Forging Warrior

Forging Warrior

 

“Get up, Danariel” Reubin commanded. It had only been two days and I was already reaching my limits. My father’s ‘training’ was utterly vicious.

We sparred with wooden swords for the most part. That generally consisted of Reubin beating me to a pulp, quite often there would be blood left on the sand once he was done. Despite appearing to be far past his prime my father was still every bit the warrior that the stories said he was. I had originally thought he was joking or being cocky when he had said that Symonds was useless, now I realised though that everyone would be useless compared to my father.

I clawed through the sand to help lift myself up. I could already feel yet more bruises starting to appear where Reubin’s stick had landed on my body. There were only a scarce few parts of my body that didn’t hurt anymore, and my leg was even worse now. On my first day after using my wounded leg as an excuse the b*****d had started to target it.

“Hurry up, we don’t have all f*****g day.” I could see him wiping sweat from his brow as I got up. So the heat was getting to him too, that provided me with a little bit of solace.

I looked around. There was nothing but sand us, sand and the occasional bit of shrubbery. My father had picked the most inhospitable environment to train me in, said that it would make me stronger or something stupid like that. I was not going to be fighting Symonds in the desert though.

In reality we were not that far from his home, only an hour or so ride south east of the castle.  It felt far more like I was in the middle of nowhere with a madman though. I suppose half of that was true.

Reubin’s stick smashed into the back of my neck while I was looking around. I yelped loudly and crumpled back down to the ground, my face burying itself in the sand.

“Never take your eyes off your enemy. The moment you do, that’s when you die.”

Reubin walked around and spun his sword between his hands a few times. To his credit though the man took his own advice and always kept his gaze fixed upon me while I once again rose to my feet.

“We weren’t even fighting. You’re an arsehole, you know that?” I replied while wiping the sand from my face. This time I kept my eyes on him though.

“Try telling your friend Symonds that after he cuts off your head.” Reubin laughed and continued to circle around me. He was starting to get even more aggravating now, and the rain was not helping.

I advanced towards my father brandishing my wooden practice sword as if it was real. The sand made for poor fitting and my wounded leg hindered me further, I nearly fell twice before reaching the man. Once there, we both stood motionless for a second before he screamed and pressed the attack once again.

Even on the sand my father boasted a speed that not many men could ever even hope to match. His feet always seemed to find that slightly firmer bit of sand that further aided his bounding flight towards me. He was like a winged devil flying just above the ground.

I bent me knees ever so slightly and coiled up every muscle in my body, preparing to explode as he grew near. I did just that as Reubin came within reach and dove past him while swinging my sword. I missed completely with both my dive and my strike.

As a result Reubin delivered a swift blow to my back and then my wounded leg. The pain was excruciating as I was once again slammed down and into the sand. At this rate my leg was never going to heal and I was going to be a cripple while I was still young.

“You’re far too predictable, Danariel.” He sighed and kicked sand in my direction. “You have a natural talent for fighting, a bit like myself although not quite as good mind you, but you have no imagination in how you fight. And you need to stop thinking about that damn leg already!”

“It’s hard to not think about something when it hurts this much.” I spat. Reubin was really starting to get on my nerves.

As I climbed back up onto my feet once more he swung his stick at me once again. This time I was expecting it though and had already swung my own sword to knock his out of the way. The two pieces of wood collided and headed in opposite directions afterwards, saving me from being bruised yet again.

I grunted loudly and swung as my father readied his next attack. He was caught off guard and his attempt to move out of the way was pitiful at best. He was getting too cocky and leaving himself open, there was no way he could avoid my strike. Except there was one way.

Reubin caught my wooden sword and yanked back. Jerking my arm violently and jarring the limb. Not only was he hurting my bad leg but he was also hurting my only good arm. I really did hate him.

“You can’t do that!” I roared angrily.

He smiled and yanked the weapon, once again paining my arm slightly. “And why the hell not?”

