Chapter Five: Family Time
Tom left the Academy in a daze. It felt like the day had slipped by in a minute. He could feel the tumultuous, expectant energy of the city as he merged with the traffic on the broad promenade. For once he could take his time on his return home, given the announcement and their early finish to the day.
“Call for a Reaping! Call for a Reaping! Muster on Firstday, Sanctuary Square!” a crier called over the crowd. She was wearing dark forest green trimmed with brown, Wayrest’s colours, and shouted from the top of a small box at the corner of an intersection. A hundred more like her would be repeating the call all throughout the city. Even more would be riding for village squares beyond the walls.
Now that it was here there was not much for Tom to do. He had been prepared for this Reaping since the last. He could be ready for muster in an hour if need be. His anxiety had nothing to do with leaving for the Reaping, though, and everything to do with his return.
“A Sowing has been called! A Sowing! Eleven years, eleven years, and now - a Sowing!” the crier sang, her green coat billowing as she strutted theatrically atop her box. “Turn out on Firstday to see the Sowing of Dain’s Quarry depart!”
The newly Sowed villages always took the name of their first mayor, and their main benefit to Wayrest. It was a simple system, but when forty six villages so far had been Sown, simple was good. They’d ended up with a lot of “Fields,” “Meadows,” and “Greens” though.
A crowd had gathered around the crier, teasing out all the threads of the gossip the call had brought. Some looked worried, some excited, some angry. Events of this magnitude brought a lot of chaos and disruption, but also opportunity, if you were well placed for it. Wayrest would have gossip for months.
Tom could sense the difference in the city. People moved about a little faster, with more purpose. Many lingered about, like those in the crowd, debating the implications of the announcement. Noises he heard every day were pitched a little higher, shouts and calls were raised with a little more urgency. Wayrest was tensing like a cat about to pounce.
Tom tarried as he decided whether to pass through Market Square or take the long way around. The Square would be hectic, with this afternoon’s announcement. Every interesting character in the city would have been drawn there, and the merchants would be in a furore.
He decided against it, for once forgoing his sight-seeing in the market. He pushed against the traffic to take the slightly longer, but quieter way near the Artisan’s district.
Tom’s thoughts turned to those of home. Father will have heard the news this morning. He’ll want extra sparring all week to prepare. His step hitched and he stumbled. This will be my last Reaping. My last chance. He knows that as well as the instructors.
He moved into the Artisans District, an eclectic mix of buildings that all followed function, not form, unlike the neat and congruous Nobles District, or the patchwork, but patterned tapestry of the Market District surrounding the Square.
The smell of sawdust and resin hit Tom like a fist to the face. Coal smoke drifted about aimlessly from a nearby forge. Heat blasted from a kiln. A cacophony of noise crashed from a hundred different trade buildings of all varieties. Metal and earth and wood and heat could produce a staggering amount of smells and sounds when combined. Tom couldn’t hear himself think, but there were no crowds, and the foot traffic was thin. Perfect for a young man with too much on his mind.
He took his time wandering past the carpenters and potters, letting the assault on his senses wash away his thoughts. It worked wonderfully, until he rounded a corner where a ruddy-faced joiner was berating an apprentice, and found himself heading into the Nobles District.
He slowed. The air felt too close. Like he didn’t have enough space to move, to breathe. The sounds of the Artisan District just behind him became jarring. He couldn’t stand it. It was all too much. He couldn’t go home. He knew what was waiting for him. Anxiety was a cold fire in his navel, and he couldn’t get enough air to snuff it.
He abruptly quickened his pace again, all of a sudden just wanting it over with. Soon he was outside the Cutter residence, the high grey walls not quite occluding the grand building behind them. He braced himself, opened the gate, and wound his way down the garden path. It hadn’t been seen to in months, which would have caused quite the stir, if they ever had any visitors these days.
Tom dragged his eyes from the overgrown roses and weeds and placed them squarely on the imposing oaken double doors.
Only way to meet a challenge is with your chin up, he told himself.
He almost believed it, too.
