"Slow your horses there boy. I wish that I could say that you will be one, but you have to be high born to be a knight. You can be a soldier and even become a general in the King's army, but a knight is a lofty impossible goal to strive for, when you are not high born."
"Your father is right lad. You have to be a noble to be a knight. Even being born noble doesn't mean that you can be a knight either. It takes lots of training, which starts from the day they are born. I can take you to where the young squires train when they aren't serving their knight."
"I'm going to be a knight. I don't care what it takes, I want to make you proud papa. I will do whatever it takes. I know there has to be a way to become a knight. Please take me to see the training."
"Are you staying at the inn tonight?
"Yes, we were planning on leaving first thing in the morning to get back to the village. It is a days ride from here."
"Well, you are going to be a little late getting home tomorrow. I'll take you both to the training grounds. The training begins just before first light. I'll wake you at the inn."
"You don't have to do this Galdren. The boy is headstrong, and if he sees the training, he will want to do it even more. The less he sees the better."
"Trust me, once he sees what they go through in a morning training session, he will change his mind."
"I don't care what I have to do, I will do it. I will be a knight."
"See, he's headstrong I tell you. I'm holding you responsible for this Galdren."
"Won't be the first time you've held me e=responsible for something Feyre. I remember a night during the campaign when we met those caravan girls..."
"Ok, that's a story for another time. The lad shouldn't be hearing tales like that at his age."
"Ha ha ha, fair enough. Well, if I'm going to be responsible I have something for you Pitre."
Galdren went to the rear of his stall and started rummaging through a large box. There were sounds of metal rattling and the occasional mumble of pain as he hit his hand on something sharp or pointy.
"Here it is. Take this boy, it will get you started on your journey to knighthood."
Galdren handed me a gauntlet for the right hand. It was shiny and new looking, with brass filigree at the edges. It was remarkable, and very big. I gently took it from his hands and turned it over and over starring in wonder at it. I tried it on, and it fit almost all the way up my arm.
"Thank you, it's beautiful."
"Your welcome lad, don't worry, you'll grow into it. Take good care of it, and it will take care of you. Here, take this rag and wrap it up."
Galdren handed me an oily rag, and I wrapped it up with the care of wrapping a priceless artifact.
"The oil on that rag will keep the metal of that gauntlet conditioned. Neve wash that rag, and always keep that gauntlet in it when you aren't wearing it.
"I will."
"I'll see that he does as well. Put that in your bag boy, and don't take it out again until we get home. That will draw some eyes are way, that we don't want looking at us. I can't believe you gave him such a fine piece of armor."
"Don't worry about it. That was one that I made for the King himself, but he didn't like the accents on it. Good thing that I only made that one piece. I would have been in a fit if I'd done the whole suit for him and he turned me away."
"Ah, I see you've learned from your mistakes then. There was a time when you would have done the whole suit without even getting all of he demands for the armor."
"Right you are. It only took me 10 suits of armor to finally learn that lesson though."
"So, that's how you got so good at your craft."
"You old fool, That's not how I got so good, I was born that good."
"Let's go get some lunch boy, I don't think we can fit in here with his ego present."
Galdren laughed harder than I'd heard a man laugh. We waved good-bye with the promise that we would be awake and ready to go by the time he got to the inn in the morning.
After lunch, we walked around the market for another hour. It was the longest hour of my life. The only thing I wanted to do, was get to the safety of our room at the inn, so that I could take that gauntlet out of my bag and look at it. That is exactly what I did until the sun went down, and even then, I simply held it, still seeing it in my mind's eye.
***
It wasn't difficult to wake me up, I barely slept that night. I was too excited. I had a piece of actual armor, and I was going to see knights to be, train. My father usually rose before the dawn, so that he could light the forges for his daily work of hammering out horseshoes.
"Papa, why don't you make armor, did Galdren not teach you how to do it?"
"He taught me, but the King's law says that only the King's blacksmith can forge armor. It keeps his subjects from being armed. If the people aren't armed, they can't revolt. Although I doubt anyone would. The King has the respect of his people. It wasn't always that way, mind you."
"What do you mean?"
"When I was a lad about your age, the King's father ruled over this land. Some say that he was mad with old age, but my father told me that he was always a mad fool. He would send his knights out to terrorize the border villages. He said that true citizens of the realm stayed near the castle. He would levy higher taxes the further you were from the castle, so most of the people did move there. The outliers were considered traitors to the realm. This was all before the Blind War. The Blind War was fought because he angered neighboring realms, but he died before the war began. His son had to come in and take care of the mess that he made."
"I didn't know that. Why does no one talk of the old King?"
"No one talks of him, because we want to forget. The Mad King cost the realm many lives. King Reese fought back the raiders of the Mudwood, and then used diplomacy to settle pacts and treaties with the other realms. He renounced all the taxes that his father had put forth, and the realm began to prosper. When the outlier villages were able to keep some money, they were able to travel to the Kingdom more often, and spend that money. That is how the birthday celebration for the King began. People would all come to the castle on the day of the King's birth, and the festival of the King began."
"I'm glad we have our king."
