Jarza had known the sounds an army made since he was but a lad of fourteen, though even then, he was larger than most grown men. The gods had seen fit to craft him from stone and oak, it seemed, broad of shoulder and thick of arm.
A gift, or perhaps a burden considering just how much food he needed to eat, but one he'd put to good use for the better part of three decades that he served as a mercenary.
He had never hoed a field, never cast a net into the sea. His hands had only known the heft of a spear and the weight of a shield. The songs of his youth were not the lullabies of home, but the snore of men huddled in cloaks and the harsh chorus of mail and steel rattling at dawn before the daily march.
Once, he had been part of the orchestra that played those war-tunes, now, he was the composer.