Board Thread:Roleplaying/@comment-3293219-20160327203530/@comment-5543592-20160330204612

Crimson headed up to the clearing Forks had mentioned, cloak swishing behind him.

He walked directly onto the camp, stepping over the fortifcations passed two very surprised guards.

"Chief!" One on his right exclaimed in surprise and recognition, named Evening Star, named after the twelth month of the year. "It's good to have you back."

"Yeah, I guess it's not to bad to see you louts either.  What's been going on here?"

Evening Star shrugged. "Not much.  Just what normally happens when Heartbender's put in command."

"Tightly packed tents, orderly bedrolls, lectures...?" Crimson asked, trailing off as Evening Star nodded to each.

"Well, it's only for a short time." Crimson said, slapping him on the shoulder. "Good work staring at stuff, keep at it."

The Archer walked from the fortifcations, down into the camp, past neat tents and neater bed rolls as men called out greetings to him. Crimson always ran an orderly camp and army. His men kept their unifroms crisp, didn't make a mess of things, and were respectful when on duty. But he allowed them a certain amount of freedom with what they did with their belongings and supplies. Heartbender did not share a similar sentiment. To him, an army was about absolute order.

Crimson strode into the command tent, where Heartbender was discussing in low tones with two other Keshik, both captains, over a map. All three looked up as Crimson entered, the Archer swishing his cloak dramatically in response.

"And he makes his stunning entrance!" The Redguard declared.

Heartbender's icy blue eyes settled on Crimson. The man was astonishingly beautiful, at least Crimson had heard that from women. He didn't think men were attractive. Nope, not him.

Heartbender's features were angular and overly quite pretty and perfect, with large blue eyes, well formed lips, and proud cheekbones. He was almost too handsome for masculinity.

"My lord, it's an honor that you join us." Heartbender informed Crimson neutrally.

"Not a lord, Bender, just a man with some real nice clothes."

"You are right of course, my lord." Heartbender replied, to which Crimson rolled his eyes.

"Alright," the Archer said, clapping his hands together, "What's the deal?  You guys got anything good cooking."

"The estate is not all that large." One of the captains began. "But it is walled, and only has one main gate, which they control.  We have numbers, but they could post a minimum amount of soldiers at that gate and still easily hold it against us."

"Right, so, you want to do a dual pronged attack then, open a second attack point." Crimson guessed.

"Correct, sir." The second captain said. The officers were always much more formal than the soldiers. Crimson didn't know if it was because they were sucking up too him or because they respected him so much, despite the fact that it was common knowledge he didn't like it. He suspected it varied from man to man. They obviously weren't mocking him. Crimson was unmockable.

The captain continued, "The plan was to-"

"Knock one of this big trees down on top of the wall, giving us our own high ground to attack from and creating an entry point, along with doing damage to the property!" Crimson said, rushing in with his guesswork.

"Well, no-"

"Don't backtrack now, it's genius." Crimson picked up a stick from the bare tent floor and held it on the map upright next to the sketch of the Oakvale estate, as if it was a model tree. "We put men into the bush here with long axes.  The foliage will obscure them and our forces from view, we'll have the element of surprise.  They do a some chopping and then,"  he made a slow-motion action of the massive tree falling over along with an 'errrrrr, timber!' sound effect before dropping the stick, "bam!" He slapped the table, making one of the captains jump. Heartbender raised a brow.

"And we have an entry point.  Two pronged attack.  Send the first force in at hte gate, draw all their soldiers there, then drop the tree.  The rest of the infantry can storm in uncontested.  They take the gate from behind, clean the estate out of all the those Bosmer, and we walk away with all their stuff."

"It is a good plan, my lord." Heartbender said. "But suffers from one break of tactics."

"Oh?" Crimson asked, with a raised brow. He didn't mind being challenged. Actually, he welcomed it. He liked hammering his plans into perfection. That's why he liked earnest, but blunt, men like Heartbender. They simply said whatever honest thoughts whatever came to mind.

"What if they have mages?"

Crimson shrugged. "We fill them full of arrows.  Magic doesn't make you invincible, despite what the rest of the band might think.  Besides, I don't think they do.  And if they do, I'm bringing some people on that can do magic stuff.  They'll handle it." He looked to the captains. "Just try to keep as many people alive as possible.  This is a high profile raid, but if they plan plans out like it's been planned-planned, we should have small numbers in the way of casualties."

The captains nodded slowly, and Heartbender bowed his head in difference.

"Great, now that we've all thunken some, go everyone into positions.  Wait for my usual signal to attack."

With that, Crimson was out of the tent with as much bluster as when he had entered.

One of the captains scratched his chin. "Where do you think he got that cloak, anyway?"