The Maiden of Moonfane Forge

Ennric had been spot on; the new recruit really was more boy than man. Easily no older than sixteen. Compared to this smooth-faced youth—with his keen light eyes and his blonde hair cut in some short King’s City style—Vetch felt even he must look like a weathered and jaded veteran. But the young recruit seemed to know his stuff. Road-weary as he appeared, he had dismounted sharply, made a proper salute, and was now already engaged in a spirited conversation with Ennric. The recruit must even have stopped to wash and don his King’s City colors—white with thin stripes of green, silver, gold, and black—before his arrival, so he would present properly upon reporting to his new garrison. That would have been no small effort for such a negligible detail after a long, wearying journey from the capital. It gave Vetch a good impression of the youth right away.

The three soldiers stood out in the road outside the South Gate speaking as soldiers speak, getting to know one another in the short time they had before their captain arrived and made them do things officially.

“Yes, you know how it is, then,” the boy was saying. “I’m the youngest son out of three. So, of course, my oldest brother will get the title and holdings, middle brother will take over the farms, and me ... well, practically soon as I could stand upright, I was dropped on the doorstep of the King’s garrison and a sword put in my hand.”

“Youngest son’s the soldier,” quoted Ennric with a broad grin.

“I like it, though. I like the soldier’s life,” the recruit said. “I asked to be assigned here. Moonfane Forge, home of The Maiden of Moonfane Forge. A town with a mage. Is it true she can cast the magic so a man could walk through the Barrier, but it wouldn’t allow any of his weapons to pass through with him?” The recruit had been stealing glances around him during the conversation, particularly at the open gate arch. “I’d heard the Barrier appears like a glowing gold wall that hangs in the air. Is it down right now?”

Vetch made to talk, but Ennric cut him off. “Could be. Dunno much about the ways of mages. Ask Vetch. He’s courting her apprentice.” The older soldier scratched his gray-whiskered cheek to disguise his meddlesome grin.

The recruit turned a surprised gaze upon Vetch.

“We’re not courting,” said Vetch.

“Then you’re as stupid as she is comely,” returned Ennric, plainly enjoying trying to embarrass Vetch in front of this new recruit. “You kids don’t even know what courting is. Think it’s like gifts of perfumed handkerchiefs and kissing maiden’s hands and all that stupid shit. No, Vetch, those silly eyes you two make at each other when she stops by, that’s courting.”

“Would you shut up, old man?” Vetch turned his eyes skyward, then glanced back at the town gate in the hope their captain would arrive on the scene soon to save them all from this idiocy.

“Though, what she sees in this oaf, I’ll never understand,” Ennric went on. “Look at him, sun-ruddied as a shepherd and hair as coarse as a yak’s.” He reached to muss Vetch’s lightly curled, auburn hair. Vetch shoved the old soldier’s hand away as the new recruit tried to decide whether he should laugh or not.

“At least I’m not gray as a gaffer and built like an old rain barrel that needs replacing,” growled Vetch.

Ennric guffawed. “Fuckin’ right, always give it right back.” He pointed a stubby finger at the new recruit. “Take that lesson, boy, you’ll fit right in here in no time.”

Mercifully, it was then that the captain of Moonfane Forge’s garrison arrived, striding confidently through the gate arch with Neschi in her wake. Vetch dropped his voice for the new recruit’s benefit.

“Captain Tarese.”

The boy nodded and came to a smart salute, as did Ennric and Vetch.

Captain Tarese of the Moonfane Forge garrison was the kind of woman who commanded respect from any and all within her presence. Fair and pale and in her thirties, her steely green eyes and short-cut blonde hair marked her as having a similar King’s City pedigree as the new recruit she now faced down. While not the tallest woman, she had the build and body language of a true lifelong swordswoman, all soldier’s swagger and steeled muscle. It tended to leave an impression.

She looked the boy up and down, then placed her hands on her hips, and smiled.

