I had been back for a few days when I realized I had broken my word to Arial. I did exactly what she said I would do. I went directly to training instead of seeking her out as I said I would. She was not going to be happy with me, but she would understand, once I told her what happened, and how I met the King and Princess Alma. I would look for her after my morning training.
My father gave me a rigorous routine to follow, and he told me that was only the beginning of what I was going to go through. The 3 movements turned to 8, and he said that that was only the beginning as well. He was going to teach me everything he knew, and that the 8 movements were only basics. He mentioned that he only trained the Targen Knights in the 8 movements, and that was enough to make them the mightiest swordsmen in the realm. I asked him where he had learned all of this, but he would shrug and tell me that I wasn’t ready to learn that yet. I had come to realize that I hadn’t known much about my father. He never told me stories of his youth, and I only found out about his feats in battle from the King.
My training started out each day, running to the river, and my father showing me a new part of a new movement. I was then to run back through the forest and stop to chop my daily trees down for the forge and the village. While I was there, I was to practice everything I knew, 100 times each. Then I was to drag the trees to the forge, cut them and run back to the river, where I would practice each movement on the uneven rocky ground of the riverbank. It was tough but I enjoyed it. Before dinner, I had one other duty, and that was to learn how to forge with my father. He told me, that was for when I decided to give up on a warriors life. I would have something to spend my time doing. It was hot work and summer was coming fast, so it was only going to get hotter.
On the day that I remembered that I was to have found Arial, I asked my father if I could skip learning to forge with him, so that I could talk to her. He smiled and said, “Yes, you should. Go and spend childhood being a child for a change.” I did all of my other duties, and then headed to the center of the village to find Arial.
I looked at the village commons, but she wasn’t there. She was always there, reading or having her midday meal. I found her father and asked him where she was.
“Ah, Pitre. Arial has taken to going up the mountain trails for her studies lately. You can find her up on one of the plateaus.”
“Thank you sir. I’ll go and look for her.”
“If you find her, tell her to come down early today. She has been coming down after nightfall, and it’s dangerous for her to come down those trails at night, even if it’s early dusk.”
“Yes sir, I will.”
I took off for the mountain trails, and decided that this was a good time to get a little extra training in, so I ran all the way up the trials to the first plateau. The first plateau was where most of the goats would herd. There was a large patch of grass for them to graze on, and it was in the shade of the mountain from the setting sun. Arial was nowhere to be seen. I quickly sprinted up the trail to the second plateau. The second plateau was barren with rocks and sand. It was exposed to the sun during the entire day, so it was also rather hot. I didn’t expect to find Arial there, for those very reasons, but as I peaked the final rise to the plateau, I could see her at the far end sitting on a rock slab.
“Arial, I’m back from the Kingdom.”
“You’ve been back, for nearly a week now.”
“It hasn’t been that long. I got back…” I thought to myself, and it dawned on me, it had been nearly a week. I let all those days get away from me, while I was training. “Ok, I guess it has been nearly a week.”
“You promised me, that you would come straight to me as soon as you got back. You didn’t, which is exactly what I said you would do. Your word is nothing Pitre.”
“I’m sorry. I had to begin training, as soon as I got home. I did remember though, and that is why I’m here now.”
“I take it you won the tournament then?”
“No, I lost.”
“Then what are you training for?”
“I have a second chance to go into the Knights Academy.”
“How so?”
“It’s kind of a long story, but the King knew my father, and I impressed him during the tournament, so he said he would sponsor me for entry next year.”
“How did you lose? I gave you the stone. Did you not keep it on you?”
“I did, it was in my pocket the whole time. I lost to Princess Alma.”
“I told you to make a necklace for it as soon as you could. The stone works best when it is touching your skin. You didn’t get the most out of it as you could. Wait, did you say you lost to Princess Alma?”
“Yes, and you didn’t tell me that it had to touch my skin, you said it just needed to be near me.”
“It will work when it is near you, but if you want the most out of it, without knowing how to control the flow of the aether, than you should have it touching your skin.”
“Why didn’t you tell me that then?”
“I told you to make a necklace for it as soon as you could. How many times do I have to say that for you to understand it. You shouldn’t have lost. Princess Alma huh? Of course you would lose to a girl. I always knew I could take you in a fight.”
