The rag-tag group of travelers soon arrived at the city gates. Up close the walls didn't look a lot better than they did at a distance, spiderwebbed with huge cracks, portions of the wall appearing to be piles of rubble poured in to fill gaps. The towers, bristling with ballistae and onagers at a distance could be seen to be in disrepair up close, many of them visibly damaged or warped. The gates were open, a handful of guards loitering around it in mail armor that ill-fitted them, leaning against posts or idly poking at the moat with old, water-warped spears. One of them looked up at the group, revealing a face that looked to be no more than fourteen summers.

"Oi!" The others looked up from their various means of dawdling and came to something resembling a military manner - a bunch of boys who looked about like they hadn't quite finished nursing. "Dolsie, go fetch sergeant!" 

"Gads balls, Siemann!" One of them ran into the city, presumably Dolsie, returning a minute or so later with a tired-looking old man with a hammer hanging from his belt. He wore no armor, only a surcoat bearing arms - a black tower with a golden ring around it on a field of gray.

"Visitors? To Falstaff? You must've lost your way, no one comes to Falstaff." The Sergeant's hair was thin and gray, and his face was heavily lined and gaunt, he looked as though one good push and he'd drop dead.