Chresian Chronicles: The Vagabonds

Ajax remembered too late, for the fifth time, to duck the counter-riposte, and in return he felt the dull wooden sword driven into his ribs, pushing him off balance and throwing him off the narrow pine log that served as a dueling beam into the mucky, stagnant pool below. It was late in the year, and although they had not yet had snow, the water was bitterly cold. He shivered and spat, green eyes glaring up at his opponent, a lean, tall blonde boy named Ammon, who cackled with glee, glaring down at him.

“Gotta block that counter, buddy,” Ammon said, and leaped down to the edge of the muddy pool, reaching out a hand. Ajax struggled over, hip deep, squeezing the mud out of his black hair, reached out his arm, and Ammon pulled him out. Ajax rubbed his ribs: that one was going to bruise. He offered his hand.

“Well done, mate,” he said, and Ammon beamed and shook it. “I’ve had enough beating for one day, and Mother Misery might have another round for us when she sees how filthy we are.”

They picked up their gear - a small satchel, a bow and a couple of practice swords, and looked around the little clearing that served as a training yard. It was situated in the steep wooded hills above the orphanage, and required a treacherous climb to reach, therefore affording the two boys some limited privacy from the overseer and her attendants. But at this elevation and time of year, the day grew chill early and the surrounding mountains cast them into shadow, and it was best not to linger too late. They were almost of majority age, but they still shivered at the sound of wolves at night, which always seemed to be just outside their window. They took a last glance around the glade and headed down the steep decline for home.

Ammon chatted happily as they made their way down, but Ajax grew brooding. Ammon was a few days from his age of majority, and families had been coming to visit. Cold eyed, beautiful but imperious women, usually in pairs, looking them over, talking quietly with the overseer, speaking briefly with Ammon, then leaving again.

“I tell you, Ajay,” Ammon said, as he recited his story for the sixth or seventh time this week, “this woman had the most amazing tits! I mean I could practically SEE them. Well the tops, anyways. And I was trying not to stare, and she was smiling at me. Kind of a creepy smile, I admit, but damn and Hades, I hope I see that one again. And tall, so, so tall. I can’t wait to see Chresia.” Ajax nodded, smiling despite himself at the description, enjoying the visual memory. Whatever these strange women’s intent, their physical allure was undeniable and intense, and it was hard to concentrate when they came around. But Ajax was a cautious soul, and he soon lapsed back into a skeptical mood.

It was nearly dark when they finally made it back to the orphanage, a compound of timber buildings arranged in a square, with a fourteen-foot timber palisade connecting two of the buildings and closing off the fourth side in a gate, forming a large interior courtyard. Tall pines crowded the structures, and here near the bottom of sheer mountains, it was almost always in shade. The distant sound of a raging river was their constant companion, and the strong scent of pine pitch filled the chill air.

They made their way to one of the side buildings - it was the smallest, at only two stories, and slipped inside as quietly as possible. The main floor was comprised of a kitchen and small mess hall, and a large mud room which stored equipment, cloaks, and boots for the frequently cool and inclement weather. They could smell burned soup cooking and exchanged a shrug of resignation. It was not great food, and it was always the same - beef and potatoes, bland, tough, and overcooked. But Ammon assured Ajax that this was better than starving, and he would have known, having lived in the streets of a city until he was eight.

“I ate my shoes twice, ” Ammon had told him, with a mixture of bravado and pain in his voice. “It was easier to get shoes than it was to find food, in Varantium. And then right before Mother Misery found me someone stole my third pair, and I was ready to curl up and starve to death. ”

They washed up quickly and went into the mess hall, and found the soup boiling with no one about. They quickly ladled up bowls and sat to eating. It was quiet, the only notable sound being the cook banging around in the back somewhere.

They were the only boys in the mess hall, and for that matter, they were the only boys left on the premises. Over the past year, several others had ‘graduated’ as the governess called it - all being interviewed as they approached majority age, by foreign women, sometimes several, mostly speaking Chresian – the language of the Amazon motherland, an island to the south. The boys came back to tell about their introductions, then were packed up on their name day, saluting the mother respectfully and being shuffled out of the yard without much ceremony by their new.. owners? Mothers? It wasn’t entirely clear, as Mother Misery counted a stack of drachmae. Ajax had caught only glimpses of them as they came out into the central square between the buildings to visit during better weather.

Only a few younger boys had come in for the last four or five years, and two of those had died of pneumonia, another of a rabid wolf bite. So as the older ones left, the numbers dwindled, and now it was just Ammon and Ajax. And soon, Ajax thought to himself, just him.

