The Nectar of Battle

Blood stained his breastplate, shining in the dim light, like a scarlet mirror. Blades flashed, buried themselves in pieces of flesh, cut delicate veins in two. Eyes turned listless and watched the battle emptily. The soldiers in silver moved as one, spreading like a puddle of grey water across the battlefield. Their crimson flags rippled like waves in the breeze. When their swords shattered they turned to black powder and sparkled in the dust. The golden army moved in lines, waves upon wave like a tide of liquid sunlight. They held their banners high and fired flaming arrows into the onslaught of men. Metal against metal rang out like church bells. Hunting horns sounded, men cried out. Soldiers fell; blood ran in river lines across the earth, staining the soil. The scent of copper and earth made men’s’ eyes tear. It waged through the day, littering the ground in black and red, and into the night until the armies were green and black in the moonlight, patterns on their armour encrusted with blood.

When the sun rose their flags hung limply. Men blanketed the field, a quilt of the dead. Light rain fell, and fog slithered around legs like snakes.

Once, there had been dragons. Once there had been magic, magic that came from sage men’s fingers. Merlin’s magic. Now only black magic played a part in battle, chaotic and uncontrolled, choking opponents in black dust, shattering swords into black glass. Dragons were long dead, leaders no longer chosen for bravery, blood stronger than clarity, stronger than judgment and compassion.

Battles were no longed fought, battles were endured. Death was fate, life a blessing. Peace a myth. Men were as poisoned as the earth, trained thieves and killers. Old gods forgotten, victory worshipped.

Bardic tales lost, people that had danced in the streets now lay there, still as stone, white as snow.

Men in silver fought for freedom, men in silver fought for power. Men in gold fought for their lives, fought for their kingdoms.

The moon waned, the sun rose. Green to gold, black to silver, violet to scarlet. Dragons rose in the light of day, in the fire that blazed in their eyes. Armour moved like scales, daggers drove like fangs. Men writhed as one, engulfed in flames, until their bodies melted together.

One gold dragon rose, emerald eyes flashing, facing it’s silver twin. They circled each other, lashing out fiercely, spitting and lunging. In the ashes and blood their performance became a waltz, a consummate dance, flourishing and twisting.

The dragons curled in on themselves, like a fern frond, then around one another. They wind so tightly they are almost one. They curl around and around, winding smaller and smaller until they are impossibly small, the size of garden snakes.

In the fire of the sunrise they slither away, abandoning the field of fallen men.

Behind them are two eggs, large and shining, surfaces as scaled as those that laid them.

When the heat of the sun cracks the eggs, the creatures that spill forth are not dragons. They do not burst forth with filmy wings and jewel like eyes. They are men. Ready to begin battle again, sacrifices forgotten, faded in time. Blood in the nectar of the grass. 

Text by Lucie MacAulay