Taken: The Life of Uktesh Book 3

by Hicks, Aaron

  The messenger took a step back and even the dozens of guards looked nervous. “I, ah, suppose that if one of the Numbers says his wife is well trained, then she could, ah, be exempt, but just one!”

  Thulmann clapped the man on his shoulder and said, “That’s great! We’ll be there. It sounds like fun!”

  The messenger said, “As one of the Numbers you’re expected to arrive the day before training starts.”

  Thulmann barked a laugh and said, “Too bad Uktesh isn’t here. We could have all ten Numbers.”

  The messenger said, “Uktesh? The winner of last year’s tournament? He lives here? Is he here now? I need to thank him, I won so much money because of him.”

  Thulmann said, “No, alas, he was captured by the invaders after single-handedly destroying most of their ships.”

  The messenger puffed out his chest and said, “I’d expect no less from someone of his caliber. Tell me, was he killed in the fighting or captured like you said?”

  Thulmann said, “Captured.”

  The man grinned widely and said, “Then we’ll see him again. I have faith that if it’s possible to get back here, he’ll be the one to do it. He wants to come back, right?”

  Thulmann gestured at Laurilli and said, “His wife is waiting for him.”

  The man said, “I knew I recognized you. You also fought in the tournament, and did fairly well if I remember correctly. What happened to your arm?”

  Laurilli said, “The invaders caught me with two crossbow bolts.”

  The messenger nodded and said, “Well, if you’re here I’m certain he’ll come back! Stronger than ever!” He raised a clenched fist and suddenly realized he was cheering on a person who couldn’t see or hear him. His cheeks flushed with embarrassment and he said, “Well, I’ll see you guys in two weeks!” He quickly backed out of the courtyard and shouted, “Take care,” before the gate was shut.

  Thulmann said, “Well, we’ve got two weeks to whip everyone into shape! Abrym how old are you?”

  Abrym smiled and said, “Sixty-two.”

  Thulmann said, “Good, how good are you with a bow?”

  Abrym lost some of his glee, “Poor, I’d say.”

  Thulmann said, “Then it’s time to buy you some archery gloves! Because without them you’re going to cut your fingers down to nubs!”

  Laurilli asked, “I think we should focus more on endurance than actually learning skills. Being able to fight longer will help more than bursts of skill followed by exhaustion.”

  Thulmann nodded and said, “You’re in charge of the endurance training then. Don’t push yourself too hard and by the time we show up there won’t be a community better prepared, outside of Beletaria that is!”

  Everyone shouted and he continued, “Maybe by the end we’ll be better than some of those villages too!”

  Everyone cheered again, and Thulmann quickly organized people into weapons training and endurance. Laurilli had a purpose again! She paced in front of Basam, Fayth, Trysha, Pamfilo, and Sara, and shouted, “Alright maggots! You think I’m just a kind sweet little girl now, but by the gods, by the end of these two weeks you will know that the devil isn’t in the details, it’s in me!” She saw humor on their faces and snapped her rapier like a whip against Fayth’s behind and said, “Do you find me funny? Now run, you weaklings!” When they didn’t immediately move she lifted her rapier over her head and started circling it around her head. They all took off at a run, With Basam laughing the whole time.

  What did I agree to

  Two months and two weeks apart from Uktesh

  When Laurilli woke up, the smell of smoke and the sight of people stumbling around greeted her. She sat up and realized that for the first time in a long time she had slept soundly. She yawned, stretched, noticed that there was no tightness in her chest, and jumped up to her feet. She quickly found a place to relieve her bladder and just as quickly headed back to where she’d slept. She put her sword belt on the ground and laid on it. She rolled to her left with the belt buckle in her right hand and carefully and grabbed both ends in her hand and looped the end through the buckle. She tightened the belt and slowly slid her hand down the belt, keeping the tension tight, found the metal tongue and pushed it through one of the holes in the leather and tucked the rest of the belt to the side.

