A Bit of a Read

Now, before I get into the purpose of this post proper, I just want to put out there right away that while it's been roughly ages since my last post, I have no real intentions on catching people up to speed. There are a few reasons for this:

1. It's past my bedtime.
2. I'm a touch lazy.
3. It would be long in the telling and while probably therapeutic, probably neither necessary nor advised.

So there it is.

Also, I've just finished a lourvely book which my friend and coworker lent to me that I advise all fantasy-enjoying types to read. Patrick Rothfuss' The Name of the Wind kept me enthralled throughout today, and fortunate was I to have such a long day to devote to it, since interference from work or any other medium would have like driven me up a tree. My point is simply that it was good. Possibly better than most books I've read, and certainly better than the books I read over the summer, which is a story for a different time. Maybe.

But that wasn't my main purpose tonight. A few days ago, I posted on the good ol' social networking site Facebook that I had written something of a rather somber, ominous tone. Being the attention-starved waif I am, I found reactions to be lacking, and so I'm going to kick it up a notch and post it here. It's a long read, so plan accordingly if you read on.

And one last thing before I open myself to questions regarding my mental and emotional stabilities, this is a rough draft intended to create background for a character in another work my friend Ben and I are working at. Slowly working at. It's also rough, and will probably remain as such. You have been warned.

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My father, ever a man of virtue and honor, worked as a sentry at the lord's estate in Zharmaen. We saw him a week out of the month, typically, for the first year that he worked, but he worked hard and earned our family money enough to buy a place nearby. It was during this time that our family grew very close, having lived so disjointed so long. My father taught us all things of the city, for we had lived before among farmers and shepherds, and our family grew comfortable with the hustle and bustle of civilization, small city though it was.

I turned six around this time, and already my mother had instilled a sense of virtue and diligence in my daily life that, though the youngest, I took on many of the chores myself. My oldest sister, Jisune, became fast friends with the local baker's daughter, and with my mother's blessing, worked part-time at their store. She and Eile did their share of work, though Eile possessed a fiery spirit that often found her getting in fights with the local boys. My father laughed at this, but my mother worried constantly about what the neighbors must have thought. They seemed to have accepted us, however, and so life went on.

Many things of varying impact happened over the years, but few are truly integral to my story. Jisune became an apprentice at the lord's in-house infirmary, learning the healing arts from a man many considered to be a genius. Eile began working under the smithy, helping him with his miscellany, though everyone else wondered how she caught the warm regard of the aging misanthrope. Between chores and schooling, in which my mother enrolled me, my father would teach me the art of the sword and the duties of a knight, though it was unlikely that a boy who inherited his mother's slight body would ever be enlisted for defense. Still, he taught me and guided me as though I would follow his steps. And while I never developed his overwhelming power or his solid stances, he praised me for my unusual dexterity and keen mind. Of course, as a boy of then eight years, I never penetrated his guard or managed to turn back his practice assaults, but I learned many things of combat and war, and also of honor and ethics.

At school, I struggled not in my studies, but to find friends. Few boys thought a quiet, introvert much fun, save for the occasional prank. To my father's pride, I never retaliated, instead stoically taking these occurrences as harmless fun. Those who similarly fell prey to bullies began to flock to me, and I taught them as well as a boy could about the importance of maintaining face in the midst of trials. And our group met with great success in thwarting recreation at our expense. I became a leader of sorts, not ever truly standing up against anyone, and yet somehow emerging victorious.

Another couple years passed. Jisune nursed the sick, never developing her master's skill in healing, but in her own right a decent healer.

Eile managed to ensnare an unwitting young man or two into courting her, but in the end, she found herself wanting someone with a similar spirit. Her work with the blacksmith did little to quell her inner flame, instead balancing and tempering it like the blades she began to help make. Our father became a captain of the guard, and suddenly we found ourselves with excess for the first time in our lives, though we continued to live carefully and store up money for the future.