"So am I boy, so am I. Get dressed now, so we can scare Galdren before he gets here."
Getting dressed wasn't a problem. I had kept my clothes on from the day before, so I only had to get my boots on. I got my bag with the gauntlet in it, and we headed downstairs. The inn was quiet, even the keeper wasn't up at this early an hour. We quietly opened the door, and snuck out so not to wake anyone. As we closed the door. I could hear footsteps running towards us. I clutched my bag tight, and my father spun around in a single motion. As he raised his arms in a defensive posture, I turned and saw our attacker. It was Galdren. He was running at full speed towards us, waving his arms and growling like a wolf.
"You damned fool, I was going to beat you to a pulp."
"I knew you would try to sneak out and get the jump on me, so I came over a little early. I've been waiting at the corner of that building for an hour. You need to get up a lot earlier if you want to catch me unawares."
Both my father and Gandrel began to laugh, and then the hushed themselves for laughing to loud, which only made them laugh louder. After they had calmed down, we began our stroll in the early morning moonlight to the training grounds.
"Now boy, I want you to be very quiet while we watch these lads train. They won't take kindly to someone making noise while they are hard at work. I want you to watch and learn. Just because you aren't highborn, doesn't mean that you can't learn something that might help you out later on. You can always become a general in the army, and what you learn here today, might help you then."
"I will father. I will watch everything. Nothing will escape my eyes."
We arrived at an arena. My father said that it was the tournament grounds. I didn't know what that meant, but I wasn't going to ask, because I wanted to be quiet and learn form what I saw. I could ask him questions later. Galdren led us to a balcony that overlooked the floor of the arena. On the far side of the grounds was a tunnel. Young boys began filing out of the tunnel and jogged to the center of arena. The looked like they were no older than I was. I'd seen 9 summers at that point in my life. The boys lined up side by side, in four rows. The stood rigid. A lone figure appeared in the darkness of the tunnel. He strode out and walked around the rows of boys, looking at each one. He would nod as he passed each one as if he had done an inspection and liked what he saw. When he had circumambulated the boys, he stood in front of them. He shouted something that sounded like "HUP" and all the boys dropped into a low squat with their hands raised in front of them, fingers pointing forward and palms down. The looked as though they were sitting in chairs, and the stayed there for what seemed to be an eternity. The band yelled "HUP" again, and they all sprung up to their originally standing position. They looked as though they hadn't just squatted for an inhumanly amount of time. They stood rigid once again. The man yelled "HUP", and the boys all dropped to the ground, on only the tips of their toes and the palms of their hands.
After 4 rounds of those two movements they began running around the outer edge of the arena. I counted 10 laps before they stopped. Then they lined up at the far end, and sprinted back and forth from end to end. This was another 10 laps before they lined up in the center again.
"This is just their warm-up." Whispered Galdren. The real fun is about to begin now.
The boys broke up into four groups and went to different corners of the arena. The tunnel busted with movement, and more men dressed similar to the first one came out and went to different groups, then more men came with racks of weapons, and horse carts of barrels. The horse carts went to one of the groups nearest where we were. I heard another 'HUP" and the boys in that group unloaded the carts. Once the carts were unloaded, they lined back up and waited for their next command. When it came, they each grabbed a barrel and lofted it over their head. They formed a circle and began walking, but it wasn't normal walking. They would lunge forward and go down on one knee. They would stand from their upright leg and that leg would then go to it's knee when the lunged forward. I don't know how long they did this, because another group caught my attention.
The group furthest from our overlook, were grabbing wooden swords and shields. On the command of the instructor, they began doing drills in unison. They would lunge and stab, step back and slash, lunge and swipe the shield in front of them in an arcing fashion, step back and thrust the shield forward. It looked like a dance with all the boys doing the same movements without flaw.
The third group was doing grappling techniques on one another. Each tandem did the same exact moves as the others. This was a couples dance, and it was impressive. Every movement was precision. Each step had a reason, each hand hold had a cause and effect. There was no movement wasted, everything appeared to be an absolute.
The fourth and final group was sparring with wooden swords. Once again a dance within a dance. Every move was efficient. The instructor walked around evaluating each student. From time to time he would stop a pair, they would freeze in the position they were in when tapped. The instructor would then move their arms and legs to a position, once they were readjusted, he would have them continue.
The sun began ago rise, and that was time for them to all rotate their position in the arena. This happened until each group had done each exercise. It was nearly noon by the time they were done with their training.
"That is only the morning training. There is an afternoon training as well, that is even more grueling."
"Can we stay and watch papa?"
"No, we have to be on our way, It's already going to be past nightfall by the time we get home."
"They don't allow anyone to watch the nightly training sessions. I've only been permitted to see it once. That is the elite training, lot's of secrets in that session. Kingdom has to keep something out of prying eyes."
I thanked Gandrel once again for the gauntlet, and my father and his old friend embraced before we headed back to the inn, to pack the rest of our bags, before heading to the stable for our horses. Before I knew it we were riding back into our village. I didn't notice the length of the journey because I was too focused on what I had seen back at the Kingdom. I would learn all those techniques that I saw.
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