When you enter the village, everything is in chaos. People are running everywhere shouting to each other, trying to gather their meager belongings over carts that have no chance to escape the charge of a knight, kneeling in prayer in front of wooden shrines adorned with flowers from the fields, stealing their neighbor his mule, fighting over something utterly pointless at the moment. Your eyes look for the girl in the narrow streets of the village, and you find her running around nearly blinded by her tears, completely forgetful that she should not speak elven in public. She can't be more than sixteen, and looks fragile as only an elven child can, her knee-long blond hair gathered in many little braids that a loving mother must have spent hours entwining and fixing with colored ribbons. She is wearing only a white nightgown and you think she was probably sleeping, and was woken up by the commotion on the street. She falls on her knees covering her face with her tiny hands, calling for her mother one more time, and that's when you notice that the street behind her is empty and strangely silent.
Then the first knight appears. Everything he wears is black, his armor, his horse's barding, his shield, his helm that cover completely his face. When he unsheathes his sword you are not surprised to see it is black as well.
