Denak stood watching the young boy as he walked quickly along the path. He was waiting for just the right moment to spring his trap on the unsuspecting boy. Denak recognized him as one of his family’s servants who lived in Rweil, a town close by. Denak couldn’t remember his name, but he knew he had seen the boy carrying firewood and grooming the niksjys in the stable.
As the young boy neared, Denak crouched down further to keep from being seen. Denak had stretched a rope across the path earlier and had waited several minutes for someone to come along. He peeked through the small hole he had made in the leaves so that he could see the rope. Just as the boy reached the rope and began to step across the rope, Denak jerked with all his might. The rope grew taunt and rose off the ground catching the boy’s lifted foot. The boy’s momentum caused him to sprawl headlong into the large mud-hole Denak had found on the path. The heavy rains of the past two ten-days created several mud-holes in the path from town to his family’s farm.
Denak watched the boy sprawled in the mud. At first the boy didn’t move. Then, he sat up and Denak saw that his face was plastered with mud. The boy’s eyes were closed, but when he opened them Denak could see the whites of his eyes. Denak began to laugh at the sight of two white circles poking out of the blackness of the mud. The boy hearing the sound looked in Denak’s direction. Denak could tell the boy was angry, but when he saw Denak the boy hung his head and slowly climbed to his feet. Denak laughed even harder. The boy went to a nearby tree and scraped his hands on the tree to clean off the mud and then used his hands to clean the mud off his face. The boy didn’t look at Denak as Denak continued laughing. Then, the boy turned toward Denak’s house and slowly made his way along the path.
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Denak gathered the rope chuckling as he remembered the sight of the boy flying through the air with his arms outstretched. This was a great prank, Denak thought. Next time, I will have to do this to Meni. Meni was the old woman who came to his room everyday and cleaned it. Sometimes when he slept late into the morning Meni would wake him up by throwing open the huge tapestries that covered his windows to keep out the night air. Suddenly, Denak’s room would be filled with light and jolt Denak out of a sound sleep. In fact, she had done that this morning, that was why he was up so early today. He hated being wakened that way.
He hated it almost as much as Etana’s lessons. The man’s relentless pursuit of perfection in Denak’s studies was infuriating. Denak had complained several times to his mother about Etana’s stringent rules. But, for some reason Denak’s mother would not intervene. It was the one area where his mother would not give in no matter how much he complained. In every other area, Denak’s mother seemed willing to let Denak get his own way, but not when it came to Etana and his studies. Denak didn’t understand why and that made him even angrier. Thinking about it even now made his dark skin turn even darker.
The only reason Denak wasn’t with Etana right now was because the man had left for Shailem several days ago. He had not returned yet, but Denak expected him to be back sometime today. He knew Etana would not miss tomorrow. In two days would be Spring Celebration for the end of Denak’s sixteenth winter, and for some reason the celebration was all Etana was able to talk about for the past several weeks. Etana seemed even more excited than Denak about the party. Denak had been to other Spring Celebrations, but they didn’t impress him. He expected his own Spring Celebration would be no different.
Denak’s mood turned dark again as he walked through the gates of the farm his family owned. And, no matter how often he replayed the scene of the boy flying through the air in his mind, his laughter was gone.