~~~~~~~~~~
Tom sat at their enormous dining table, long enough to seat two dozen people. Elaborate oak panels decorated walls half in shadows; half lit by ornate lanterns in gilded sconces. Marbled floors reflected crisp footsteps from Mart, their butler. Tom could vaguely remember his father entertaining guests with lavish parties in this dining room when he was very young. It was grand, and it was made pathetic by dividing the massive space between just three people.
Tom sat across from his mother, a demure woman with Tom’s mousy brown hair and broad shoulders. Tom’s father sat to his right. He was a lean, dark featured man, taller than Tom and with a narrower face. His eyes were the same as Toms’, deep blue, and carried a brooding quality that Tom never cared to be compared to – accurate as those comparisons might be.
Tom knew he was reserved to the point of being withdrawn, and didn’t necessarily take exception to being called brooding, but he liked to think he was like a bear hibernating through winter. His father, on the other hand, was a snarling dog behind a locked door.
The clink of cutlery against plates seemed too large a sound for the space. He could hear his father chewing, slowly, methodically. His mother smelled like old roses, and his father smelled like smoke. Everything smelled like the pork Mart had served. It was unbearable.
“So,” said his father, lifting a forkful of skewered meat.
Tom and his mother both flinched slightly, as if the single word had fallen from a great height and splattered them with something foul.
“The Council have called a Reaping,” he finished, talking around a mouthful of pork.
No one answered him.
“Do you not find that interesting, Lady Cutter?” asked his father. “How about you, boy?”
His father never used either of their first names anymore. They were not to use his either.
A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.
“Yes, Lord Cutter,” they murmured together.
Lord Cutter sighed, and placed down his utensils, chewing loudly and swallowing the last of his meal. He dabbed his mouth with a napkin. Tossed it on his plate amid his scraps.
“You sicken me,” he declared simply. “The both of you.”
Again, silence. It made no difference whether they replied or not. They had learned that a long time ago. Better not to give the hangman the rope.
“This meekness,” continued Lord Cutter. “It ill-suits my House. Wouldn’t you agree?”
Still, silence. They knew what came next.
“SICKENING!” his father screamed, slamming his palms on the table. His plate jumped, scattering scraps about. Spittle flew from his lips. “The BOTH OF YOU!”
His mother cowered slightly. Tom sat perfectly still as his father composed himself again. He had reached breaking much more quickly than usual tonight. It did not bode well for the rest of the evening.
“Right. I’d better have that weakness out of you then, boy.” he rose from his place. “Come.”
He turned on his heel and swept from the room. His mother headed towards the kitchen, presumably to fetch Mart to clear the table.
Tom sat for a second, feeling numb, unable to shepherd his thoughts into place. He’s even angrier than usual. This will be bad. He shook himself into action, standing. At least he can’t disown me just yet. I’ve still got one more chance.
He followed his father from the dining room, following the sound of his footsteps across the house to their family’s training room.
He hurried, and arrived just after his father. Making him wait for any perceivable length of time would only make this worse.
Their training room was a large room attached to one side of their house. It alone was bigger than most village houses. Its polished wood floors had been worn smooth by thousands of hours under sweaty, scuffling feet. Around the perimeter of the room stood weapons racks and armour, carrying a host of different armaments for them to practice with.
Tom quickly stripped and pulled on rough-spun breeches for training. Mart kept two pairs clean and ready in here for their use at all times. He left himself shirtless. He’d ruined countless shirts with rips and tears and sweat before his father had put a stop to it.
Tom approached one of the weapons racks with haste. The largest section by far was laden with swords of all kinds. He selected one almost at random. A single-handed, double-edged straight sword with a simple cross guard. He no longer particularly cared which sword he used, he’d trained with every type for hundreds and hundreds of hours. It felt like there was no difference between them anymore. None had helped him manifest.
His father was waiting for him in the center of the room. Only two sconces were lit, and they cast flickering shadows over his lithe body. Tom was only slightly shorter than him but significantly broader. His frame supported far more muscle. It made even less difference than it did with his peers at the Academy. His father was an Exemplary Idealist of the Sword. He was physically superior to Tom many times over.
