Druzland Stage names are based on their army ranks. They start with Infantry, Seargeant, Cavalry, Squire, Knight, Banneret Knight, Commander, and Lord Commander. While it is unclear exactly why being a cavalryman places one in a position of power above any other type of soldier, for the reason was never recorded, our best theories are that only those who earned their place were given a horse and the only people that could afford to care for the animals were the ones who earned a higher wage than a normal Seargeant. As for why Squires come above the Cavalry, Druzlanders say that it’s because personally serving in a knight’s personal detail grants you a greater honour and power than being free in the masses.
Excerpt: An Examination of Power – Shouza Namano
When Ashe woke up, the sun was only just beginning to lighten the world and a weird state of twilight enveloped the tent. A metallic tang hung in the air and his clothes were stiff, as though they’d hardened. Ashe looked down at them, trying to figure out why they felt so weird, and saw dark splotches and patches on his clothing.
What the hell had he done?
Frantic, Ashe patted his body for wounds as his heartrate spiked. When he couldn’t find any injuries, he sighed lightly. Looking at his bunkmates, Ashe quietly pulled off the threadbare sheets on his bed and tiptoed outside; he would need to clean up before anyone found anything out. Running as quietly and as quickly as he could, Ashe made his way to the bathhouse in record time. Not bothering to take his clothes off, Ashe jumped into the baths and began scrubbing at them to get all of the blood off. When the sun began rising, though, Ashe had to stop and return to the hut, hoping that he wouldn’t be discovered.
When Ashe returned to the hut, though, and the sun fully rose over the horizon, he realised it was futile. Even with all of his vigorous scrubbing, Ashe could tell that dried blood was still all over his clothing, which was also now soaking wet.
Ashe knew that he was positively fucked.
As the others woke up, they looked at Ashe in shock but only Sammath spoke up, “Who’d you kill?” Curiosity was clear in Sammath’s voice.
Ashe looked at the bald young man incredulously, “No ‘Are you alright, Ashe’? No ‘What happened, Ashe?’ Not even, ‘Why are you covered in blood?’”
“Nope,” Sammath grinned, “If you weren’t alright, then you wouldn’t be here right now and, with that much blood, it’s clear something’s dead.”
In spite of his dire situation, Ashe couldn’t help but grin slightly. When the guards began shouting, however, his smile was quickly turned into a worried frown. A guard burst into the ramshackle hut and stared at Ashe for a second before yelling to his compatriots. Ashe cursed for what felt like the hundredth time that day.
Quickly making a decision, Ashe made to dodge around to the guard’s left before juking right. Unable to use his powers, Ashe had to rely on his small size and his speed to escape the guards. As the bigger man reached out to grasp the small boy, Ashe dove through the guard’s arms and rolled as he hit the ground. Immediately, he sprinted towards the door which was only a metre away. Desperate to get away, Ashe glanced back at the man as he made it out of the doorway. As it turned out, that was a big mistake.
While Ashe looked back, he ran straight into another guard, who promptly wrapped him up in his arms. Ashe grunted at the collision and, slightly dazed, was unable to stop the guard from grabbing him. Ashe began squirming and wriggling in the man’s grasp, kicking at his body and legs. No matter what Ashe did, however, it was to no avail.
Looking back in desperation, Ashe locked eyes with Sammath. Mouth drawn tight, Sammath shook his head as their eyes met and Ashe knew that he wasn’t going to be getting any help from the older boy. Ashe turned his head back to the guy holding him, right in time to get a fist to his face. As Ashe’s world went dark, he replayed Sammath’s grim face over and over in his mind.
When Ashe woke up, he was strapped to a chair and in what was easily recognizable as an office. Groggy, he groaned and shook his head. Ashe’s heart pounded in his chest and each pulse sent a spike of pain through his head. Looking around at the room, Ashe took everything in. A large desk took up most of the room. Some of the newer Shinian writing utensils, named pens, sat in a small container on the desk. Otherwise, the only thing that covered it was paper, with letters that Ashe couldn’t read.
