Vol.1, Ch.2, P.6
Revision – 2022.10.27
At day’s end, I would throw myself into bed and simply let my thoughts sink into the deep dark. Sleep comes to me like death, abyssal in its fathoms, where even dreams are undone unto naught.
But this night was a peculiarity.
Out of that bottomless eigengrau of slumber came a vision—a murky moment from my younger days. Within that dream, I was yet a tiny boy, drowning myself in a stack of books at the Buckmann manor study. A pastime of mine in those distant days, to steep myself in that palace of books and lose myself to literature.
And of all the stories I devoured, the most palatable were the tales of knights.
Souls with sword in hand, wagering their very lives for King and Country—from that vivid image was I enlightened of my raison d’être, one that emboldened me by no small degree with its sheer palpability. Humouring myself with notions of life’s purpose was indeed quite precocious of me, I admit, but that was, unabashedly, the kind of kid that I was.
I’d spent my life fenced in by the expectations of my family as they groomed me to be their next master. Perhaps it was in that confinement that I simply longed for a reason of being. Not that it really mattered anymore—those fences, those expectations, all of them now laid in shambles, after all.
But within that dream was I a boy utterly mesmerised as I quietly read a particular book: this one a collection of sonnets, penned a few decades ago by a courtly poet, singing of the knight’s heart and human condition. Of a different sort it was from my favourites, but I indulged in it hungrily nonetheless.
I’d also partaken well of works rich with war stories, and by their influence, came to consume as much as I could annals and manuals of the military sort. But in the end, it was genuine chivalric literature that most sated my cravings.
“How about… you… then!”
I reached for another, having just finished the poems. But for the little boy that I was, retrieving books shelved ahigh was an olympian trial in and of itself. Up the ladder I would go, stretching and stretching as far as I could to take my next target.
“Oh! Well hallo there, friend!”
Freshly caught was a copy written by a beloved author of mine. Truly what I was hoping to chance upon: an authentic knightly tale. With great enthusiasm did I crack open its pages.
“…Whoa…”
A story that sang a spring shower of praises upon a certain knight’s way of life—to it, I gave myself, letting slip from my mind the passing of the hours. The words wove visions of a man of magnanimous yet lonely pride, who parted his homeland with sword in hand, was knighted in the far courses of his path, and fought for his folk with the whole of his soul.
Such a storied life I lived for myself from the warmth and comfort of that manor study.
Finishing the fable, I flew to my feet and snatched a feather duster from a nearby bookshelf. The puffy thing was now my sword, keen and ready to sail through the air, which I eagerly obliged.
“Yah!”
A slash and a swing of the feathered sword here and there, over and under. I was a knight, a tenacious and noble-hearted swashbuckler of a knight.
“Rrah! Yyah!”
As the duster dusted about, that runt of a Rolf made an oath: to study and serve the sword. But of course he did. Mastering the sword to perfection was part and parcel of being a knight, and the story I’d just read spoke no differently.
In it, the knightly warrior bolted straight at his opponent, striking the latter’s forearm with his blade.
Inspired, I attempted the same.
“Dyah!”
But I was overmuch the clumsy and fumbling little fool. Try as I might, I could not become just like that storied knight. Annoyed, I twisted and twirled that duster of a dirk once more, over and over.
“Yah! Hya… Eh?”
With my wits back in their roost, I noticed a little girl standing right by my side. Her smile beamed more brightly than the afternoon sun setting behind her.
“…E-Emilie!” Embarrassment struck like lightning. I quickly hid the duster behind me—belatedly so, of course. “You weren’t here for long… were you?”
“I was! Since you started on that book!”
“What! Could’ve said something, you know!”
“Maybe, but I wanted to watch you some more,” Emilie smiled further, warmly and with hale. In the face of such mirth, I could hardly help but smile myself.
And just like that, the dream drifted away. The burning noonlight faded back into the black of pre-dawn.
Without a word, I continued lying there upon my bed, staring up at the cavernous ceiling of the Order barracks. After whiling for a moment, I got up. All the other men around me were still deep in their slumber.
Taking my sword, I quit the sleepy place, heading outside for my morning training. Yet another day was about to start.
♰
“Dyah!”
With a shout, I bolted straight at my opponent and struck his forearm with my blade. Yielding a low yelp, he left his own sword to clamour upon the ground.