I continued growing much as ever, though more in mind than in body. Medium-height and thin, many of my peers still held me in high regard for my peaceful negotiations of situations made difficult by less friendly classmates. The opposition, finding their fun tarnished by such a small boy, began to get more fierce and malevolent. Once and awhile, I was ambushed walking home from the schoolyard. Sometimes my father's training served me well, and I was able to escape. Other times I was not so fortunate. Those who gravitated toward me either fell away, not willing to be tied to the enemy's enemy, or became more closely linked to me, believing I could save them. And I did when I could, and when I couldn't, I would suffer with them.

My mother worried increasingly for her two youngest. Eile I didn't think would ever not worry her, and I came home often with a bloodied lip or eyebrow or a blackened eye. My father and she fought often, as she didn't believe that his codes of conduct should be so deeply ingrained in a child my age. But he was proud of me, and I was thrilled to be so accepted by him. I felt as though, in my own way, I had a piece of heaven in my scraped hands.

War broke out between Zharmaen and Moufain in the far north. Many soldiers were taken from the lords' estates across the kingdom, but my father was able to remain, taking me out to the nearby forest to reinforce his survival training in case the war reached as far south as our residence. However, a crew of bandits learned of the reduction in security and raided the town, cutting down people in the streets, pillaging the stores and the wealthy's residences. We saw the smoke rising from those places they had gutted then torched and ran back to the village, but by the time we had returned, the fires were mere cinders, and the town nearly deserted. Bodies lied in the street, splashing grotesque color on the muddy cobbles. I was violently sick, but my father allowed me no time to nurse my churning insides. Heaving me across his shoulder, he carried me through the now unfamiliar streets. He paid no attention as I lost my stomach behind him. We came upon the road to our humble house, and my father stopped so abruptly, I was nearly tossed onto the ground in front of him. Absentmindedly, he caught me with his right hand, but his left moved in the familiar pattern of Iyuan priests. I looked, despite my mind screaming to remain ignorant, at the remains of our house. The walls had fallen in after the flames ate away at their supports, and like a rag flung carelessly over its rack, my mother's body hung over the broken in window in her shredded apron.

My father dropped me. I managed to land neatly enough and sidestep as he half strode, half ran to the crumbled building for which he worked so hard. To the corpse of his wife for whom he worked even harder. I stood, gaping. Wide-eyed. Terrified as my innocence leaked away like the blood of so many seeped between the cobbles. My father knelt at the doorway, bringing his wife to rest in a more serene position belied by the corpse-mask of terror. My knees shook, my mind both a-buzz with mis-firing thoughts and painfully blank. A thought caught: "Why was he so calm? Why, when I am so broken?" I wanted to beat him, I realized, for not grieving as I was. I balled my fists in agony, steeled my legs, ran and struck him in the back of the head, not caring that my fist burned as bone impacted heavier bone. My father turned his head slowly, looking at me blankly. He looked back down and his arm shot toward me. I put up my arms to defend against a blow and found myself entangled, then smothered against his broad chest as he sought to hold on to the last vestiges of his life. Heavy, hot drops fell on my hair.

Minutes passed, then my father's head shot up. He murmured my sister's names, then ran toward the blacksmith, which was closest. Inside, the smith sat in a corner, a sword dripping blood in one hand and his opened side in the other. He looked up hazily at my father, then, recognizing him, slumped forward in shame. My father made his way to the door, hesitated, then ordered me to bandage the smith while he went to look for Jisune at the lord's estate. I had very much wanted to follow, but I did as he asked, tearing strips from one of the smith's tunic and tying down with the leather strips normally used for grips. From the pack I still wore, I gave the smith water, then laid him on the pack, taking the blanket from his bed in back to lay over him. Once he was settled, I waited, trying to work my mind around what was to be done next.