Other than the desk, the only thing in the plain room was a cabinet with a small lock. There weren’t even any windows to let light in, only some Runes embedded in the ceiling which, if Ashe was being honest, probably cost quite a bit.
After taking stock of the room, Ashe decided to try and take advantage of the situation he found himself in. At that moment, he was alone, and he doubted that he would get any other chances to escape. Ashe squirmed and twisted his wrists around in the rope, grimacing in discomfort as the coarse fibres rubbed against his skin. Trying to move his legs, Ashe found that he couldn’t. Whoever had tied the ropes seemed to know what they were doing.
Slumping in the chair, Ashe didn’t know what else he could do. His powers wouldn’t work. Ashe had no family to call on and his only friend, Sammath, wouldn’t be able to help him. He was tied to a chair, in an unfamiliar room, in a slave camp, in a foreign country. To top all of that off, he was also possessed by a fucking demon who was the entire reason that Ashe was in this predicament in the first place. Feeling like crying, Ashe was about to let loose the floodgates of his tears when the door opened behind him and he quickly held back from releasing his emotions.
“So,” A voice spoke from behind Ashe. The voice was clearly masculine and Ashe turned his head to look at the man, “You’re the one that killed four of my guards. Not much to look at, are you?”
In Ashe’s mind, the man wasn’t much to look at either. He was balding and middle-aged. What Ashe would call portly, the man was just on the verge of being overweight and it showed. With brown hair and eyes, lightly tanned skin, and good quality clothing, the man seemed like any other average inhabitant of Arikar. When Ashe considered, however, that he seemed to be the leader of this place, Ashe knew that the man would be quite strong.
When Ashe didn’t respond, the man leant against his desk and roughly grabbed Ashe by his cheek. Turning Ashe’s head left and right, the man looked at Ashe’s face, “What I want to know is how a scrawny, little thing like you, someone with virtually no magical power, managed to kill four of my guards. I know this world is full of surprises but you certainly don’t have any martial arts training, otherwise you would have used it to escape from my guard earlier and, speaking of escaping, why didn’t you just kill my guards and then run? You had the chance to.”
Ashe looked the man in the eyes, “It wasn’t me that killed your guards.”
Cocking his head, the middle-aged man stared at Ashe curiously. Pursing his lips, the man seemed to be taking Ashe in, “You know... I think you actually believe that but there’s something else there. Are you telling me that, if I punish you, I won’t be getting the one who killed my men? After all, you are the one covered in blood.”
Ashe hesitated; he didn’t have much experience in lying and, with the way the man had phrased his question, he needed to think about how to respond. Ashe’s slight pause was enough for the man, “That’s what I thought. Is there anything else you have to tell me?” When Ashe said nothing, the man leant back on his desk, nodding before calling out “Guards, take him to the cell to rot for a few hours.”
With a small click, the door opened and one of the guards came in to grab Ashe. Instead of taking off the ropes, the guard just lifted up the chair with Ashe in it. As the guard did that, Ashe felt remarkably small. Outside of the door, Ashe was blinded by the light and his headache came back in full force, pulsing strongly. “Euuurrrgghhh,” Ashe groaned in pain.
“Shut up,” The guard shook Ashe, just making his headache worse. Trying not to get shaken again, though, Ashe clenched his teeth together and shut his eyes. After what seemed like forever, Ashe entered a darker, cooler building. Daring to open his eyes, Ashe took in his surroundings. In one hand, the guard grabbed a ring of keys off his belt and the jingling felt like it hit Ashe in the head. Scrunching his eyes in pain once again, Ashe tried to fight back against the pain of the headache but the grating of the keys on the metal lock seemed determined to make it worse.
After another eternity as the guard fiddled around with the steel keys, something Ashe was intentional after the guard had noticed it was causing Ashe pain, the door swung open on screeching hinges and a lance of sound pierced Ashe’s brain. Roughly setting Ashe down, the guard cut the ropes on Ashe’s chair before leaving to slam the door shut and send one final jolt of agony through Ashe’s skull.
