The Red Knight

Marc, son of Atlas,

Hailed west from the Chryse.

He rode on a wyrm

With claws and scales layered thrice.

To Arinor he flew,

With neither water nor cloak,

Across blackened dunes

And through the valley of smoke.

When labored, he landed,

At the city’s armored edge,

His requested the Red Legion

That he make a pledge.

To protect until death,

And serve Arinor’s walls,

Write his name in the scrolls

Of the crimson knight hall.

Lacking lineage and line,

The knights bade him to go,

Prove his worth to their city

And to slay a plaguing foe.

A creature of deserts

With a shell made of earth,

A thousand legs made as spears,

Its rocky maw like a hearth.

It crept over the dunes

Consumed all in its path,

Had no hole or a home

but the shell on its back.

Marc saddled his wyrm,

And rode from the hall

To destroy the great slater

And bring back peace to the wall.

He first took to the north,

Towards Tempe Fossae,

But myths of the creature,

Were all that men could say.

He then headed to Fesenkov,

He scoured each of the great mons.

Still the beast remained hidden,

Through each dusk and past the dawn.

Four moons and a night,

Marc’s search appeared lost.

And he prepared to turn back,

Without the great slater’s claw.

But come dawn of the fifth,

Between the great dunes,

Rose a mountain of earth.

So Marc armed his harpoon.

The legs made of spears,

Burst up from the ground.

Raining boulders like hailstones,

As it emerged from its mound.

Marc hacked off it leg.

It shrieked at the blow,

And swiveled to retreat,

To its tunnels below.

Marc hacked at its shell,

Made of earth and steel,

But found neither gap nor break,

From which its life to repeal.

With a shudder, Marc slipped,

And fell on the beasts face.

As it snapped at its prey,

Without mercy or grace.

Marc twisted in hand

The bloodied harpoon,

And speared the great slater,

With its mark, sealed its doom.

It crashed down on its spears,

On its now bloodied maw,

And Marc severed the arm,

Carried back its steel claw.

To the walls of Arinor,

To the great crimson knight hall.

Gave the spear and the prize,

In the presence of all.

And once knighted, he rose,

A red shield in his hand.

Now a soldier of Arinor,

He acts with justice by his hand.

The years passed. He stayed true.

But it didn’t feel right.

When a man

Claimed the throne.

And after

Came the blight.