For Better or Worse...

[trickey]

great! keep it up!

[cbraund]

The Romans charged the sheild wall one more time, and finally the Dumnonians were scattering.

They were fleeing! The battle was won!

The Roman commander knew that Arthur was his deadliest opponent, and now that opponent was beaten.

The Dumnonians ran back along the foot of the steep valley, covered by Arthur's few longbowmen and cavalry.

The knights hadn't even had a chance to charge against the Romans, as even when they threatened to outflank them the Romans formed a square shield wall to repel them, similar to the Dumnonian shield ring tactic, except the Romans carried strange rectangular shields.

Also, the longbowmen were useless unless they could hit the face, as the Romans wore thick breastplate armour, and their shields were now covered in copper, a lesson they had learnt from defeating the Franks.

The Romans formed turtles so they could ignore the longbowmen, and slowly began to advance along the valley. The knights couldn't attack them due to the long Roman spears, and the deadly slingshots who had already killed Gawain by slinging a stone into his face.

Now the Romans marched forward to victory.

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"Let's hope Merlin does his bit." Arthur smiled as the Romans advanced into the trap.

From the top of the hill, loud crashes, bangs and booms were heard, and lightning was seen in the pouring rain. The rockslide had begun, and now the Romans calmly stopped their turtles moving, and braced themselves.

Merlin looked down from above, happy with the common men pushing the rocks. He watched eagerly.

The rockslide threatened to engulf the Romans, but their formations stood firm like cliffs against the sea, and most of the rocks were channeled between the Romans.

Others bounced off the Roman shields, and while their weight may have been enough to a man-held shield downwards, as happened at the centre of a few turtles, it wasn't enough to buckle the shields on the outside of the wall, which kept the ceiling of the wall standing.

Then a huge boulder hit, crushing most of one turtle. The Dumnonian men cheered, as it meant another legion down, but there were more.

The Romans had survived the landslide with only one battered legion hurt.

Then came the explosions. Merlin had thrown down a number of wooden balls the size of a man's head, filled with his gunpowder and with fuses lit, and some had gone into the middle of the legions.

Two legions disappeared in the fireballs, and two more were thrown back by the force of explosions near them.

All of the legions were now in disarray. The shield walls had been momentarily broken.

Now Arthur's men charged.

The Dumnonians came not in a shield wall, but in a murderous rabble, the way the old British people fought.

The Romans knew that they were doomed, and began running for the shore. Their leader tried to rally them, but his head was removed from his body with one swing of Excalibur.

The Romans were fleeing Britain, and a few made it back to their boats, about two legions' worth.

The rest were slaughtered.

The men onboard the boats breathed a sigh of relief. They were home free.

Then they saw the war galleys of Kernow, the small kingdom to Dumnonia's west. Its King had decided to repay Arthur for him dealing with Siluria by sending his famed war galleys to destroy the Roman boats.

The Romans prepared for a fight, confident of their boarding skills.

But Kernow sailors didn't fight that way. The galleys got closer, and some threw bundles of hay onto the Roman galleys.

The Romans left it there, bemused by the enemy's behaviour, and preparing to board them.

Then the bowmen of Kernow lit their arrows, and fired them into the bales of hay.

They were soaked in an oily substance the Kernow men had found caught fire easily, and now they did so quickly.

The Romans tried to put the fire out, then began to dive into the water, where they either drowned or were speared as soon as they reached land.

Britain was safe, and Arthur had won his greatest victory.

*******************************************

Then came the news.

"Sir, Galahad has declared that you died fighting the Romans, and he took control of Dumnonia as a Christian King, supported by Sansum!"

"He won't be hard to remove." Arthur was hurt by the betrayal, but not worried by the prospect.

"But sir, that's the thing," the aide panted. "He opened the gates of Camelot to Malagant, to come to peace talks! But Malagant killed him and the garrison!"

"So Malagant has Camlot?!" Arthur was worried now, as Malagant had more than enough men to defend Camelot and make it an impenetrable fortress.

"And Guinevere." the aide said unhappily.

Arthur groaned. "And what of Sansum?"

"He fled south, but he heard that you are alive, and so now is raising a Christian army to destroy you, and then just defend Dumnonia against Malagant, not retake Camelot."

"And what of Dumnonia's pagans?" Arthur asked.

"All the ones within Sansum's reach are being slaughtered to cleanse the earth for the coming of his God." the aide was almost crying now. "They killed my family sir!"