Ashe collapsed to the ground, clutching at his head and the guard sat down outside the cell. Through the steel bars, Ashe could see that the guard was a big man with steel-plated leather armour covering his body. A sword hung off the man’s hip and Ashe knew that he would know how to use it.
When Ashe managed to gain control of himself through the headache, he was able to sit up and he looked to the man, “Can I at least have some water?”
Not reacting to Ashe’s question, the guard leant back and closed his eyes. Ashe tried to ask again but the guard snapped at him, “Shut up. You killed my friends; you don’t get water. If it weren’t for the boss, you’d be dead already. At least we get to kill you later.”
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Leaning back, the guard rested his head against the wall and Ashe decided not to antagonise the man further. If he did, it would probably end up with the guard getting even angrier and Ashe didn’t need that right then. Lying down on the floor, Ashe curled up into a ball and tried to fight his headache and the slowly increasing dryness in his mouth.
---------------------------------
When it came time for the guard to pick Ashe up off the floor, some eight hours later, Ashe’s headache had only worsened with his dehydration. Metal grated against metal as the old lock and rusted hinges squealed, sending a spike through Ashe’s head. Ashe groaned and the guard didn’t even bother to tie him up, simply hefting Ashe over his shoulder like a sack of rice being carried home from the market.
Every time the guard took a step, Ashe’s body flopped on the guard’s shoulder and a surge of pain rushed through his body. Not wanting to let the guard know how much pain he was in, Ashe kept his mouth shut for the duration of the journey. With the creak of hinges, Ashe felt cool shadows fall over his eyelids and he groggily opened them up to find himself in the same office that he’d been in earlier in the day.
Sitting behind his desk, the man from earlier frowned at Ashe’s state. Turning his head, he glared at the guard, “What the hell happened to him? I need him healthy and able to talk, not half-dead from dehydration. Get him some water.”
“But, sir-” The guard went to complain but was immediately interrupted.
“But what? I don’t care if he fucking killed your mother. Go and get him some water.” When the guard hesitated slightly, the middle-aged man lost patience, “Now!” He shouted. Grumbling to himself and shooting a glare at Ashe, the guard left the room to follow the man’s orders.
Massaging his forehead, the middle-aged man leant back in his chair, “Sometimes people are just so stupid, don’t you agree, boy? Of course, that’s rhetorical. You’re in that group, too, considering you killed my men but, when people allow their emotions to overcome their logical reasoning, I find them quite difficult to deal with.”
Ashe decided not to respond; he wanted to save what little moisture was left in his mouth, stop his swollen tongue from hurting, and he didn’t think it would be the best idea to answer back. When the guard came back with a pitcher of water, though, he was unable to stop himself from instinctively grasping at the life-giving liquid.
With a glare from the man who ran the camp, the guard set the pitcher down by Ashe and left the room. Ashe sat up, reaching out to the water when the man spoke, “Careful there, boy. Make sure you don’t drink too quickly. If you do, you’ll be just as dehydrated.”
Briefly, Ashe considered ignoring the man’s advice but decided not to; the man hadn’t actually done anything to him yet, after all. Gingerly sipping at the water, he let it sit in his mouth a little bit and slowly swallowed. After a few minutes, his mouth began to feel a little better and the slave camp leader seemed to recognize that.
“Good. You were smart enough to listen to me.” Ashe glared at the balding figure but the older man just shrugged, “Glare at me all you want but I know I was right. What I don’t know is why you killed my men. I mean I would have guessed that you wanted to escape but we found you in your hut. I just can’t work out why you didn’t take the chance to leave when you had it. We could have avoided this entire fiasco.”
“I…” Ashe swallowed, his tongue aching slightly, “I told you earlier. I didn’t kill them.” Ashe raised the pitcher back up to his lips and took a drink.