“Very funny. She is actually rather good with a sword, and has been training for many more years than I have. I will make a necklace for the stone tomorrow. I really would have done it sooner, if you would have told me that it would work better if it were touching my skin.”
“Ok then, I suppose that you want to learn how to control the aether, don’t you?”
“That is what you said you would teach me isn’t it?”
“It is, and I will, but you need to do some training of a different kind first.”
“What kind of training? I am already training all the way until dinner time now?”
“Do I hear a whine coming from you Pitre? I know that I can’t be hearing that, because the only thing you love, is your training.”
“You are right, but you said I was going to learn something from a scroll, and that means I’m going to have to read. I don’t like reading.”
“Yes, you will be reading, but first you have to prepare your body and mind, by opening them up. As the scroll says, you can only control the aether, after you first control your body.”
“I have control of my body. What do you think I have been training for? I have to control my body to control my sword, and my mind is the same way. When I achieve the Swordsman’s Euphoria, I have complete control over my body and the way it interacts with the environment around me.”
“The Swordsman’s Euphoria? What is that?”
“It’s hard to explain. When I enter it, everything becomes more clear to me. I’m aware of everything and my body becomes one with everything around me.”
“Hmm, that is interesting. Maybe you are more ready for this than I had thought. That sounds a great deal like the state you have to be in to control the aether. How do you get into this, Swordsman’s Euphoria?”
“I have to calm myself. Usually I relax and take a deep breath, I concentrate on what I am about to do, and then I slip into it.”
“Can you do it right now?”
“I don’t really know. I have only done it while training and in the tournament.”
“Try, I want to see what you are doing. It might be exactly what you need to do to control the aether.”
I said I would give it a try. I pulled my sword out. I carried it everywhere, since the King decreed that I could. I rest it at my side, relaxed, took a deep breath, and began. Before I finished my breath, I had slid into the Swordsman’s Euphoria. The world became more clear. I was aware of everything, even something I had never seen before. I was looking at Arial. She stood about 10 feet in front of me. She had moved back when I drew my sword. Her raven hair blew slightly from a mountain breeze, and around her thin figure was a light. Not a light, but a glow. I light blue glow surrounded her body. I looked around to see if anything else was glowing, but it wasn’t. As my eyes came back to her. I saw small tendrils or light reach out from her, and then the glow pulsed and increased. I saw the tendrils reach out again, this time I saw one go towards my pocket. I felt the stone radiate a heat, and then the tendril grew brighter and I watched it flow up the tendril to Arial. I shook my head. I fell out of the Swordsman’s Euphoria and just stared at her.
“What are you looking at?
“You were glowing. I saw a blue light around you, and it reached out and touched the stone in my pocket.”
“Hmm, I always wondered what I looked like when I was gathering the aether. It appears that it shouldn’t take you very long to learn how to control the aether yourself. You go about it a different way, but that is where you need to be, to begin to control the aether. I’m still going to make you learn the way I did though. I know exactly what is happening that way, and I can’t be sure of what exactly it is this Swordsman’s Euphoria is doing.”
“Can we start tomorrow? I promised your father that I would tell you to come down the mountain early. He is worried about you walking the trails after nightfall.”
“I was going to suggest as much. I have to really think about what you just did. Can you teach me how to achieve the Swordsman’s Euphoria, so I can see how it differs?”
“I’m not sure. I don’t even know how I learned it. My father just had me train until I was exhausted and then he told me how to breath and relax. I did, and then it happened. Ever since that day, I’ve been able to do it when I want to.”
“Then show me the way you learned.”
“You want to learn how to swing a sword?” I was baffled, Arial had never had any interest in my training other than to laugh at me when I fell.
“I suppose that I do. You get up before dawn don’t you?”
“Yes, I’m training before the sun breaks the land.”
“It’s settled then, I will be at your door when you leave for your training in the morning.”
“Ok. We better get down those trails before the sun falls, or you father is going to be mad at me.”
We walked down the mountain together. Arial was mumbling to herself the entire time. When we reached the common square, Arial mumbled something that sounded like “I’ll see you in the morning”, waved and walked off towards her house. I did the same, but my wonder was about what had happened and what I had seen.
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