Ezra could hear mumbling voices all around him and tried to open his eyes, but struggled to do so. His bones ached in a way that he’d never felt before, and unconsciousness called for him.
A splash of frigid water over his face made him gasp, and Ezra opened his eyes while he tried to catch his breath. He sputtered and coughed, his vision blurry as consciousness returned to him in full. It took a couple seconds, but finally he could see clearly, and the Lieutenant stood in front of him holding a water bladder. Ezra raised his hands to wipe the water from his face, and his arms shook like he’d done pushups for an hour as he tried to do so.
“Shaky, huh? You’ve never done that, then,” the Lieutenant spoke, and Ezra took a shaky breath as the cold from the water settled into his bones.
“What the hell happened?”
“You manifested an aural attack, kid. A pretty good one for someone who doesn’t have a Knight they’re serving under, or so I’m told,” came the answer. “You’re from the slums, right?”
“Uh, yeah?” Ezra answered. “Why else would I be here?”
“To be an assassin,” he shrugged in answer. “To infiltrate the Count’s forces, or the Duke’s beyond that in this extermination expedition. I don’t know what else, it’s not my job to think, not really.”
Look, Jormun spoke up, his words coming uncommonly quickly. You basically did what only an Adept can do well. The only reason why you’re not under more suspicion is that you obviously aren’t an Adept, since they don’t pass out from using their aura. Tell however much truth you want, but you probably don’t want to mention the ghost teaching you aura.
Ezra’s mind was still foggy, and he fought to answer. Finally, he mustered up something and said, “What’s an aural attack?”
“That light you sent my way? The attack that knocked you out?” When Ezra didn’t have an answer to that beyond shivers, the Lieutenant sighed and hung his head for a second before he perked up and offered a hand up to Ezra. “Okay, let’s get you some rest, then we can talk a little more about it. Your shirt’s filthy, you might want to wash it and let it dry while you explain how you got here.”
Obviously he wasn’t going to get an easy escape from all this. Ezra accepted the hand and struggled to his feet. He was so tired that it felt he’d never started exercising in the first place, and his legs shook underneath him.
“Amy,” came the Lieutenant's command, “help him.”
She nodded and stepped under Ezra’s arm to offer her support. He took it, but tried not to lean on her. After all, he couldn’t just lean on a girl, could he? That thought quickly went away as she pulled him tight and helped him step quickly forward. They were still in the cleared out pit where the Lieutenant had tested him, and he was escorted into a nearby tent. Inside, a small fire burned in front of a few stools. The Lieutenant sat on one, gestured to another for Ezra to sit on, and then waited for the story that was coming his way. With the single minute that he’d been given, Ezra had decided to largely tell the truth, just while retaining some of the more fantastical parts of the story.
He stripped off his outer tunic, which was covered in mud and looked for somewhere to wash it.
“We’ll take care of it, if you start talking,” the Lieutenant said, gesturing to another man that stood in the corner of the tent. This man, younger and wearing only a simple gray uniform with only a standard issue knife on his hip, immediately stepped forward and took Ezra’s dirty laundry without complaint. He took it to a corner where he pulled out a waterskin and poured it over the dirtiest parts of the tunic before beginning to scrub.
“Alright,” Ezra began, unable to hesitate any longer, but not sure if he should just start at the dream. After hesitating for a second, he said, “It started when I was a kid. Born to a prostitute here in the slums, so she didn’t want me but still took care of me, enough for me to live. She died when I was about seven, so I lived on the streets, and I always heard stories about Knights, how they’re able to change an entire battlefield all by themselves. Whenever I could listen to a story, I didn’t care to hear about the Beast, the Watcher, the Stone, or the Queen. Religion never mattered, but Knights? They were real, and if I could become one, I’d do it, no matter what.”
The Lieutenant didn’t react, but the younger man in the corner and Amy both seemed to understand what he was getting at, nodding along. Ezra continued, “Course, that wasn’t ever going to happen. I ended up getting into the Madam of The Dragon’s Toenail’s good graces and have worked for her as a bouncer for the past two years. I figured that’d be the closest I get to being a Knight. Then, ‘bout a month ago, I had a dream of a man on a battlefield. His every swing killed dozens, and he used the bow, the spear, the sword, and the axe. Everything he did? It was what I’d dreamed about.
“When I woke up, I learned the word ‘aura’, and that it was in everything.”
At that, Ezra shrugged, unable to give more specific information without sounding like a madman. “I started to feel it, like there’s different people in fire, ice, and wind or whatever. Then, I just… got stronger, I guess? I’ve been training, doing pushups and running, and then I heard there’s an extermination expedition coming up, so it’s my best chance to prove myself, maybe even earn the attention of a mentor who can teach me more?”
He felt pretty lame for how he ended saying it, but there really wasn’t anything else he could say. After all, what he was asking for was basically what Jormun wanted him to do. Then, he sat in silence for a few seconds while the Lieutenant sized him up. Then, he got a request that he certainly wasn’t expecting.
“Take all your upper layers off.”
