Runaway dragon – Chapter 8

The days in places like Kambaresa can get pretty tedious at times for outsiders, when there isn’t a ton of activities to get stuck in, or maybe more so while one knows there is an event awaiting them, but a big gap up until it commences. As for the trio which Eyren has attached herself to, there’s a manner of substance in between these, in that they’re holding out for a break in the monotonous stream of normal life which they might capitalize on in order to escape, but they don’t actually know when that moment will roll around. Could be in a couple of hours, could be days. And until that moment rears its head, all they can do is dawdle.

Whilst Eyren and Nivra sit down in one of the rooms they’ve rented to perpend whether there’s anything they could entertain themselves with, that’s when the third party joins them and Osvij looks pretty pleased as he’s carrying a form of mysterious bag.
“Splendid news! Managed to get ahold of a pretty nice haul of goodies – spiced nuts and fruits from the south that were sold here from a roaming merchant just a couple of days past.”

Nivra appears to perk up at that, hair tail fluctuating and her eyes brightening.
“Oh? Are they unusually savory or what?”

“Heh, well, probably the best kind of snack you can procure around these parts, if you ask me. I’m not into the sweeter aspects, you see, but salty and spicy is always a treat. And these were doused in cumin, paprika and sea salt.”

“Oh hey, that’s my thing too! I’d love some.”

“Of course. It would be pretty selfish and…probably unreasonable of me to bother eating these on my own, heh. Come, dig in, you two. Remember to imbibe healthy sips of water, though. It might get a little dry otherwise.”

With the agent setting down the package on a table in between them, Nivra snatches a handful and nigh-on instantly exhibits heightened level of happiness, not just by the giggles and smiles she presents, but her tail perks and swishes around with a far more pleased presence. It appears to remind her of home. This brings a small smile onto Eyren’s lips, who has come to the belief that this easterner deserves a better treatment after having been locked up in this town for a much too extended period. Even if she doesn’t perceive any tremendous pressure to hurl herself into the mix, Eyren does grab a minor fraction of the nuts and chews on them, but then seems placated with not taking anything beyond what the duo does.

One who takes note of this is the Nijki, whose vision diverts to her and amusedly monitors how she isn’t being especially avaricious.
“Intriguing. Not going to have any more, pranti Eyren?”

“Hm?”, wonders his fellow northerner, her eyes flittering as if she hadn’t known he was half-watching her.

“You don’t seem as keen to jump in and grab these tidbits as our friend here. Not to your fancy, I take it?”

“Uuh…well, that’s not exactly it. Guess I just don’t consider it fair if I nab more than you guys, who seem to really be into it.”

“Heh”, goes Nivra with her mouth partially stuffed with the treats. “Who cares ’bout that? If you want ’em, just take some!”

“Nah, I’m alright, thanks.”

Osvij’s lips tilts with additional involvement.
“This isn’t the solitary element of you I find engrossing either. Your behavior, your knowledge, your origins…you haven’t spoken heavily of yourself, besides how you’re from the north. And when you took off your coat earlier, I noted a symbol tattooed into your skin that was…recognizable. An unspecified organization, correct? Not convinced from where, though.”

Running a hand over her hair, Nivra blinks her eyes.
“Wait, really? Saw it too, but figured it was just a…cosmetic thing.”

Eyren snorts and shakes her head, wondering if it would be worth it to reply and be honest. Not that she doubts these two have some cognizance of that association, for its fame is conveyed across the continent in one vein or another, but their judgments and impressions may diverge quite extremely.
“Yeah, you probably have seen it a couple of times”, she says and then pulls up the sleeve on the copper-colored shirt she has on, exposing the image painted into the skin on her left shoulder – it depicts a black round shield shattered by a hammer. When she’s positive that they’ve studied it acceptably, Eyren digs into the pockets of her coat that’s lying in reach and fishes out the old steel and ebony badge she keeps of the mountain below a crescent moon. “These two symbols are both associated with the same guild – the Rittmark.”

Osvij rubs his chin with engagement.
“Ooh, I hadn’t spotted that badge of yours before now. Fancy that.”

“Hold up”, goes a surprised Nivra. “Rittmark…isn’t that the faction of knights up in the north?”

“Correct, sort of”, says Eyren. “You might better refer to them as just a martial-aligned order, though.”

“But…okay. I thought they were made up of mostly nobles and the wealthy?”, she prods, and Eyren can regard how a mildly wary mark flows through the dragon-horned lady’s expression.

To mollify it, Osvij shakes her head.
“No, this is not quite the case, pranti Nivra. Despite that it may be a safe bet for the chief part of their members, not all of them are that fortunate. Their reputation does vary, I suppose, but anyone from whatever origin or caste is suitable to sign up with them…provided you have the means.”

“Heh, yeah, that’s about right”, says Eyren. “Your assumption isn’t wrong, Nivra, cuz generally you won’t get into their martial academy unless you’re loaded. Suffice it to say, I was not, since I grew up on a farm near a village north of Urmesan.”