Across from Ashe, the man muttered something in a language Ashe couldn’t understand – Arikaran, he guessed, considering he was likely in Arikar. Sighing, the man spoke again, “You know, kid, the funny thing is, I believe you. I don’t think that you killed my men. Unfortunately, I think we both know that you may not have killed them but your body certainly was used to kill them. Now whether that’s because you were hypnotised, someone was controlling your body like a puppet, or something a bit more mystical, I couldn’t give a flying fuck.”
“All I want, kid, is whoever killed my men. If you give them up, I can kill them to set an example and you can go back to your hut like nothing ever happened. If you can’t give them up, well… I really don’t want to kill a kid, but I will if I have to.”
With that threat hanging out there, Ashe felt his stomach flip and tie itself into a knot. He knew that Cab had positively fucked them but, if he was being honest with himself, he hadn’t thought it would be so serious. Taking another sip at the water, Ashe reflexively swallowed. While he tried forcing himself to appear calm, his mind was roiling. It felt like a large fruit pip was stuck in his throat and a deep, yawning pit had opened up in his stomach. Like a king tide flooding up over the side of the docks, panic rose over his mental walls and washed down into his consciousness. Concentration was the only thing that allowed Ashe to keep his hands steady as they gripped the pitcher of water.
Despite Ashe’s best efforts, the man seemed to have seen Ashe’s panic and he reclined a little in his chair, “Good. I see you understand the gravity of the situation. You understand just how much shit you’ve landed yourself in, so… you’ll give up the person who actually did this, right?”
Ashe hesitated before answering, “… I… I can’t.”
For the first time, Ashe saw a flash of anger cross the man’s face. Pushing his chair bag, he slammed his hands into the desk and, although he didn’t exert any power through the suppression of the camp’s Runes, Ashe felt his presence, “For the sake of all that is holy, kid! Just give up the fuckhead that did this and I’ll kill them in a heartbeat. I don’t care what they’ve done for you; they don’t deserve loyalty like this. You don’t deserve to die for what they did-”
For the first time in years, Ashe felt a flash of rage run through him and he looked up, temporarily forgetting about his circumstances, “Done for me?! What do you mean done for me?! The only thing he ever thinks about is himself. All he cares about is himself.”
Voice immediately returning to a more normal volume, the camp head continued, “So give them up. If he’s really that bad, then surely, you’d give him up in a heartbeat?”
Ashe scoffed and put the pitcher down on the floor, curling into a ball, “If it were that simple, I would have done it years ago,” Ashe acutely felt the familiar chasm of despair beneath him. Right then, it felt like he was balanced on two pieces of rickety wood, staring down into the pitch-black depths below. Tears prickled at the edges of his eyes and he sniffed, wiping at his eyes with his arm, “It doesn’t matter, though. I give him up and you’ll kill me. I don’t give him up and you’ll kill me. There’s just no point in caring anymore. I’d rather you just kill me and get it over with.”
For a second, the man behind the desk was shocked; he’d very rarely seen anyone so fatalistic. There were people who’d been slaves for month with more will to fight back than the Ashe. What had Ashe seen and experienced for him to be so disillusioned with life? Thinking that he might as well try one last time, the camp leader sighed, “Look, kid. Please. My men are demanding your head. They want to burn you at the stake. Even if you can’t give them up to me, at least give me something. If you do, I can make your death swift.”
Ashe just shook his head, not even bothering to answer, and the middle-aged man slumped back down in defeat, thumping into his chair, “I’m sorry, kid. I tried. Whatever comes next is your fault.” With that said, the man called in a new guard to take Ashe back to his cell but, before Ashe left, the camp leader had one last thing to say to Ashe, “Hey, kid,” Ashe turned his head back towards the man, “If you change your mind before tomorrow morning, you can still get out of this.”
The guard, seeing that his boss was done speaking, pulled Ashe along with him, taking him out of the office and towards the small prison in the camp. Pushed into the same cell as before, Ashe grimaced at the squeal of rusted hinges as the door slammed shut on him. Ashe sat down and curled up into a ball, lying on the hard, stone floor of his cell. Unexpectedly, the guard came back with a pitcher of water, some bread, and some slop from the other prisoners’ meal. While it wasn’t much, it was better than starving through the night so Ashe thanked the guard.
