Dishonor (Book 1 of the In Search of Honor series)
Chapter 12: Welcome to the Village

Somethinggrabbed my wrist and I started and looked to the left to see Fire loungingagainst the door frame with her hand on mine. Rod stopped and looked back as myhand pulled on his. But a man with dark skin was pulling him away from me.

“Letgo of him sweetie. Ya both have work ta do today ta pay for ya staying in davillage.” She was right. But why couldn’t we work together? I would ask herlater.

Ilet go of his hand, “See you later Rod…”

“Ilove you dear Elizabeth!” He called back to me as he was led away.

Andthen he was gone, out of the building. “This place is only temporary lodgingfor ya and ye friends. Ima offer ya a room in my home if ya want to stay andlive in da village. Watcha say to that?”

Iwas stunned speechless for a second. She wanted me to live in her house? Whywas she being so kind?” I umm, I don’t know what to say.”

“Sayyes. Me man Carter wona mind no bit. He’s a good man. Just till ya and ye manbuild ye house. Or ya and ye brother if ya dona want to move in with ye manyet. We’d all help ya build if ya wanted to stay. I think most everyone herehas taken a likin to ya newcomers.” Her lilting accent was hard to understandat points, but I understood most of what she said. If we wanted to stay we hadto have a house. I could stay with her till we built a house and the villagewould help us build it.

Fora second my mission flashed through my head, but I couldn’t go back to thecity. I could survive passing through once. Actually, from the readings we’dtaken we could have passed through without the meds and been fine, but twotimes was pushing it, and three times was too much. If I made the trek backhere after going to the village I would die unless someone invented a cure toradiation before then which I highly doubted. “I… then yes. I would love tocome live in your home and thank you.”

BeforeI could say anything else another fit of coughing ripped through my body. Thesecoughs hurt. Damn it hurt be sick.

“Areya ok? That was no weak cough.” I looked over at Fire and nodded trying to keepmyself from coughing again, but it didn’t help. I just started coughing again.

Firewas there with her hand on my shoulder as I got control of my coughing. “Yasure ya ok? If ya sick ya can get relieved from ya work.”

“No,I’m fine. Thanks though. So, what am I doing today? I want to do my fair shareto help the village since you kindly took me in.” I smiled at Fire and hoped Iwasn’t giving her the wrong message. I liked her as a person, but I didn’t likeher as anything more.

“Yeto learn with Sandy ‘bout fighting and horse care for da first half of da day,then for da second ya’ve been assigned to learn weavin n’ tannin a hide withme. Basically ya’ve been assigned as aclothing maker.” She smiled as if this was great but I had no clue how to makeclothing. In fact I was a fairly useless person if you didn’t want somethingcleaned or for me to navigate somewhere. Guess I would learn now.

“Whatabout Kevin and Rod? What are they assigned to?” I couldn’t help but be curious as to whatrandom tasks they had been assigned.

“Yabrother’s been assigned as a hunter n’ a blacksmith’ ‘prentice, n’ ya man a schoolteacher and barn cleaner in consideration of his pale skin.” She looked likeshe was waiting for me to have a negative reaction, but I just nodded.

Iwould have to tease him about being demoted to barn cleaner later, but he wouldlike being a teacher. In fact he was a good teacher. “I actually think they’llenjoy most of their jobs, except barn cleaning. Why am I assigned to learnfighting by the way?”

Shelooked at me like I was crazy, “All our people know ta fight n’ what ta do withda horse, but ya, ya have no clue and ya own one! Sandy said she’d teach yaeven though she thinks ye hopeless. Once she proclaims ya satisfactory ya’ll bemine all day in clothin.”

Great.An entire society where everyone was expected to learn how to fight. What couldit be for? Were there enemy villages out there? I let the thought drift away asI followed Fire over to the barn where Sandy was standing with her hands on herhips.

“Whatare ya doin standin there like a damn idiot? Get ya butt over here now!” I wassurprised by how angry Sandy seemed, and I turned back toward Fire looking forhelp, but she shoved me toward Sandy.

“Go,ya’ll be fine.” I hesitantly went forward. I never asked to learn to fight. Infact I never really cared to learn how. Oh, I had dreamed about killing guardsfrom time to time and that sort of thing… but not actually learning to fight.That was just something that a woman didn’t learn to do.

