Guardians of the Great Wood Villages (On Hold)

Chapter ONE

'Practice makes progress, not perfect right then and there' - Elek Flarren

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In the north part of one of the Great Wood Villages, there lived a girl named Alyx Flarren. She resided in a wooden hut with her grandparents, Elek and Celia Flarren.

Alyx had shoulder long, auburn hair which rarely let her beautiful green eyes show. Ever since Alyx was a toddler she had been told that the reason she was living with her grandparents was because of the death of both of her parents due to the many dangers of the Great Woods. She often would ask her grandparents how they died but the didn't seem to like to talk about the topic.

Elek had been training Alyx ever since she was about five years old, to participate in the village's 'Ceremony'. He wanted her to succeed to become a guard to protect people from the things that had killed her parents.

Every year, the village got together to celebrate the Guard Academy accepting two new children from each of the Great Wood Villages to be a guard in training. These guards in training would do many different things once in the Guard Academy. They would go on errands and little missions but mostly they would have to learn about things they would need to know in order to become a guard.

The guards would graduate at the age of twenty three to protect the Great Wood Villages. The Ceremony tested children from the village from the age of twelve to sixteen to see who could join the Guard Academy. They would pick the most qualified boy and girl who would then join the Guard Academy a little while later.

Every village in or around the Great Woods was considered a 'Great Wood Village'. Each of these villages had a so called Elder who was like a village leader. The Elder would also decide who would join the Guard Academy.

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"Wake up Alyx," Celia said as she bent over Alyx' mattress. "Not now Ma," Alyx replied, sleepily. "Come on Alyx. The Ceremony is in a few weeks and I don't think you are ready yet. We need to train more," Elek added. Alyx referred to Elek and Celia as 'Ma' and 'Pa' since they acted as her mother and father in a way.

Alyx sat up on her mattress in the corner of the room. She stretched her arms and legs and walked slowly to the wooden table in the middle of the room. There were quite a few different bowls with berries, little pieces of meat and other things nature had to give. She sat down on the little wooden block that worked as her chair and ate a bit of what was on the table.

After that, she put on her leather boots, her silk top, her jacket and set out with Elek to practice. Before they could go though, Celia said, "here Alyx, take these," and gave her a pair of leather sleeves that reached from her wrists to her elbows. She thanked Celia and finally slipped out of the door to find Elek waiting for her.

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Snap! A twig broke underneath Alyx' foot. She was running this path for the fourth time in a row now and she thought she knew everything about it in- cluding where to dodge where to jump, but the twig got her distracted. She whipped around and tripped over a slightly bigger branch. She lay on her back for quite some time and knew that in the Guard Academy, she would have already failed. Elek stepped out from behind a big tree and grinned.

"Again," was all he said. Alyx jumped up and speeded back to where she had come from. She dodged, ducked and slid under and over all kinds of branches as she attempted her fifth run. After quite a while of almost silent running, she jumped up, grabbed onto a bough and let her tired body hang from it for a while.

"I think at this rate you could be ready for the ceremony in a few days but do you think the same?" Elek asked as he came out from behind a different tree, "you see Alyx, it's not just about if I believe in you, it is about do you believe in yourself rather than letting others influence your plan of action" He had an old frail voice but there was something refreshing about that youthful smirk on his face.

"Yes Pa, you've told me this about a hundred times," Alyx replied in an annoyed voice.

"Let's head home, Ma is waiting," was the only thing the man said without taking notice of Alyx' attitude.

On their walk home, Alyx' mind was full of questions like: Will they accept me as a new guard in training?... She just recently turned twelve so it was perfect for her village to have the celebration so soon.

"I hear that it has been the twelfth birthday of one of the Elder's granddaughters, Flora," Elek started, "so you will need to train extra hard to get the new girls spot at Guard Academy." Alyx nodded since she knew that very special villagers were treated accordingly. That made it that much harder for "normal" villagers to compete, although you would have special rights to a spot in the Guard Academy if any of your relatives were at the guard school before you.

The Ceremony wasn't only about asking questions though, it was built like an actual competition. The first stage was, of course, theft. As a guard, you would, aside from guarding of course, also have to know how to break into a traitor's lair and retrieve valuable information. To do that, you would also have to be able to track things, which was the second test.

There were many other parts to the test but those were not public like the other ones. There were only rumors about what the new recruits did the week after the celebration. Some say they would be tortured until enough gave up. Others say that they had to fight each other but Alyx believed none of this.

All she wanted to do was make her grandparents proud in succeeding and visiting the Guard Academy.