As the population had declined, so had the overseer’s mood, from placid and cool, to dour, even angry, over the past two years. Ajax didn’t understand it at first - less boys meant less work, and even he had to admit that he was a handful. But once he made the connection to the money, he understood. Her income was drying up.

Up until recently, however, their daily routine had remained the same as it was for years: Intense schooling in language, history, geography and maths for three hours a day, and then combat and physical training for four hours, five days a week, followed by chores around the compound. The sixth day would often be some sort of field trip, and on rare occasions, an overnight camping trip, which they had greatly enjoyed. The years rolled by, punctuated by the dramatically shifting Venetian seasons, and a few holidays: hot cider on New Years Eve, a rare treat ladled out by the overseers, who seemed unusually cheery and even giggling, and then brief, somber ceremonies to Hera on Mother’s day at a small altar in the courtyard – little more than a prayer uttered by Mother Misery, followed by tea cakes and honey, before returning to their duties.

The schoolmaster was usually Mother Misery, and combat training rotated between two other overseers - heavy brutish women, who swore extraordinarily and had gap teeth and tyrannical breath, but knew their business with any weapon, imposed fierce but fair discipline on the boys, and took their training seriously. By the time Ajax was fourteen, he had been holding a sword in his hand for a decade, and he knew every parry, dodge, and lunge combination in his sleep.

Book studies consisted primarily of history and language - he spoke the mainland Greek of Venetia, but Mother Misery also taught Chresian and Hypatia-Torricia dialects, as well as Latin. It wasn’t clear why this was important, but he was good at language and writing and he enjoyed it. Math was cursory at best, and advanced science was completely ignored, though Ajax barely even knew that would be considered a subject elsewhere.

Life had been generally quiet, and more bland than outright unpleasant - at least for Ajax. Ammon had lived enough in the world to remember the misery outside the walls, and his stories gave Ajax the sense that things could be worse, even if they weren’t particularly great.

When he had been very young, he remembered, nursemaids tended to him, warm and caring, who played with him and nurtured him, but by age eight they moved him from the nursery building to the one he now lived in, and life had changed. He wept for the caring woman who had doted on him, until the older boys caught him and thrashed him mercilessly for it, at which point he controlled himself and stiffened his lip.

Aside from Ammon’s stories, though, Ajax knew almost nothing of the world outside, with one exception. When he was fourteen, wandering in the woods at midsummer by himself, he had stumbled on a small group of cabins a few miles from the orphanage. An elderly woman sitting on a stool outside one of them saw him and gestured him over, and gave him a bit of beef jerky to eat. And she told him stories - fantastical stories of glittering islands and brass men that moved with a stilted gait - and soldiers and wars. He listened for hours and paid her back by helping with chores - picking vegetables, stacking firewood and such. He asked her once about Chresia, and she nodded. She had been born there, but it had become a wicked place, no place for boys, she had said. Eventually the woman had gotten sick, and one day he arrived to find the cabin empty, except for a small weathered leather map placed on the bed, with a vellum note addressed to him. He took it home and hid it, and reading the note, a glimmer of the future beyond the forest began to blossom in his mind.

Other than this, his world consisted of the dark woods, the palisade, Mother Misery and the overseers, gruff and strict, although rarely outright mean, and of course Ammon. He thought about Ammon as they ate, enjoying his bright company, as they chattered about the girls they hoped to see, and the world outside.

A few days later, they stood together on the edge of the square, and Ammon clutched a duffel bag of his few belongings. From the building across the square, three tall women with impossibly pale skin and long platinum hair strode purposefully, followed by the governess, clutching a heavy bag. They stepped up to the boys, towering a good foot over them, their blue eyes shining, but their smiles remote. They wore bright white, fitted tunics over tight grey leather breeches and black platform boots.

“Hello, Ammon,” said one of them, and reached out her hand. “Are you ready to go... home?” She said it oddly, with some sort of humor that brought a faint smile to one of the other’s lips. The third, shorter, but otherwise a mirror of the pale goddesses, stiffened slightly.

Ammon looked up and grinned, then turned and hugged Ajax. His eyes were a little damp.

“Look me up when you get to Chresia, mate, I’m old enough to buy an ale now! ” He cackled and took the tallest one’s hand, and the walked across the square again, and out of sight, followed by the governess.

Ajax felt a chill, and went back to his bunk, but he stared at the place where Ammon had bunked, now cleared and empty, and it made him sick. He stood again and tromped out through the back of the barracks, up the hill behind the orphanage, fighting tears.