Spontanéité

Of the Children of the Earth 🔹 snapshot

There are so many of them, packed together in the meeting-ground, and the air thrums with the noise of thousands of murmuring voices, the sound echoing in the first-cavern, continuing through the tunnel to all the others. It's always difficult to forget, here, how incredibly huge this People and its Fortress is. It is night here below and within the land, but in the Fortress above, the day has just barely begun.

Silence falls as the First Commander lifts his arms in the air, and he drops them to his sides, his eyes scanning the people under his authority, this first-cavern of his soldiers. In the dim and shadowed light, there are hundreds here, those of the Children of the Earth trained in hand, blade or bow, armour reflecting the little light there is, weapons concealed.

"We will train in the wilderness today," he announces. That in itself isn't unusual. It's the look on his face, the gleam in his eyes, his grin. I glance at the soldiers next to me. They noticed too. The First Commander shouts, giving his signal, and we move as one, our footsteps like a thundering drum. Most of the other caverns we pass are training here still, but the second-cavern, the one at the second entrance and equal in size as ours, is ahead of us already, emerging from the meeting-ground.

We do not speak as we move through the paved streets, horses and their carts stopping to let us pass, the Children of the Earth stopping and moving away for us to continue on without interruption. Some of my companions nod to any they know, glancing at windows in the houses of their loved ones. As we pass the northern sector, the horses and riders with the chariots converge with us along the road. It will lead us past the farmlands and outside the Walls to the wilderness where, what, we will train? We have trained Outside before, yes, but not with the riders and chariots. Not with only the first and second caverns.

The woman next to me grabs my hand and squeezes it lightly before releasing it again. She offers me the faintest of smiles when I look at her before we both resume looking ahead. We do not speak. Nobody speaks.

Filling my ears are the hushed voices of the Children of the Earth, parents quieting their children or trying to stop their infants' cries as they watch from doorways, the snorts and whinnies of the horses, the clacking roll of chariot wheels on the paved ground, the footsteps marching in unison, the occasional click of bow against bow as the archers walk together ahead of us. What kind of training are we to undertake today? Will we be training at all?

But nobody questions the First or Second Commanders. Nobody questions the Arrowheads, or the Generals, or the Captains. We've been trained better than that. The Walls have already been opened for us, and we pass through without interruption. I can see curiosity and confusion in the faces of some of the Watchers. But nobody speaks. Nobody questions. This People knows better than that.

Using wordless signals, the First and Second Commanders have us separated us into our divisions. I move to join mine, a grouping of perhaps fifty soldiers, under the command of a General. Now the murmuring of voices begins. What sort of training are we to undertake? Why are we training with the second-cavern, riders and chariots?

It takes a while before the General responds. "One of the Wandering Realms has encamped in the wilderness, in our territory. We are to remove them."

"We are to what?!" I exclaim, and the others all turn to look at me, not all of them sharing the same shock as I am, it seems.

The General crosses his arms. "They are trespassing on our land and have been encamped for longer than five days. By our laws, they can stay here no longer."

"There must be some other way," the woman beside me pipes up, shaking her head.

"The Commanders sent a herald to the Realm after three days as warning, but they have paid it no heed if they're still here. They've brought this upon themselves." He sounds convinced.