Shadow

Arthur crouched on the cliffside, over looking the army as it marched through the valley, only a small number of torches lit and clearly exhausted, but being pushed onward by their commanding officers. They were marching in the late night, the full moon hanging high in the air above them to show the way. Their plan was clear - they wished to advance while Arthur's kingdom had their guard lowered, and take them out before they could fight back. Perhaps if this army was not half asleep themselves, they might have had the upper hand with that plan. And perhaps, if Arthur wasn't their enemy.

The horses were his first target. He knew that only the commanders, captains, and other officials would be permitted to ride them, and that they would be spread strategically through the ranks, in order to keep the foot soldiers in sight and under control. Despite the lack of light or audience, they were forcing a very formal march - much to Arthur's advantage. He slipped the knife from his waist in his off hand, and the sword off his back in the other, and dropped from his perch.

There was a solid eight seconds of falling, dropping nearly a thousand feet. More than far enough to kill a man. He could hear the hard flickering of his cloak flapping in the wind behind him, and in the last second before he landed, so could the people below him. He saw the first officer turn his head to look up at him, and then he was on top of him, his knife stabbing through the officer's neck and killing him instantaneously, the horse crumbling under the force of his weight slamming into its body. Half a second later, his other arm was slamming down, cutting two men in half who had been marching behind the officer's horse.

As he stood up, tearing his weapons free of their gory sheaths, the second landing occurred behind him. The shadow that had stretched out from his body in the full moon's rays, pulling away from him as he dropped down to his foes. Arthur glanced toward it, seeing the form it had taken as it grew. A massive beast, with muscular form. Claws as sharp as blades, with teeth to match, and where Arthur wore a cloak, this monster had wings. It was black as night, just visible in the moon's glow, and its landing sent an unclear number of bloody limbs and heads flying into the air.

Horses were rearing in terror, swords were being pulled, but it was too late. The beast was already on its rampage, throwing bodies against the stony walls, and Arthur was leaping around the death fields, decapitating the heads of the army before they could bark out any retaliation orders. Any survivors would surely be considered mad, spitting tales of a man who fell from the sky accompanied by a hellish shadow monster that slaughtered an entire army.

But they'd be right.