Chapter Fifteen
Vessener, Murisa Kingdom.
A day turned into two, three then and still there was no word from the court of King Lorenz concerning Kalil, except for the increase of some guards making rounds in the streets and watching from the ramparts along the walls. They were armed and fully prepared for defense. The silence grated her patience. She wasn’t the only one whose sense of calmness was wearing thin. Her fellow comrades were beginning to lose it too. Each day that passed without a word from the royal court brought a new set of anxieties inside her and pushed her fellow warriors to an edge. Word on Latrell attack had already begun to spread around. She could even sense the restlessness in commoners when she passed them by. It was just a matter of time the streets became crazy with terrified people.
However, what picked at her mind unrelentingly was that there was no movement from Kalil. No other ambush. Abasi had been deadly quiet. By now she had expected to be on the field of battle or worse.
Were they waiting for each other out? Who’d rip the other one’s leg out first?
Nara couldn’t make out. Frustration seethed through her. She gritted her teeth, her thigh muscles tightened from exhaustion yet she pushed herself harder and rose her leg, delivering a swift kick to the worn strawman’s head.
If she could find out, she would’ve by now. Of course, she couldn’t despite having an almost free pass to the king’s court as a lady of noble birth. Recently no one other than officials were granted to enter the king’s residence. The castle had been under a strong guard. Social snobbery cliques had no gossip too. That left her to get details from her father. Unfortunately, her father wouldn’t tell her anything. He left home in the wee hours for court and returned late in the night. And if they talked it was about her quitting the army. Just two days ago, she argued with him about the same thing. The space between her brows creased when she recalled how their conversation went.
“Nara, you need to stop doing this” he had said coming from the kitchen to the sitting room. She knew what he had meant when she was harnessing the sword belt on her waist. She was dressed in a dark combat training clothes and on her way to the military quarters.
“Father you know I cannot.” She looked at him once she was done adjusting her belt.
“Yes, you can. You should start doing what you're required to do as a lady” he insisted. She sucked in her lower lip, holding back a scoff.
Sew, gossip and wait to be married to some arrogant lord?
“Please let’s not go there,” she pleaded, wanting to avoid an argument. “Can we talk about this later?” Her will to remain temperate was crumbling with each passing day, while fear began to look real. Ever since she informed the General about the elf, and not heard what he would do with the information apart of taking it to an account, an ominous feeling inside her has been tormenting her ceaselessly. And if her assumptions of the elves siding with Kalil were true, then she and the rest of Murisa were more than done for. They were damned. She couldn’t suppress a shudder skittering through her skin and sinking into her bones.
“This is the time. I don’t want to argue about this any longer. Do as I say. From this moment, you are forbidden to go to the military quarters or associate with it in any form” Her father’s words were cold it startled her.
Nara frowned. “You cannot do that.” She said, controlling her anger. “I’m not a child, I’m capable of caring for myself-”
“And I’m your father I’ve indulged you enough to the point you’ve become disobedient. I will no longer tolerate this behavior from you!” Her father’s gaze was stern as his tone.
Nara took a deep breath to control her temper. “You know clearly what you’re forcing me to do is to abandon my comrades.” There was an edge to her voice. “I call it a betrayal.” She couldn’t just walk away especially now, her fellow soldiers counted on her. As time passed, she just didn’t fight alongside her comrades she became to depend on them as did they. They were tied together by a unique relationship, a bond which assured they could count wholeheartedly on each other, put faith on the other completely and got each other’s back not only for survival in a time of adversity. They were there to comfort one another because one can relate and knows what the other is going through. They knew the horrors of being a soldier and no one else.
Her father looked at her, exasperated. “You’re too stubborn for your own good. This is not the life I wish for you. Understand there’s a lot more going on now.” His words rose concern.
“Then tell me, father, what it is?” Nara searched his tired face. No doubt, there was more to what’s been going on. Still, her father was reluctant to say. And he argued she was too stubborn for her own good. Now we know where she got that trait from.
“It’s nothing for you to worry about” Her father grasped and squeezed her arm. “You are young and have a whole life ahead of you. Do not shorten it.”
Her throat worked. Nara swallowed bitterly and held her father’s eyes. She understood her father loved and cared for her which also meant he feared for her life.
