Lord Baird Attacks

Lord Baird pulled sharply on the reigns of his nervously stamping warhorse, looking up at the battlements of New Boston’s castle that towered ominously over him and his small **** of mercenaries. The castle walls were a jagged, weathered gray. Daunting. At regular intervals on the walls were starkly outlined pikes mounted with skulls. A inhospitable winter wind keened cruelly through the air, setting dust devils dancing.

Trull, a lean faced, hawk nosed knight waited for his lords command, proudly holding aloft Baird’s dark blue standard. “My lord, the men await your orders.” He was an intelligent and ambitious man, but his rise through the ranks of Lord Liam’s guard had been constrained by his common birth and a lineage that included a **** born great grandmother. Baird only saw the man’s drive and potential and had been quick to recruit him. Trull had no love for Lord Liam.

Lord Liam Boston of New Boston stood atop the battlements and looked condescendingly down upon Baird’s men. “Your skull will join my decorations soon Baird,” he promised loudly.

“No Lord. Your ‘skull’ will grace my ‘pike’. And I mean that figuratively… because I’m going to let you live… as a cocksucking ****!” he yelled then turned to Trull. “Do you want to be a Lord, Trull? Because I can give you Lord Liam’s body, life and domain - if you swear undying loyalty to me.”

Trull nodded as he considered Baird’s strange promise and believed him. “Aye my lord. I do. And I will.”

Lord Baird’s ten men prepared for battle. Each was armed with a neural disrupter, advanced technology from the confederation that was forbidden on Acteon by both custom and law. In contrast Lord Liam’s one hundred men were armed with medieval weaponry – bows, swords and spears. The outcome of this battle was never in question to Lord Baird. It reminded him of the mythical charge at Krojanty of Polish cavalry versus Nazi tanks.

“Open the gates. Sally forth and butcher this rabble. Bring me Baird’s head!” Lord Liam ordered and the gates opened.

Trull shouted encouragement to Lord Baird’s men in response. "For Lord Baird and a new dawn! For justice and equality!" The men roared in reply, their voices echoing off the castle walls. Trull turned to Baird, "My Lord, do you want us to target the archers first?"

“Yes. Have at them!” Baird snarled, brandishing his neural disruptor.

As if on cue Liam’s archers fired. Arrows whistled a deadly tune through the air but they hit more of Baird’s forbidden technology, an electromagnetic **** shield, and the swarm of arrows hung in the air, eerily suspended in space for a moment before clattering harmlessly to the ground.

“Magic!” One archer cried.

“Forbidden technology!” Another accused.

The archers kept firing uselessly. The charging cavalry, unused to such weaponry, were quickly cut down by the blasts of the neural disrupters. The mercenaries, led by Trull, charged forward, overwhelming the defenders with their unprecedented weapons. The battle was swift and bloodless, enemies falling senseless to the ground in paroxysms of agony. Lord Liam watched in slack jawed disbelief, then, realising he was outmatched, retreated to the keep proper, locking the gates behind him.

“Bring me Lord Liam alive. Shoot everyone else…” Baird ordered lazily. The disrupters erased short term memory. No one on Liam’s side would remember how Baird had won this day - not if everyone in the castle was knocked out by the disrupters.

As Lord Baird's forces secured the outer bailey, Trull rushed to the keep. He addressed his men, "Our victory is not yet complete. Capture Lord Liam! Let us end this here and now!" They stormed the keep, indiscriminately shooting their way up the winding stairs to Lord Liam's chambers. There, they found Lord Liam, defiant to the last.

Trull swaggered in confidently and looked about Lord Liam’s sumptuously appointed bedchamber that was promised to him by Lord Baird. Soon he would take on the mantle of Lord Liam. At the **** rail on the bed cowered a whipped and naked **** girl named Sial. She was Lord Liams current favourite and Trull had long coveted her tiny vivacious body.

"Trull!? You traitorous **** born scum! You will not take me alive!" Liam shouted, drawing his sword.

“I did not betray you, Liam. You betrayed me by constantly misjudging me. I was the smartest, most skilled and most able of your men - and the most loyal. And yet you could not look past my low birth!” Trull raised his disrupter, hesitating for a moment then dialling the power down. "My lord, there will be no glorious warriors **** for you. We don't need to kill you. We don’t even need your surrender," he said, his voice steady as he fired.

Lord Liam tensed and shuddered in pain, sword slipping from nerveless fingers as he toppled. Trull reached to his belt for his manacles. “You should never have looked down on me, lord,” he spat. Then he turned his attention to Sial. Lord Liam was defeated. **** and plundering would normally follow. But Lord Baird had given explicit instructions and most of his men were wise enough to not disobey Lord Baird. No one slept with the slavegirls until Baird said they could.