Tom set his feet and raised his guard. He leveled his gaze, almost meeting his father’s eyes. He could see a black rage boiling in them, hot and potent.
“Quickly, boy,” he snarled. “We have only a week to prepare.”
He took a half step towards his father and immediately recoiled in surprise and pain. A long wound in the meat of his sword arm bled freely. Tom gasped and dropped his guard. He hadn’t even seen his father move.
“What is this weakness in you?” asked his father. “It surely didn’t come from me. Sometimes I wonder if you’re my own get! Then I remember your pathetic mother had a hand in you.”
Tom hesitated. His father was usually cold and detached. He lost his grip on his anger, but he had never completely lost himself in it like now. He had been dismissive and cold towards his mother, but never so outright hostile.
“Stop this feeble indecision and FIGHT!” he screamed.
Tom lurched forward almost automatically. Years of leaping to obey his father made anything less impossible. He moved his sword through a perfect thrust, aiming for his father’s chest. It was batted aside dismissively. A new wound on his thigh ran red.
He flinched at the pain, raised his guard again, stepped forward turning, and swung an arcing cut with all his strength. His father didn’t even bother to parry or block with his sword. Instead, a shimmering blade of force appeared to meet his swing. His father disdainfully stabbed him in the side.
The door creaked, and his mother entered. Tom knew better than to expect any reprieve from her. She’d never tried to intercede with his father before. She knelt to one side of the room, watching.
Lord Cutter noticed her entrance, and his gaze became hotter.
“Surrounded by weaklings!” he raged. “Do you not care about our House? Why do I bother?”
All of a sudden it seemed likely his father might just kill him right here and spare himself the embarrassment of a son returned from three Reapings with no Ideals. In the state their House was in, it would give them the final nudge into complete irrelevancy.
He launched himself at his father, throwing everything he had at him, even as his strength bled out of him from multiple wounds. Absolutely textbook cuts. Flawless parries. Perfect lunges. His father didn’t even move. None of his efforts made any difference, and Tom had several new deep cuts to show for it.
His father screamed incoherently, full of so much pure anger that Tom recoiled from him again. It saved his sight. Lord Cutter released a storm of barely tangible blades into the air, and they flensed him like a mouse falling in a knife drawer.
Tom lost all his strength then, slumping to the floor. His father always kept up the pretense of training for at least an hour or so. Tom couldn’t manifest the Sword if he didn’t improve with it, after all. This though, this was torture, plain and simple.
Through blurring vision, his father approached.
“Weak,” he said, his voice now cold and empty. Then he stabbed him again.
“Weak,” he repeated, in exactly the same inflection, and stabbed him again. And again. And again.
~~~~~~~~~~
When Tom regained consciousness it was dark and everyone was asleep. His mother must have healed him after he passed out. He was vaguely surprised his father had allowed it, this time.
He lay awake in bed for hours, his mind running over the spectral memory of his injuries, over and over. Same as always. His gut had been a knot, not just today, but for years now. He hadn’t found a single moment of true peace in longer than that. The last day he could remember going to sleep without having taken a beating was during the last Reaping.
I have to manifest. I have to manifest. I have to manifest. He sung it to himself like a lullaby. Suddenly he just felt tired. Weary. Done with the world. I could just as easily be ripped apart in my sleep on the first night of the Reaping as manifest. I will either die, or I won’t. He had come to terms with that a long time ago, on his first Reaping. A spark of insight flashed in his mind. Just as I will either manifest, or I won’t.
A strange kind of relief settled over him. The anxiety burning in his stomach tamped down a little. At least for a blessed six weeks he would be free from the beatings, both at the Academy and at home. Without the constant abuse, maybe I can gain enough clarity to finally manifest. If it took facing down monsters as a regular human with a regular sword, then so be it. At least monsters weren’t supposed to be his friends. Weren’t supposed to love him as family. Guilt rolled over him – I prefer monsters to my own kin, what kind of person am I?