Ezra squinted, unsure of how to react to that, but when the Lieutenant gestured for him to hurry up, he did it. Pulling his two remaining tunics off at the same time, Ezra shivered in the cold but tried to flex as he stood there in front of the swarthy man. After all, he was proud of the muscle he’d packed on in the last month. Fortunately, it was only a few more seconds before he was told, “Put ‘em back on.”
He did so, and asked, “Why?”
“You’re not a trained assassin,” the man in the uniform answered with a shrug. “You’re too scrawny.”
“I’m not scrawny!” Ezra retorted without thinking about how this was keeping him from being thrown out or into jail. “I’ve gained a lot of weight!”
“You were a bouncer like that?” the hairy man laughed, though not meanly. “You maybe weigh eleven stone now. If you’ve gained that much weight, then you were ten stone before? Sixty three kilos, and fighting in bars to keep people safe? Yeah, you’re not a trained assassin. You’d be in better shape, have eaten better food. You look like someone who’s only barely on this side of starvation.”
Having gotten even a few seconds to gather himself, Ezra didn’t argue. Instead, he nodded once, though he still disagreed with what the man had said.
“So, unless someone else comes up with some reason for you not to,” the Lieutenant said as he stood up and extended a hand to Ezra over the small fire pit, “welcome to the Count of Villy’s personal army. You’ll be given three full meals a day, two with meat, and a large silver in payment every two weeks for the next two years, unless you decide to renew your contract. Though you aren’t required to provide your own equipment, it’s suggested that you save up to buy new boots and better armor when you can, in that order. This county’s too poor to provide anything more than a boiled leather chestpiece and a spear to you when you sign on, so, if you wanna live, it’s in your best interests to make sure that you’re well-equipped as soon as possible since this is effectively wartime. Is that clear?”
Unable to understand just how quickly everything had changed, Ezra nodded slowly and took the Lieutenant’s hand.
“Thank you, sir,” he said, without anything else to say.
“If we’re not doing drills or anything, just call me Georg,” the Lieutenant, Georg he supposed, said. “Otherwise, Ezra, welcome to the army. Between you and me, I think you made the right choice. The militia’s going to be drafted soon, and conscripts aren’t going to have a good time on this expedition.”
“Yeah?” Ezra asked, deciding to play dumb.
“Yeah,” Georg nodded, while Amy and the other, yet nameless man agreed. “If the Duke’s drawing on Villy, then this isn’t just a Dragonkin with a couple goblinoids. I’ve been on some campaigns closer to home, and those’re dangerous but not too bad. This many people being called means that there’s more than just a couple run-of-the-mill Dragonkin.”
Ezra felt his mouth go dry at that, but he nodded as Georg continued, “The Duke’s not going to be sparing with the lives of the conscripts, but Soldiers are more valuable, so we’ll be used more effectively than as living shields.”
A heavy silence fell over the tent, and after a few seconds, Georg shrugged. “I hope we’ll all be safe. But I’m going to go get back to my job, see if I can’t find another couple people with potential. Nobody’s going to have your potential though, kid. Looking forward to seeing what you can do.”
“Thank you, sir,” Ezra said as the Lieutenant walked out. The man waved dismissively as he continued on his path, and Amy nodded reassuringly.
“You could have said that you’ve worked with aura,” she glared at him, though he could tell that she wasn’t upset but attempting to tease him. He got a flash of Matilda in the way that Amy looked at him, though he could see that, under her helmet, she was at least a couple years his senior and lacked the freckles that adorned Tilly’s face.
“I didn’t know,” he shrugged helplessly. “I didn’t want to pass out in front of everyone either.”
She shrugged and with a genuine smile, said, “Happy to have you. Good luck on the training!”
Then, without another word, Amy turned and hustled out of the tent. Ezra was left there, and once the two others stepped out, he fell onto the stool. His legs had been shaking ever since he stood up, and he welcomed the opportunity to relax a little.
There’s a reason I never told you how to do that, kid, Jormun’s voice interrupted the recovery.
“I wasn’t trying to,” Ezra grumbled under his voice. “I just got angry because he was being an asshole.”
No, he was nice, Jormun laughed. He wasn’t abusing you, just testing you. Still isn’t fun, but he was nice, not trying to break you, just to see your limits. One of the most important parts of being a soldier is to keep getting up. If you don’t, you’re worthless on a shield wall, in a charging phalanx, or any other maneuver. A talented fighter who’s got a weak heart ain’t worth the latrines he can dig.
Ezra huffed a breath out of his nose, disbelieving the old ghost’s words but not saying anything more. Instead, he leaned over the fire and attempted to warm his fingers. They were the coldest they’d been in a very long time, since his inner world was basically empty of all the aura that he’d spent so long trying to gather. How long had he set himself back with that attack that he didn’t even mean to make?
As he grumbled to himself, a voice interrupted his thoughts.
“Your name’s Ezra, right?”
He started and looked at the young man who’d washed his tunic, and felt a flush of embarrassment down his back. Somehow, he’d forgotten the last person in here, the one who’d been in here in the first place.
“Yeah, Ezra,” he said, smiling up at the other man as he walked closer. “You?”
“I’m Yoran,” he answered with a weak smile of his own. “Are you ready to get your equipment?”