  She stood up and shook her hips to ensure it was on tight enough. When she was satisfied she rolled up her bedding, tied it with three strings and picked up her canteen. She swished some water around in her mouth and spat it out to the side of the road before she drank two deep gulps of the water. She bunched up a new shirt before she stripped off her dirty shirt and quickly worked her way into the clean shirt. She looked around, but saw that no one was watching her except for Pamfilo, who Laurilli had learned, wanted to baby her, regardless of how Laurilli felt about it.

  She walked down the other side of the road to the stream and filled her canteen with water. She took another deep gulp of the cool water. She knew that she, and the rest of her group, had to be in Bainbridge and ready by high noon, and when she glanced at the sun she knew they didn’t have much time to spare. She roused the twins, who were always the last ones awake. She helped Basam coral Robyn, Katy, Kayla, and Elysha, who were having a water fight in the stream. After fifteen minutes of battling the twins to get ready and the children to stop playing, they were all finally in a line and everyone had a partner. She sighed in relief that they could start moving and without a backward glance they started walking toward the town. At the edge of the camp, she thought about yelling to wake up those that had somehow slept through the chaos of the morning, but decided against it. Those who would be there would be the better recruits, and she didn’t want to upset the system.

  With a shrug she walked away from the group of people who’d slept together for safety. After an hour of walking the group made it into the town. They crossed underneath a drawbridge gate and found that there were two guards with bored expressions standing around a fire for warmth, their breastplates dull and poorly kept. Laurilli and her group weren’t even questioned as they walked in--armed as they were--and so she continued forward toward the crowd of people. She flowed with the crowd and pulled Elysha with her, hoping that everyone would be able to stay together by linking hands. She saw homes and shops with two stories of space. She was surprised that a town this small had begun to build up rather than out. Back in Manori the bigger the house was the more ground it took up, but here it looked like the status symbol was not the biggest house, but the tallest. Some seemed to end with a loft like she and her mom had had at their old home, but most here had another full floor. She stared open-mouthed as the buildings got higher and higher. They’re even taller than in Baenok! Some even seemed to be leaning to one side and she saw two that looked like they’d fallen into each other, and had simply been reinforced and built up from there. She even spotted a building that had the wall facing the street filled with windows going up five stories, though she was sure that the top window must be for a loft area. She wanted to walk in just to see if the entrance was really that high, or if it was a trick the architect has used.

  While she stared at it she was not watching where she was going and walked into someone’s back. After a quick apology she found where the recruits needed to be and got in line behind a group of older men. A quick head count revealed that none had gotten lost, and neither of the twins had succeeded in sneaking away.

  The other men were talking about the dismal quality of recruits this year. When Robyn walked up to one of them and pulled on his coat they broke off their conversation to gape at the blue headed boy. One of the men with gray peppering his beard, and a wide-brimmed hat that shaded his eyes and covered more than half his face, said, “You see here, this boy is so under-developed that he doesn’t even look eight years old.”

  One of the men made the connection to the meaning of Laurilli’s loose left sleeve and said, “That girl is even missing an arm!”

  Laurilli said, “Excu
se him, he’s young-looking, but he is eight. You can tell because he constantly forgets his manners.” She said the last bit to Robyn.

  Robyn shook his head and said, “They said Robyn’s father was dismal quality!”

  Laurilli said, “Do you know what that means?”

  Robyn shook his head and said, “No, but you do and you looked at them like you look at the twins.”

  Laurilli smiled and said, “I’m sure I did.” She turned to the men again and said, “Please excuse us.”

  They did a double take at Laurilli, and the gray-bearded man said, “Girl you cannot be serious about taking part in the training! You’re, well, you’re missing an arm!”

  Obviously.

  Laurilli said, “I wasn’t aware there were any exceptions. If you’re saying there are I’d much rather be sleeping in my comfortable bed.”

  “Then what are you doing here?”

  She sighed, “I’m here to train, sir.”

  “Go home girl. We need a cripple to fight our battles for us like we need a swift kick in the ass.”

  They really need a swift kick in the ass so…

  Laurilli smiled at the dragons’ thoughts and said, “I hate to disagree sir, but the messenger who told us about the mandatory training, knew that I was missing an arm, but he said that I was skilled enough to join this year.”