My father returned with the medic under whom Jisune apprenticed. He moved to the smith's side, checking the bandaging and tut-tutting, but I watched my father carefully controlling his abundant emotions. He turned again to the door, but the medic stopped him, asking him to remain for the night. He explained that the brigands had taken Jisune, that she wasn't dead, but they wanted to increase their number. I watched my father blanch, but the healer continued, saying that they fled quickly on horses to the east. The best course of action, he continued, was to rest, then to track them down. After several tense moments, my father grudgingly agreed.

In the morning, my father extracted our hidden funds and what supplies we could scavenge from our home. Before the sun had risen, we left the city behind, traveling east to the next small city. My father intended to hunt them down, but he wanted even more to offer me the same opportunity. I had forgotten I was small and not that strong. Hate accompanied my despair. When we set down for the night, my father would train me until sweat dampened my clothes. After he drifted to sleep, I would get up and train more. We talked little over the next days, but shared each other's obsession.

The hunt took a year. The brigands used High magic to mask their trail, and initially, tracking them was impossible. We persevered, my father using muscle and coin to eke out answers, while I integrated myself into the waifs of settlements, using my charisma to find the leaders and the respected among the thieves, gathering information through those channels. While we were together, we pooled information as he trained me with daggers and the short sword. After too long, we found them. The night before, we camped a small distance from their hideaway. As I drew my knives across my whetstone, I could feel my limbs shake in anticipation. I'd never killed anyone before. I looked forward to killing the next day. My father sat on his bedroll on the other side of the small fire, making homage to his knightly oaths. We sought different things for the morrow, but it didn't matter. What mattered to me was simply that there would be blood.

There was a great deal, in fact. I still have no recollection of how many fell to our steel that day. Twenty, possibly thirty men. We fought our way to the leader's chamber, resting briefly in nooks and crannies when we could to catch our breath and bind our wounds. Five, maybe six times I nearly died, narrowly avoiding wild slashes from the rabble that made up the brigands. Finally we made it to the pretentious double doors, making an easy mark of the leader's residence. We halted just outside, catching our breath as blood hammered in our ears. My father nodded. Whether I was ready or not, we were going in.

The leader sat on a wooden throne, attended by women, many of whom shrieked at our gore-smeared appearance and shrank to the back walls. Two did not. One wore a sword, trained by the smith in basic technique. The other wore no weapon, but true to a healer, didn't quail from the sight of blood. Two jaws tightened as the eyes above recognized the intruders. But the family that abandoned them would not rip them from their master.

"Stockholm Syndrome," Grahem spat.

The interruption stirred the assassin from his self-inflicted trance. "Yes. They were told we gave up searching the next day. They hated him at first, I'm sure, but they somehow grew attached to him. I don't understand it."

Grahem nodded. "How could you?"

"My father didn't understand it, either," the assassin continued, ignoring the question. "Maybe he didn't understand it more."

Knight oaths dictated that my father would combat the assassin leader alone. Reinforcements of a sort came as they began to fight, so I left to take care of them, to die, if necessary, to give him the chance to free my sisters. I didn't want to die, though, and I fought viciously, faster than any of them out of sheer hate and desperation. They fell, the five or six that were there, by underestimating me. But the last one slashed me deep in the abdomen. I thought I was dead. I prayed to any deity I could think of to let me live, to let me return to being part of a family. I passed out.

When I awoke, my wound was bandaged poorly, and in front of me, amid the corpses, sat my father reciting his oaths to his sword. But something was off. His litany was unsteady, rising and falling. As my vision cleared, I saw he was slouched, rocking back and forth like a babe.

"What happened?" I asked as I rose.

He froze, turning to me slowly, a mad tic in his eye. "They're dead. All the enemy: dead."

I looked at him trying to reason the meaning in his words. Then I understood. I ran into the room behind us and found no life whatsoever. All the honor and virtue and oaths I was taught meant nothing at that moment. I was twisted in an instant, realizing the futility of these things people cling to. And so I freed my father from them. I was an assassin thereafter.