FTW #5

The next few pages had stains on them. And it looked suspiciously like blood stains. It seemed he hadn't waited to clean up his hands before penning down some more in journal. There were pictures of a walled city, destroyed siege equipment, burning banners and a battlefield with innumerable dead. The caption read 'Battle of Albara'.

It was a famous battle between an expansionist king and a free state. The city state had triumphed against all odds. It was a tale often sung over campfires. The next page read:

"Banners fluttered in the wind
The smell of war lingering in the air
Bloodlust began to uproot
The goodness within every soul.
Two armies would meet
Yet only pawns would die;
The tyrant would survive
Sacrificing his men, deaths of whom
Only the bereaved would feel.

The township prepared for a siege
Supplies had been gathered
Crops harvested, sheep herded
Into the city, for the outskirts
Were no safer than the domain
Of the fearsome Khiztin-Lord.

The powerful king had a great army
The city had none to lead them
They looked upto me as their own
A lost brother in a lost town.
Black and silver banners appeared
On the horizon, an ominous sign
Of an inbound storm.

Would the will of the free
Overcome the strength of the cruel?
It needed to be, if I was to move on
And see what left to be seen
Of the large world
Who had mankind great
But hearts small.

~FTW."