Morning Flames

Fires. Burning campfires scattered throughout a forest. Campfires that billow globs of brown smoke into the clear morning air. Campfires that can be smelled from across the plateu. Campfires whose light is mocked by a small sliver of light rising above the distant horizon. The yellow light of a sun casting over a war torn forest. The morning mist clings to the ground mixing with the smoke and the dust shimmering under the harsh glares of the sun. The world is a bustle of people men crawling about the camp in preparation for the day’s grim task.

The morning light fell over the saps purging the darkness from the fields, casting long shadows over the machines of war. Everyone -- fletchers standing over their arrows, bowmen leaning back their heavy bows with heavy sighs, infantry men barking orders out packing up their dewy camp, the gray haired captains huddling in the cold morning air discussing in hushed tones the morning’s campaign, and the lowly servants walking from tent to tent signing small notes of praise of another morning – wanders around the camp in the growing life engulfed in a small array of lights and sounds.

A small group of men, all dressed in a solemn black robes huddle at the edge of the camp. With voices ladened with sorrow they speak hushed whispers. In the center a patch of disturbed dirt as long as a man and as wide sits. The freshly dug earth glistens in the morning air, the wind playing a slow melody as it whistles through the morning air, the leaves casting off from their arboreal branches add a sweet fragrant to the dewy air, and the a man huddled in his bundle of black cloth slowly lets a small tear sprinkle the damp earth. With steady breaths silent prayers are expelled into the morning sun morning for the loss of another campanion.