C14 Getting used to the place
The morning started with a kick out from the bed. Rosa felt the blanket taken away from her. She rolled out of the bed and fell on the floor. ‘Ahhh, that hurts.’ She thought while rubbing her back and looked up to see Babak grinning at her. She did not realize how exhausted she was until she hit the bed. She quickly ended up falling asleep. However her sleep was not a comfortable one. She tossed and turned and ended up waking up in the middle of the night twice. It took a while for her to get some good sleep. The early morning wakeup call was a hassle for her. “Rise and shine kid you will be late for training.” Rosa noticed the sky was dark and blue with a little bit of the reddish hue on it. “Huh what training it is not even morning yet?” She sat on the floor and yawned scratching her eyes. Babak threw the blanket on the bed again. “Clean these up before you go. The assembly for the newcomers will start as soon as the whistle is given. “Huh whistle? What...” Rosa wanted to ask more questions but he screamed back. “Hurry up.” She got up groaning from the floor and proceeded to clean the room.
She dragged her feet down the stairs into the workshop. She got greeted by a strong heat flash on her face. Babak and Merlin was already setting up the room for the day’s work. The chimney needs to be heated enough to use it for metal work. This makes the room really heated up and the instruments need to be ready for use. She saw Merlin setting up the table on place and pulling a cart full of rust out of the room. She stood for a while looking at their work. It slowly became more dark and reddish inside the room. The heat made sweats drop from her forehead to her chin. She quickly shook her head and slowly proceeded to get cleaned up. The morning time was going really slow for her. Usually she is an early riser but she never got up this early it was after the sun was up in the sky. ‘Ah this is still night time why am I up this early?’ She kept yawning and threw the bucket in the well. It was still heavy but lighter then yesterday without the tools in it. The bucket fell in the water with a splash. It sounded louder with the emptiness around her. She moved the rope a bit for the bucket to move sideways and fill it up with the water. The whole time she yawned and felt drowsy her shoulders were slumped while her eyes felt reddish and sleepy.
Finally she pulled it up after two pulls the bucket rope almost slipped from her hand. She woke up from her drowsy state with the jerk felling and quickly grabbed the rope to stop it from falling back in. ‘Argh this stupid metal plated bucket. Why would anyone put metal plates on a bucket like this? Ugh it’s heavy” She frowned in irritation while pulling it up. It took her a little more strength to pull it up. Finally she could reach it and pour the water out into another bucket. Rosa finally bends down to scoop some water out and splash it on her face. The water felt cold and refreshing. She sighed and quickly finished up washing her face. ‘I should ask about this ridiculous design of the buckets to Babak. What on earth was he thinking when he made this?’ she felt an anger incoming in her head however she readied herself for a twisted answer Babak has a very different way of thinking when it comes to creation of stuff. Back in the village Babak used to have two corners in his workshop one is the regular type of work. The other was different designs of utensil and weapons. Babak’s favorite thing to do was to create swords and daggers which do not match with the regular criteria. Although they hardly got sold in the auction he used to take great pride when they are done and out of the cold water. He would polish them and set them aside as precious trophy for himself.
‘I wonder what happened to those weapons. I did not see any of them when I was hiding in there.’ She felt a bit sorry for him. Babak worked hard thinking of the designs and drawing them then creating them. He used to take a day off from her work and spend nights in such creations. ‘I wonder does he have any time of shelves for his dreams here.’ She started feeling a bit sad at the thought Babak might not be getting that time for himself. The sky was getting lighter; Rosa looked up for a bit and walked in the room from the back door. A light whistle could be heard from the outside. She tried to listen properly ‘Where is it coming from?’ She suddenly felt her collar yanked up from her back. She looked up to see Babak was yanked her up and pushed her to the front door more like almost threw her like a ball. “Get going now, you are getting late.” Rosa did not understand what he meant by that. Merlin joined her as she got steadily to her feet. “We are almost late come along I will show you the way.” Rosa followed him the whole way confused but decided it is best to ask questions when it is the right time. She walked a little faster to catch up with him. Merlin was taller than her and walked in a faster pace. He covered more distance with his steps than Rosa could run to catch up with him. She saw a lot of the men around her were running out of their tent. Some looked really scared. She got curious of the frightening look. ‘Where are we going actually? Is it something scary?’ she thought getting more curious. She was surprised to see how calm she was in the situation. Usually when she would see anyone with a frightening look she would try to hide or get scared herself and could not think properly. Now however there was a strange calm sensation in herself. ‘Is it because I have people I know around me?’ She thought while running; however no answer came to her head in the brief time she had from the workshop to their destined place. She could see Merlin waving her to get closer. The men were standing in straight lines all in perfect position no body moved even a bit. She could feel a strange aura of silence and dread coming from the people around there.
Rosa slowly advanced to stand beside Merlin but he shook his head and pointed her to stand at the far left corner of the line. “You are new you need to stand there.” She moved to the directed place and stood mimicking the person in front of her. She made sure to stand at the very last of the line. Her wish to stay out of visual as much as possible played a big role at this moment. Not much could be seen from her position. She looked around pulling her sleeves up this shirt were loose for her. ‘Should I ask for some needle and thread to fix it?’ She made a mental note to ask Babak and knotted the end of the sleeves such that it does not create any distraction for her at the moment. Rosa took a look around her, it was still pretty dark but she could make out the features of the men around her. They were taller than her. She felt like a child beside all of them. ‘If these people are such scared of what is incoming right now. What will happen to me?’ She thought of the situation dreadfully and looked around to get a hint or anything about what is going to happen. She was not getting any courage to ask anyone. She moved her head again and her eyes fell on Merlin. He had that smile on his face. His features were casual and relaxed. She kept starring at him for a while. ‘Out of all the people around here why is this person so relaxed?’
