39pmThis week I’m looking into the lives of a Khazardian soldier and a Gnome Archer on the Khazard Battlefield. I asked their mothers if they would mind if I read and published one of their letters from their sons (I didn’t tell either mother that I would be talking to the ‘enemy’, hope they don’t mind).
From Grazan, a young Khazardian soldier
“Hi mom!
Things are going slow here on the field. We’ve had to retreat many times because of our numbskull General, Khazard. When it comes to tactics he seems to be braindead. Just the other day he told us to charge at the enemy’s War tortoises! You know how big those things are from the sketches Zack drew for me in the last letter. Just as we were about to reach them we heard our commanders calling us back. Needless to say we lost many men. I, thankfully, was not wounded at all except for a slight cut on my leg where a random arrow whizzed past me. The enemy’s archers are the one’s that really did the damage. As we were retreating they were peppering us with arrows. Their arrows are small but boy do they hurt.
Our armor only protects our chests and heads, it does nothing to protect our legs. Many of our men had had their legs amputated on the field to save them. We’ve petitioned to our commanders about having leg armor built for us but all they say is ‘We’ll talk to general Khazard about it’. If Mr. Bonehead see’s any of us wearing pieces of plate armor on our legs he lectures us all and nearly tortures us. He’s actually killed some of our men because they wouldn’t remove the makeshift armor when he told them to. He says leg armor makes us look wimpy, yet he wears it himself! A few men tried to kill him once, but they were all found dead in their tents the night before they were going to assassinate him.
I hate it here. The food is rotten and the living conditions are terrible. Our beds are worse than dirt. Mostly they’re piles of rotting hay with rotten sacks on them. Most men would rather sleep on the dirt, but only a few have that luxury.
Love,
Grazan”
From Boiren, a young gnome archer
“Hi Mum!
I’m doing fine. Took a wee bit of a tumble last yesterday but I’m not too bruised. I hope all is well at home. How’s Dad’s business going? The last regiment that came said that this war was actually helping our economy. I hope this is true for Dad’s General Shop also. Buky, Nitroy, Guinor, and Alak all say ‘Hi’. Their Mum’s should receive letters from them on the same day as you receive this, though we both know how crazy our mail service can be.
I know you don’t like the war but I find it fascinating how patheti-sorry, ‘strangely’, these Humans fight. Just yesterday they came charging at our line of War Tortoises (Gnome! I love those guys!) and started retreating right before they reached us. Needless to say we fired at them while they retreated and got th-Sorry. We retaliated and they ran away in a disorderly fashion. I was riding my unit’s war tortoise but got bounced off as we crossed the bridge. That’s when I got my wee tumble that I mentioned earlier. We’ve been having trouble with gnomes falling off of their tortoises when they charge. Lieutenant Schepbur put me in charge of developing a new type of harness for the archers and mages on the tortoises. Needless to say my first design failed, Heehee! But Buky, who was using my second design, stayed on. Buky and I tested that design again today and it worked well, but got a little loose. Tomorrow we’re going to try a slight change I did. If we get these harnesses working right then we’ll be much more efficient on the battle field. We shouldn’t have any more rolling gnomes, Heehee!
Well Commander Montai is calling for a meeting and since I’m working on the harnesses I need to go.
I love you mum, take care of Dad and the babies for me!
Love your son,
Boiren”
Both are still at war and their mothers would not let me publish their replies.
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