Will Chester, dutiful Blacksmith’s apprentice, and mischief maker extraordinaire, blinked himself awake from a midday nap, when the sun moved over the ridge of the hill he had been laying on, leaving him in shade. He sat up, and stretched his arms far over his head, his back cracking with a satisfying pop as he let out a yawn that could only have been proportional to his effort of getting up if he had just been resurrected from the dead.
It would have been a nice day to be resurrected into in any case, Will mused, chuckling to himself at the errant thought, taking a moment to just keep sitting and take in the gorgeous view he, and every other occupant of the village behind the small hill he was laying on were blessed with. Long stalks of grass bending under the force of small, almost playful gusts of wind that were a near constant part of the weather. Tall, towering trees, standing all around them, delivering shade to the ground below with their thick, near impenetrable canopy of leaves. And then his eyes wandered upwards, and he fell onto his back once more, content to stare at the peak of the mountain, at the foot of which his small village had been constructed. It seemed nearly impossibly large, which was owed in part to the fact that it was the only mountain in the area, along with its odd barren nature. No plants ever laid root on its cold, stony cliff faces, and so no humans ever did either. It was almost eerie, the way that the trees just stopped as soon as they reached the foot of the mountain. Of course, that eeriness paled in comparison to the convenience of not having to keep vegetation around the mine in check.
But these contemplations on the mountain and its grandeur, as much as he enjoyed them could not go on any longer, as he could already feel his eyelids growing heavy once more, and he pushed himself up until he stood, still a bit shaky from left over wooziness, though the feeling quickly faded as he took some steps over to where Charlie, his best friend, lay still asleep despite the quickly cooling surroundings. He poked him in the side with the tip of his boot, smiling. The scrawny boy was apprenticed under his father, the librarian and self-appointed head scholar of the village. His father took his education quite seriously, and as a natural result, Charlie rarely got enough sleep, or sun for that matter, which was why Will had dragged him out here in the first place, even if he had protested the whole way that he didn’t need it, only to fall asleep the moment his head touched the grass.
“Wake up already!” he exclaimed, slightly frustrated when his nudging didn’t do anything, pushing his boot in a bit harder, which finally got Charlie to flinch awake, eyes wide and a bit frantic as he looked around, the very image of a boy that had fallen asleep during his studies and had just been found by an angry father. He calmed down after a second, when he remembered where he was, and let out a deep sigh of relief.
“Good gods, you scared the hell out of me, Will!” he complained, relieved eyes turning into more of a glare as he too pushed himself up, and dusted his clothes off, never taking his eyes off Will. “You can’t just do that to a man without warning!” he continued, which caused Will to cock an eyebrow at him “And how, exactly, would I have warned you that I was going to wake you up?” he asked, feigning genuine curiosity, though the mask didn’t hold for long, and his face, all doe eyed naivety, contorted into a grin as Charlie’ shoulders slumped a little in mild embarrassment. “Not my proudest moment, I admit it, but gimme a break, man! I just woke up!” As if to underline his point, the scrawny scholar-to-be, threw his head back and yawned, not bothering to cover his mouth, before looking around, clearly searching for something, or in this case, someone.
“Where’s Anya? She was with us, right?” he asked, looking to Will for confirmation, who nodded, crossing his arms, and looking around as well “Yeah, but I think she didn’t even try to nap. The audacity!” Will said with mock outrage, also looking around “Maybe she took a walk or something?” Just as he said that he spotted her at the edge of the woods, her solid, broad-shouldered frame almost impossible to overlook as she walked up to them in a completely unhurried manner, crunching down on a big red apple she had probably found in the woods somewhere. The area was ripe with fresh fruit around this time of year, so much so that the village didn’t have enough people, or time, to pick them all. She had a big smile on her face and waved to them as she chewed, reaching them after another twenty seconds or so, throwing the apple core over her shoulder with a satisfied exhale “So you two are finally up, huh? I thought you were gonna sleep all the way through dinner if I didn’t wake you up!” was her greeting to them, looking at Charlie in particular “Even if I admit that some of us might really need the sleep!” she allowed, though even just looking at her, one could tell that Will’s little sister considered sleep a waste of time that she could be using for other things!
“Yeah, yeah, we mere mortals need a nap every now and again, get over it!” Will said with a small smirk, tempted to fall over and unconscious just to spite her a little, but really, he was wide awake at this point.
“So, anyone opposed to going back? Standing in the shade like this is awful!” he complained and when neither of them raised any objections, they started walking back, following the same trample trail that they had taken to get to the spot in the first place, Will in front, Charlie in the middle and Anya ‘guarding the rear’ as she liked to call it, even though there was never any need for guarding to be done. The trail led them over the crest of the hill, and into a patch of forest that separated the tiny hill and the village, bickering all the while about the fact that Anya didn’t bring back any apples for them, despite the fact that she would have been perfectly capable of putting two extras into the satchel she always carried around, filled with wire and small shards of metal, that she liked to toy with when she got bored, away from the forge. She claimed that she simply didn’t want to bring back potentially bruised apples, considering the hard contents of her bag, but neither of the boys bought that for a second. Charlie even posited the idea that she had simply picked the tree clean in a fit of gluttony, though that got him a punch in the shoulder from Anya, rightfully so, Will thought, which was why he had kept the same thought to himself, knowing damn well how hard Anya hit.
A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.
