Year 16-1

The Cottage, though it stood the test of time, it continued to change like everything else. From cold to hot and full to empty, it was a constant. But there was a time when it was packed. There was a time when it was bursting at the seams with life.

"Use a bow," Michael said.

"I'm not an archer," I complained.

"You're not a swordsman either, boy, but you're better with a bow," he added while pressing the weapon in question to my chest along with a quiver full of arrows.

"I beat you with a sword," I joked.

"You beat an old man," Michael said.

"Old man?! Aren't you a dragon slayer?" I laughed.

At the age of 16, I remained a part of the Dane household. Michael and Loreal were ever in love. Scott and Harris, at ages 19 and 20, were preparing to leave soon to start their own stories. Farrah was finally old enough to work but often neglected her responsibilities. And I was preparing for the Hunter Trials. After three years of training, Michael thought I was ready. I thought I was ready, but we disagreed on the details as usual.

"Use a bow. You have the eye for it," he continued to pressure me.

"I have an arm too," I debated while taking the weapon from Michael only to keep from letting it hit the ground.

Every Hunter Trials ended with the finalists competing in armed combat. It was imperative to choose the right weapon.

"If you want to pass the test, listen to me, boy," Michael added while holding his belly.

Moments before he pushed my decision, I bested him in a duel out in the fields. I beat him twice, so my confidence was high.

"I'm using the sword," I repeated to Michael's dismay.

Despite the many weapons he taught me to use, I always favored a sword, my father's sword. Using it made me feel closer to his memory. It was a memory distant and foggy after so many years, but ever gleaming. Michael, infuriated, threw up his arms before retreating into the cottage.

"The boy won't listen," I heard him yell while walking through the wooden door.

"I wonder where he learned that," Loreal quipped in response.

My better weapon was the bow, but I wanted my father present on such an important day.

I had to clean up and put away the training equipment before preparing to go into town. Gear that amounted to rusted weapons and beaten scarecrows had become my daily rivals and allies. Michael enjoyed all of his wards, but it was no secret he uniquely bonded with me. Knights, soldiers, and Hunters, they all shared lives centered around conflict, death, and control. Michael, with his warmth, never hinted at doubts in his life, but there was a joy he found in training me. I saw it; I could feel it. Our time together was more than merely passing knowledge. He groomed me, perhaps to fill a position he willingly abandoned. Still, he was not my father. Michael was a kind man, but I couldn't see him as anything more.

"March said her brother is taking the trials today," Farrah said, walking up from the trail.

Ten years old, she was old enough to be alone, but I didn't like particular neighbors she visited. That girl got everything and more. With her blond hair, she even resembled the Dane's enough to think they were her birth parents. I, with my red hair, and our brothers, with their black, we were always orphans to those who saw us together.

"Good," I said sarcastically.

"March said her brother will be looking for you," she added while I put the last of the impromptu dummies away on the side of the house.

"Good," I said again, rolling my eyes in my skull.

"March said he's going to knock you on your ass like he did a week ago," she continued.

March's older brother was Tom, a boy Michael frequently asked to assist us in my training. The Dane's were getting old, and Michael wasn't always Spring. Sometimes he was brittle like Winter. Of course, the only reason Tom ever agreed to help was so he could also learn. Orphans were common, but we were often treated poorly by those who still had their mothers and fathers.

I did my best to ignore Farrah. I needed to get ready soon, and the last thing I wanted carried on my back were doubts.

When I walked into the cottage, the Danes were in the main room, getting themselves ready.

The cottage was hardly the small one-room space it started as. Michael added rooms or space to existing rooms as my adopted siblings and I grew older. It wasn't cheap, nor was it easy, but he treated us better than most. After all, with myself, Harris, and Scott becoming men, Loreal demanded Farrah have her own space. We lived in a home almost fit for a noble, but we always knew it as The Cottage.

Scott was in our room, the boy's room, packing his things. With plans to marry a woman soon, he had to leave Nestle the day after the Hunter Trials. I got dressed in the best leather armor Michael could afford me while Scott moved his things into crates.

"Will you watch?" I asked.

"Watch you humiliate yourself before all of Nestle? Wouldn't miss it," Scott said.

"I only need conquer 3 of the trials," I said.

"Don't you mean 4," he corrected and teased me.

"I have combat skills," I said.

"You've never won a fight against a real foe," he added.

He was right, but combat trials were rarely so straightforward as jumping into an arena and exchanging blows. I was confident I'd have a good chance.

"I will today," I said before continuing to ask, "where's Harris?"

I sat on my bed to pull my boots on, and Scott sat beside me, looking out the window.

"It's his day as well," he said.

Harris was preparing to make a Vow to one of Nestle's Gods, and so were a dozen other town folks. It was a big deal. Every year countless people made Vows, but so few were enough to entice the attention of Gods. Even if a God was tempted to grant a person power for their Vow, there was no guarantee it would be sizable or relevant. The Vow ceremony conveniently took place during the time of Hunter Trials. Had it been possible, I would have made myself present to support Harris in person.

As things were, I knew Michael and Scott were likely to attend my event while Loreal and Farrah would see Harris'. The Hunter Trials were known for becoming... unseemly, but Vow ceremonies were little more than saying lines and lighting candles. Of course, the women would miss out on blood and men pissing themselves with fear.

"This family of bastards might make something of itself," Scott remarked to a bird sitting in our window.

"I know who my father was," I said, if only silently to myself.

The trials were held all day in Nestle's backwoods. Each year, senior hunters created new trials meant to test skills necessary to battle monsters. To become a Hunter, I only needed to pass three. Anyone who did so moved on to the real test, combat. The remaining prospects would battle in one on one fights, and whoever won would immediately become a Hunter.

As expected, I passed three of the preliminary trials that day. A test of finding fake goblins hidden in caves, an examination of basic knowledge on creatures allowed and not allowed in the kingdom, and a test of seeing through deception. By nightfall, the real test, The Trial of Combat, was about to begin.

Candidates were paired before finding themselves released into the woods. Whoever brought back their opponent, dead, unconscious, or subdued, would win.

Pairings were selected at random.

Tom was there, but so were several boys and men I'd never met before. They were men I never fought before. I knew I could best Tom in a duel, but clashing with a new swordsman could have led to the loss of more than just the night. Death was a real possibility, a genuine threat.

No one was required to kill. Still, the thought was enough to give pause. It was my last opportunity to choose a bow over my father's sword. With Michael and Scott standing to the wayside watching me, I was conflicted. A long-range weapon had the advantage, but it came down to more than practicality.

Michael wasn't my father; he couldn't be... but I was conflicted.

I took the bow.

It didn't mean I was giving up on my father. I was...taking advice from someone who wanted to help me. I was allowing myself to be open through the act of trust.