  The gray-bearded man said, “Really? This I have to see. How skilled are you?”

  “I am good with my rapier, and I am working my way back to being accomplished in unarmed combat.”

  “What’s that sword you wear.”

  Laurilli sighed, “It’s called a rapier and I’m good enough with it.” She ignored the fact that for the last several days she had been beaten mercilessly by Heathyr as her mom drilled more advanced skills into her through practice.

  That’s just because you and your husband both enjoy ignoring my helpful suggestions.

  A helpful suggestion is by definition useful. You’re suggestion that we strip down to our underwear to be able to more clearly see where we were being hit was not.

  It would have been useful at relieving me of boredom.

  The gray beard said, “Girl, no one your age and limitation could possibly have more than a passing understanding of unarmed fighting. Your body could not handle it.”

  Laurilli shrugged, she looked up and saw that the sun was, thankfully, practically at the noon hour, so she smiled and said, “It was a pleasure to meet you sirs, but the reason we are here is about to start.”

  Laurilli turned and started to walk off, with Robyn in tow, when she heard the gray beard ask, “Girl, what is your name?”

  She smiled and knew her dimples were showing when she said, “Laurilli. I’d have your name as well, sir.”

  His eyebrow twitched as he answered, “I am known by some as Roain.”

  Laurilli continued to walk away, pushing her way to join in the group of people at the front of the stage. Slowly the rest of her group came to stand around her. A loud trumpet sound echoed throughout the square, all the talking ground to a halt, and everyone turned toward the stage. Out walked eight men one of whom Laurilli recognized at the messenger who had recruited there group to join in the training. The announcer asked that those who were recruited by these men to line up in front of them. Laurilli, and the rest of her group, walked over to stand in front of her messenger, and noticed that their line was far shorter than all the others. She looked to her right and left and saw that all the other lines were made up of dozens more people.

  She felt a hand slam down on her right shoulder, “Howa! Lovely Laurilli made it!” Laurilli turned to see Enan and his son. Behind them were several other people Laurilli recognized from the camp last night. She was glad to have other people in her line, and even though his face did not give anything away, Laurilli could tell that the messenger was glad, that more people than just Laurilli and her group had shown up.

  She whispered to Basam, “I thought for a moment that we were going to be the only ones who made it on time.”

  Enan spat to the side, ignored the angry, “hey,” and said, “Ack, me an’ me boy ‘ould o’ been ‘ere ferst, sept’n that we done stayed behind ‘an woke this sorry lot up.” He threw his thumb over his shoulder and gestured to include those behind himself. “Speak’in o’ tha’, why’d’n’ you wake us up?”

  Laurilli said, “I figured that getting here on time was part of the test, to see if we have what it takes to be in trained in the first place. Also, I think that anyone who slept through the ruckus we made getting ready deserves the punishment of being late.”

  Enan scratched his chin and said, “Well, I don’ know ‘bout tha’, but I’m still glad tha’ I helped out these boyz.”

  By then a man had been talking about the honor of being in the first training class and that the safety of the whole was more important that the safety of the few. Laurilli grinned and thought, that was not well received!

  No it wasn’t. He’s basically telling the people that they are forced to be here and that they’re already considered an, ‘acceptable loss.’

  That’s what he meant? I missed that.

  “To wrap this up, I’d like to introduce you to one of the men-” a woman coughed loudly. The speaker said, “One of the men and women, who will be training you. One of the Numbers--the hero, named Three!” The whole square burst into cheers and applause.

  Enan put his arm around her and pulled her to his side in glee, “This is why me an’ me boy decided to come fo’ this, we had heard so much about this man, some say tha’ h’’s the best o’ all the Numbers.” Laurilli stretched on her toes and craned her neck to get a glance at this man. She saw the man with the wide brimmed hat and the graying beard—who had told her to go home--walk on stage and remove his hat. There, tattooed on his forehead, was a golden tattoo of a trident. It clearly depicted the number three. His eyes scanned the crowd, and for an instant his eyes met Laurilli’s. She shivered as Three’s glance moved on to the next person. Laurilli had been in the presence of men who could kill other men as easily as regular men killed bugs, but Three’s presence sent a chill down her spine. Laurilli swallowed and wondered if she wanted to learn what Three could teach her.

