Sir Fenrick watched the young [Healer] get back up and go do the job his patrol squad's [Healer], Ethrick, currently could not do. He held up his hand with a casually raised finger to keep Heral's mouth shut for the moment. When he was sure the young miss was no longer in hearing range, he turned to Ethrick. "As a dedicate of Lunaria, what is your read of her?"
"My lady wants her dedication," Ethrick said. "She is acting like every moment could be decisive, which may well have been her experience up on the border. She went through genuine shock -- the physical effects, not just Keeri's version of it -- but real shock that her skills immediately began countering when she heard of the [Profaner]."
He worked his jaw and made weird grimaces, curling his tongue about. After a moment of this, Ethrick rubbed his face and spoke again, still slurring his words, but not as badly. "What she did with you, the needle and the potion, that was new, and from what I can see, much better than just slapping around the brew. She is an [Arcane Healer] if she is not a [Blessed Healer], and as she is not yet a dedicate of any god, being Blessed is not likely.
"As to her truthfulness, well, I haven't seen it myself, but I'm told that even when a noble is stripped of their titles, the freemen of their lands remain covenant-bound. She is an unbound freemen; it adds weight to her tale, and so are the woman and man distributing healing potion and Bruise Balm. All the other freemen I have Identified are peasants."
Heral groused, "Who's to say they're not bandits?"
Sir Fenrick gusted out a sigh. "This is why your father entrusted me with knocking sense into your thick skull, Honorable Mister Heral. Your mother has taught you to be far too arrogant of your birth. We are all born naked and wailing into this world. All. It is a dangerous overreach of noble privilege to persecute freemen for being unbound to any liege, one that may likely find all your noble privileges revoked by the chop-block. As the girl brought up, words are whispers before the shouting of actions, and results speak loudest of all. Look. What are the results of her actions? To whom are they given? What has she asked of us in return? Is she someone who provides results worthy of earning her loyalty over?
"Should you survive your arrogance to gain your second class, questions like these will determine the course of your life. Honorable. Mister. Heral." Sir Fenrick deliberately emphasized Heral's lack of any title.
The boy did an admirable job of controlling the rage Sir Fenrick purposefully invoked in him.
"Look," Sir Fenrick ordered again. Turning back to Ethrick, he asked, "Are we like to lose anyone else today?"
The [Healer] was already sweeping his gaze over the impromptu field hospice. "Without a closer inspection, and no active Triage, I cannot say for certain. I am most concerned for Doble and Sateen, and their breathing is steady if labored. I'm a little misty about what happened, but by the difference between the bodies of our people and their equipment, we had a serious scuffle in the last day or so, and that girl is going to see level ten before nightfall if she manages to stay upright. Fortuna smiled upon us to put her in our path.
"She's right that I cannot stand yet. It irks me, but the best I can do right now is sit here and watch while the healing potion works its way on my brain."
Sir Fenrick shrugged back into his gamebeson. "Help me get my armor back on, Heral."
The boy was competent, intelligent, and diligent. Within the limits of his arrogance, he was also compassionate. If his arrogance had been centered on his own capabilities, Heral would likely already be his father's heir. Sadly, that was not the case.
Sir Fenrick watched the [Healer] youth while Heral tightened the buckles on his armor. An idea took shape, but he would have to broach it carefully with his liege.
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Heral had been Sir Fenrick's squire for two and a half years now, and in that time he had leveled up to fourteen as a [Noble Warrior]. His weapon and armor skills, his Tactics and Strategy skills, all of his combat-focused skills were capped, and stagnating by the end of the last harvest season. The only skill in his class that had room to grow was Noblesse Oblige. It was a rare skill, and as a core skill of his class, explained why [Noble Warrior] was itself a rare class.
His father had been so proud when Heral gained the class during his first dungeon delve. Peasants went to class stones to gain their [Laborer] and [Merchant] classes. Nobles had to fight so they went to the training grounds of fighters to gain their classes.
Yes, his father had been so proud, then. When he had stopped gaining levels, though, and had to confess his lack of progress, his father had been so disappointed.
It would have been far less hurtful if his father had yelled, or cussed, or in some way raged at Heral's failure. Instead, the polite upturn to his father's lips that was so much a part of his resting face slowly turned down, and the bright interest in his father's gaze transformed to melancholy.
"Ah," was all he said to Heral. He had closeted himself away with Sir Fenrick for most of the next day, and after that, Sir Fenrick was demoted to a patrol captain. A common patrol captain! No wonder the good knight resented him so! It was, after all, Heral's fault that the noble knight to whom he was squired fell so far in his father's grace.
It was Heral's failure to advance his core skill. It was his shame that occluded the honor of his knight-master. Why else would Sir Fenrick rebuke Heral's good mother? For what other reason would the patient knight rebuke him on behalf of a peasant?
Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.
Peasants relied upon their liege lords for safety from the monsters spawned by wild magics, the predations of bandits, and the subjugation of other sapient races. A liege required the obedience of his peasants, and had to project and maintain a strict discipline or else when instant obedience was necessary there would be hesitation, and people would die. It was simple. Wasn't it?
He finished securing the last buckle on Sir Fenrick's armor and stepped back the appropriately respectful distance. His Etiquette skill was strangely not part of his class, but it, too, stagnated, waiting for one more level.
Sir Fenrick settled back into the weight of his armor and rose. He turned to face Heral, and there was a thoughtful, speculative quality to his noble knight-master's gaze that made Heral uneasy.
