mcahogarth

Coracle, Chapter 25: The Boy Knight

Added 2018-07-06 14:00:01 +0000 UTC

Coracle continues! The index is now at the bottom. Visitors, this is the first book of my new Middle Grade/YA novel, being serialized for coffee cup subscribers in advance of Kickstarter and publication. <3

***

Marda said goodbye to Josephire, who wanted to stay in the Arboretum past the required period, and that was fine, because she would see him tomorrow and there was someone else she wanted to talk to, and not much time to get to him. They had some free time between their electives and supper, but what if he went back to the dorm? The one she couldn’t enter because Dafid had been right! There was an enchanted door between the girls’ and the boys’ halls, and it really did caution people using it that it could only be passed through once! Given that, Marda wanted to leave her one time for an emergency. Like… she didn’t know. A fire, or something.

She jogged around the back of the abbey toward the bridge to the training fields, passing a handful of other children who were ambling back from their chores at the stables or the weapons yard. No sign of Evie, though she looked; maybe Evie was still with the horses. Marda thought if there had been a praisetree orchard here, she might have also lingered at her chores… the Arboretum was actually pleasant enough that she might stay there, if she didn’t have something to occupy her like she did today. But she did, so she kept going, scanning the kids passing her just in case.

Her quarry though was exactly where she’d hoped he’d be: still in the field. He wasn’t, however, stabbing things heroically with a sword, or learning how to bear a shield, or practicing alone with a quarterstaff, the way warriors in old tales did, the ones that her brother Patric loved to hear their father read aloud. He was…

“Are you stuffing straw into that bale?”

Alain looked over his shoulder and grinned at her. “Yes? Want to help?”

“I guess?” Marda hunted around the ground, found handfuls of straw, and brought them over. The bale was a large rectangle, turned on its side, held together with twine, and it had big chunks missing, so Marda threaded her straw into the holes. “Is this what they have you doing for an hour and a half?”

“Along with other chores, like counting arrows and then hunting around in the brush for any that have gone missing… and checking the field for holes…”

“What happens when you find one?” she asked, mystified.

“Then I have to pack it closed with dirt and tell the weaponsmaster about it, so the groundskeeper can do a check for burrowing animals.” Alain smiled at her across the bale. “They like to keep the field as level as they can, otherwise people might put an ankle into one of those holes and…”

“Break it?” Marda shuddered. “Yes, I can see that.” She glanced at the field, saw other bales… they had cloth targets draped over them. “So they really aren’t teaching you to fight?”

“Not yet, no. The electives… they’re not really about the thing. They’re about doing the stuff that lets you do the thing.” He paused and laughed. “That sounded really stupid. I meant… the library elective isn’t about reading books, it’s about putting away books and cleaning books and repairing books so that when you want to read a book, it’s there....”

“Oh!” Marda exclaimed. “And the Arboretum work isn’t about doing anything with the plants, it’s about growing and taking care of them, so that you can use them eventually.”

“Yes!” he said, brightening. “You get it! So what they have us doing here is… taking care of the yard and the weapons so that when people come to learn, that’s what they concentrate on doing.”

“Someone has to take care of things that get used,” Marda said, more to herself than to him. “Otherwise, they fall apart.”

“Or they’re too dirty, or not ready, or they’re broken.” Alain nodded. “Right, just so. And when we’ve got the learning part done, then, I bet, we’ll come right back to the ‘how do I take care of the stuff’ part, because when we’re out on our own, no one else is going to do it for us. It’s just that here, we’re doing the ‘taking care of’ part for hundreds of people, and that takes a lot more time and help than if we had only two or three.”

“It’s important to take care of things,” Marda agreed. “And people.”

“And the world,” Alain said. “That’s why we’re here.”

She considered him, then nodded. “So do you really like Josephire?”

Alain, who’d been bending to gather up more straw, paused and looked at her. “You came here to ask me that?”

“I think you seem nice to me,” Marda said. “But he said he can’t imagine why someone so together would want to be friends with a walking disaster like him.”

Alain choked on a laugh. “Did he really say that?”

“Not in so many words? But… um… yes.”

Alain shook his head, smiling. “That’s exactly what he would say, too. You’re not on our side of the hall, so you don’t see him. He’s always got a kind word for someone who’s down. One of the boys was homesick and crying, and he had a long talk with him…” Alain stopped and said, “You know, the thing I noticed most was that he closed the door almost completely? So that no one would notice and say ‘why are you crying, are you a baby?’” He straightened and knotted his straw before tucking it into one of the last remaining holes. “He’s kind. He takes care of other people like I’m taking care of this bale. I like that.”

“I do too,” Marda said, much struck.

“Anyway, that’s why I want to be friends with him. Because he’s nice.” Alain grinned. “He’ll never believe it, though. And he’s got a temper, and he’s proud. So convincing him will probably take me all year.”

“I’ll help,” Marda said, handing him the last of her straw.

“Marda, right?”

Marda nodded. “And you’re Alain. And you’re going to be a Knight, aren’t you?”

“I don’t know,” Alain admitted. “But I hope God says I should, because I’d really like it.” He grinned. “Can I walk you back to the abbey? It’ll be time to eat before we know it.”

“Sure!”

“Let me just tell the weaponsmaster I’m done with this bale.”

Alain did walk her over the bridge, and they talked about home—he asked about her orchard, and she learned he was the son of a parson in a village that bordered one of the few large freshwater lakes, and the dam that kept it in check. She could see why he was popular: he was polite, and he really listened when people talked; you could tell because he asked questions that had something to do with what you’d just said. And his mood was sunny, but that serious kind of sunny that Marda was hard-pressed to explain. Only that there were people who were happy all the time because nothing bad had ever happened to them, and there were people who were happy despite having bad things happen to them. Her father was definitely one of the latter. She thought Alain might be too.

He waved goodbye to her behind the abbey, heading toward the boy’s side. The group idling there on the grass greeted him, and Marda heard faintly his answering hellos. Our Knight, she thought decidedly, because if God was going to knight him she wanted him for their group. She was still thinking so when one of the boys headed toward her, and the waving pied hair gave him away.

“Were you walking with Alain?” Dafid asked, wide-eyed.

She glanced at him. “Yes?”

“Everyone wants to be Alain’s friend,” Dafid said. “Even after only a few days of being here.”

“What about Josephire?” Marda asked suddenly, curious. “Does anyone want to be his friend?”

Dafid frowned a little. “Josephire is… um. Hard to describe.”

“I don’t mind if you take your time.”

Dafid glanced at her and laughed. “Oh, all right. He is the kind of boy who will walk into a wall even if he is trying to avoid it. And he will get angry if you tease him about it. But who wouldn’t, you know?”

“I do know!”

“But he has not got a mean bone in his body. I mean, he’ll become angry but he will not stay angry. He is not…” Dafid frowned. “The outbursts are only skin deep.”

“I have free-time with him,” Marda said.

“Alain?”

“Josephire. We’re both in the Arboretum. I like him!” She smiled. “He is a little awkward. But who isn’t!” She peered at Dafid. “I hope you’re nice to him, because I’d like him to sit with us at meals.”

“I find him quite agreeable. Just… maybe not directly beside me. He spills things.”

“I’ll put Alain on your other side,” Marda said.

“Will you?” Dafid said, brightening. “That would be great!”

Yes, Marda thought firmly. Yes, it would.

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