To be a Knight

The sun rose over Mir. A quaint haven, Mir rested between the border of Bruke and Ryn, separated by the Ojun, the village’s livelihood. It had a ferry, one of two to Ryn, which Lochran, its keeper, obsessed over his ship, the Psyche White, for it was his family’s, passed down four hands thus far. He kept it pristine, not a barnacle nor a speck of rot on it, the wood nearly perfect and still the first. Even Hroamn Dasc would vie to see His face in those polished planks.

The Psyche White was Lochran’s world, which ’tis a shame he did not actually like to let it be used for what it was intended for. How he gritted his teeth whenever somebody came to ask if he would take them over to Ryn, for during the spring and early summer one could see across the Ojun, the air so clear it would allow one to see the edge of the world if that bright, wild landscape yonder of the Ojun did not block it. “I’ll toss you across,” he’d say before shushing them off for it was often the young that asked and didn’t have the coin. Those that did often showed forthwith, but even then it was with lumbered steps and methodical actions, hoping they’d change their mind or try, just try, to rush.

Ah, but there were times when he felt the same. Especially then, at the start of spring. The air was still heavy with winter’s breath over Mir, dew clinging to the wildlife around, but when the wind shifted and the fog that held upon the Ojun, even in the strongest of sunlight, was displaced enough, the warmth from the north, of things to come, managed to steal over as well as gave the village a taste of the denizen’s music across that cerulean expanse- yes. Even he felt the tug of wanderlust, then. If only a moment, a mite of thought, before he it was gone with the wind.

He would return to maintaining his ferry, waiting for “business” just so he could refuse again. True business he would never turn down, but no one ever came to Mir. No one ever needed his ferry nor spend a moment there in that haven. It was nestled away in Bruke’s most southern point of the Wyrm’s Reach. No baron, duke, or king ever checked; didn’t even send a messenger. The last time one happened upon it was roughly two decades before, when the Event transpired, and it was because the messenger got lost. That was, also, the last time Lochran had business.

Indeed, Mir and its people were simply forgotten in the royal accounts. No guards even came to patrol, but the people of Mir didn’t need for anything and were hardy folk. Being so close to Ryn, the wind carried its worlac berries and diasun seeds to their shores. Game was plentiful in the Wyrm’s Reach, so far out that no patrol dared to question or check, and there was always the bounty of the Ojun. Fish, from the tame, almost lackadaisical aquelian white-ridges to the snappy roarschan, swam through it, connecting to the Lyrus to the west and all the way to the Ludo Sea to the north. The wind, also, had an affect on the grissun spiders, soothing them and allowing their silk to be harvested and spun for clothes and other, sturdier needs. Most of the timber around was ironwood, which made for a strong core for most items. Not even a forgotten kettle overnight could hope to burn those aged timbers. Though stone and metal could be fitted onto shafts, the wood kept quite an edge on its own, and made quick, nearly quicker, work of the stone in the quarry north of Mir, already clacking away in the dawn.

There were six houses in the haven, an acre in between each and all pointed towards the well at its center. There was a stone wall around Mir, the entrance a wide arch, its portcullis sticking out at the bottom half a foot, looking like teeth. Lochran’s house was the closest to the ferry and had its own portcullis to the dock, erected in the bridge between his house and the office for it. The house to its right belonged to the elder of the town, Linde. Her husband, Raphael, passed four winters before, and she wasn’t as bright-eyed as she once was. Be that as it may, she still had the sweetest smile that warmed more than the balmiest of summers and was more welcome than the first songbird of spring.

In the two houses across, built along the road out, there was Julius and his wife, Deitre, and Dorin. Julius and Deitre hoped that their daughter, Bree, would have settled with Dorin, but, like so many before, she left. Dorin was the loner type, anyways. He preferred to be down in the mine than worry about whomever was waiting for him at home. If the gods wanted him to be with someone, they would come to the village. Then there were the two, outer houses. One stood empty, once belonging to the poet, Hilda. She left for Ryn two winters before, the draw of their music too strong, and with it took Mir’s scholar, its only teacher. The other house held the most recent addition to the town, Naomi, and her son, Firenze. Who was sleeping. Much to the woman’s perturbation.

“Wake up, sleepyhead,” she said. Her voice was soft, far too soft for the venom it held. Lo, have mercy for the poor mother. It was the fourth day in a row he had done so; even failed to wash off the day’s muck before soiling the bedding she worked hard to clean. She put her hands on her wide hips, ruffling her yellow dress, glaring down her small, pointy nose at the slugabed. He was face down in the single cot, head buried in the sheets- but jumped out of it with a yelp, reaching for his bum. A few angry spots still lingered on it from the days before, their makers, the wooden spoon, clapping happily against her palm, clucking her tongue in time with it and smiling at the gibbering mess on the ground. “Come on! Up up.”