Instead of sharing his thoughts, though, Sir Fenrick modulated his tone to that which he used when he had an implacable order to issue. "Go to the [Healer] Miss. Tell her you are there to assist her, then do so. Follow her instructions as if they came from me. Ask her no questions that do not pertain to the healing of our patrollers. Offer her no comments. Deflect any questions not relating to the healing of our patrollers with the courtesy you would show our arlthane's daughter. Most of all, observe. It is time you learned how to apply your Strategy skills off the battlefield."
Heral bowed his head to the proper degree and answered in the only way he could. "Your will be done, Sir Fenrick."
He turned to obey, the heat of his frustration eased with the moment to calm himself provided by the familiar routine of aiding his knight-master. Without that heat, though, he had only the cold ache of his failure.
The girl was busy, her skin faintly luminous with the expenditure of mana, most noticeable around her eyes where the luminosity was magnified by moisture. Heral's mother was a [Mage], so he knew better than to break her concentration. Even if a petty part of himself wanted to lash out and hurt someone else. It was merely the Spirit of Misery seeking a Company, and there were already enough Miserable Spirits among the wounded.
Since he needed to assist her, but could not gain instruction from her yet as to the how, he fell back on training. If he were aiding Ethrick, he would be fetching bandages and splints, so that's what he did. They had few supplies left from the field care they cobbled together directly after the skirmish, but they had some. When he returned, the girl was sitting, drenched with sweat.
"I am to assist you. As you direct me in the care of our patrollers, so I shall do," he announced. Then he remembered the bandages and cleansing solutions he had retrieved. "These are what remained of our [Healer's] supplies. How am I to aid you?"
"Water," she panted out, and he felt a moment of resentment that she would turn him into her page boy. Then she started pointing to a number of the moderately wounded. "Dehydrated. Those three. Sip. Hold in mouth. Count five." She held up her splayed hand. "Swallow. Quartermaster. Water barrels. Four bags."
"One for you?" He asked.
She frowned, considered, shook her head. "I'll throw up now. After them. Thank you."
Heral turned, gathered six bags, as much as he could carry in his arms, and went to find the caravan's Quartermaster.
That turned out to be an older man, about the age of Heral's grandfather. The Quartermaster showed him proper respect, and asked if he should begin brewing another batch of minor potions, or would they need lessers?
As no one was in critical condition, Heral asked for the minor potions. Not only were they cheaper and quicker to make, but the lower mana they imparted lowered the chance of alchemical illness from overdosing on potions.
He returned to find the [Healer] girl recovered enough to direct her parents in resetting one of the new patrollers broken legs. She was glowing with yet more mana use, and the patroller was merely grunting at the discomfort instead of screaming the way he had that morning.
After the break was set, the girl looked at her trembling hands. She turned to the man and ordered, "Hands, Dad."
Then she looked around, spotted him, and demanded, "Water bag," reaching up. He juggled his load so she could take one, and went over to the men she'd indicated before.
He made sure he was in a position to watch her as he went over the [Healer's] instructions for rehydrating. He got distracted by seeing the [Healer] use the water he just gave her as a spell reagent to cleanse her father's hands, and the skin around the patrollers broken leg.
"If it weren't Fortuna blessing us, it was Lunaria herself to put a [Blessed Healer] so near where we had need," one of the men he was instructing said.
"Aye, and one with beauty to soothe the soul while her blessings heal our wounds," another added, with a lecherous glance.
Heral did not understand the irritation that prompted him to say, "She's thirteen."
The first man asked, his eyebrows raised, "Her levels are that low?"
"Her age is that low," Heral clarified.
The letch's grin fell, and he looked like he wanted to cry. And somehow, that improved Heral's day.
Once he was sure the men could see to themselves, Heral returned for his next assignment. He took over the [Healer's] mother's job of helping with setting bones so she could help the Quartermaster brew more portion.
While they were about the business of healing, Sir Fenrick got camp set up. The [Healer] girl ordered a few of the otherwise whole looking men to go sit with Ethrick, among them Warrick, who had been their forerunner.
Warrick, with uncharacteristic anger, yelled, "I'm fine!"
The girl clambered onto unsteady feet and yelled back, "You are concussed! It is your duty as one of your liege's swords to recover! You can do nothing from the grave but rot! Now, go. Sit. Down!"
Sir Fenrick stepped between them and used his Commanding Presence Aura. The [Healer], for all that she appeared a stiff breeze away from unconsciousness, did not react. Warrick, on the other hand, began to cry and shake.
The girl glowed, and Heral barely caught her as her body collapsed from the repeated Stamina draining. Heral had to stare at her in shocked disbelief when she spoke. She was still conscious?!
"Thanks. Catch. Sit. I sit. Now."
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That evening, after his guard shift, while Heral lay on the edge of sleep, he considered the question Sir Fenrick had asked him. In the heat of the moment, the idea that any liege had to earn loyalty from one bound by covenant to give it had seemed absurd. Insulting, even.
Helping the [Healer], Miss Cerise, and seeing how she pushed herself to the very brink of her limits, constantly riding the edge of collapse until she had done everything she could to restore his father's guard to a capable fighting force changed the context around the question.
Heral didn't know how to define that change. Miss Cerise was not one of his father's peasants, but she was a Freeman and not a noble. Yet, she took the covenant between liege and Freeman so seriously she had yelled chastisement in the face of an armed [Warrior] about his duty to stand ready to uphold that covenant.
She worked herself beyond diligence to ensure they were all ready to uphold the covenant. Even though it wasn't her covenant.
That was significant. The Nobles Covenant, to defend the Freeman and create the conditions in which everyone could live a long and prosperous life, there was something more to that covenant then Heral had so far understood if it could provoke so strong a reaction.
[Noblesse Oblige] advances to Beginner-8.