For the first time in days, David wanders his village’s marketplace and greets every familiar face that he can recognise, from behind each merchant’s stall. Despite the fact that it has been a good couple months since he quit being a mercenary, it seems they still remember when David would bring them goods from other towns that they were having trouble finding.
The bard admits that he is a tad nervous at the prospect of buying medicine for Alexander. If he reveals to the local apothecary that he seeks to aid a user of the magical arts, then it is more than likely word will reach the ears of strangers, and Alexander has made it explicitly clear that he wishes for his presence to remain a secret. At least, for now.
David will definitely abide to the rule Alexander has set out for him—Don’t talk about me. Ever.—but it will certainly be difficult to find what he is looking for, when he cannot ask around.
With a huff and a few other waves shown to a couple more villagers and acquaintances, David first makes his way over to his home. It is nothing much—just a single bedroom with enough space to cook if need be—and the bard feels no need to linger atop the old, creaking floorboards more than he must. But David has come here for a reason; if Alexander does end up accepting his request to find Markus and Sasha, the bard has no doubt they will get into fights during their long and hardy travels. And, should this happen, David will definitely be in need of the armor and weapons he once used for his own battles, before he retired.
The bard takes out a large bag from beneath his bed. Dust rises into the air. David’s head recoils back into his neck. He coughs, then chokes on his spit, before his surroundings finally clear of the substance that had once plagued him, as he opens his modest, wooden window.
The sound of children laughing and playing in the streets below filter into his room. An anxious knot forms from within his gut. David wishes he didn’t have to touch his old belongings, however, buying an entirely new set of blades and protective gear would be much too costly.
He grabs the weapons. He pushes away the image of a man calling out the name of a woman unbeknownst to David at the time, when this soldier was at his mercy; when his pulse beat through David’s blade, as David plunged it into his heart, where they laid both, in a field filled with dead sunflowers, endless battles and pained cries. The woman, David later found out, was his victim’s late wife.
The bard wishes he could take it back.
All the pain, the hurt he has caused, in this game men like to call War.
As he reflects back on those days for the brief, instant of a second, David wonders why he ever thought it would be a good idea to join the army. Every day, he would wish to trade the violence he’d been taught for love, and his weapons, for musical instruments—even as a young boy, there was never a bout of fight in him. Not in that way, at least.
David never enjoyed bloodshed; only, as a man, he felt as if it was his duty, to learn how to revel in victorious nights, and the art of mastering a blade.
The bard blinks.
He stares down at his hands. They are covered in red.
When he looks away, then back at his dark, leather gloves a moment later, the horrid vision is gone, and everything is back to normal.
He throws his bag over his shoulder, lets out a low, discontented huff.
As the floorboards creak again with each of David’s footsteps, the bard ignores the cold sweats running down his spine; the urges that reside within his heart, to throw his weapons away for good, and never think of this nightmare again.
He shuts his windows’ dust-covered blinds, and then the entrance to his now-empty apartment, which steals the little light remaining from the rest of his old room.
This journey will not be an easy one, but David has a duty to protect his friends—Alexander, too—and the bard would rather die, than let the people he cares much for, suffer alone.
It’ll be all right, he thinks to himself, as he strides down the village’s plaza once more, and tries not to throw up at the weight of the swords and armor, that push down, hard, against his shoulder. After this, David will finally rid himself of these terrible tools, imprinted with even worse memories—he just has to wait a little while longer; that’s all.
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