Marachius Ainsley

His First Attack on Boralus

Marachius sat at his desk, tapping his pencil to his bottom lip. He spent several moments in quiet thought as he tried to decide what he should include on his field report. Put the pencil back to paper, he wrote a few more lines on the paper and then stopped to re-read what he had put down. The paladin then put his pencil down with a nod of satisfaction.

Marc was just setting his pencil into a cup on the side of the desk when he heard the commotion outside. He turned to look at the open doorway when he heard the call.

“Incoming! Man the defenses!”

Almost immediately after the call, there was an explosion that Marc could feel vibrating through the floorboards. The paladin jumped out of his seat and grabbed his shield and mace. He stopped for a moment to look at the armor that was laying on his bunk and debated taking the time to put it on. But then he heard the screams of people out on the docks. He took a deep breath, strapped the shield tightly to his arm, and went running outside.

In the air above Boralus was one of the Horde’s airships. The paladin watched as trolls and orcs rappelled down into the city. He paused, trying to figure out where he should head. Then he heard a scream and looked to his side. A troll was standing over a young lady, one of the vendors that he had bought food from before. Marachius started sprinting at the troll, pulling up his shield at the last moment and barreled into the troll. The impact sent the troll flying to the ground. 

Marachius stopped and turned to the young lady. He knelt beside her and gave her a quick scan looked for any obvious wounds.

“Are you okay, ma’am?”

The woman started to say something, then her eyes grew wide. She pointed to something behind Marc and screamed again.

Marachius turned just as the troll swung his club at the paladin. Marc tried to get his shield up to block the attack but he was a hair too slow and didn’t have a chance to set his shield to absorb the strike. The troll’s club drove the top of the shield into Marc’s shoulder. The paladin was knocked off balanced and tumbled to the ground. 

The troll moved over Marachius and stepped down on his shield, pinning it to the ground. The troll looked down at the prone man and raised his club high in the air. But before he could bring it down, Marachius swung his mace around and slammed it down on the troll’s foot. There was the sound of foot bones cracking and the troll let out a howl of pain before he stumbled back a few steps. Then with hatred in his eyes, the troll turned and hobbled back towards the docks.

Marachius rolled to his feet. His shoulder throbbed, but he wanted to give chase. Before he could move, he heard the voice of the woman beside him. Marc put the thoughts of going after the troll out of his mind and moved back to the young vendor. Keeping watch around him, he reached down and offered his good arm for the vendor to pull herself up.

“Paladin! Over here!”

Marachius looked behind him and saw a couple of soldiers standing at the doorway of one of the nearby stores. Nodding, he guided the woman to the doorway. The soldiers parted and allowed Marachius and the vendor through. Inside, Marachius saw several civilians huddled against the back wall.

“Are you injured, paladin?”

Marachius looked back to one of the soldiers who had come inside to check on him.

“A little sore, sir. But nothing serious.”

“You up to helping us defend the civilians here?”

“Yes, sir,” Marachius answered, rolling his injured shoulder and trying to suppress a grimace. 

“Good man,” the solder said, patting Marachius on his good shoulder. “We keep these people safe until the attack is over.”

“Yes, sir,” Marachius nodded. “Show me where you need me.”