User blog:ReDquinox/By Shield And By Faith - Chapter II

The next few days were not as enervating as Vyrine had hoped. After being given her mace, the brand new Aspirant thought she was going to be plunged into martial training and amazing expeditions. Instead, she was plunged into history lessons and ecclesiastical teachings. Needless to say, she was soon bored to tears.

“...And so the Nordic King Wulfharth joined the war, turning it into a three-dimensional conflict,” the old Curate Drenas droned on. “Seeking to claim Resdayn as a part of his dream of a Nordic Empire, he too marched against Lord Nerevar, but he was not allied with the Dwemer. A Chimer scholar chronicled his march across the mountain pass between…”

Vyrine barely even listened to the old man’s monotonous voice. Her father had made very sure during her upbringing that she was familiar with the tiniest details of the Tribunal’s history, much to her constant annoyance as a child. Right now, she wished he had not done so, because maybe she would have at least some attention to this lesson. Her mind slipped away to daydreams about combat training. She imagined being taught how to wield her mace, and then beating Davys in a sparring match. That would be quite the experience…

“This lecture is not worth your attention, I see?”

Vyrine blinked and saw that Curate Drenas had turned his attention to her.

“Would you rather be elsewhere, Aspirant? I hear the market is lovely these days. Maybe you would better be suited to dawdle over there than in this tower?”

“N-no, Curate, not at all,” Vyrine muttered, hastily sitting upright.

“Good, then pay attention,” Curate Drenas sighed. “You are here for a reason. You want to become an Ordinator. Act like it.”

“Yes, Curate,” Vyrine murmured.

Curate Drenas nodded and turned back to address the rest of the room.

“As I was saying, Lord Nerevar was not happy to be standing on opposite sides of the battlefields with Dumac. After all…”

Vyrine sighed quietly. This was going to be another long lecture.

Outside of the lectures, Vyrine had taken some time to get to know the others. She had learned that the wide-shouldered girl with the amber eyes was Thelse, who slept to her left; she did not say much and mostly kept to herself. Faldris was a guy with handsome, chiseled features, but he was not exactly the brightest. She had received more confirmation that Davys was indeed a bit of an N’wah, and he appeared to feel like he was more skilled than everyone else - perhaps because he was, at combat at least. He could not remember a prayer verse if his life depended on it. Then there were Khaman and Syrdin, who were quite the opposite of Davys; they knew all of the prayer verses and history lectures even better than Vyrine did, and they were so familiar with the 36 Lessons of Vivec that they could recite the entire work from memory. They were also quite hyperactive. Azura’s grace, they were hyperactive.

Vyrine thus spent most of her free time with Garvis, who certainly was preferable company over most of her other fellow Aspirants. He was an energetic young man, a bit younger than Vyrine. He was a bit of an underperformer, but he held his own. Vyrine quite enjoyed his company.

“I heard you’re finally going to start your martial training soon,” Garvis said one day, while they were descending the central staircase to get to the lecturing chambers.

“Then you’ve heard more than me,” Vyrine answered. “Who told you that?”

“Overheard some of the Curates in the hall the other day,” Garvis shrugged.

“It’s about time,” Vyrine chuckled faintly. “They’ve been making me wait long enough. Curate Drenas is going to ‘’kill’’ me with his lectures one of these days.”

“Hey, we all had to wait,” Garvis pointed out. “You know no one is entitled to special treatment here.”

“Yeah, but I’ve been ready for it for ages,” Vyrine sighed.

“Syrdin knows the lectures better than you do, and he had to wait longer than you for his martial training,” Garvis shrugged.

Vyrine couldn’t argue against that. “Still took too long,” she grumbled stubbornly.

“Okay, you can quit your grumpiness now, you have nothing to complain about,” Garvis smirked. “Be happy! You’re gonna start your martial training soon!”

“I guess you’re right,” Vyrine supposed, letting out a chuckle. “I can’t wait.”

“That’s the spirit!” Garvis grinned. “C’mon, the Curate must be waiting for us.”

“Right, yeah,” Vyrine nodded, as they increased their pace and hurried down to the lecture hall.

Vyrine still had for a while in anxious anticipation for the official news. By the time it finally arrived, she had almost started to doubt Garvis’ claim. Three days had passed since Garvis had told her about it, when Curate Faver sought her out in the library. Nonetheless, Vyrine immediately knew what he was going to tell her.

“Ah, Aspirant Vyrine. I’ve come to give you some good news,” he told her.

“Really?” Vyrine asked, feigning ignorance about it. “What kind of good news?”

“You have been deemed ready to be enrolled into the martial training program.”

Vyrine grinned from ear to ear. “Finally!” She exclaimed.

“I knew you’d been waiting on it for quite some time now,” Curate Faver nodded. “Come along, no time to waste.”

