Stargazer

Chapter 4

During the afternoon break, my stomach turned excitedly. I found the tent adorned with odd items in front such as glass bottles of different colors hanging from the poles and wood carvings of odd creatures that creeped me out.

"Hello?" I chimed a string of bells hanging by the door flap that was partially thrown open. A red beard appeared through the door, then Jermain's large body with it.

"Ah! Solé! Ya decided to come! Good ta see ya!" Jermain was eating, as usual, and carried a platter of white curds and an unidentified mug. "You want some cheese?" He held out the platter then immediately took it back. "No! Ya must train first! Then cheese!"

He ushered me round back where he had a small wooden table and a couple of chairs. There was a dummy of sandbags set up to look like a human hanging from a wooden pole deeply embedded into the ground. "Don'tcha worry! That thing's not going anywhere, I set it up myself," he said proudly as he saw me inspecting it questioningly. Jermain took a seat at the table with his drink and cheese and began whittling at a new chunk of wood. "Okay!" He looked up at me, "Any day now! Let's see whatcha got!" He smiled and waited expectantly.

"Okay," I hesitated, "What do you want me to do?" I looked at him stupidly.

"Anything! Fight this sandbag man like he’s a ruthless enemy set on ending your life. And follow your gut!"

I held up my fists in preparation for a fistfight as I thought about which maneuvers to do first. "No! You're thinking too hard! Just do it!" Jermain yelled. I took a hard punch at the sandbag's head and a series of throws in it's stomach. After what seemed like some time of me punching at the sandman, Jermain stopped me again. "I can tell you're still thinking too much! Think how ya do during training."

"This is how I think during training. Master Kahlweh gives us a set move to do and we do it, a thousand times some days, if we must," I wiped the sweat from my brow.

"Master Kahlweh, huh? That explains it," he muttered the last part under his breath. He disappeared in his tent and came back out with a couple of dull swords and bulky looking chest plates made with wood and rope. "Here, put this on," he instructed as he put on the other. A large piece of wood was set on the chest, another on the back, and two smaller pieces hung from the shoulders.

"I see no sand dummy's gonna work for ya. Gotta be the real deal. So, you're gonna fight me instead!" I gulped as his barrel chest stood above my head and his arms and legs, thick like an animal’s.

He threw me one of the small, dull-edged swords. "When I say 'go,' you're gonna come at me, but not with just your brain! Fighting is an art, ya need to feel it inside. Let it speak to you!" He planted his feet into the dirt and prepared in a crouched position and I did the same. "Go!" He yelled and I went at him using my full strength to hit him in the chest. He somehow knew that's where I'd go and blocked my sword with his, throwing the edge back at me. I tried again, this time, going for an arm, and again he blocked me. I got frustrated with the unfair advantage of the bear-like man in front of me and began to hit him with everything I had, leaving no breaks between blows, and yet he still managed to parry every blow.

"Goooood!" He bellowed. "Now you've stopped thinking! Finally! You're doing!"

I continued my attacks, throwing in an occasional leg kick at his chest that managed to push him back, but a barely visible amount.

Finally, my body went into a zone where I felt the familiar movements of fighting. My mind drifted and I thought of the stars, how they seemed to speak to me, if I let them.

Suddenly, I felt a great power take over me, and as I ran at Jermain, my body lifted into the air as if everything were in slow motion. Feet poised at my target I impaled into his chest like legs of steel but with the grace of a ballerina’s.

Jermain went rolling backwards onto the ground, a look of shock on his face that quickly turned to a grin. "Good god girl!" He laughed and wiped his brow, "Where'd that come from!? Where'd you learn that move?"

I stopped, both of us catching our breaths. His thinning hair was now dripping with sweat.

"I don't know. I didn't, I guess." Jermain began guffawing big deep comical laughs.

"HA! HA! HA! That's how the art of the Assassin is done! See? Now tell me, what were ya thinking of in that moment?" He plopped back down at one of the wooden chairs and took a swig of his mug, then filled a tin cup of drinking water from his barrel for me. I hesitated a second, unsure if I wanted to share.

"The stars, I guess," I replied as I greedily drank and emptied my cup.

"The stars!? Hmmmm, they must be your inspiration, then!" I nodded then helped myself to more water as Jermain pushed the cheese platter towards me and began whittling again. "Hold on tight ta the thoughts of your stars. Eat up, you deserve it!" I greedily shoved the cheese curds in my face, happily devouring the salty morsels. "Ya know, good fighting and whittling have a lot in common," his comment struck me as ridiculous and I accidently scoffed out loud. "No, I'm serious!" He continued. "I take my weapon here, ya see," he held up his sharp little whittling blade. "And go to make my move, but there's the real trick! I'm not calculating the move I will make, it's more of a subconscious thought, a feeling in my bones!" I saw where he was going with it, then. I never thought of fighting as an "art" but his view completely opened up the possibilities to me.

