Path of a Novice

by R K Lander

  Yes, it was finally coming together; he had made progress and now, all he had to do was wait for the right moment to approach his mentor. But one thing he did know; it needed to be soon, very soon for the risk of the boy’s identity becoming known was too great.

  As it turned out, Handir did not have to wait long, and after the next council meeting, Handir had seen his chance for what it was. Aradan was in a good mood, the day was yet young, and the king had not requested his presence. Bolstering his resolve, he trotted up to his mentor and took up his pace, stuffing his hands into his ample sleeves as he was wont to do when walking and thinking at the same time.

  “Lord Aradan.”

  “Councillor Handir,” he replied perkily enough, and Handir was encouraged.

  “I have need of your counsel,” he said innocently, too much it seemed, for Aradan stopped short and turned to his young apprentice.

  “What is it?” he asked in genuine concern.

  “It is a private matter, my Lord, of some import. I would not burden you with it but I know not who else to turn to.”

  Aradan studied the boy’s face before slowly nodding. “Alright, you have my full attention.”

  “Thank you, my Lord,” he said. So far so good he thought. “I know you are more than aware of my family’s—communication issues.”

  “Handir, do not use those euphemisms with me. While I am pleased you remember your lessons, we speak now as friends, I dare say. As such they are misplaced. Speak freely and for the sake of Ari, plainly.”

  “Lord Aradan, if I may. I must first ask that you consider this conversation a private issue and, as such, to be spoken of only between ourselves.”

  “Handir, I cannot promise that,” said Aradan with a warning glance. “Should you disclose something I feel of relevance to the king, I will not withhold it from him. But this, of course, you already knew,” he murmured, searching his prince’s soft blue eyes for the answers to his unspoken questions.

  “I do know, Aradan. But my dilemma is this: family conflict is leading to an ever-growing rift between myself and the Crown Prince, indeed with my own father. I know you are sympathetic to the Silvan cause, as I myself am, and that you dislike the ideas that Lord Band’orán is promoting. I consider it my duty to remedy this and the only way forward that I can see, is to break the barrier of silence on the matter of the queen’s departure. Only then will I be able to work with my father and brother to return this kingdom to what it once was, reverse the downward spiral into conflict and perhaps, even treason.”

  Aradan stared disbelievingly at his young charge, before letting out an overdue breath. “After all this time—is this not a little—out of the blue? You cannot think me so naive as to presume I would not read between the lines—that there is a reason for doing this now?”

  “Nay, I respect you, Aradan, this you know. I would never underestimate you. I simply wish to promote my theory and gain your confidence. I will speak to my father on the same question I wish to ask you. Does that help me to earn your discretion?”

  “It may,” said Aradan as he began to walk once more.

  It had to be enough, decided Handir, but that did nothing to quell his trepidation.

  “Alright,” he said slowly and Aradan glanced at the boy worriedly. “I need to understand the circumstances surrounding my father’s—indiscretion.”

  Silence.

  “I understand if you are under oath, Aradan. I wish simply for any information you can offer, even if it is a simple impression. I know you were already deep in my father’s confidence at the time. I know you know what happened.”

  Silence.

  Handir looked down, his confidence failing rapidly. Aradan was not talking.

  “Aradan, this is important. It is not a whim, it is of the utmost significance to this kingdom that I understand him so that I can defend him.”

  “Defend him from what?” asked Aradan curtly.

  “From those who would seek to discredit him.”

  “And who would do that?”

  “Now it is you who underestimates me, Aradan. If you do not wish to speak of it do not, but do not turn the questioning upon me when well you know of whom I speak.”

  Silence.

  It was not working; his plan had failed. Either he conceded something, or he would desist.

  “Aradan, would it help if I told you what you truly want to know—the wherefore of my sudden conviction to know the truth?”

  “Yes—it would make all the difference, Handir,” said Aradan slowly, his eyes searching the second prince with a depth that unnerved him.

  “And yet we come full circle, for to do so I must have your promise.”

  Silence.

  “I cannot give it,” said the Chief Councillor tightly. “Yet I will concede this one thing.”

  Handir stopped abruptly and turned to his mentor, his face now unguarded and open, young and vulnerable, but he cared not for in some unconscious way, Handir knew Aradan was about to reveal something of import.

  “It was not some careless whim, Handir. It was not a moment of weakness that sent your mother away from her children, away from the only elf she had ever loved,” said Aradan softly, a cloud of crushing grief almost visibly surging from his bright eyes.

  “What then?” Handir whispered, his own eyes filling with unshed tears of empathy. “What was it that could achieve such a thing?” he pleaded.

  Aradan’s face softened before he slowly enunciated the words he knew his young charge could never have imagined.

  “It was love, Handir. He loved a Silvan woman with eyes the colour of summer moss. He loved her as much as he respected your mother.”

  The tears in Handir’s soft blue eyes finally brimmed and then slowly escaped and the prince looked away in shock. His father had not loved his mother, he had loved another he could not have . . . he had loved the woman that gave birth to the Silvan.

  “Handir,” called Aradan softly, but there was no answer, for the prince was lost in emotional chaos, half-hearted denial, disbelief, anger, incomprehension.

