I could think of a ton of things you wouldn’t want to do hungover. Riding a horse was at the top of that list.

I’d found myself being woken up early that morning by Leomorn, not completely sure how I’d ended up in a bed made of straw that poked and made you itch everywhere. Farmar was on the floor on one side and Missing ear had been on the other.

We’d left Farmar and our new friends to wake up on their own and we’d ridden out early after drinking all night after the fight. Scarface, Burly Dwarf, and Missing Ear had told me their names, but I’d been too drunk and they’d been too hard to pronounce to remember. The girl who’d kissed me had draped herself all over Scarface for the rest of the night. I was kinda relieved.

We rode along, the rocking of the horse both exasperating my headache and making me fall asleep at the same time. It was a combination that was about to drive me insane.

Varris rode beside me and Leomorn and Brienna rode ahead. She’d given me a scowl sourer than ever before when she’d seen me that morning. I guess drunken bar fighting was also something she disapproved of.

“Not a bad night,” Varris said. It was mid-morning and the sun was already making me sweat, the beer smell still coming out of my pores.

“If you say so,” I said. I wished I had some sunglasses right then. I held my horses' reins loosely, really just keeping them from falling in the dirt. He was following the other horses so I shut my eyes.

“You fought well. The chair was good.”

I shrugged. “So do you always pick fights in bars?” I asked.

Varris gave me a grin. “That was fun, wasn’t it?”

“Not really. Those guys could have killed us.”

“Ah, you did fine. Besides Gorge is a good guy, he was just drunk. And mad that you tried to steal his girl.”

“What? You brought them over. And Gorge?”

Varris grinned a sneaky grin. “Yeah, because of that huge scar on his face. And yes, I brought them over.”

I said, “Wait. You knew those guys were going to come to start trouble?”

He nodded and laughed. “We can’t have a Mage’s heir that’s never been in a fight. You held your own. You should be proud.”

I guess I was when I thought about it. I hadn’t been killed, and once I’d got over my fear it had actually been kind of fun.

We rode for a while and I thought about that.

After a while, Varris said “Try using that healing spell on your lip and nose. The one Leomorn showed you.”

My lip and nose did hurt. I reached up and felt the tenderness in them. My lip felt split.

I tried the hand motions. Nothing happened.

“Try again,” Varris said.

I did, focusing on the motions and the pain in my nose. I made them and then suddenly my nose and lip tightened up like they were being pulled, then a sharp pain, then everything released. I reached up and could feel my lip was no longer busted.

“Cool.”

“Do it to me,” Varris said. There was purple bruising building up around his eye.

“Can I do it to other people?”

“Sure you can. Try it. Dwarves can’t do magic. Not a blessing-or a curse- we are gifted with.”

“Ok, how?” I asked.

“Look right at me,” Varris said. “Focus on healing me.”

I did. I stared at his eye and the purple bruising around it, then made the hand signal. Varris twitched and groaned and put his hand over his eye. After a moment he removed it and the bruising was gone.

“Good as new,” he said. “Thanks.”

“Wow,” I said. “So cool.”

Varris shook his head. “No, I’d say it was hot. Very hot. But it worked.”

I let that one go. I’d have to explain cool another time, one when I wasn’t hungover.

That was pretty cool though. “So I can heal myself and others?”

“Just minor stuff,” he said. “Cuts and scrapes. Get yourself run through with a sword and you’ll need Leomorn and some potions to heal that. Or a priest.” He laughed. I didn’t think that it was that funny.

We rode a while after that, Varris and Leomorn alternating riding beside me, Brienna always keeping ahead of us. We rode over grass-covered hills, snow-covered mountains in the distance. We stopped for lunch beside a small stream and drank from its cool clear waters and ate some bread and cheese and a beef jerky type of meat that Leomorn unrolled from his saddlebags. I didn’t think too much about it and what it might have been. It tasted pretty good.

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That was as close to Brienna as I had been all day. She mostly ignored me but every once in a while she’d glance at me and make a grunting sound.

As we were eating she said, “Looks like you healed your face today.”

“Yeah.” I rubbed my nose and lips. They felt fine. “Feel pretty good.”

“Too bad they don’t make spells to improve someone’s looks,” she said.

Varris spit out his cheese and started choking.

Leomorn bit down on a grin, then gestured with his eyes for me to give it back to her.

I didn’t know what to say. She certainly didn’t need any spells to help with her looks. She was beautiful. She had the looks but boy could she have a better attitude.

“Oh yeah,” I said. “Well too bad they don’t make a spell that makes someone nicer. Cause you need it.”

“Too bad they don’t make a spell that makes someone fight better, because you’re so far behind it wouldn’t even work on you.”

I was starting to get pissed now. “I killed that dragon, didn’t I. How many dragons have you killed smarty pants.”

Her face turned red. “That was luck and you know it.”

“Was it?” I knew it wasn’t luck. It was more than that. It had been part of the game. You couldn’t miss. But Gary had said I was on my own now. I wouldn’t be lucky enough to pull it off again in a million years. But she didn’t have to know that. “If a dragon was flying by right now, I could shoot it in the eye.”

She looked at me like I was completely stupid. Which I was. “With what bow?” she said.

Ugh. Touche.