“I’m up I’m u-agh!”

Firenze found his feet only to fall over them, landing on his bare derriere again. The wood thumped, as did his head on the bed. He winced, hissed as he rubbed it, ruffling the shaggy blond locks atop. Normally they were kept short, his mother made sure of that, but she has been lax on it over the last few moons. He spent the last sixteen years with it proper, and she didn’t see the harm in letting him try it out. That didn’t mean she didn’t harp at him for taking care of it, though. His hair was a splitting image of hers, after all, but that and his soft, green eyes were where the similarities ended. She was a shorter, fairer lass, where it seemed even a strong breeze would keel her over if not for the burden left from motherhood, but all who knew her knew better than to think her weak. Especially Firenze. She packed more a punch than a Lurin boar, and was far more accurate. And willing. Which was why he really couldn’t afford to keep sitting there.

The lad clambered to his feet again, rising to stand two heads over her. Easily. He wasn’t anywhere near as thin but didn’t have the bulkiest build either. Even Lochran, in his graying years, had more width on him. Under his mother’s glare, though, he still felt two feet tall, especially with her wielding that spoon.

“Hurry up and get your knickers on,” she said, waggling that utencil at his hair. “You need to rinse that before you hurry off to work.”

“Ah, mom,” he whined, wincing again and flinching as she slapped that spoon in her hand, hard enough to make the air crack.

“Don’t try that, young man. How many days now? It’s a wonder Dorin hasn’t come in and thrown you over his shoulder.”

“I know! I know, and I’m sorry-”

“You’ll definitely be sorry if you don’t stop with the bellyaching and get moving.”

He nodded and walked around her, heading for the door... only to stop and walk, backwards. To her. The house was little more a hut, one open room with a wardrobe centered off to the right, separating two cots pressed against the wall with it. The kitchen and fireplace took up the left, while the rest of the room was dedicated to a table and seats. The floor was covered in soft pelts, still rather fresh, cleaned not even a moon before. On the one closest to the beds were a pair of brown trousers, as well as a stained shirt. Firenze’s shoes, a pair of fur slips, were outside the door, but he would worry about them after paying the well a visit –and putting on his pants of course.

The dust and stone of the town was warm as he stepped out. The birds sang in the treetops; bugs buzzed. The odd one made it through, their bright shells like gems upon the vines that clung to the stone well, but the birds made quick work of them. It was a warm day, warmer than the days before, with a smattering of clouds in the sky to mar the soft blue heavens. The wind whispered through the thick forest, bringing with it the scent of timber and wildflowers, rousing Firenze out of his sluggishness before the cold water fully woke him. It ran down his back, splashing off as he gasped and spluttered. It dribbled along his face, still a few years away from adulthood, still shaping it into the chiseled man the soft clay was giving way to. He wasn’t there yet, alas. Couldn’t even grow a beard, nor a mustache, which Julius heckled him to no end on. Someday he wished he left with Bree, but that would have only added to Julius’s ire. Though Firenze never had those feelings for her, he was still protective of his “little girl”.

Firenze huffed, the first proper sound he could make after that cold spray, reminiscing on how that “little girl” knocked him out. His head still ached from that branch; the first two weren’t so bad, but then she snapped back on the third... How was she doing? Did she make it to Praguma, and was she been able to get an audience with His Majesty Eren?

Was she living the dream they had for so long, that so many of the others wanted in that haven? Did she become a knight... He huffed again, and threw on his shirt. The water on his back dried enough, his hair at least cleaner than it was. It was only going to be ruined again by the time he returned home, a small price. If he was going to be a knight someday he needed to accept his hair long, for it needed to be a flowing, majestic mane, and properly maintained. Alas, it wasn’t a mane just yet, still little more than scruff, hanging down in his face as he made his way out of the village and to the quarry.

He passed Deitre and Linde along the way, gossiping as they battered the rugs clean of dust. Linde matched her stroke per stroke, not letting up on those fur skins. Firenze waved to them; they simply shook their heads, urging him along. His fur slips slapped on the stone path, even echoed a touch as he went under the town’s arch, and soon the road gave way to pounded dirt.