  “I will leave you to your thoughts,” was all he said before striding away, flailing in his own sea of tumultuous memories he did not care to relive.

  But there was a question there too, one Aradan now needed an answer to, and which Handir had not wanted to disclose, not unless Aradan gave his word not to speak of it.

  It was a dilemma, even for one such as Aradan.

  Chapter Nine

  First Contact

  “Love cannot be surpassed for it is all-encompassing to an elf. Life itself can be choked by her the whiles, for is it not better to face the void in love, unaware, than to face eternity without it, in painful lucidity?”

  On Elven Nature. Calro.

  ***

  Angon disappeared into the trees. The other warriors tracked silently behind Turion at the fore, and before Lainon at the rear.

  Fel’annár was in the middle, feeling somewhat indignant at being treated like a weakling, a helpless twit unable to fend for himself. He had been told that, should there be a confrontation, he was to climb into the trees and offer cover with his bow. Fer’dán, an Alpine warrior was to accompany him—as if he were a child! he scoffed angrily. He had tracked back home with Idernon and Ramien, albeit that had been for rabbit and other small game. Here, though, they searched for signs of Deviants, and suddenly, the mere comparison, and his own, callow stupidity made him chuckle out loud, garnering the other warriors’ disapproving gazes.

  Fighting the blush that threatened to flood his face, he disciplined his mind as best he could, banning his inner dialogue from distracting him with a deep breath and a purposeful blink of the eye, and soon enough, he realised that the forest had quietened and the warriors moved differently. Their bodies were tightly coiled, their steps purposeful and quiet, eyes fixed on the path
ahead, peripheral vision straining to take in as much visual information as they could. This was the closest Fel’annár had been to the enemy and his attention threatened to falter once more – excitement, apprehension.

  He took another deep breath, but the fight to stop his own thoughts from manifesting themselves became harder with every step he took. His mind searched for protocols, strategies Turion would enforce, techniques he would use with his bow. His mounting distraction became apparent when he missed Turion’s silent signal to ascend.

  He was the last to scamper up the bark of the nearest tree and take up his position near Fer’dán, who glared at him in reproof. Fel’annár decided he deserved it as he straightened his ruffled cloak and once more, cursed his puerile ways.

  Still a novice, he realised ruefully, yet determined to prove himself. He bore the stern, non-verbal reprimands and prepared his bow, watching Fer’dán as he did so, yet always with an eye on Turion.

  Bird call from their scout had Fer’dán drawing on his short bow and Fel’annár did likewise. This was it then, he realised. He was going into battle with Deviants for the first time, albeit from the safety of the trees.

  The enemy could be heard now and a soft breeze brought with it their scent. Fel’annár scrunched his nose up in disgust, for the smell was pungent—so much so it made his eyes water, impairing his vision. Swiping at them impatiently with his sleeve he rapidly took up his draw once more, unaware of the smirk that Fer’dán had allowed to escape, for the boy had unwittingly smudged his cheek with dirt.

  “Steady, boy. Do not take to the ground unless you are ordered to. Take out the archers first if there are any, and if there are none, take out those in the fanciest clothes,” instructed the veteran warrior calmly, as if they prepared for a summer picnic.

  “Aye, Fer’dán,” said Fel’annár a little too tightly—he was nervous, and he was irritated—at himself.

  “Aim for the chest or neck.”

  ‘Chest or neck,’ repeated Fel’annár to himself in surprise, surely the eye or the neck; he did not understand and made a note to ask Lainon later.

  Another call—imminent contact—they were coming and he was ready. His breathing doubled to keep up with his thumping heart, his eyes as wide as they could be and his mouth slack and open.

  The fine hairs at the nape of his neck prickled painfully and his sight narrowed to where he knew the enemy would appear. He was ready, he said to himself again, in spite of his writhing stomach.

  “Steady, boy,” came another warning from Fer’dán but Fel’annár heard it as if from a distance.

  A guttural roar, more terrible than Fel’annár could ever have predicted, echoed around the glade and painfully in his ears, and the very sound of it was enough to shock him so that for a moment he could not move. It had been the sound of an animal, not a mortal, the sound of a wounded beast and Fel’annár found himself wondering why he had not expected that. Yet the battle was already underway, and Fer’dán, seemingly unaffected by the unnatural bellow, released his second arrow. Jolted out of his stunned paralysis, Fel’annár drew and then released, his keen eye following his own projectile until it embedded itself in the eye of a mountain Deviant who shrieked and then fell to the floor, mercifully dead.

  Fel’annár smiled despite the cold sweat that had beaded on his forehead, and then drew once more, letting loose another, green-fletched arrow, his smile wider as he watched his second victim fall, its eye pierced.

  The group had been small and the archers had not been needed upon the ground, and so, with no more mountain Deviants left alive, a satisfied novice followed Fer’dán to the ground.

  “Clean up—Angon, see to it,” barked Lainon, as Fel’annár watched in awe of his Ari’atór mentor whom he was observing in battle for the first time.

  But the dark lieutenant suddenly whirled on his heels and came face to face with a startled Fel’annár.