“Ah, the big eastern city in Steorshlag”, Osvij comments.

“Mhm. Close to the border of Tsabchuur.”

“Ahh yes, hence the reason it’s tricky to mark your accent.”

“Well…you managed to, anyway.”

“O…okay, then”, Nivra grants hesitantly. “How does a farmgirl pan out as a knight, though?”

“First and foremost by showcasing her skill. Although I…didn’t exactly go through the legitimate route, heh. When I was almost a teenager, there was a tournament arranged in the vicinity of Urmesan, primarily for kids in…mid-well-off families, you could say. Those with traders or craftsmen parents. My family couldn’t pay that anyway, and my mother didn’t approve of the Rittmark, so she refused. Since I sort of…idolized the Rittmark and their reputation, I knew I had to get in. To me, they and their warriors were the best of the best, practically a class of heroes. You hear of them in every snow-drifted field of Steorshlag, traditionally by wandering merchants or hired heralds. They’re invincible, and no regular troops or mercs can match them, being the ‘bulwarks of the north that shall ever rise’.” She emits a faint sigh. “So, I snuck inside.”

They hear Osvij chuckling, whereas Nivra arches her brow.
“…honestly? How’d that work out?”

“Eh…in the end, it didn’t. I’d prevailed in fetching a couple of leather armor pieces, a sword and shield, plus a rusty old helmet I found in a box somewhere. But…well, in a matter of hours, the knights who hosted it started asking questions and owing to that I couldn’t field them appropriately, they realized I wasn’t a contender. Was gonna throw me out, but…” She pauses and her eyes drift down, stroking her thumb over the badge. “…one of the men there, he disagreed. Felt that my skill belonged in the Rittmark.”

Osvij smiles lightly.
“He saw your innate ability, I imagine.”

With a pensive peek sideways, pictures flash through Eyren’s mind at such a velocity that it nearly starts spinning, but she recovers in time.
“…something like that. Anyway, I was brought in only by his good graces, so they assigned me to him. After that, I spent years studying under him, plus learning how to fight in the manner they do. That is, until I realized what they were.”

“What they were?”, asks Nivra. “What’d you mean?”

Exhaling and shrugging, Eyren leans forward, setting her arms down over her legs.
“To get into the Rittmark, you usually have to meet a number of requirements: you have to lay out for the fee, you have to be of a suitable age at the onset – generally around ten to twelve – you must survive their rigid teachings and tests through the five to seven years which the tuition lasts, and finally, you must be happy to conform with their doctrine. The doctrine of ‘money and power is everything’.”

The Ahterilonan’s visuals flicker for a moment.
“That’s what the Rittmark is for real?”

“In my experience, yeah. Once the basic grounding is over, Rittmark squires – which they call their students – journey alongside their elected masters everywhere in the continent, in order to be familiarized with the individual weathers and terrains you might run into in every province, plus how people live and fight there. You might then assume this is to appreciate how the continent is formed, what crowds and ideals are found and how to be of use to them, but really, it’s predominantly a stimulant to expand your value to potential buyers.”

“…excuse me? Buyers?”

“Of your services. Rittmark may be expert combatants and adaptable sentinels, but they’re not ‘noble souls’ or proper knights from fairytales. It’s not an organization dedicated to shepherding the citizens of this continent – they’re mercenaries. Sure, they’re highly seasoned and generally multitalented mercs, but that doesn’t alter their identities. In fact”, she snorts, “Rittmark gravitate towards being pretty shoddy officers as well, seeing as we aren’t instilled with expertise in grand strategy or leadership. We’re trained to do battle, to kill efficiently and to withstand any climate.”

“Gosh, I…I wasn’t aware of that. But you do hear so much ’bout how refined Rittmark are. Even heard of their skirmishes down in Nova’keshmir…”

“Yeah, likely due to that it’s this strain of individual that make the order exist. The Rittmark was founded as an institute by nobles, wealthy landowners, well-off traders and esteemed military families: the exact kind of crowd they enroll kids or servants from as students. They’re not heroes, never were. Just freelancers who demand pretty high compensation in order to campaign against your enemies.”

Stroking a hand along his cheek, Osvij then points a finger towards her again.
“That badge you’re holding, it is proof of your triumph in the trials, no? Does that not signify you were Rittmark?”

Shutting her eyes and groaning in a meagerly tormented style, Eyren’s shoulders slump, nearly defeated.
“…yes and no. You’ve listened to how I demean these people, slandering what they declare to be in the eyes of society. To be honest, I never truly harbored any issues with the physical and mental training by itself. I crushed every ordeal, each exercise. My master saw me as a natural element in the future of the Rittmark, and would’ve emerged as one of their numbers eventually…but I refused. Their immersion with gitties and compensation, how they would seek out clients of only the highest order and gloze over the suffering of the masses, even walk by instances of village plundering while they’re happening…” She clenches her fist around the badge and her eyes open in a hardened state. “It left me…disillusioned. The stories I’d been fed, I realized they were just lies. Drivel to fend off criticism from disbelievers. My mother…she’d been right all along, and I didn’t see it until I was virtually signed up. That was not the protector of the destitute who I’d dreamt of being.”