“In real life, in a real battle, you can’t do that! You would lose half your hand if you did.” I ripped the sword from his grip and put the end of the stick to his chest. Oh how I wished that it was a real sword in that moment.

“In real life I would be wearing virtually indestructible armour. And I would have killed you more than a hundred times in the past few days.” He smiled mischievously and started to walk away. His back was facing me.

I screamed and lurched forward, launching myself in his direction. My sword was aimed straight for the middle of his back and the stroke fell lightning quick. However my father was far faster than lightning. He twisted around and ducked under my sword before slamming his hand into my stomach.

I went careening backwards but unlike the other few times he had hit me I managed to stay on my feet. Normally my leg hurt too much to stand or move well, but compared to the lava in my chest it didn’t seem to hurt so much anymore.

“At least you’re not completely stupid.” Reubin smirked.

While he was smirking I leapt forward and whacked my stick into his side. The man simply shrugged the blow off before punching me in the leg with his free hand. It was the kind of thing I would have done if I had a free hand.

Truthfully the punch did hurt, but like I said the lava in my chest made it ignorable and bearable. So instead of collapsing to the floor and crying like I used to I brought the elbow of my right arm up and into his jaw.

Once again though, although my attack had struck home my father failed to be affected by it. His weapon smashed down and into the side of my foot, the foot of my bad leg. Now I didn’t collapse because I was in too much pain to stand, it was more like the foot snapped and would no longer support me.

“Good work.” My Reubin smiled. At first I had thought that he was being sarcastic, I realised soon enough that the b*****d had meant it though.

“Time to head back to Whitewind, Danariel.”   He added after staring at me on the ground for a moment. I had actually been about to hit him across the side of the head, lucky I didn’t, he might have died quickly.

“Whitewind?” was my immediate response, I had forgotten. Or maybe I never knew what it was called.

“And they say my memories bad…” Reubin muttered under his breath. “Whitewind Hall, Danariel? You know, big castle that you lived in for a long time.  You know, the one you ran away from as a kid and returned to the other day. Got it? or do I need to elaborate more?”

I glared at him. “I had forgotten how kind-hearted you were father.”

He shrugged and smiled. He looked rather proud of himself. “I answered your question didn’t I? Next time I’ll simply refrain from doing so son.”

I shook my head angrily and pointed to the horses. “Let’s just get going already.”

 

As much as I hated the man he was good at what he did. What he did being killing people, or training others to kill people. ‘Good work’? if you haven’t figured out what that good work was yet than you should know. The ‘good work’ I did was getting angry.

I remembered from when I was a kid, one time when he was drinking he had talked about getting angry.

‘It feels like a lava in your chest, Danariel. It makes you forget about all other pain if you’re angry for the right reason, and in a battle. Well in a fight that ability to ignore pain is what gets the job done… even if you die in the process.’

He was a bad person, well, he is a bad person, and there was no arguing with that fact. But he still gave good advice sometimes. It left the question though, why hadn’t the lava protected me from Symonds? It had only seemed to make my wounds worse then…

 

 

“Pick one.”

I took a step towards the swords my father was referring to. Like I said, he was always blunt and commanding in the way he spoke. I suppose being a soldier and then a lord made you like that.

“And don’t just be an idiot like you always are and pick any old sword. Pick the sword that you think would be the best for you to fight with.” He added shortly.

I had always intended to pick the best one, he knew that. He was just trying to get me angry again, it wasn’t going to work this time though. Since that fight in the desert three days a go I had been doing my best to stay calm.

Out of the swords that were in the rack I could straight away rule out all but five. The others were all either curved or jagged, and I much preferred a straight sword. Then out of the five two of the swords were too short for my liking, and another of the swords was far too big. It was like a cross between your average longswords and a greatsword, and that just wouldn’t do.

