This woman, indeed, Etraon thought.

Their new mentor stood taller than he, nearly as tall as a man. Her long, dark hair was tied back in a braid along with a colored cord, slung over to one side to spill down across her left shoulder. Her white tunic was layered with a leather vest tinged with green. There was some light embroidery at the hems, though Etraon couldn’t quite decide whether it was of gold or silver threads. The bottoms of her pants were strategically stuck down into soft, comfortable-looking brown boots, and the confidence with which she walked in said boots had them all staring at her with a sudden, newfound respect. They watched silently as she passed them and reached down to retrieve what she had thrown out the door. She smiled then, startling them all as she held the door open for them and ushered them in.

Etraon had never seen such a place before, nor had he expected to see such detail to the architecture within the barracks that appeared extremely boring from the outside looking in. Oak planks were pieced together at varying lengths like a puzzle on the floors, and they were all surprised by the good lack of creaking from them as they walked. Their mentor, who by this time had introduced herself as Karina, explained that the wood had been placed on top of the stone back and properly leveled on with mortar, which took away the creaking. The lack of noise, she said, would be vital to their concentration in the future. In the field, however, silence was dangerous and they were to make note of that. Etraon felt a tap on his shoulder and suppressed the urge to smile as he saw Damon scribbling down her every word on a parchment attached to a writing board that he had procured from his pack. He briefly wondered if he ought to be doing the same, but, seeing as he had no pen or parchment, shrugged off the idea.

Sirena tripped once, bringing up one hand to brace herself against the wall. The effort was wasted, however, and they watched her go down; then, glancing at the walls, they saw that there were no seams within them. That revelation started a chain reaction of touching the cold stone and looking it up and down, and a flurry of questions arose. Karina smiled and simply explained that this particular wing was special in that they had been cut from a large piece of stone that was already present.

They came to an arched corridor, above which a golden plaque resided. Karina reached up and retrieved it, bringing it to the nearby torch so that they could all see what was written. A bird had been etched into the plate. They could make out its sharp eyes, fierce beak, and curved talons: a bird of prey and a symbol of war. The wings were long and regal and Windsor, seeing that Karina was waiting for someone to speak, asked if it was an eagle.

“A kite,” she replied, “your empire’s national bird.” She paused then and looked down at Etraon in particular, who started uncomfortably with the sudden attention. “This band you’re about to join was created by Counselor Derek’s predecessors, those closest and most relied upon by the Emperor. The Kites. While the fact that Prince Etraon is within this group may be an accident, I hold each and every one of us, yourself included, your Highness, accountable to carrying this name with honor.” She placed the plaque back where it belonged and continued walking. “Should you graduate successfully, you will be given your own name as a band. One of the bands before was given the name of Kitetail.”

“Kitetail?” Windsor asked excitedly. “You mean the band that-?”

“The very same,” Karina replied. “They had another name before, but Emperor Utarion changed it upon the mission being completed to honor them for their successful ‘tailing’ job.”

“Ah,” they chorused.

“Remember these halls well. This will be the first and last day that you get a tour and an explanation. After this, you’re on your own. Questions will be replied to with an assignment to do research.”

“Research?” Damon asked, his eyes coming alight with the word at the same time Catherine groaned with the same question.

“Yes, research. Now come along. There’s plenty more to see before supper, and I, for one, would like to have more than cold gruel and beans tonight.”

When the past thirteen years of your life were spent living in a castle with servants who waited upon you hand and foot and your parents carefully chose your companions to be made up of those who had, not only a similar status in life, but extremely good character, the mess hall could only be called, well, a mess. A small rebellious grin began to crawl its way up Etraon’s face after his initially shocked reaction to the noise that blasted them all in the face the moment the heavy double doors had been opened had passed. These would be the people that he would be with for the next year. Everywhere he looked, children his age of all hair colors, skin colors, backgrounds, and accents were gathered here. All were of the same status, new recruits with their respective instructors. Etraon could barely contain his excitement.

But never had he seen such chaos. Food was flying through the air, and standing amidst the airborne dinners and the shouts made it difficult to hear one’s own thoughts. Etraon craned his neck, trying to see the expression on his new mentor’s face, but she had turned her back towards him. He saw her move to the side and followed suit, narrowly dodging an empty fruit basket as it passed through the space where Karina’s head had been just a moment before. The appetizing smell of food that he had first scented outside the doorway had become much less so and the sight of mashed potatoes plastered on the walls made him wonder if this was really the glamorous path to knighthood that he had always dreamed of. A warm spatter of oil hit his face and the faint aroma of butter arose, dripping slowly off the ends of his hair.