“I’m sorry father” she mumbled avoiding his gaze. He let go of her arm and scrubbed his face and expelled a weary sigh, knowing she’d made up her mind. Desperately wanting to escape the guilt tripping silence, Nara moved past him and hurried away.
***
Nara grit her teeth hard. She punched the strawman hard, again and again till sweat perspired from each pore, creating a layer of sweat over her skin. Her lungs and throat burned and her breathing labored. She wanted to scream and harm something alive to remove this feeling of despair. So, she kicked and fisted the strawman with all she had. Straws rain down to the ground as she attacked ruthlessly. Her whole body was burning from heat and muscles aching, and she didn’t care.
Nara kept on doing this for a while wrapped up in her own world ignoring other warriors in the vicinity until Astrid passed in her line of sight that’s when she stopped. Astrid still hadn’t left for Fisher as she’d said she would.
“Astrid” Nara called past a dry throat. She noted how Astrid’s shoulders stiffened while she kept on walking.
Nara stalked toward her. “Stop being childish”. She had had enough, now she demanded an explanation to why she was receiving the cold shoulder. “Clearly something is going on here, and I’ve somehow missed or forgotten to what I should know” Nara stood in front of her. If it were anyone else, she wouldn’t have bothered to figure what was wrong. But this was Astrid, one of the few friends she had. Friends were hard to come by for her.
As it has become the norm, Astrid avoided her gaze. “Nothing is going on.”
“Then why do you avoid me like a contagious disease?” Nara challenged, blocking her when Astrid tried to move around her.
That seemed to get her because Astrid clamped her jaw and leveled her eyes at her. “It is the way you look at me.”
“Pardon?”
“Even now” Astrid mused bitterly. “You’re looking at me like I’m a lost child.”
“I don’t understand” Nara frowned. Her confused expression aggravated Astrid. “Since the other night, you have been looking at me pitifully, and when you speak to me, there’s caution to your tone as if I’d break any moment.” Astrid’s laugh was humorless. “I see the judgmental looks people give me from the distant, I’ve now fallen to the coward soldier status to them, and I am fine with that. But I didn’t expect it from you. Not after everything!” her last words were painful fervidly whisper.
Nara was rendered speechless for a moment, she cleared her throat then spoke. “I’m sorry if my actions offended you. However, I only treated you as a friend who cares. Perhaps you misunderstood my understanding and sympathy with pity. And I only spoke to you with caution because I only wanted to give you space, not that I feared you’d break. You are still the courageous warrior I know, nothing has changed regardless of that night. Everyone has their moment where they feel afraid and vulnerable that that doesn’t change or give the right to regard them lesser.”
A pregnant pause.
“I’m sorry for being irrational and causing you embarrassment the other night” Astrid apologized, her shoulders relaxed when Nara nodded her acceptance. “Truthfully, you have always been the brave one. I’ve not seen you ranting like most of the others. You have managed to stay sane despite present circumstances.” Astrid said.
Nara shook her head. “Not true, my time isn’t here yet. I believe my break down would be far worse.”
“Perhaps a bunch of us have been pretending this whole time to be dauntless when we are nothing but spineless hypocrites” Astrid gave her a sad smile.
“Don’t say that, you know it’s not true” Nara insisted.
“I am still leaving when I get the chance to meet with the General. I have not seen him since we got back, no doubt he’s been occupied by the meetings in the king’s court” There were regret and remorse in Astrid’s eyes. That answered why she was still here. Nara couldn’t lie and say she wasn’t bothered by her decision. Weren’t they supposed to stick together till the end? Didn’t it mean nothing all the years she served with them? Who is to say, if she left, other soldiers wouldn’t follow her behind, abandoning their post? What would become of the army then?
“You realize running to Fisher won’t protect you from the war. Once Abasi’s army set foot here they won’t leave no stone unturned that includes in Fisher” Nara said.
“Still I want to spend my last days in peace and freedom” Astrid muttered, lowering her gaze to the ground.
Nara’s mouth thinned in disappointment, seeing the resolve in Astrid’s expression. A twinge of hurt pricked her chest. Weren’t the two of them supposed to stick together and have each other’s back to the end?
“I respect your decision” Nara clipped, not masking how she felt. She wasn’t going to wish her the best because she wouldn’t mean it. Right now, she only felt let down by one of the most important people in her life.
“I’m sorry” Astrid mumbled again.
“Yes, me too. I must go” Nara had already begun to stride away even before the words left her mouth.
***