“…I give.” A quiet resignation, accompanied by a scowling gaze thrown my way. The onlooking officers buzzed.
“Bloody ungraced won again, boys!”
“They did bugger-all but flap their feders. What were you expecting, man? If magicks entered the fore, he’d be squashed like a roach, he would!”
“The bloke’s no slack with the sword, you have to admit. Could do to learn a thing or two from ‘im…”
“Yeah, bright idea there, mate. Perhaps he can teach you how to sew shut that wayward mouth of yours too, eh?”
Like silver, iron can be infused with odyl. But make no mistake, for these two metals can’t even compare—silver, at the end of the day, is foremost amongst all metals as a conductor of odyl.
A magicked strike from an iron blade is something I can easily chance guarding against, as I would not be blown away so inequitably by it. But just the same, it was not a risk I could indulge indefinitely. Though little, odyl yet courses through such strikes, and given enough of them, injury is inevitable.
Likewise, a paling could be formed through iron armour, albeit with gaps and blind spots. By repeatedly striking against such protection and finding its weaknesses, it is possible for my blade to bite its mark. I could therefore put up a fight through my swordsmanship, so long as my opponent is a regular officer, donned with nothing better than iron arms and armour.
I’d thus far claimed victory in all of my spars for today’s training. But the taste of victory is as sweet as it is short-lived. And as if to answer my unease, an executive officer clad in silver emerged from the crowd.
“Your next dance is with me, lad.”
“Oh! Been waiting for this!”
“All bets on the lieutenant! Whip ‘im till he whimpers, good sir!”
“‘Ey! Ungraced! Fun time’s over, y’hear!? Now’s when the big boys show you how we really play ‘round here!”
That last line came from none other than my prior opponent. As expected. It was routine at this point, really. Yoná’s cherished children, laying down the hand of judgement upon the cocksure man She’d forsaken. Poetic justice at its finest, one sure to entertain the gathered officers, riled and foaming at the mouth, as they all were.
♰
A shower of sneers and snickers rained down upon me as I laid flat on the ground, defeated. The image of a man ungraced, blown away like a leaf against a gale—surely an exotic delight served only from the kitchen that is the 5th Chivalric Order’s school of swordsmanship.
But no matter how many times I was laid low, now matter how terribly the pain throbbed, my sword never left my grip. To them, it was both a sight and slight of unfettered stupidity, boldness that merely spurred their inner sadists.
“What’s this, now? Look there, still clingin’ to his sword, he is.”
“He’d sooner part with a sword of a different sort, I’d wager. What point is he trying to make, really?”
“What’s wrong, lad? Licking the dirt brings that sweet a taste to yer tongue, is it? Well, quit it an’ get up, why don’t ye!?”
Against the hail of hecklings, I managed to get back on my feet and stand ready with my sword.
“My turn now, mate. Let’s have a bit o’ fun, shall we?” said another silver-armoured challenger, coming to the fore. Stuck to his face was the look of sheer glee.
♰
After training was brought to a close, I washed my wounds by the well. Today, too, saw me terribly torn up.
The moment brought to mind a peculiar memorandum, one I had found long ago in the study back home at the Buckmann estate. It was penned by a baron of a foreign land who had developed a taste for suffering—’masochism’, was it? Pain of both mind and body turned instead to pleasure for this baron, and the memorandum told of his life in high society as he bore for his own perversion a secret shawl of shame.
It scarce held my interest then, and so I read only the start of the story. Thinking about it now, perhaps I should’ve delved deeper. I would’ve liked to learn a thing or two from this baron, of how suffering might be of some avail to me.
As I ruminated on profitless thoughts, a voice chimed from behind.
“Rolf.”
By that point in my time in the Order, I had been conferred the honourable epithets of “ungraced”, “addle-pate”, and “scum”. One soul, however, yet called me by my name.
“Emilie, my Lady.”
“Those wounds,” she pointed out. “Are you all right?”
“I am. It is no cause for concern.”
“…I see.”
A silent pause followed. By its end, Emilie forced a clumsy smile.
“Say, Rolf. ‘Tis been a long while since we last dined together, isn’t it? Won’t you join me for supper?”
“Yes, my Lady. If I may.”
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