The quarry wasn’t too far from town, but it was still a good jog. Though the foliage was dense, there never was any fear from the local wildlife. It was as if they, too, wanted nothing more than to wilder away, to rest in the dream of time immemorial. It always pained Firenze to take the life of a rested deer or a sleeping boar, but they needed to eat. They needed to survive, and there was always more of nature’s bounty abound. In truth, he was thankful for the life he had... yet he still wanted.

No. He needed.

There was never challenge in Mir, never hardships. Even the coldest of winters weren’t so bad because of the Ojun. Again, they never wanted for food. Even when the meatiest of game hibernated, fish were always plentiful in those serene swells... Because of that, he always wondered what life would have been like wherever his mother originally came from. Where she and his father called home.

No matter how many times he asked her, she wouldn’t budge. “Be grateful for what we have, dear,” she would say, patting the only memento from his father, a pair of enchanted pata with fitted, black scabbards. They hung over the fireplace, their black gauntlets drinking those flames, glimmering like polished jet before turning into fire as well as it spilled into the damascened silver and gold passing from the covering on the wrist to the hand. There was no separating those hand covers from the blades, made of Seric steel. The silver stopped there while the gold wrapped about the base of the swords then ran up and embossed along their middle, filling in the fuller, the coast for those waves of metal to wash against. The edges were kept clean, oiled, and sheer, the blades both as long as his legs. He took them down more times than he ever wanted his mother to know and tried them on, feeling their soft, fur-lined interior and the firm, hickory handles. Whenever he gripped them proper there was a small pop on the air. From there, no matter how hard he swung them he could not let go and they would not budge from his arms. Only when his fingers lost all contact to the handles did that pop ring in the air again and he was able to put them back. Every time, though, when he asked, she would walk over to them, pat them, and repeat that line.

“Be grateful for what we have.”

He was. Firenze was thankful and knew he was blessed for everything... But that didn’t satisfy, as it didn’t those that came and left before him. He could feel their call, their pull to join. His dream was not there in that quiet haven but out in the world, becoming something... grander. He felt he was meant for something greater. He knew he was.

And he knew it was time.

The forest thinned, cut away for timber, and through it he could see the opening to the quarry. It was little more than a hole in the ground, but at least had a clearing, lined with lain stone. His pickaxe sat at the entrance, scooped up as he slid down the layered steps, his head just grazing the ceiling until it opened to the mines. The lad didn’t know how old they were, how deep they truly went, but he knew Dorin did most of it. His pick thundered through the dim caverns, his grunts louder, the thunder that was always right before the lightning, crashing into the stone. He was on the third level, where they found a silver vein the day before.

Firenze hummed a soft tune, walking up to him. He might have been tall, but Dorin put him to shame. In every way; it was hard to tell him against rock around, a mountain in his own right. His shoulders, alone, seemed to be made of boulders, his arms and legs thick stalactites, coming from a trunk of a body, all a rich bronze. No hair dared touch that perfect surface, the top of his head gleaming in the torch light, while his blue eyes glistened, tearing away the dusk that surrounded.

Dorin righted himself, groaning as his back popping, another storm. It settled as he rested his pickaxe across his shoulders, tunring and smiling at Firenze as the boy approached.

“Finally awake,” He said, his voice far too soft for such a giant of a man. Firenze had a deeper voice, at least, but he could only dream of matching the power behind it, the authority, the respect- the attention it demanded. “Naomi wasn’t too pleased.”

“She talked to you, huh?”

“At the break of dawn... She ‘apologized’ on your behalf and offered breakfast. I declined, but enjoyed the company all the same. She always had the gift of gab... Alas, I had to get to work, so I asked her not to be too harsh on you. You’ve been working hard every single day.”

“Yeah, though not in the way she suspects... You didn’t tell her, did you?”

“No, but she’s clever. She knows something is up, and raked me over the coals. You know, in her sweet way. Really should tell her soon.”

“I am... Tonight’s the night.”

Dorin chuckled, and brought the pickaxe down from his shoulders.

Holding it just under the pick’s end, instead. He gripped it with both hands, the rounded tip pointed towards Firenze, raising his own in the same fashion.

“Then we best make today your final test,” Dorin said. “If you can land a hit, I won’t be waiting at the entrance of town all night.”

“You’re on!”

And the halls rang with their sticks, clashing again and again. It was only cut by Firenze’s gasps and continued winces, knocked to the ground again and again. He would not falter, however. The last few moons, the increased sessions against the retired General Dorin; it all built up to that day. His day. No matter how battered and bruised, he would not give up. He would land that one hit. He would make it out in the world, become legend, and make his mother proud. He was going to make them all proud.

But, most important of all, he was going to make his father proud.