Vyrine nodded enthusiastically and quickly put aside the tomes she was tasked with reading. She strutted after Curate Faver, who had already turned and begun to make his way back to the stairs. She already knew exactly where they were going, as she had peeked into the training hall on a couple of occasions before to watch in envy as the others got to learn how to wield their weapons. From now on, though, she would no longer have to just watch.

Curate Faver opened the door into the combat training hall, allowing Vyrine to step inside first. The hall was brimming with the sounds of wood clashing on wood and the huffs and shouts of men and women going about their training routines. The large hexagonal room had one sizable window on the far end, casting sunlight onto the canvas mat in the centre of the room that covered most of the floor. The walls were lined with racks containing wooden training weapons, ranging from long quarterstaves to clubs and sword-shaped sticks. In the middle of the room, a dozen or so Ordinators were practicing unarmed martial arts, mimicking the motions of the Curate guiding them. It was quite hypnotising to behold.

More relevant to Vyrine, though, was the smaller gathering of Aspirants Curate Faver was leading her to. Davys and Syrdin were in the middle of a duel using wooden clubs. It was not much of a contest, as Davys was clearly the better fighter. Syrdin swung his club in a backhand motion, which Davys easily parried. As Syrdin’s club bounced off harmlessly, Davys quickly struck with his unarmed free hand, punching Syrdin in the side. That seemed to be the end of the duel, as Syrdin stumbled backwards. Davys grinned triumphantically, clearly very satisfied with himself.

“Aspirants, your attention,” Curate Faver said, causing Davys to tear himself away from his gloating. When he saw Vyrine approach, a smirk crept onto his face.

“They finally decided to tear you away from the comfort of the library, I see,” he sneered. “Finally got enough paper cuts for them to decide you were tough enough?”

“Oh, you know about those?” Vyrine asked, pretending to be surprised. “I didn’t expect you to, considering you’ve never seen a book in your life.”

“At least I know how to-” Davys began, only to be interrupted by Curate Faver.

“Enough, both of you,” Faver commanded. “Aspirant Vyrine is here to train, same as all of you. She has been deemed ready, which she will now prove. Vyrine, take a club from the racks.”

Vyrine nodded and took one, feeling the heft and swaying it around a bit to get familiar with it.

“Now, Faldris, come over here,” Curate Faver said. Faldris did as told, stepping out from the group and standing opposite Vyrine.

“Test her mettle.”

Faldris glanced uncertainly at Curate Faver. “Uhh… are you sure?”

“I believe she can handle it,” Faver shrugged. “Go ahead.”

Faldris turned back to Vyrine. “Okay…” he said, cracking a handsome smile that made Vyrine glance away and seriously regret the fact that he had nothing inside his skull to accompany that face.

“Raise your weapons,” Curate Faver said. Both the Aspirants obliged, their clubs held up as they slowly began circling each other, waiting for the other to make a move. In the end, it was Faldris who struck first, likely expecting to have an easy time against Vyrine. He swung his club at her diagonally downward at her. Vyrine, however, was no stranger to fights; she had been in a fair number of them as a youth, both playing and for real. She quickly sidestepped under Faldris’ swing and went to bat him in the side. Faldris, not having expected such a move, could only just manage to turn on the spot and hastily parry the blow.

“Woah… okay,” he uttered, readjusting himself and swinging an upward backhand at her. Vyrine parried it, though, stepping to Faldris’ left side, and quickly swatted the back of his left knee, putting him off balance and sending him down on one knee.

“Impressive,” Curate Faver said, stepping in and dismissing Faldris, whose expression was one of utter surprise at his defeat. Faver seemed less surprised by this outcome, however.

“You already taught yourself how to handle yourself, I see.”

Vyrine nodded, breathing a bit heavily in the aftermath of her victory. “I did, Curate… Trained a lot when I was younger.”

“I suspected as much,” Curate Faver nodded.

“So she managed to beat Mister Airhead, big deal,” Davys shrugged, causing Vyrine to frown disgruntledly at him.

“Want me to beat you too?” She challenged, tightening her grip on the club.

“Oh, I’d ‘’love’’ to see you try,” Davys grinned. “Someone needs to put you in your place, after all.”

“I’ll put this club in your-” Vyrine growled, only to be cut off by Curate Faver.

“I said enough!” He barked. “Davys, you will continue your routines. Vyrine, you will find Curate Rhas to begin your training. You two will stop this bickering and have your sparring match, ‘’when the time comes’’. Is that clear?”

“Yes, Curate…” the two Aspirants murmured. Vyrine glanced angrily at Davys, who only gave back a sneering look.

Vyrine sighed and turned to find Curate Rhas, the combat instructor. She’d get her chance to put that club where she had intended. She was going to train hard to become a skilled fighter, as she had dreamt of becoming for so long now. And then she’d put Davys in ‘’his’’ place.