Something yellow sailed overhead and somewhere behind him, Etraon could hear Sirena scream. Or perhaps it was Catherine. It was definitely a girl, but given that he had only known them for a few hours, he had yet to distinguish them by their voices. Karina turned at the sound and her face darkened noticeably at the mess that the food, a banana, Etraon could see now, had made of her mentee’s clothing, hair, and face. She pointed back towards the door and they all made for the hall as quickly as they could. Windsor slipped rather suddenly on a brown liquid, which, given its close proximity to the mashed potatoes on the wall, Etraon could only assume was gravy, and muttered something angrily to himself. His face clouded momentarily, but, feeling Etraon’s stare, glanced up and his expression reverted once more to his normal care-free, sideways smile.

There were a few more accidents before they were able to exit the mess hall and close the door again. Aurelius had an unfortunate encounter with an extremely angry girl, who proceeded to attack him with the contents of a pumpkin pie that lay nearby. Aurelius, being allergic to pumpkin, proceeded to sneeze over and over again, and was scratching frantically at the skin on his arm. Having come into contact with the orange squash, his exposed forearm was reddening at an alarming rate. Etraon, in the process of helping his cousin remove it from his person, suffered a light blow to the head from a half-eaten corn cob. Damon somehow made it safely to the doorway without harm and was holding it open for them as Karina and Catherine helped a distraught Sirena out into the hallway with Windsor in tow. Aurelius and Etraon brought up the rear.

Karina motioned for Damon to close the door and sighed in disgust as it shut with a shuddering squeak.

“What a tragic waste of food,” she said then. She glanced down at them with an unwavering gaze, taking in the mess that the food fight had made of her mentees. “I’m sorry, Kites. I’d planned to only take you to your rooms after you had gotten some warm food into those empty stomachs, but that obviously isn’t going to happen anymore.” She dismissed them to the baths, telling them all to wash up and to meet back in the common room for dinner.

Windsor was coming out of his room and he gave Etraon a startled look as the two of them approached each other just in front of the baths’ entrance.

“How did you end up taking so long, Etraon?” he asked. Then, as if remembering, he bowed slightly at the waist only to have Etraon catch him at the shoulder.

“Please don’t do that, Windsor,” Etraon told him. “We’re going to be working together in this band as equals after all.”

“The situation is a little awkward, isn’t it?” Windsor agreed with a sheepish grin. “But that still doesn’t answer my question.”

“You saw Aurelius earlier, didn’t you?”

“Poor chap’s got an allergy to pumpkin, does he?” Windsor nodded, wincing slightly at the memory of his new band member’s reaction to the stuff.

“It isn’t bad enough to where he’s going to start breaking out in rashes or have a bad case of hives, but he’s going to be up scratching unless he manages to wash off the remnants as quickly as he can.”

“You’re late because you helped him clean off the pumpkin chunks and sent him running for the baths ahead of you.”

“He’s my cousin,” Etraon replied simply, “and a good friend.”

“Anyone who has the honor of having the crown prince referring to them as a good friend is worth getting to know. Maybe there may even come a day when I become a man that you would find worthy of introducing to others as a good friend.”

“Windsor, what are you even-”

“I’m joking,” Windsor laughed, tapping one finger impishly to the side of his nose. He reached forward, pulling back the flaps to the bathing area and paused. “Well, I’m serious, but I’m mostly joking. But I do think it’d be an honor if you’d…oh, you know what I mean.”

Etraon chuckled and followed after him.

The baths were quite spacious, which Etraon found to be of no surprise - given the way Windsor’s mouth was hanging open though, he decided that such large bathing quarters were not the norm for those outside of the palace.

“This place is huge!” Windsor exclaimed, dropping his scrubbing brush and soap into the wicker basket that he had carried with him into the baths. He stepped down into the water and grinned back at Etraon, who was watching the scene with some amusement. “It’s warm!” he continued, delighted.

“Consider yourself privileged, Windsor,” Etraon chuckled, lowering himself down into the water after him. “These barracks have better facilities than the others in the empire.”

“But this bath is at least ten times the size of the one back home!”

“People like General Douglas donate to this barrack because it’s the one where the most promising recruits are sent and the hardest training ensues,” Etraon explained. “Father said that that the nicer baths and better food were meant to encourage the new recruits to stay on.”

Despite what Etraon might have thought, given the enormity of the baths in the palace, the bathing facilities of the barracks in which they were now housed were something of a luxury to those who came from neighboring cities. Warm water was piped in from the outside, connected to a large well that was kept heated by an ongoing flame, seen to by a rotation of servants from the castle. The large pool that Windsor and Etraon were now soaking themselves in was large enough to hold ten full-grown men, seated comfortably up to the shoulders, and far enough apart that each man could feel as if he had his own space. A trailing divot ran along the perimeter of the room, circling along the walls of the baths, accompanied by shallow stone basins acting as various points on the water’s path. These were filled with warm water, while others remained solitary for the purposes of holding personal belongings.

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Author's Note:

xoxo,

Elfarine