Rosa was getting more and more confused with the environment around her. Finally three men entered the area they wore dark brown clothes and silver capes behind them. They looked middle aged in their features. The person in the middle had auburn colored hair. They slowly took the steps and stood on the podium facing the lines in front of them. They were escorted by five more behind them the five of them wore swords in their hips and dark blue capes. They stood in front of the line facing the podiums. Finally the slow murmurs also came to a silence. “Group leaders start with the sessions.” Rosa was too busy looking around to figure out what was going on that she missed whose voice was that. She guessed it must have been the person in the middle. One by one the lines left following their group leaders in blue cape. Rosa stood still and waited till it was time for her line to leave. She followed the person in front of her and took care not to fall behind. The same problem came up quickly. The men in front of her suddenly took a faster pace of walking. She started half running and half walking to keep up with them. They moved in unison in three straight lines. Rosa could clearly see that she was the odd one out in the group. She dreaded this fact and sighed. ‘I am so going to regret this. What am I doing here in the first place?’ The man in front of her started jogging faster. Rosa noticed this a bit late and almost got left out she sped up a bit more to catch up. The path slowly became steep and she saw they were jogging up the hills. Her breathing was uneven for a moment due to the climb. ‘This is not getting any better.’ She thought. Rosa accelerated and kept up with the people around her. Finally she could match up the rhythm of the men around her and continued to run in a line. The slope became higher and higher she could feel herself getting exhausted she could feel the heat building up in her. ‘When will the climb end at all?’ She thought while feeling sweaty all over her body. Her legs were feeling itchy and she could feel sweat beads on her back. ‘Is this training? Why do I have to do this?’ she thought irritated a bit.
The men around her looked like they did not break a sweat. She took a glance on the individual running beside her. He was looking a little exhausted but strong. ‘Does this happen every day?’ she thought shaking her head and kept running something in her head warned her might not be the only thing she will be facing at the end. The sun was bright and up in the sky when they reached the top. As soon as the whistle blew they stopped. Rosa felt steams were flowing out of her. She bends over and took in some large breaths holding her knees. Finally after a few gulps she stood up straight to look around the place. They were at the high top of the hill. ‘No wonder it was hard.’ They could see the fort from this place. Four of the guards were armored and moving around the area with large pikes on their hand. “Is this a lookout point?” she murmured unconsciously. “Yes this is one of the four points around the fort you can see the high path ways from here. It is easier to protect the fort this way. Rosa turned around to find that it was the man who was running beside her. He was taller than her that Rosa had to lift up her head a bit to look at him. “You must be the new addition here. My name is Tom.” He gave a smile. The name felt a bit familiar for her but she could not remember where she heard it. The person in front of her does not look like anyone familiar. “I am Rosa.” She answered along with a nod to sign that she understood what he said.
There was some wooden dolls step up at one corner and stacks of hay beside them. A small storage like box was kept beside them. Rosa was curious to what was inside the wooden box. She leaned on her side as much as she can to see what is going on at the front. The group leader stood facing the group and whistled to get their attention. He kicked the box down. The box opened to a bunch of wooden swords of different size. He had a frown in his forehead which made Rosa worry what is coming up next. She quickly stood straight to hide behind the line. “Front Line first the quicker you fall the more time is added.” The lead shouted to the group. He removed his cape and put it on the top of the box. “Choose the weapons wisely.” He took one of the long wooden swords and walked in the middle of the field. Rosa gulped in air; she felt a cold fear starting from her head to her feet.
She raised her head up and leaned to her left towards Tom to ask in her low voice, “Hey what are we going to do here? What is the leader planning to do?” He looked at her with a guilty face. “That is commander Roux he is one of the tough one here. You need to survive his hits. The more hits you doge the less time of pushups you need to finish.” Tom looked a little worn out in fear himself. Rosa started sweating more at the thought. Roux was a large person with muscles who looked four times of what she was. This person added with a weapon made her feet start shaking and she slowly started to lightly jump n her place to hide her nervousness. Tom smiled at her, “Don’t worry I think he might take it easy on you as you are new to this place. His words did not make her feel any better. The idea of getting hit by this person was making her feel dreadful.
The first participant went forward taking one of the wooden swords from the toppled box and stood straight facing his opponent. There was a slight difference in height. They swung their sword at each other. It took only two swings for commander Roux to throw down his opponent. The large thunk made Rosa jump on her position. She looked at the front saucer eyed. The hit looked really painful; Rous shouted, “Two rounds no slacking.” The trainee got up rubbing his hand and shoulder and moved away quickly to start with the pushups. The next trainee could only doge one swish of his attack and fell hard on the ground. Rosa flinched and bit her bottom lip in fear. ‘Maybe it was not a good idea to stand at the end.’ With each person falling down at his hand the amount of fear kept building in her heart.