Sandygrew impatient waiting for me and walked over and grabbed my arm and dragged meto the place where she had been waiting. “Today is archery n’ hand ta handcombat. I’m starting ya with archery because that is da easiest thing to learn,but it’ll still take a while till ya get good. Now I want ya to go run fourlaps around da village. We’ll do this each day before we train to get ya inshape.”

Istood there for a second looking at her like she was crazy. “GO! Run!” I jumpedand started running. It was different running in boots from being barefoot. Iwasn’t sure if it was better or worse. I ran at the jog I was used to whenrunning with the dishonored from place to place.

“Runfaster! Ya cana outrun someone comin at ya with a sword at this pace! We’retraining to be soldiers, not lazy good for nothin joggers!” I glared at her.This was the pace I was running and if she didn’t like it she would have todeal with it because I wasn’t dishonored anymore.

“Doya wana die? Do ya no care for ye life? I can take it from ya if ya no wanalive!” It couldn’t hurt me to run harder… but I didn’t want to give her thesatisfaction of running harder.

Shekept yelling at me the whole time, and I was tempted to walk, but I decidedagainst it. I did kind of want to stay in the shape that being dishonored hadforced me into, and all the easy living in the wall was telling on me. Itbecame harder and my breathing became rougher by the second lap.

Iphysically became unable to run faster no matter how much Sandy the bossy womanyelled at me. And she didn’t carry the fear that a guard would put into mylegs. She wouldn’t kill me. She wouldn’t hurt me.

Whenwe finally finished I stood there at the gate bending over and panting in thebackground I could hear Sandy yelling, “Walk it out! Don’t stop! Deep breaths!Hands over ya head!”

I was already sweating heavily in my leathergear. I didn’t move and just stayed there trying to get breath in my body.Sandy grabbed me and pulled me upright and lifted my hands up and said calmerand nicer, “This will help ya recover faster. Dona lean down like that. Comeon, let’s go ta da archery range.”

Howcould she sound like she hadn’t even been running? She led me over to a placewith a line and a distance away hay bales with targets pointed on it. I guess Ididn’t get a gun till I proved myself in archery or something? “Why don’t I getto shoot a gun?”

Sandylooked at me like I was crazy, “Only da sharpshooters geta gun. Da ammo is toorare. Now, pick a bow from the bin over there.”

Ilooked over where she was pointing and sure enough there was a lean to shed.The bows must be in there. I walked in and found the tall wooden bin with bows.I found a wooden bow that was just slightly shorter than me.

Ijumped when a hand touched my shoulder and looked to see Sandy standing behindme. “Good choice. That’s a recurve bow n’ its draw weight is good for ya.”

Shepassed me a string and I wasn’t sure what to do with it. She also passed me aquiver with arrows in it and a piece of leather with straps. Then she grabbedsimilar equipment but her bow came from a special case and was even taller thanmy own. She stroked it for a second, “This beauty is normally a man’s bow, butI’ve trained till I could draw it.”

Ihad no clue what she was talking about. “Put the wrist guard on ya left armusing da straps n’ go ahead n’ put da quiver on ye back by putting da strapover one arm n’ under da other,” That’s what the leather with straps was for! Ithen followed her directions and put the quiver with it’s arrows on my back.“Now we need ta string da bow, put the one loop around da bottom and put yourlegs on either side of da bow and pull da string up like this.”

Thebottom of the bow was braced between her legs and she pulled up on the stringand pushed down on the top till they met and the bow was strung. Her actionswere easier to understand than her words. She strung her bow so easily. It tookme a couple tries, but eventually it was strung.

“Good,now let’s go back out ta de range n’ I’ll teach ya ta draw da bow n’ we’llshoot till ya arm’s tired. Just remember dona walk on da range till we bothhave no arrows left.” She sounded as if she thought I had shot one of thesethings before. Maybe she just couldn’t imagine someone not knowing how to shoota bow.

Ifollowed her out to the range, watched her draw and shoot her bow perfectly anddidn’t pay attention to her long drawn out explanation. It made no sense, andwatching her easily pull the string back and release looked easy enough.

