Chronicles of Ilandri - Volume 1

Black Dawn (Pt.1)

The prison cell was dark for most hours of the day as little sunlight came through the tiny barred window to the outside and even less came though the tiny barred hole in the heavy oak door, which locked him in. The faint torchlight caused flickering shadows outside his cell, which at first he had mistaken for the guards or visitors. He knew that no one would come and see him. Martyn had abandoned him when he left the city and would likely never see him again. When the army came it would be a massacre as the city was not prepared for what was coming. As he sat there in the dark he remembered back to when he had joined the city guard. He and Martyn had joined on the same day when they were sixteen. They trained as recruits for several months before being inducted as a guardsman and assigned to a tower. Both of them spent several years as a guardsman before Nathaniel was promoted. Every guardsman has two options at that point. They can either join the watchmen, permanently based in the city, or become a ranger and patrol beyond the city walls.

Nathaniel had felt the need to have a life of adventure and did not hesitate to join the rangers. He looked back to the day of his first patrol fondly. At first he had felt nervous and anxious but as he settled in he grew to love life as a ranger. He had been shaken by his first ambush on a goblin camp but time had hardened him to it and it became second nature. Nathaniel took on the mantle of ranger to the fullest extent possible and became seasoned within the ranks. Martyn had decided the quieter life of a watchman was his preference. The watchmen guarded the walls, important buildings and helped to keep the peace within the city. Since there had not been an attack on the city in many years, most of the watchmen had never even been in direct combat with goblins of any sort. That made the rangers the backbone of the guard's fighting strength. All of the rangers were seasoned warriors, used to combat and killing.

It was not so long ago that Nathaniel had been promoted to sergeant at arms, setting him above many of the other rangers for his skills and leadership. At twenty five he was one of the youngest ever rangers to be promoted to the rank and part of him felt like his best friend resented him for it. The watchmen of course had their own sergeants at arms, but Martyn had been a couple of years behind Nathaniel to even be promoted from guardsman and the jump to sergeant was usually a much longer leap. There had even been rumours around that Nathaniel was being considered for promotion to ranger captain. Most rangers only reached captaincy when they were in their forties at best. Only the tower captain and commander of the guard would stand above him at that point. It was however very hard to become tower captain and only the best would reach that rank. There were many captains within the rangers and the watchmen all after the position, so that by that point it had become quite political.

As Nathaniel stared blankly at the smooth walls of his prison cell he realised that none of it really mattered anymore. He would never reach those higher echelons of command from inside the prison, especially not if the city did not stand beyond the impending doom making its way to their gates. Several days had passed since he had been thrown in the cell. His only way of measuring the passing of time was watching the sun rise and set through the tiny window hewn into the rock. It was not a large window, barely big enough to fit his head in and it was blocked by three thick iron bars. The days had been getting strangely dark recently, as the sun had been blocked by grey clouds. The door to his cell was thick and made of oak, with a similar size window in the upper centre. Three thick iron bars also blocked it, meaning he had very poor visibility through it too. He had nothing to do while he sat there wiling away the days and so had paid close attention to the changing of shifts. The guards were all watchmen of the city guard but he recognised none of them. He could usually tell what time of day it was by the sound of the guard changing.