"Don't worry, we'll get revenge." Arthur said with a determined look in his eye.

The Christians had caused too much trouble, and it was time for them and Malangant to pay.

******************************************

More to come later! Comments appreciated!

Chris AKA Nemesis

[trickey]

very good! IMHO i think you might want to try making your battles a bit longer.

[cbraund]

To be honest, a) I'm crap at writing battles! and b) I'm trying desperately to get this one finished quickly so I can get on to my new one, since this one seems to be losing in the finals anyway.

Anyway, the rest will be up later, don't expect too much I'm afraid, but I promise that the new story will more than make up for the battles in this one!

Chris

[cbraund]

Sorry it took so long, but here it is, the finale!

*******************************************

The Christian army appeared on the hilltop infront of Arthur's army, known as Lindinis, and Lancelot had to stop himself laughing out loud.

They were pitifully armed, in a shouting mob, and with a few on ponies, donkeys or old horses.

Arthur's army was in a shieldwall. There were some Christians who served him, but were Christians who believed in peace with all man, not kill all pagans like the madmen at the top of the hill believed.

There were even women and children in the baying mass, and Arthur shuddered to see them.

Few of the Christian army had spears, and even fewer had shields.

Some had swords, others axes, and many more just knives and pitchforks.

They charged down the hill in a rabble, led by the men on animals.

Three even rode huge bulls which charged towards the shieldwall with their horns lowered.

"Stand firm." came the order from Derfel, captain of Arthur's shields.

The Christians weren't even going to try to outflank the shieldwall, as Derfel had been scared that the might. Then he would have had to form a shieldring, one of the more hated tactics.

But they were charging straight for the army. Now the longbowmen behind the shields fired, and the storm of arrows flew through the air to begin the slaughter of the rabble.

The bulls reached the shieldwall only to be impaled on spears. Their momentum carried them through the wall, but it quickly closed back up behind them.

The riders were ruthlessly killed, as were the bulls to stop them going crazy with pain. They would make a fine victory feast when they retook Camelot, Lancelot grinned to himself despite the slaughter.

Stupid Christians he thought. Damned well deserved it for being so stupid as to try and rebel against Arthur!

But Arthur was looking in despair as the Christians impaled themselves upon spears and swords.

They were beginning to gain the upper hand by sheer weight of number. Arthur and his knights would have to act soon to rout the Christians as planned, but he had one last hope.

"Can you do nothing, Merlin?"

"They're Christians, they don't believe in the powers of the Druids! I might be able to scare them, but they believe they are fighting for their God, and so they will not surrender! Anyway, Christians are fools, they deserve it anyway!" Merlin spat on the ground to avert the evil of Christians.

Now Arthur's war horn sounded, and his knights charged from the wood.

The Christians, seeing Arthur at the end of the knights, broke away from the shield wall, and either ran towards the knights or away from them.

Now the shield wall broke, but to attack, not because a Christian had breeched it.

Arthur plunged his sword into the Sansum, who was trying to get his army to attack Arthur, and drew Excalibur to begin the slaughter.

A child picked up a spear and thrust it towards Arthur's face.

Arthur knocked it aside, and to his shame killed the boy. There was nothing else he could do, as the child was intent on killing him.

"The waste of it all." Arthur cursed as he killed another man.

Merlin had stopped beside Sansum, and was obviously taking pleasure in torturing the dying man. Arthur ignored it, knowing that was what a traitor deserved.

The Christians were fleeing, and the longbowmen chased them with a flurry of arrows.

Arthur had won his kingdom back, but now he knew he had to retake his capital.

*******************************************

"Camelot." Arthur said in awe. He had seen it many times, but it still deserved admiration, and when it was defended by a huge army like Malagant's, it was a sight to behold.

"Wish we'd never designed the place to be so damned impenetrable." Lancelot smiled. Camelot had wells that drew fresh water from a spring deep in the hill it was on, and farms inside that harvested enough to feed a thousand men, let alone the eight hundred Malagant had. Arthur had only five hundred men.

Arthur nodded in agreement, but Merlin snorted in disgust.

"Impenetrable? You don't know the meaning of the word!" he cackled.

"It's strong on every side." Arthur argued.

"On every side but one." Merlin corrected him. "The walls have no roof on them, nor does the courtyard!"