“I don’t need a bow.” I stared right at her, her green eyes glistening with anger. “I could throw it and hit it right in the eye. Then I’d take this sword,” I gestured to the sword Leomorn had given me, “and I’d cut its head off.”

Brienna shot to her feet and went to her horse. She grabbed her bow and some arrows. She walked back over to me and threw them down in front of me. “Let’s see it,” she said.

I looked at Leomorn and Varris for help but they just shrugged.

“Ok, fine,” I said. I picked up her bow, it was thick and heavy well made. I picked up an arrow. “What do you want me to shoot?”

“Since there’s no dragon flying by for you to shot its eye out…” she looked around and saw a large dark shape in the water of the creek. “Shoot that fish there. See it?”

I did. It was a slender sliver shape, about two feet long. “Easy.”

I notched the arrow and drew back the bow. Brienna scoffed. “The arrow goes on the other side of the bow. Not across it like that.”

The arrow had ended up on the outside of my hand instead of the inside.

“That’s how you shoot, this is how I shoot.”

I could almost hear her eyes rolling from behind me. I lined up the arrow on the fish and hoped I’d hit it. I let the string go.

There was pain everywhere. My arm, my cheek, my pride. Everything hurt.

I could hear Brienna laughing and Leomorn and Varris snickering.

I held my forearm tightly, the skin red and burning from the bowstring hitting it. The arrow was on the opposite bank of the creek. I hadn’t even hit the water.

“You obviously can’t shoot,” Brienna said. “So tell me how in the world you ever hit that dragon.”

I held my burning arm. “Just luck I guess.” It was better than the truth. That it was preprogrammed to go in but now I couldn’t hit a dragon with a bow if all our lives depended on it, which they just might.

“I knew it,” she said. “I knew it. You’re not the Mage’s heir.”

“Wait,” Leomorn said. “Just because he got lucky with a bow doesn’t mean he’s not the Mage’s heir. He can do magic, magic that only someone who is naturally gifted can do.”

Brienna was furious with him. “Magic a child can do, Leomorn.”

“Yes, but magic that it takes those children years to learn he did immediately. There’s something special about him, Brienna, whether he can shoot a bow or not.”

She wasn’t having it. “He can’t even shoot. He doesn’t know how to handle a sword.”

“Then teach him how to shoot,” Leomorn said.

“What? Teach him how to shoot?”

“Yes,” Leomorn said. “Teach him how to shoot a bow. You are the best shot with a bow in your father’s kingdom. Teach him.”

Brienna stomped down to the creek and starred out into the hills. The snowy mountains hung in the distance.

I held my stinging arm and waited for the pain to go away. After a few moments she came back and without looking at me she said, “Pick it up.”

“What? The bow?”

She sighed deeply like she had lost all of her patience already. “Yes, the bow. Pick it up. If you’re really the Mage’s heir then you need to learn to shoot. You can’t rely on luck anymore.”

That was true. And I couldn’t rely on anything to be preprogrammed either. I was on my own.

I picked up the bow in my left hand.

“Here,” she said. “Hold it tightly. Hold it up, but don’t draw the string.” I did. She moved to the side of me and gripped my elbow. “Turn your hand,” she said and rotated my elbow. Instead of my hand being straight up it was at an angle. “That will help with the slap.”

“The slap?”

She rolled her eyes. “Hitting your arm.”

Oh, that. “Yeah, that would be awesome.”

She gave me a funny look. Guess she’d never heard the word awesome before. Her green eyes probed into mine, but only for a second, then she was barking orders again.

“Feet here,” She said and kicked my feet apart a little. She handed me an arrow. “Nock.”

I’d seen enough movies to know that meant to put the arrow on the string. I did.

“Now hold it between these two fingers.” She held up her index and middle fingers. I did. “Good. Now relax and breathe. Pull it back slowly until the string touches your cheek.”

I did.

“Let it rest there. Breathe. Find the target. That log,” said pointing. “Put the arrow below it. It will rise when you release.”

I lined the arrow up where the log met the ground. My arm was starting to feel heavy from the tension of the string, my bicep tightening.

“Now when I say release, then release it smoothly. Don’t jerk it.”

I was ready.

“Breathe,” she said. “And… Release.”

I snapped my fingers off the string and felt it only lightly graze my arm, not rip the skin off like before.

I watched as the arrow sung through the air and hit the log.

“Bravo,” Varris said from behind us.

Brienna rolled her eyes. “Yes, yes, very good. You can hit a log. Keep practicing and maybe one day you can hit something that’s shooting back.”

I held the bow and looked at it. It had ornate carvings all over it. Brienna gently but firmly took it from me. “This is mine. Get your own.”

I nodded. At least she didn’t completely hate me anymore. Maybe.

She walked over to her horse and put the bow and the arrows back on her saddle. She stood there like she was composing her thoughts. Finally, she turned to me. “Where do you come from?” She paused and I didn’t know what to say. “Why are you here?”

I had no answer for that. Certainly not the truth. Would she even understand it or think I was crazy. I’d only told the King because he seemed prepared for the ridiculousness of it, expected it even. Brienna didn’t give me that impression. She wanted something from me that I couldn’t provide. A logical explanation that I was truly some kind of hero.

“A long way from here,” I said.

She looked at me like she expected more. I didn’t say anything.

Finally, she shook her head and started to walk away from me. As she passed me she said, “I don’t think you belong here.”

You could say that again.