Three Moments

Three Moments

Orryn of Coroness could narrow his short life down to three defining moments.

The first had been when he was a young lad, well before becoming a man. The day the fighting had stopped and everything had changed. They had heard the news from a sweat-stained and bleeding soldier of Everlake. The man had come to their house on wobbling legs, his clothes torn, dirty and rumpled.

“Resilee is victorious! The Imperials are retreating,” he’d said wearily.

A sword that had seen better days dragged the ground as he leaned against the door jamb to tell them the rebellion had succeeded. Orryn’s older sister Antia had squeezed his shoulders from behind while tears streamed down both of their faces.

“Do you know of our fath – “ Antia had begun, but the soldier had pushed off and moved down the road to the next farmhouse. They watched him silently until he’d moved out of sight before they turned to go back into the house.

Orryn could barely contain the energy flowing through his limbs. “Now Father can come home!” He bounced on the simple bed in one corner while Antia moved to the stove in the other corner. She glanced at him, tendrils of her blonde hair hanging limply from the scarf on her head.

“We don’t know if he will, Orryn. We don’t know where he was in the fighting.”

“We got a letter! Remember, Antia? Just a few days ago!”

“Yes,” she said patiently. “We did.”

She turned back to the stove and said nothing more. Orryn stopped bouncing and sniffed the air. Garlic soup. Again. It was really just water with garlic and potatoes. Potatoes had been the only crop they’d been able to grow after their father had left for the warfront many years before.

Orryn had only fuzzy memories of a big man with fading hair and a dirty blond beard. More abundant were memories of his mother, who had died of a fever just a year ago. Antia had ensured they were fed and he kept up with his reading as Mother had requested.

He was only ten, but he knew his sister cried many nights. He’d asked her once why she was sad, and she’d said it was nothing. When he complained about the potatoes, she simply ate her food in silence. When his shoes got too small, she’d given him hers and walked with ripped burlap wrapped around her feet.

But this was the day they’d been waiting for! The fighting had never gotten very close to them. Antia had told him once that they’d lived in a different place, further north, before the war. They’d had a bigger house and a few servants, she’d said. Their mother had worn untorn clothes, and their father had been clean-shaven and laughed often.

When the rebellion broke out, they left their home and fled south to this farm. Antia said they had smuggled him in a trunk. When he’d asked why she wasn’t in a trunk, she had quieted and changed the subject.

People were safer the further south they went. The Imperial Army did not care much for the southern heat and only went where there were confirmed rebels – or children exhibiting magic.

Orryn had seen a company clad in Imperial yellow and silver once as they marched west and far off in the distance. He’d looked up from his spot on the ground in front of the house, where he lined up thin sticks and called them soldiers. He knew those weren’t the colors his father wore; this was the enemy. He’d run back inside the house and hidden in Antia’s skirts until he was sure they were gone.

It took over a month after the soldier brought them the happy news, but their father did return home. Their joy was bittersweet when it became clear he had changed. Gone was the strong, healthy, jolly man they had known. He was still tall but even Orryn could recognize the frailness of his father’s frame and the limp that never seemed to go away. Nor could they deny the strain around his eyes, the screams at night, or the permanent furrow between his eyes.

Almost a year after Father’s return came the second defining moment in Orryn’s life: the day King Buclear appeared at their door. The new king was clad in finery and surrounded by several big men. Orryn peered around his father, who showed emotion for the first time since he’d returned. A broad smile had lit his face as he clasped arms with the king and invited him in.

“And who is this strapping lad?” Buclear asked in a deep voice. Orryn swallowed and stepped forward, unable to keep his eyes off the golden crown perched atop a head full of red hair.

“My son, Orryn” Father rasped. The skin around his eyes tightened. “He is…”

“I can feel it,” Buclear said as he scrutinized the scrawny boy. He knelt to bring himself down to Orryn’s height. “Do you understand the power you hold, boy?”

Orryn looked at his father uncertainly before he shook his head. His tongue refused to move, it seemed.

“Well, hold it you do.” The king’s smile widened. “You will be the first, son. Together we will build a new world.”

“You will take him as the Imperials would.” Father stepped in front of Orryn. He kept his head bowed, but his tone was like iron.

“No.” The king stood. “I will take him and give him great purpose. But he will be free to visit, and you will visit him.”

Father’s dull eyes finally rose to look at Buclear, moving over the king’s face as if he searched for something. Then he nodded once and turned away quickly, taking Antia’s arm and leading her into the house.

Orryn had packed his meager belongings – a few changes of old clothes, a wooden sword, and a spinning toy – and said a solemn goodbye to his father and sister. He did not glance back as he climbed on a horse next to the king and started away, but he could not keep two drops from falling from his eyes.

The third defining moment came five years later. Tall and lanky at fifteen, he’d been trained in magic by an old wizard from the Tower itself who had been lured to Buclear’s court. Wizard’s Tower sat right in the Imperial capital of Loirelia, a rocky piece of evidence of imperial power. Young boys manifesting magical abilities were taken there to be trained. They were never allowed to see their families again. This was not the way Resilee handled their magic-wielders. King Buclear did not keep his young magic students away from their families – though few had families left.

King Buclear travelled his new lands often, and when Orryn had been deemed trained enough to be of use, he was able to go with the king occasionally. Only Antia remained at their farmhouse. Father had faltered to return to his old life for two years before deciding he was born to be a soldier. He had rejoined Buclear and become an advisor to the king, often traveling with him and Orryn.

They had travelled from one town to the next, getting closer to their border with the empire, and the whole company had halted beside a lake for a rest. Orryn splashed water on his face and looked around curiously. He’d never been this close to the border before. Some said there was a spot nearby where one could stand in three different countries at once.

He stood and stretched before he skirted around the lake to get a closer look at the tree line. Just a few more feet is Loirelia, he thought. The trees on that side were indistinguishable from the ones near him. Shouldn’t there be a sign, a red road or something?

He started to turn away when he heard something echo faintly through the trees. He paused, turned to the company he was with, but they had moved further away and talked loudly amongst themselves. A scream sounded behind him and he whipped back towards the imperial lands, springing forward with his long knife gripped in his left hand.

He moved quickly and silently through the trees, halting every few seconds to listen and re-orient based on the sounds reverberating around him. The commotion grew louder, closer. Orryn spotted a small hill and headed towards it to get a visual advantage.

He’d barely crested the hill when something rammed into him with the force of a small bull. He flew backwards, the wind knocked out of him as he landed at the bottom of the hill with a grunt. A split second later, the body of the person who’d slammed into him hit full force once more, pushing him further into the ground.

Orryn struggled to breathe as black spots floated in his vision. The body on his flailed and as his senses returned, he realized it was a small girl. Not a little kid, but a girl about his age and small in stature. She scrambled away hastily. As she tried to catch her breath, Orryn looked closely at her.

Maybe she was a little younger than he’d first thought. Big blue eyes looked wildly around, bloodshot and wet. Tracks of former tears running down her dirty face. Deep red hair waved wildly around her head.

Orryn pushed himself up and noted the hunted way she watched him.

“I didn’t see you.” He slowly held a hand out to help her up. She backed away quickly and looked back at the hill. Orryn followed her gaze in time to see men in yellow and silver appear. When the Imperials caught sight of the two of them, they streamed down the slope with swords drawn.

Orryn’s eyes widened and he moved towards the girl quickly, no longer caring if she was scared. “I can help you! But you must come with me.” The girl never hesitated. She let him take her hand and they both turned and ran straight to King Buclear.

After that, the soldiers chasing the girl were no longer a problem.

This is how Orryn met Raven of Borivessa, and they became the best of friends.