  “What are you smiling at!” he hissed, taking the young novice completely by surprise, his piercing blue eyes glinting like ancient steel under the desert sun.

  The other warriors, including Turion, had gone deathly silent as they watched their lieutenant face their young novice.

  “I do not understand,” said Fel’annár, his worry and incomprehension written clearly on his open face. He thought he had done well; he had not missed a single shot.

  “If a warrior bids you aim for the chest, you comply!” he shouted mercilessly.

  Fel’annár made to open his mouth and defend himself, but could not quite manage to get his thoughts together, for the lieutenant’s face was a dreadful sight.

  “You are a novice, boy. You are not yet qualified to make tactical decisions. This will not happen again,” he finally said, a little more calmly, before he spun on his heels and went to oversee the clean-up, the heavy air around them seeming to part before the Spirit Warrior, aware perhaps, of his anger and the terror he had masked as ire.

  A friendly hand squeezed Fel’annár’s shoulder, making him jump. It was Angon who simply walked past him. He smiled timidly before another hand landed in the same place, silent and strong and it was not long before all seven warriors had offered their silent support. Fel’annár had erred because he had disobeyed Fer’dán, yet he still failed to understand why it was so important to aim for the chest, where the damage may well not be fatal—why not go for a sure kill? It was beyond his ken and he resolved to ask Lainon about it—later of course, for the Ari’atór had been fierce in his wrath and Fel’annár had no intention whatsoever of crossing him again until he had calmed down.

  Blowing out noisily, he slung his bow over his shoulder and followed the warriors, for there was dirty work to be done. The thought of touching the stinking bodies of the Deviants admittedly turned his stomach for they were a gruesome sight. He had prepared himself as best he could and had seen the drawings, read the descriptions, yet their unholy screams had taken him completely by surprise—nay they had terrified him and he swore he would not be taken unawares again.

  They had gathered the half-rotten bodies and then dug open graves so that the birds could feed on them. Burning them was not an option here in the thick of the forest, yet neither could they leave the carcasses to pollute the ground.

  They set up camp a fair distance away, and Fel’annár was invited to sit with the troop and its commanders for the first time. They talked quietly as was always the case after a skirmish and he was glad of it, for he did not wish to spoil the moment with some infantile comment, preferring instead to listen and speak as little as possible.

  He was good at that—not drawing attention to himself.

  Lainon watched him from across the fire, the orange flames that danced before him reflecting in his slanted eyes and lighting them up like a mountain puma hunting under a moonless night. The boy was worried, in spite of appearances, but he had respectfully held his peace, waiting perhaps for this very moment when Lainon would explain to him why he had shouted at him before the entire patrol.

  Yet it was not Lainon who spoke but Turion.

  “You are confused and that is understandable,” he began, waiting for the rest of the warriors to quieten. “I will tell you why you deserved that down-braiding,” he said matter-of-factly as Lainon nodded, staring into the flames as he listened.

  “In battle, it is often the case that the archer’s aim is not at its full potential. The excitement of the fight, exhaustion, poor light, an injured companion; there are many variables. It is the work of a good archer to guarantee a hit, whether it kills or simply maims. That way you never waste an arrow. If you take a difficult shot you may lose that arrow—your results will be poor and your companions on the ground will suffer the consequences.”

  Fel’annár listened carefully before opening his mouth to ask the question that was screaming to be freed, but Turion stopped him with his hand.

  “Wait, and listen.
I saw your marks and I know you did not waste arrows, but it was simply circumstance that allowed you to snipe, rather than to confront in battle. Had you been on the ground and firing your bow, would you have been able to make those shots?” asked the captain rhetorically.

  Lainon turned to face the novice, daring him to gainsay the captain, and to his absolute shock—he did.

  “Yes,” he said a little too quietly, before looking around at his companions in silent apology. “Under the correct circumstances, I know I could make the same shots. I believe I have learned a lesson, but I also trust my instinct in this. If I know my circumstances permit, I therefore know I can make the shot. Had I been tired, perturbed in some way, injured, I understand the need to take a guaranteed aim, rather than one that may send my arrow astray. But that was not the case. I was safely perched in a tree, fresh and alert—I believe it was a good tactic and yet I did indeed disregard Fer’dán’s guidance and for that I know I deserved your ire, Lieutenant. I will make sure that does not happen again.”

  Both commanders stared at the young novice, still processing the boy’s bold words with blank faces and fiery eyes.

  “How can you be so sure, Fel’annár? You have never engaged in battle before, you do not yet know how you will react. Your words are based on faith. It is the duty of the commander to ensure his warriors’ safety—never trust to faith in that, Fel’annár.”

  Fel’annár held Turion’s steady gaze before dipping his head in silent acknowledgement. “I understand, Captain,” he said softly.

  “You should also be aware that you were nervous, Fel’annár – we could all see that, even if you could not,” said Lainon. There was a warning in his eyes and Fel’annár would not gainsay him. He was right. His tendency to downplay his own emotions, to disregard them as unimportant had been honed over years of defending himself, of telling himself that he was alright. Again, all he could do was nod, this time more slowly. He thought perhaps, that he had learned a valuable lesson.