Not soon after, through the tree line, the village wall came into view. A solid 20 feet of pale stone, taken from the Peak, looking clean and unmolested as ever, thanks to the tireless work of the guards, that did so little actual guarding that the title was more formality than anything else. Case in point, when Will looked up, he saw two guards had dragged out a table into the middle of their post above the gate and were playing cards. This was unsurprising, as it was what the guards did most days when they were done with upkeep duties, playing for rocks, leaves, and sometimes actual money when their pay had just come in, or they were feeling particularly lucky. They never got in trouble for it either, since the road they were allegedly supposed to be guarding hadn’t seen any traffic other than the occasional villager going out for a walk in... well, at least for as long as Will remembered. As they walked, Will waved to the guards, who didn’t even look up from their game but still managed to wave back at him.
Entering the village, they quickly made their way past the empty farmers houses, standing abandoned since everyone living in them was out in the fields, hard at work to bring the harvest in for the village, unlike the young trio who all had apprenticeships that allowed for at least a little bit of free time, which they were quite grateful for. After walking in companiable silence for a while, Charlie spoke first “Now what to do with the rest of the day...” and the familiar way he trailed off immediately caused both of his friends to look at him with a small frown “Man, we literally just dragged you out of the library a few hours ago, and you’re already wanting to go back?” Will complained, causing Charlie to fluster a little bit, raising both hands as if to defend himself.
“Hey now, I never said anything about that, did I?” he exclaimed, causing Will to chuckle.
“You might as well have shouted it! It’s what you do every day! And you need to change it, at least a little bit, before...” he too trailed off, his face taking on a grim tone of determination, as he stared at Charlie “we will have to kill you, because the darkness has clouded your miiiind!” he waggled his fingers threateningly at his companion, making eerie ghost noises, causing Charlie to snort in indignation, smacking at his friend’s fingers, or at least attempting to, since Will was a bit faster and managed to pull them away, dancing backwards to get out of range of any follow up swipes at his hands. Charlie jumped after him, only to stop cold with a choking sound, as Anya had grabbed him by his shirts collar, not letting the boy move even an inch further, giving both boys a disapproving tsk “Come on now, no fighting you two!” she scolded, causing them both to glare at her, right up until she dashed forward, giving her brother a solid thwack on the fingers with the flat of her hand, a grin splitting her face from ear to ear as he winced, rubbing one hand with the other “Totally unfair” Will grumbled, but as soon as she turned back to Charlie, whose collar she still had firmly in hand, he ducked low, pushing into the back of her knees with both his hands, causing her to topple backwards with a shriek onto the dusty street, at which point Will took off running, laughing at the top of his lungs, as he heard her getting back up, and chasing after him, dragging Charlie with her, even though he looked like he wanted to be doing anything but getting involved in this.
Wills feet were hammering against the dry ground, trampling up little dust clouds, and he nearly slipped as he took a corner a little too tightly, looking around frantically for a way to keep out of Anya’s hands, so he’d have the last laugh. There! Thinking quickly, he jumped onto a sealed rain barrel, grabbed the lip of the roof, and pulled himself up onto it in one quick movement, putting his years of running away from annoyed adults to good use, while his pursuers came to a skidding halt on the ground level “You’re not getting away that easy!” Anya shouted up, though there was no malice in her voice, if anything she sounded happy that he had run away, conveniently solving the issue of having nothing else to do. Poor Charlie, meanwhile, after running no more than 50 meters, was standing behind Anya, hands on his knees, huffing and puffing like he’d just lifted an ox over his head. Unfortunately, just as Will wanted to make a snarky remark about her following him onto the roof, another voice rang out through the street, ear piercing and commanding as usual, the bane of every mischievous teens free time “Will Chester if you do not get off my roof right this very instant, I will make sure your parents don’t let you out of the forge until your beard reaches your ankles!”
Will blanched, his triumphant expression falling off his face as he looked down, realizing whose house he was currently standing on. To no one's surprise it was the very same person the voice belonged to. Currently standing in his doorway, was a wrinkled old man, back bowed by age, face as leathery as a bat’s wing, with both old yet nimble hands wrapped around a gnarled walking stick that he was leaning on, though his eyes still twinkled with untold and untiring malice. It was Mister Brown, the resident master tailor, and professional bringer of ruin to innocent summer days. Will did his best impression of a lightning bolt, striking the ground of the street within a second of hearing the voice, realizing that getting thrown around by his little sister was a lot better than Mr. Brown making good on his promise.
He lowered his head towards the sour old man, hands clasped at his front. Luckily for him, years of running away, also lent themselves to years of practice at apologies, when one inevitably got caught “I’m very sorry sir! I promise it won't happen again; it was a mistake, and one I will do my very best to avoid repeating!” He put so much regret into his words, that it felt like every syllable might burst with it, meeting the old man’s eyes, hoping he would see the humility and shame he was trying to project out of them. Seeing that that had apparently somewhat mollified the old man, he felt his shoulders slump a little in relief. The old man didn’t talk for a few seconds, visibly weighing the pleasure of telling on him, against the effort of doing it right this minute, and fortunately the effort won out. Without so much as a word, the old man stepped back into his workshop, and slammed the door shut in Wills face, leaving the street in blessed silence for a few seconds. Then Will took off again, or tried to at the very least, though he was stopped cold this time, feeling a hand clamping down on his neck, making his thoughts of escape puff away into thin air with the sigh he let out, giving in to his fate.