"But we are not birds that can fly!" Lancelot ridiculed the old Druid.

"Don't ridicule me boy, or I'll turn that pretty wife of yours into a toad to match her personality!" Merlin turned on the knight.

"So how do we get in then?" Arthur asked quickly to save Lancelot from Merlin's wrath.

Merlin revealed his plan.

******************************************

Merlin tied a loop in the end of the rope, and handed it to the longbowman, the best in Arthur's army.

He gave him his instructions, and the longbowman fired.

They were on Caer Cadarn, a big rocky hill that overlooked Camelot.

The arrow went over the ramparts, which were free of men since it was a cold night, and they were in the towers warming themselves by the fires. The loop settled over a turret on the far side of the rampart, and Merlin pulled it tight. Camelot had turrets on both sides of the walkway to give the archers some protection even when the enemy had was in the courtyard.

He then tied it to a rock further up the hill, so it formed a "rope bridge" as he called it, just above the men's heads.

Derfel was the first to use the strips of leather that Merlin was handing out, taken from the leather armour of some of the dead at Lindinis.

He hooked it over the rope, and held on as he jumped off the ridge.

He sailed down the rope, and on to the ramparts of Camelot.

*******************************************

More warriors followed, then the archers. By then Derfel had led an attack to capture the gate, and the alarm had been sounded.

But most of the warrios and archers were now across, as more rope bridges had been made to carry them to Camelot.

Now the archers were in the gatehouse, and defended by Derfel's men. The archers could rain death upon the enemy in the courtyard, and there was no way for the enemy to attack other than up the staircase or along the ramparts, both ways only allowing one man at a time to attack.

The gates were opened and the drawbridge lowered, and Arthur led his knights into the courtyard, to begin the massacre of Malagant's army.

******************************************

"And where is he?!" Arthur demanded of the man he knew was Malagant's second in command again. The battle raged around them, but Arthur wanted to know where Guinevere was. He had just been told she was with Malagant.

The terrified man told him, and Arthur slit his throat, tired of giving mercy to enemies who would then continue to plot to try and bring him down.

Lancelot's horse was dead, and Arthur called to him.

"Take mine! I'm going to look for Guinevere!"

Arthur charged his horse close to a stairway, then jumped onto it from his horse. Lancelot rushed over to climb onto Arthur's horse.

Now Arthur charged through the passageways, his scale armour presenting an almost invincible enemy to Malagant's men, who got out of his way.

Arthur still beheaded them though, to guarantee they wouldn't stab him in the back.

Now he charged into Guinevere's room, where he found Malagant with a knife to her neck.

"Let her go." Arthur hissed.

"Never. One step closer and she dies." Malagant growled.

Arthur charged, knowing Malagant would kill her whatever he did.

Malagant slit Guinevere's throat, then charged at Arthur, dropping the knife and drawing his sword.

The two men met in the middle of the room, and Arthur swung Excalibur hard, but Malagant blocked.

They struggled, but then Malagant landed a blow on Arthur's hand, and he dropped Excalibur.

Malagant swung his sword, and Arthur ducked, falling over a chair behind him.

The chair broke under the weight of his armour, and he fell to the floor.

Malagant sensing victory closed in, and raised his sword for the killing blow.

Arthur closed his eyes and waited for it, knowing he had nothing left to live for.

******************************************

Arthur opened them again when he heard a scream.

Malagant fell on top of Arthur, a knife in the back of his neck.

Guinevere, as strong willed as ever, had ignored her own pain and inevitable death to pick up the knife, and had plunged it into Malagant's neck.

Arthur threw off the dead Malagant, and hugged Guinevere, whose blood dripped down his armour, and some seeped inside.

Arthur called for Merlin, and he arrived soon after.

"You have your victory Arthur." he proclaimed. "Britain is yours."

Then he saw Guinevere, and rushed over to help.

"Put Excalibur over the wound!" he ordered.

Arthur complied, and was amazed to see the wound healing.

"How?" he asked.

"Your sword is a Treasure of Britain, one of the sacred objects the Gods gave us." Merlin told him.

And seeing that, Arthur believed him, for the first time.

*******************************************

Stupid ending I know, but only one I could think of!

Anyway, hope you enjoyed the story, comments appreciated and thanks for those already!

Chris AKA Nemesis

[civman2000]

yeah, he should've died IMHO. In response for your question after I left the chat: sure you can have MAD in the contest even if running it!