[quote=Cale Tucker]
Dread walks up to to the gated door to the current Lord's estate, glancing at the guards as he smirks and nudges his soldier beside him; the one he wanted to travel with him. "Hey, guys, think we could see your Lord? I wanna offer him some War Boats for a shiny copper.... I'm serious, tell him I'd like to sell him all of them for a very cheap price."(Next Merc Post could/should be in collab with Ashgan)
[/quote]

Moody gray clouds obscured the heavens above, bleeding gentle spring rains upon the earth. While the mountain peaks to the northeast remained densely covered in snow and ice, the gloomy woods that encroach upon the earthen giants seemed to thaw, dressed in a brighter green than in the previous months. A wave of fog rolled down the mountain slopes, washing over the land and engulfing it in a haze of white; even in the midst of noon one could barely see one’s own hands. The inhabitants of Coalfell were no stranger to these phantasmal mists and barely paid any heed to the ghostly veil as they mulled about their daily routine. Cozily tucked in between the elder trees of Blackwood, Almare’s capital was more a hamlet than a city, a rickety amalgamation of about two hundred old wooden houses with most having grown a thick coat of moss over the years. Indeed far from noble, any one of these houses were no more luxurious than that of a common lumberjack. Glistening, wet cobble roads paved the pathways in between the moldy houses, eventually converging towards the elevation where a grand stone manor overlooked the town like a stern father.

Castle Coalfell had been built with haste, and it shows. Originally, it had been little more than a fortified tower which stands to this day as its central keep, but over the decades since it was erected, layer upon layer of added defense had been piled on top and around the spire, eventually forming walls complete with ramparts and corner towers of their own, while the base of the tower was expanded to contain great halls where guests could be received, the royal armory could be stored and the king’s soldiers might rest. Stables had been added to the courtyard where the lord’s best steeds might be kept and taken care of, and beyond the yard’s walls lay the freshly added baileys, the walls of which were still halfway in construction. Craftsmen were eagerly at work in between the scaffolds to further improve their prestigious fiefdom’s infrastructure. Below even this, on the slope leading up from the town to the castle, multiple layers of large, sharpened pikes had been rammed into the soil, making any climb that was not the main road a treacherous labyrinth of spikes that could impale an ox. Castle Coalfell was perhaps not the prettiest of seats for a lord of Lundland, but it was practical and defensible; much like everything in Almare.

The gate to the outer baileys was open so that supplies for the ongoing constructions could flow freely, but a pair of guards sat lazily by the side, to keep an eye on unwanted guests. Wet, cold, and blinded by the dense fog as they were, a bottle of fine cider was all that kept the two at their post and in high spirits. If the morning had been any indication, it would have seemed like that bottle was to be their only company until the shift’s end, until a pair of unusually well armed fellows ascended the trodden, muddy path towards them.

“Just what we needed,” Cynbel muttered under his breath, wiping his mouth from his last swig as he rose from the stool he had been sitting on for the last five hours. His arse sure felt sore.

“Halt there, stranger,” the guardsman called out to the approaching duo, holding out his left palm while his right held firmly onto a well-crafted spear, “thou dost approach the castle of lord Ardobert Griffiths, sovereign of Almare. State thine business.”

“Hey, guys,“ the leader-looking type of the two smugly answered with a smirk, “think we could see your lord? I wanna offer him some war boats for a shiny copper... I'm serious, tell him I'd like to sell him all of them for a very cheap price.”

The Almaric watchmen glanced at each other for a moment, as if seeking the advice of the other. Eventually Baglen, who had not spoken up to this point, shrugged and Cynbel returned his attention to the mercenaries.

“Just who in the Goddess’s name are ye’? Dost thou think thou canst simply walk up to the lord of a kingdom and haggle a price for thine boats as if he were a common fisherman?”

“Cynbel,” Baglen intervened, “I dost think they’re from the mercenaries who didst land in Mortham earlier this month. Methinks we ought to at least inform the lord’s court of this here offer.”

“Is that so?” Cynbel skeptically answered, eyeing the mercenaries with distrust, “Perhaps thou art right. Very well, good sirs, if thou wouldst share thine names, we shall send word to the lord. In a few days at most, thou shalt receive an answer to thine offer. Art we agreed?”