The Shield Bearer

Chapter 1

The air was bitterly cold tonight. Flakes of snow fell on her cloak and stayed there as she stood, holding her shield. Her arm hurt so much, but she couldn't ease it, not yet. She resisted the shaking that was trying to take up residence in her muscles.

"Shield up!!" Elric, their instructor shouted at one of the other trainees as they must have started to weaken in resolve. Elric was a large, brawny man. He stood six and a half feet tall, and was covered from head to toe in silver paladin armor and carried a silvered greatsword, in one hand, with his gleaming paladin shield in the other.

"If you intend to be a Shield Master, then you had better be able to hold that shield up, no matter how much it hurts or how cold you get." Elric began walking up and down the line of fifteen trainees, giving each a stern eye. He stopped in front of Rene and gave her a long stare. He wasn't wearing his helmet tonight. Rene took in his short cropped black hair and neatly trimmed beard and mustache. His face was almost square, especially with the way that he had his beard shaped.

Rene focused, not taking his bait. She had been training for four long years, for this test. She wasn't about to mess up now. The class that had she had started in, was nearly one hundred strong. But the ranks had shrunk to the current fifteen. Tonight, Elric had made it clear that no more than ten of them would continue to the final test.

"I'm impressed that you have made it this far, girl." Elric always called her 'girl'. "I've lost a lot of money on you." He chuckled coldly. But Rene continued to stare straight ahead, her shield steady. Even as she seemed to be looking past him, she was measuring his posture, trying to gauge whether he was going to try to break her stance with a feint or an outright attack. He continued to try to get a response out of her.

"Yes, I wagered against you making it through the first year." He shook his head. "Dammit!! That cost me too much coin!" He grumbled under his breath. He seemed to be genuinely frustrated. "No woman, has ever made it to the rank of shield master! But here you are, trying to prove us all wrong!" His voice had elevated above the conversational level now.

The sound of rattling metal interrupted his tirade. In a flash, he was down the line. With a deft swing of his blade, he knocked the shield out of the hands of Micheal, one of Rene's few friends in the class. His shield clanged loudly on the cobblestone of the courtyard. He was out. He dropped to his knees from exhaustion and from the pain of failing.

Elric loomed over him. "Go and gather your things. Inform the barracks master that you have failed the test. He will instruct you on where to go from there."

Micheal reached for his shield as he struggled to stand up, but Elric kicked it out of his reach. "These shields are for those that can hold them!"

Rene watched through her peripheral vision as he stumbled to his feet and marched back to the barracks, his head hung low. She had hoped that he would pass the test...He would now have to face his father, a shield master of a long line of shield masters, in shame. This generation would not continue his family tradition.

A flash of movement caught the other side of her peripheral vision as another trainee collapsed, apparently from exhaustion. Elric made a gesture to one of the observing priests, who quickly approached and pulled Stephen out of the line and toward the infirmary.

Stephen was definitely the most handsome of the trainees, but he knew it. On numerous occasions, Rene had to turn away his advances, despite his claims of being the duke's son. He was arrogant and full of himself. Most of the unit thought that his status as 'the duke's son' was the only reason that he had gotten this far. Rene wasn't sad to see him fail.

Elric returned to his spot, in front of Rene. "I bet you are next." His voice was cold and unforgiving. But Rene didn't feel the bite of those kind of words anymore. She had experienced much worse words from the many men and women that found it inappropriate for a young lady to be pursuing the path of a shield master. She didn't care what they thought. She wasn't doing this for them. She wasn't even doing it for her father, whose only hope of continuing the shield master tradition in his family had fallen to his daughter.