I nodded at him, "wow, I guess I never really thought about it that way."

"That was obvious," he teased. "But you did it! Takes ya a bit ta let go, I'll admit that. But, once ya did, the results were magical!"

"Yeah, that was...new! I can’t say I've ever felt that way while training before!" He held up his current carving in process, no doubt another creepy creature.

"Maybe ya need to pick up whittling to learn how to relax a bit,” I shook my head and we both laughed.

I continued going to Jermain’s tent every day at lunch break for training practice, and every day, his sessions got more difficult, and his lunches, more delectable. But the funny thing was, as I thought about my trial to come, less than a day away, I began to get less nervous of whatever tribulations I would face. I felt more ready than I had ever in my entire life.

The pressure was still there, though, and that would never go away. The pressure of having to succeed because failure was not an option for me. That pressure still tightened my stomach into a knot and made my heart race.

It was now Friday, and Jermain had me walk with him, this time, away from his tent. He had a large rucksack of things, I had noticed as he led me to the horse stables.

Two horses were geared up, standing by the stable fence, and ready to go somewhere.

“The cream one’s yours today,” Jermain pointed to a beautiful buttercream mare with a blonde mane and tail. “Her name’s Vanilla, but I wouldn' try to pet her head if I were ya.” he chuckled and walked over to the other dark, chestnut mare that had white hair, a stark contrast to his shadowy coat.

“Jermain, what is this?” I said in a tired, ‘I’m not in the mood’ kind of way. “I have to be back to training classes in an hour. Where are we going?” I put my hand on my hip automatically in disapproval.

“And this one is Maple. Yes I do love this girl, she’s a sweet ‘ol girl she is,” he completely ignored me, cooing at and stroking the mare who responded in a happy snort. He jumped up on his horse and got comfortable in the saddle. “Ah just get on, will ya? You’ll see where we’re going when we get there! I already got ya excused from classes the rest of the day, so ya can quit ya worrying!”

That was enough to shut me up. I climbed onto the beautiful cream and once I was in the saddle, attempted to stroke her shining coat at her neck, but instead received a threatening nip. Jermain chuckled,

“I told ya, she can be a bit particular. Careful with that one.” and he rode off continuing to chuckle to himself. I quickly attempted to follow, and eventually caught up, but the mare was wilful and stubborn at my commands.

We rode what felt like a couple of hours through grassy, sandy terrain, until we reached a patch where the grass began to get greener and thicker. Trees started popping up here and there, and eventually we found ourselves in a tree cluster. The deeper we rode, the taller the trees got and I realized we were in a forest! I hadn’t known there was a forest like this so close to the desert, it was like a jungle. It had vines and flowers, foreign sounding birds called loudly to each other and other unseen animals announced our arrival.

Suddenly, I looked up and saw, by a glimpse between the other trees, in the distance stood the largest tree I had ever seen. It had a trunk so large around, several people would need to hold hands to circumference it, and it had branches, thick arms of muscle, encircling it everywhere from the bottom all the way to the top.

Jermain must’ve seen my gaping mouth, “I expect there are trees here, that had no reason to be touched. Never been cut, I s’pose!”

“What is this place!? I had no idea a place like this even existed!” I didn’t even try to hide my shock, the nature was breathtaking, and I had never seen such vivid greens in my life.

“It doesn’t technically have a name. But we like to call it ‘The Guild Forest.’ There’s a couple others like this throughout Sordova just like this one, and it’s our job to protect ‘em!” He declared it proud of the fact.

“Protect them? From what?”

“From, well, anyone, I s’pose! Our own people, people of other lands. They’d come in, take what they want and leave the forests a wasted heap of ruin in the end, if they had it their way.”

“But, why would anyone want to wreck a place like this?”

“Because a place like this holds treasures. Different types of woods, fruits, and medicines a person could sell or keep for themselves. Some people are just desperate and selfish, not giving one damn about nature.” My heart thrummed in excitement to hear that the forests had a tie to the Assassins and maybe I would have a chance to protect them one day.

We were suddenly in front of the enormous tree. I looked up from my horse and wasn’t sure if there was a top. The height made me dizzy just looking from below and upward, I wondered what it would be like to look down being up. Then it struck me and I felt immediately nauseous, was Jermain going to make me actually climb this?

...This tree will be my death sentence.