The beast trudged through the wet earth, straining with each step to pull its hooves out of the fetid muck. From France to the Seljuk-occupied holy land and back again, the horse had dutifully carried its master. But now, so close to home, it could not bring itself to listen to a single command more. Sheets of freezing rain reflected the last remnants of sickly green twilight. The beast's rider attempted to will it onward, but his sharp kicks to its ribs were met only with the slapping sound of boot on hide. The rider dismounted and pulled at the reins, grinding the bridle into the chapped flesh of the horse's mouth. In return, the horse planted its hooves further into the dreck.

The surcoat that covered the knight's mail absorbed the rain like a sponge, each drop of water a tiny hammer blow driving him further into the liquid soil. At the start of his journey the coat had been a vibrant blue, marked by delicately sewn fleurs-de-lis of yellow. It was an elegant signifier of both dogma and privilege, but as months turned to years, the coat became tattered by the blowing desert sand and discolored by the blood of the dead. Now, as his journey neared its end, somewhere near the border of his home land, covered in mud and sopping wet, the coat didn’t signify a damned thing. 

The knight gritted his teeth and pulled the reins with both hands as hard as he could.

"Move, you bastard!"

His shoulders throbbed, the muscles clenching and bunching into agonizing sheets of granite below his neck. Then, like a bolt fired from a crossbow, a stabbing pain tore through his right hand and up his arm. The jolt of it forced him to release the leather strap and he fell backwards, splashing with a thud into the ice cold mud.