To his left, from upon the ramparts, a commotion arises.
Lord Atapa! a rider approaches, shouts the guard, & He be hard pressed by some of the natives.

Atapa bounds up the stairs, yelling for his archers, as he reaches the top, a guard points toward the nth east.
In the distance, he see's a rider, galloping hard towards his gate.
He is pursued by several natives & they seem to be catching him.

Atapa turns to his captain, we must go to him, he may not make range for the archers.

With that, he bounds down the stairs yelling for the gate to be opened.
He leaps off the stairs & lands on his horse, spurring it hard he takes off at a gallop through the opening gate, his captain close behind.

The rider, beaten & bloodied, see's the commotion ahead & charges on with new hope of making it to his destination, but at that moment, a spear pierces his horse’s flank & horse & rider crash to the ground.

Back at the fortress, the captain of the Archers knows they are barely within range.
The order goes out to the archers, only the keenest eye shall fire, if you have doubt, step down, he orders.
6 archers stand there ground & prepare to fire as the native rabble close on the hapless rider.

The rider is momentarily winded & struggles to regain control of his senses. He looks up to see 5 vermin bearing down on him.
He growls to himself & then curses his fate, so close to his destination & yet to fail, I shall at least die with honour.
& with that he draws his sword & charges toward his assailants.

Overhead, a whistle is heard & then, thump, thu-thump.
Three of the enemy fall as a volley of arrows slams into the small group of natives.
The rider hears a distant cheer from the fortress & suddenly, his load lightened, he begins to see hope.

The remaining 2 continue toward him, he must fight them now, they are to close for the archers to risk another volley of arrows.
The dust rises as the battle starts in earnest, the glitter of steel & clash of metal on metal is all that can be heard or seen.
The rider holds his own, for what seems like an eternity, but he is tired & hungry from the ride & his strength drains quickly.
His guard drops from exhaustion & a searing pain burns into his right shoulder as the enemies swords slices into his unprotected shoulder, he staggers back & falls, his vision blurred by the pain.
The last he see's is 2 shapes, dark & menacing, moving toward him, suddenly, perhaps fortunately, he passes out.

The rider opens an eye, wondering what sight will behold him in the afterlife.
He is in a room, laid upon a bed, a healer leans over him & speaks, welcome back lad.
The healer turns to his assistant & mutters to him quietly to fetch the lord of the house.

Atapa strides into the room, Greetings brave rider, you must indeed have urgent news to risk the wilds of midia?
We got to your aid in the nick of time, you did well to hold out, the 2 natives were quite surprised by my captain & I bursting through the dust & beheading them as they leant over you for the kill.

The rider slowly raises himself up to a sitting position.
Greetings Lord Atapa, I have word from my Lord wrymmlore....He says Hi.

The rider collapses again into unconsciousness.