It was a simple decision picking between the two remaining swords after that. They both had the type of blade I liked but one of the swords lacked a cross hilt. It was only logical that I would pick the one with the cross hilt as it offered more protection. Or so I thought.

As I started to grab the swords hilt my father’s hand grabbed my wrist. “What the hell are you doing?” I think he laughed when I tried to explain myself and stuttered.

“I said pick the sword that is best for you!” he screamed. “My son is an imbecile… who would have figured.” He swapped to a jovial tone halfway through speaking. I think he laughed again afterwards too.

“This is the best sword for me.” I replied slowly. I was angry but I didn’t want to let him have the satisfaction of knowing, he probably did though.

“Than why does the damn thing have a cross hilt?” His voice was like fire. Fire couldn’t think or reason, it just did things.

“For protection, I thought that was obvious?” I snapped back. He definitely knew I was angry then. It was raining pretty heavily. “ Clearly you’re not as great a warrior as everyone would seem to think…” I added under my breath.

“Well yes, they do give protection if you actually use them.” He eyed me carefully. “When’s the last time you ever used the hilt of your sword to block or deflect an attack, or for anything else? Because I for one have never seen you use one so put down that damn sword and get the damn sword with no cross hilt that you were looking at before.”

I shut up after that and did exactly as I was told. Retrieving the sword without a cross hilt I gave the thing a few swings before realising how correct my father had been. The sword felt better in my hand than Rowan’s sword that I buried with Piers ever had. It definitely didn’t feel as good as Piers’ sword, but that was a different matter altogether.

“From the look on your face I’m guessing you now understand why that one is better for you yes?”

I nodded hotly and turned to face my father. He had beaten me close to death in the courtyard we now stood in. It was funny to think that he was now teaching me something here. I large part of me still wanted him me to kill him, and I was certain that one day that part of me would get what it wanted.

“You know that you teaching me all this changes nothing right?”

Now it was his turn to nod, his nod wasn’t angry though. He looked almost sad.

“You can never make things right between us.”

“I know.” He smiled. “I don’t plan on trying to set things aright either, Danariel. I’m helping you now because I can, not because I feel guilted into doing so.”

The rain my father brought never stopped. But after that moment was when I started to be able to ignore it, or accept it. Or at least I think so. Maybe. There was still no sun though.

“Make a sword like that one.” The sound of his deep voice ended our ‘little moment’.

 “What?” I blurted out before I had time to think. “What do you mean by make?” I said to correct myself soon after.

“I thought you said you used to be a smith?”

It was true, I had said that, but I had not said that to him. I had said it to the woman who had lead me to my room. We made small talk sometimes, usually while I was eating. Her name had been Belladonna if I recalled correctly, it was a nice name.

“And in any case, that meteorite metal is nearly indestructible. Even if you mess up you will still have an indestructible piece of metal to beat Symonds to death with.” Reubin laughed and I think I might have to. It wasn’t even funny though.

“I could give it a go” I mumbled.

I was too busy thinking about what he had told me before to listen to what Reubin said after that though. ‘Supposedly the white metal bonds to the first person who’s blood it consumes, after that it can carry the spirits of their loved ones’. He had also said that I would need to use some regular metal too.

In one of Pandora’s saddlebags was the parcel that contained the shards of Piers’ broken blade. If I used it alongside my white metal I would have all I needed to make myself a new sword. Piers’ sword falling apart had made everything come together for me.

“I remember their being a forge here, at Whitewind.” I looked up and into Reubin’s eyes, he had been saying something but he stopped immediately. “Where is it?”

He pointed silently over towards the opposite side of the castle. “Just walk that way, you can’t miss it.”

I was already moving out of the courtyard by the time he finished speaking.

“I’ll have the metal brought from your room.”

“And there’s a wrap of brown cloth sitting beside my bed” I called back as I moved around the corner.

“You always were a horrible demanding kid.” He howled with laughter as I disappeared around the corner. Yeah because I was the horrible one, I think I only found that joke funny afterwards.