It was still dark outside, with only some minutes before the sun rose and brought the heat of the spring in Chetwood and Hamglen when Fiontann made his way past the gate of the hamlet and towards Chetwood. It was one of the days of the more relaxed training, he would run in Chetwood wearing his normal clothes with only his greatsword on his back. On days of intense training he ran in chain mail with shield and sword on his back. He left the hamlet behind him and turned left at thee crossroads before starting to run along the path. The breeze was still chilly and pleasant with the sun not rising for some thirty minutes still, plenty of time to run before stopping to do some shadow fighting among the tree to keep in shape. The tall man turned away from the path as soon as he got in the forest and made his way through bushes and dry branches, mud and gravel, low hanging branches and dense foliage. A usual routine to keep his stamina high no matter where he was. He reached a small clearing and without stopping he drew his sword and did some shadow fighting along the clearing before sheathing the weapon again and going on.
At the next clearing he used some boulders to take cover as he shadow fought some trees and then sat on a big rock to catch his breath after the intense training. The sun was about to rise and Fiontann lay down and waited for it so that he would start running back when the sun was up. He had noticed that there were no birds singing, nor insects chirping as always and when he opened his eyes he saw three men coming out of the shadows of the trees fully armed. One carried two swords, another a sword and a shield and the third man a spear.
“I’ve nothing on me,” Fiontann said. “You can keep going,” and sat up on the rock with his sword on his lap.
“We came for you,” grinned the man with the swords. “Your time is up.” The other two men nodded and they all came forward towards the Bree-lander who sighed.
“Why is that?” he asked, “Whom did I wrong?”
“That is of no matter now, you’re as good as dead.”
Fion rolled his eyes and exaggerated a sigh, “Oh well, why not. Come on,” he said and drew the sword from its scabbard and got up.
The three men approached him circling the boulder and Fion kicked some gravel towards the man in front of him, the one with the shield and quickly parried the incoming spear before stepping back and away from the twin swords.
“Get on there!” shouted the man with the swords and the spearman pressed Fiontann on one side in order to give the others the opportunity to get on the rock. Fion stayed away and as soon as the two got on the rock he jumped down and kicked the spearman in the shin. The man was quick and retaliated with a hit in Fion’s face with the butt of the spear. Fion stepped back and the other two who were agile got down quickly and once more the three surrounded the former sellsword.
Fion blocked the twin swords, but the shield hit him and pushed him towards the spearman who was holding the weapon horizontally at that moment and blocked Fion from going too far and pushed him back. Fion tried to turn in time in order to try and block another hit, but a sword slashed at his left leg, he couldn’t tell who it was, instead he tried to stab at the man closest to him, but a sword parried his greatsword just enough to drive the blade away from a torso and Fion felt a heavy blow on the back of his head that brought him down. He rolled away from his assailants, but not far enough as the blade of the spear pierced his right side. Fion staggered to his feet and charged at the three, now angry after the blows that he got.
The fight went on for some brief time more as Fion tried to keep the others from circling him and moving quickly taking and giving blows. He attempted to keep them in a line so that he faced only once at a time. He bruised a couple of them and stabbed them, but he took more bruises and more stabbings and slashes. The bleeding tired him faster than the fight would and he reactions became slower, as his did his thought, he started to fail defending himself and ended up on his back on the ground. All seemed lost for the Bree-lander and the one with the twin swords prepared for the final blow when an arrow went clean through him and he fell on the ground…