It had been two days since Lord Alfors' entourage had set out from the camp near Shaya village. The rain had kept getting worse and worse with no end in sight. Dartelo was thoroughly miserable, but he consoled himself with the thought that so was everybody else. These last two days had truly been a living hell for the young Vilruhn. It had turned out that, just as his father Mavry had said, riding a horse was definitely not something one could learn easily. Dartelo's body ached all over and he had discovered numerous places and muscles that he had never even known he'd had, let alone that they could hurt so much.

His small horse trailed calmly towards the end. Everybody had warned him to be careful with the old horse called Flame, but it gave him no trouble. It seemed as if the falling rain had doused the embers of Flame and it looked as if it would fall asleep at a moment's notice. This would have been a real possibility, were it not for the strange creature that had the penchant for falling off every once in a while. Dartelo was almost convinced that Flame was somehow making him fall for its own amusement. Or at the very least, for the rest of the entourage's entertainment.

The rag-tag group had entered a forest on their very first day of travel. Dzherbon had said that it was called Ritimba forest by the Iorissians, which would approximately translate as "forest without an end". Dartelo wholeheartedly agreed with its name, as the deep and dark forest seemed as if it covered more land than his eyes had ever seen.

Dartelo was in a foul mood. He had barely slept, the food was horrid and he had been struggling with the very first task he had been given - to learn Iorissian. He realized that he had to prove his worth if he wanted there to be any improvement in his current situation. Or, at the very least, in the quality of food.

"How do you expect to continue in my service if you can not even speak to the other servants?" Lord Alfors had stated when he had seen Dartelo's flustered expression upon handing him his assignment.

After moving his possessions to the new tent, his possessions being himself and the clothes on his back, Dzherbon had immediately taken him to the small hut. What surprised Dartelo the most wasn't the state of the small "dwelling", but Lord Alfors' uncanny ability to catch him in any lie he tried to use. After a few minutes of awkward verbal dodging, Dartelo had finally given up and shared his real name and a bit about himself.

"I know how to raise cattle and grow vegetables!" he had said with pride, to which Lord Alfors had coldly harrumphed.

"I am neither an animal for slaughter nor a brainless plant. You shall need to learn the finer things in life. Kalir sorayah."

"What?" Dartelo had asked, his eyebrows raised.

"It is Iorissian for 'Another Dawn'. If you wake up to another dawn, then it is a good day. It means you have another chance to better yourself." Lord Alfors then said, after which he snapped with his fingers and stopped paying attention to Dartelo. The two had hastily left the small hut afterwards, Dzherbon going into detail about who Lord Alfors was and what an amazing opportunity Dartelo had been given by the gods.

That had been two days ago.

'In retrospect, I'd probably agree with him if he wasn't so smug about it...' Dartelo thought.

The rain continued pouring down and soaking through his new clothes. He had been given rough clothes that looked more suitable for a ranger than a servant. Especially the leather boots that went as high as his knee. It had taken him a good half an hour to figure out how he was supposed to tighten them properly, having grown used to the leather moccasins that were typical for the Holy Pietra Empire.

Underneath the leather boots he had donned a pair of "tights", or so Dzherbon had called them. They looked as if they were leather, but they were a snug fit and kept his lower body warm and dry. He was secretly amazed at their quality. A leather such as this would have been a hot commodity in Pietra, where a good part of the year was nothing but rain.

"Just these tights are probably worth more than your family's whole farm, boy! They're made from the skin of a fire lizard, which doesn't live this far up north. Remember to thank the Lord earnestly," Dzherbon had explained, as he had shamelessly taken off his trousers to show his own pair. Everybody had laughed and roared at the sight.

The rest of his clothes were made from coarse materials - trousers, a shirt, a vest and a cape. All of them were in a dark color that was neither black nor green, yet somewhat in-between. Dartelo had wondered why, until the very first night when one of the guards that was wearing the same set of clothes had showed him how the color let one meld into the shadows. It was truly amazing.

The sun had already set, yet the group continued on through the dense forest. Lightning flickered through the barely visible sky above their heads. Dartelo suddenly felt an inexplicable fear and even the hairs on his neck stood up. It was as if a pack of wolves was gazing at him.

"Won't we be stopping for the night, Dzherbon?" Dartelo asked, while trying to remain on top of his horse.

"We can sleep on our horses if need be. We need to hurry to the nearest town, our lord has urgent business to attend to, so we shall get a change of horses there and continue." the westerner explained as he slowed down his horse's pace. He was now right next to Dartelo, and continued with a bit of annoyance visible on his face, "You've been slacking off. Go back to Siem's side and continue your studies!"

Siem had been a part of Lord Alfors' entourage for over a decade. He was an average-looking man of around forty years with brown hair and brown eyes. If you put him in any crowd he'd be as indistinguishable as a fly in the desert. While Dartelo was not sure what he actually did for the lord, after spending a couple of days with the rest of the guards and servants, he knew that Siem was the most knowledgeable of the group. He knew proper etiquette, how to read and write in at least three languages and how to cook.

'Ah, I'd kill for a bit of that rabbit soup right about now.' Dartelo thought, as he moved his horse to the side and went towards Siem.

In the meantime, Dzherbon had returned to his position in the middle of the group, next to Lord Alfors. It was clear at a glance, that the westerner was more than just a battle healer.

Lord Alfors looked at his personal healer and, with a wry smile, asked, "How is your junior doing?"

"Worse than I did back in the day, milord. The boy may not be fit for studies at the Royal College, but Siem should be able to beat the language into him by the time we're back."

"Don't let Siem neglect his other duties, Dzherbon. The boy is interesting, but our safety is paramount. Better a mute lad than all of us dead and buried in a trench."

Dzherbon looked as if every word that Lord Alfors uttered was that of the gods. Absolute reverence could be seen in his eyes. The westerner saluted, the back of his open fist touching his forehead, and left to complete his master's command.

Lord Alfors looked out into the dark forest all around himself and smiled, his thoughts turning back to the plan he had come up with.

'Well now, come, make your first move, dear cousin.' he thought as the wind whistled through the trees' leaves, his expressionless face drenched.