Ilifted my own bow and drew it, and she slapped my arm, “Dona draw without aarrow! It’s bad for ya bow to release without a arrow!” I slowly brought thebow back to its original position.

Ipulled an arrow from the quiver on my back and clumsily put it on the arrowrest above my hand and against the string.

Shewas standing next to me and suddenly she grabbed me and turned me right, “Face right,feet a shoulder’s width apart, now look left at the target. Better.”

Nowmy position looked like hers when she had demonstrated. I lifted the bow againand started to draw carefully holding the arrow in my fingers like she had doneand she was there guiding my hand farther back. Then my hand was too far back.“Just bring ya hand ta ya lips. When ya release, follow through by bringin yahand back.”

Ireleased, “Ouch! That thing hurt!” The string hurt my arm!

AndSandy was laughing. I looked at my arrow and saw it lying in the ground at myfeet. “What did I do wrong; I did what you told me to.”

Shestarted laughing even harder so I had to wait till she calmed down, “Ya reallyare a beginner, didna wanna believe it… but…” She pointed down at the arrow onthe ground as if it spoke for itself.

“Now,pick it, up, and ya try again. This time, donna put ya arm holdin da bow in daway of da string n’ donna release the arrow before ya release the string. Yarelease em at da same time, like this!”

Shewas suddenly standing correctly and drawing back her string with an arrow. Iwatched her hand carefully this time instead of watching the arrow. Shereleased and drew back her hand afterwards in one smooth motion. I looked downrange and saw the arrow perfectly in the center of the target. Apparently, thepeppy looking blonde lady wasn’t only a super fit fighter type, she was a goodshot. Why did she have to be so good at everything? Was this all she did? Ifshe wanted children why was she so desperate to be a fighter anyway?

“Now,ya turn,” I wasn’t sure if she had said something before that, but I hoped shehadn’t. I tried again, and this time I managed to get a bow at the base of thetarget.

“Better.Now we practice.” She started shooting off arrow after arrow, and then wouldwait while I loaded up each and every arrow and carefully drew it back slowlyfocusing on my form and fired a shaky shot that never seemed to go near mytarget.

“Ifya shoot faster ya arm’s wonna get so tired.” She spoke casually as if it was theeasiest thing in the world to do, but I couldn’t shoot faster. Archery was alot harder than it looked.

Istopped counting how many times we retrieved and shot arrows. Eventually my armgot so tired I simply couldn’t draw the string back anymore, “Umm, Sandy… Canwe stop? I can’t draw the string back anymore…”

Shelooked at me sharply then nodded, “Unstring ya bow, collect ya arrows, andleave ya gear in da shed. Jog over ta where we were before we ran and I’ll meetya there.”

Herbow was up before mine and she was gone before I even finished collecting myarrows. I struggled getting the string off and finally ended up using a methodsimilar to how I had gotten the string off. I put all the gear up almostforgetting the wrist guard and remembering it at the last second. Once all mygear was up I ran over to Sandy only to replace Fire there and Sandy glaring ather.

“Gowork clothin! Die if a battle ever comes! I donna care. Tomorrow no archery.Tomorrow w’ll work on hand to hand combat and then I’ll teach ya horse care,and ya’ll be expected ta look after ya own beast after that.” After Sandyfinished yelling she stormed away.

“DidI do something wrong…?” I asked Fire.

Firegave a small and yet joyful sounding laugh that came from her belly, “Na, Sandythinks everythin’s bout fightin. Methinks that’s why she donna carry no child.Now, come, we have work ta do.”

Ifollowed after her and found myself in a room with people doing different taskswith yarn or fabric or leather or simply a big pile of wool becoming yarn.

“Anna’ssick today, and we need ya on da loom. Clothin’s what we trade with da othervillages so we have ta keep producin’. So today all ya’ll learn is da loom andweaving, which is fairly easy.” She took me over to this giant wooden thingwith tons of string up and down in it.

Sheexplained the loom to me, and it didn’t seem that hard. I just had to keep somelevers moving and watch the yarn to make sure it didn’t get tangled and to addmore yarn before it ran out. I happily sat down at the bench at the loom andstarted working with Fire helping me at first. Eventually I was able to do itcompletely by myself.

Itwas boring work, but at least I wasn’t being tortured by Sandy.