Nivra bites at her lower lip once she absorbs every syllable of the northerner, how they scream with a sense of honesty and verity.
“Did you…leave them right away or…?”

“Obviously, I didn’t. It may seem kinda…self-gratulatory or childish, but I wanted to make a big deal out of my opinion on them. It was going to be…theatrical. After I’d nailed the last of the tests, upon the graduation ceremony, once I received my badge I tossed it to the floor and pulled off the silk cloak they’d granted me too. Told them what I thought of their despicable behavior and that I spit on their lack of honor and empathy for commoners. My master, he…did his best to convince me to stand down, but I wouldn’t listen to his bullshit, not anymore. Almost right away, a duo of their knights challenged me to a fight, but that couldn’t stop me and they were left bloodied along with my badge on the ground. Departing from the hall, I took Razz and prepared to set off and never look back…” She stares down at the badge and in its faint sheen, a reprise the scene borderline plays out for her once more. “…but that’s when my master appeared one final time. He approached and handed me the badge, said I shouldn’t quit without it. Initially, I rejected and told him to fuck off, but…he insisted. ‘Do whatever you wish with it – sell it, toss it down an outhouse, whatever – but it’s yours. You earned it.” Her fingers straining over the badge, she shrugs. “He wasn’t a particularly inspirational man, but…that day, I couldn’t say no. He was…more sympathetic than he’d acted at any previous moment of our communion. So I took it anyway. Guess you could view it as a variety of…idealism from me, that I could renew the image of what Rittmark are to the world. In some ways, I…still retain that in my heart.”

Both of Osvij and Nivra are plunged into a sequence of silence when Eyren’s candor comes to a close, letting their wits run over the events and consider them for their own respective slants.
“How…long ago was this?”, wonders Nivra.

“Not that distant. Three, four years maybe?” She touches the area where they spotted her burnt-in mark earlier. “What I showed you here is an emblem that’s associated with people who’re no longer Rittmark. Traitors or quitters are designated with a term in Goetejul, the big central tongue – Skeldingmyerech, which reworded is ‘Shieldbreaker’. It isn’t practiced anymore, but in yesteryear, those who’d failed the Rittmark greatly, betrayed them or broke laws of the land would have their shields cracked by one of the higher-ups and then get this crest literally charred into their skin, as a sign of being cast out. These days, it’s merely a remnant of old habits, and…not sure, but I stand with the idea. I happily embrace the role of a Skeldingmyerech, to broadcast my distaste of their lousy ideals.”

“I…dunno how to respond in a way that doesn’t make me seem either dumb, boring or gullible, but…” Listing her shape across to the northerner, Nivra leaves a hand over Eyren’s shoulder, where the tattoo rests under. “You’re not who or what I visualized you as, Eyren. You’re better. Never known or encountered a Rittmark, but…screw those guys. You act closer to what the word ‘knight’ should mean.”

Although it’s clearly purported as praise and an expedient to cheer her up, Eyren simply breathes out with a subdued level of gratification, patting the shorter woman’s hand.
“Thanks, but…a knight isn’t really what I aspire to be. I just wanna help people. Make these lands a little less shitty.”

“Hah! That’s great, though, isn’t it? But…” She wrinkles her brown in concentration. “You’re disorienting me. If that’s what you’re after, how come you won’t get in with a team like the Resistance? Or anything. To me, that totally corresponds with your mindset.”

“Mm. You’re…not inherently wrong, but…” She gestures with her hands in skepticism. “Blame the Rittmark. Because of them, because of what I saw and was taught, I just…don’t trust organizations. Including those who may struggle for a good cause, they might eventually end up walking down a rotten path, and I wouldn’t wish to risk being embroiled with it when it happens.”

“But that doesn’t-…yeah, okay, suppose I can see why you’d be skeptical. It’s not like I aim to bully you into anything, but…what I’m telling ya is that the Resistance isn’t what the Rittmark were. The people there are good and their integrity is real. You haven’t seen it in action, so it’d be a stretch for you to take it at face value, but I’m not fibbin’.”

“And I don’t disbelieve your belief in them. Even if I may not share it.”

“That is…always something. I sympathize with that it probably doesn’t suit ya completely, but if you ever for a moment wanna redefine that, I’ll try to keep a place for you among us.”

She is stubborn in her measure of promoting them, Eyren won’t deny her that. Chuckling, she gently pats a hand over Nivra’s lap.
“Doubt I will, what with how bullheaded I’m inclined to be, but…my reluctance to enlist doesn’t indicate we can never work together. I’m still available should you be pressed for a failed Rittmark’s talents at some point.”

These terms prevail in perking Nivra up, drawing a grin over her face.
“Now that is an offer I won’t pass up.”