  “During this martial training you will be tested,” Three started softly. Everyone could hear him easily, though they all strained forward to make sure they heard the next words. “You are not warriors, you are not militia. When you are done with your training you will return to your homes and life will return to normal, aside from an occasional patrol. If the war comes to your home, you will be able to fight and defend that which is yours. Sadly, most of you won’t make even make decent warriors,” he turned and pointed to Laurilli. “This girl could probably beat all of the lot of you in sword play.” Murmurs arose from the crowd, the men to Laurilli’s right and left shot glances at her; some curious, most with more than a little heat. “If you don’t believe me, then I challenge anyone with a wooden sword to outshine this radiant girl. Girl, come up here.”

  Laurilli walked up to the stage thinking, this jackass is insane! For all he knows I’m just wearing my fathers’ sword!

  I think there may be more than that. He was probably goading you, and when you resisted he must’ve realized you’d been well trained.

  That’s still not very comforting.

  She got to the stage and hopped up. Those who had not been able to see her suddenly knew the insult for what it was. Soon one, then two, three, and four swordsmen with wooden swords moved toward the stage. Soon thirty-one people stood up on the stage. Laurilli knew that they all had one thing on their minds; beat the cripple. They cleared a space to fight, but before the situation got out of hand Thulmann stepped forward and said, “Of course, us being honorable Numbers, I’d be more than willing to play the role of gatekeeper.”

  Laurilli saw most of the men jump back off the stage, but Baloce remained, “What do I have to do to pass you, O’ Gatekeeper?”

  The crowd s
aw that it was a boy Laurilli’s age and they shouted, “Let them fight! That’s as fair as it will get!”

  Thulmann’s jaw flexed several times before he laughed heartily and said, “A boy fighting a girl with one arm? That’s entertainment you want to see?” Scorn dripped almost palpably from his words.

  Someone in the back--Laurilli thought it sounded like Dekan--shouted, “Yeah,” into the sudden silence and after a pause the courtyard erupted into a wild cheer. Thulmann was shaking with rage when he turned to her, “You don’t have to do this.”

  She took a deep breath and said, “I think I do.”

  Thulmann nodded, clearly not happy with the scene unfolding before him. He walked back to where the other eight Numbers were standing, grabbed Three and threw him through the air to land in between Laurilli and Baloce. Thulmann shouted, “You want a fight? Instead of two beginners, will you accept a substitute of two of the best in Sinai?”

  The crowds’ roar of approval literally shattered the windows around the square. Thulmann didn’t waste a moment. Suddenly his two swords were working their magic against Three’s staff. Laurilli saw that her father, in his fury, that Three would risk injuring her, was making mistakes. She shouted, “Calm down! You think Uktesh would’ve missed those mistakes!”

  Thulmann paused, nodded to her, without taking his eyes off of Three, and pressed the attack again. She backed away until she was standing with the remaining Numbers and watched. It took much longer than Laurilli would have expected, and she more than understood how Three had earned his place in the Numbers, but with a loud crack Thulmann broke the staff and rested his sword at Three’s throat. The crowd burst into cheers again, and started to chant, “Four! Four! Four! Four!” Laurilli hugged her father and was heading back to her group when Baloce jumped back on the stage and raised his hands for silence.

  He spun his wooden sword and shouted, “Let’s keep this party going!” The crowd erupted in cheers again, and Laurilli had had it! She was tired of his bullying and angry that he’d wasted her father’s kindness. But more than anything she wanted to smash his smug face into the stage! Or through it, the dragon added viciously. She Rushed, then Soared at him, and although he saw her coming he never truly knew the force he’d unleashed on himself. He grinned and slashed into the air where she’d been. She Stepped a second time back in front of him and punched him with the hilt of her rapier.