Looking at him with a conflicted grimace, the woman shook her head, “If you want to thank me, piss in the pan rather than on the floor.” With that, she turned around and didn’t speak to Ashe for the rest of her shift.
For Ashe, the night passed even more slowly than the day. As the moon rose and fell, the temperature inside the cell grew colder and colder until Ashe was shivering in the freezing mountain air. Stones and pebbles pushed into Ashe’s body as he lay on the ground and no amount of sweeping with his hands could clear them.
So, when the sun rose above the horizon, bringing with it the morning of execution, Ashe rose to meet it with bleary eyes and a pit in his heart. Sluggish and in pain, the man standing guard outside had to pull Ashe along before the boy heeded his call to come. With rope tugging along at his hands, Ashe let his head fall to the ground and trudged along behind the guard. With barely enough awareness not to trip over his own feet, he missed the camp’s leader falling into step behind him and didn’t realise that he was meant to stop until he bumped into the armoured back of the guard in front of him.
Blearily raising his eyes, Ashe took in the large pyre of wood and the tall stake, standing high above the kindling. As he took it in, the fact that he was going to die began to set in. Instead of being afraid, something he’d spent so much of his short life doing, he was honestly quite relieved. Burning alive sounded like an extremely painful way to go and he didn’t really want to die but, at the same time, he had no desire to be alive. There was no reason for him to live beyond his survival instincts, which were what had been keeping him going for so long.
Some wooden steps created a bridge from the ground to the stake and Ashe was led up the small hill of wood. All around him, Ashe saw the grim faces of his fellow slaves. Some looked up at him with hardened gazes, mouths drawn tightly into lines. Some looked at him with pity. Others couldn’t even bear to look at him at all, focussing their gazes on the ground at their feet. Around the prisoners, the guards stood and looked at Ashe.
Most of the guards viewed Ashe with practiced neutrality but there were some, including the guard that had let him roast in the cell without water the day before, that looked on with a smile. Ashe tripped over his own feet as he reached for a step that wasn’t there, not having paid attention to where he was walking, and he nearly dragged down the guard leading him.
Ashe pushed himself back up onto his feet, and looked at his hands, where several small splinters poked out of the skin. Clearly not willing to wait for Ashe, the guard pulled at the rope around Ashe’s hands to make the boy hurry forward. In seconds, Ashe was standing directly in front of the stake and the boy was being made to turn around by the guard.
He untied the rope around Ashe’s hands before pushing the boy up against the stake and his arms around the back of the tall, wooden pole. Ashe briefly considered trying to struggle but discarded the thought. Even if he was able to escape the guard, there were dozens more that would quickly incapacitate him and bring him right back.
Ensuring that the knots were pulled tight around Ashe’s hands, the guard cut off Ashe’s circulation with a rope and Ashe began to feel his hands go numb as the guard tied his legs to the side of the wooden pole. With that done, the guard straightened up and made his way down the stairs. Ever step sent reverberations through the stairs that Ashe could feel through his feet. As the guard made it to the bottom of the stairs, they pulled the stairs out from the pile of wood, leaving Ashe’s weight to be supported only by the ropes tying him to the wooden post.
Grunting in pain as all of his weight was pushed onto his wrists and ankles, Ashe watched uncaringly as the guard walked over to a small stand that had a torch burning brightly in it. Gripping the shaft of the torch, the guard pulled it out of the stand and held it aloft for everyone to see. Turning around, the guard looked Ashe in the eyes, their mouth pulled tight. Ashe closed his eyes as the guard walked forward, waiting to hear the crackle of flames devouring the wood and the heat lapping at his feet.
Instead, however, Ashe heard screaming and the clashing of metal on metal and, when he opened his eyes, he couldn’t help but smile slightly.