Reaving Mattock
Description
A re-purposed farming tool, the Reaving Mattock has a heavy steel head and a stout oak handle inlaid with tempest jade. What a mundane mattock does to hard or frozen soil, the Reaving Mattock does to enemy soldiers, leaving them bleeding to death or crippled. They are unsurprisingly popular with the agriculturally-minded yeomen of the Marches and with the Varushkans, and much less so with the citizens of the League, Dawn and Urizen due to their associations with farming.
These weapons were among the first weapons crafted by the Imperial Orc artisans after they joined the Empire, many of whom were familiar with similar tools from their time in the mines, or working the farms. They have remained a popular choice, especially with those Orcs who prefer to spend their time slaughtering their barbarian cousins rather than embracing the strict discipline of the Imperial armies.
Rules
- Form: Weapon. Takes the form of a great weapon. You must be wielding this weapon to use its magical properties.
- Requirement: You must have the Weapon Master skill to bond to this item.
- Effect: Once per day you may call IMPALE with this two-handed weapon.
- Materials: Crafting a Reaving Mattock requires seven ingots of tempest jade. It takes one month to make one of these items.
He couldn’t hear anything from the world around him; the blow that had split his skull had seen to that. He’d not even seen the attacker that had felled him; hit from behind as he ran to his tent to fetch his weapon.
His wife … his legion ... he had to protect them. She was slightly built and while she wielded herbs with great skill she was not a soldier. Tannat had insisted on remaining alongside him and the reaver band, despite the rigours of a long pregnancy. The warlord had shrugged and told her she knew her own mind best; if she thought she could keep up, then he would not stop her accompanying the band.
A shadow loomed over him blocking his view of the clouds; a fur-clad orc with a blade taller than he. The barbarian looked down at him and spat, a thick glob of phlegm landed on his barely breathing chest. The barbarian snorted and raised the blade high in the air, preparing to end Brint's life.
The blow never fell.
Brint didn’t hear the scream but everyone else did - anger mingled with fear and the sound of it cutting through the echoes of battle. A small figure burst from the tent wrapped in simple robes, a petite female orc who looked barely older than twenty summers, the wailing of her newborn sounding behind her.
“Leave. Him. Be!” she snarled, her voice little more than a whisper. She had a farming tool over her shoulder, almost comically too large for her. She hobbled toward the barbarian standing over her prone husband.
The barbarian orc laughed and hefted his weapon, bringing it up for a killing blow. She raised her tool to meet the jagged sword of the barbarian, screaming defiance.
The blow never fell. The barbarian's prized blade fell into the mud as he bellowed in pain and confusion, his left arm shattered and broken and dangling uselessly at his side. He fumbled to draw his long dagger with his other hand. Before he could draw it a pair of arrows thudded into his chest and sent him sprawling to the floor. The last thing he saw was Tannat standing over him, legs spread, almost overbalancing as she swung the bloody mattock up to bring it down on his face with murderous force.
Sweat plastering her hair, Tannat drove the mattock deep into the ground by Brint's head, grabbed him under his shoulders, and started to drag him back towards the healer's tent, swearing that if he lived she would make him sorry he had ever been born.