“Look at this one,” she chuckled. “It would have been ... oh, over ten years now, when I was the one standing right where you are, decked out in my King’s City stripes, nervously holding my horse’s reins.” She kept the appraising smile on her face as she held out her hand. “I’m Captain Tarese, your commander here at Moonfane Forge.”

The boy stepped smartly up to shake her hand. “Wenzl, Captain. Reporting for permanent reassignment from the King’s Capital City royal garrison to the garrison at Moonfane Forge.”

“You have your paperwork?”

Wenzl made a short nod. “Yes ma’am!” The boy turned and went into his horse’s saddlebag to draw out the packet of papers, which he handed over to Captain Tarese.

She perused them momentarily, nodding a couple times. “Ah. Captain Tyne. I knew him.” Satisfied, she looked up and slapped the papers in the palm of her hand a couple times. “These look good, recruit. Some shining recommendations in here. How old are you, Wenzl?”

“Seventeen, ma’am. I know I’m small for my age, but I’m a good swordsman. All my instructors said so.”

“And you requested this assignment? It wasn’t a punishment?”

“That’s right, ma’am.”

“I did, too,” said Tarese. “Moonfane Forge is a good place to make a life. But you still have to earn it. It may look quiet out here, well away from the capital, but we’re still king’s soldiers and we have a lot of lives and livelihoods to protect here. We do not slack in this garrison. You get lazy, or you don’t measure up, I send you right back to the comfy capital. Clear?”

“Clear, Captain!”

The boy actually grinned. Vetch was suddenly reminded of his own first days in the garrison, and all the years of his boyhood watching the soldiers in their sharp black and silver uniforms, how much he wanted to prove himself in their ranks.

Captain Tarese shoved the papers into her belt. “Alright. Vetch, Ennric, your shift’s about over, eh? Take Wenzl, show him around. Explain how things work here and find him a bunk. Wenzl, take your ease the rest of today. Stable your horse, get some food in you, and settle in. Uniform and assignment tomorrow. Until then ... welcome. It’s good to have some new blood from the King’s Capital here. You’ll have to fill me in on all the news from home later.” She turned her eyes upon the rest of the soldiers standing around and raised her brows. “As you were, soldiers.”

The three soldiers and the new recruit saluted as the captain turned and strode off back through the gate.

Vetch, Ennric, and Neschi looked to one another. Neschi grinned.

“This way, Wenzl,” she said. “This is the South Gate, the main gate into town. She turned and walked through.

Wenzl nodded, clicked his tongue and followed, leading his horse by its reins. Vetch crossed his arms. Ennric suppressed a chuckle.

The young recruit walked through the gate as one would through any open gate. But as the horse followed placidly on its reins, before it reached the open gate, suddenly its nose bumped into the invisible Barrier, just as if it had walked into a solid wall. The horse whinnied in surprise, pulled its head against its reins, and sidestepped back into the road. Wenzl stumbled and was yanked off his feet into the dirt.

Neschi doubled over laughing. Ennric and Vetch both chuckled. For his part, Wenzl didn’t look so much embarrassed at being the butt of the joke as amazed. The boy stood up, wide-eyed, and stared at where he now knew the magical Barrier was.

“Animals can’t pass through it, boy,” said Ennric. “And it’s only gold colored for a while after it’s first cast. It’s invisible after that. And it’s never down.”

Up the road a ways into town, Captain Tarese turned on her heel and looked back at the scene. She sighed and rolled her eyes.

“Do you three have that out of your systems now?” she called back, and without waiting for an answer, continued. “Good. Neschi, you can take the boy’s horse around the outside of town to the stables, unsaddle it, feed and water it, and brush it down. Vetch? Ennric? What I ordered before.”

Chastened, but still smiling, the three saluted again to see their captain off. Neschi accepted her punishment with grace and, after Wenzl had collected his saddlebags, took the horse from the boy to lead it around the outside of the town to the stables.

Vetch brushed some of the dust off the back of the new recruit’s surcoat and then clapped him on the shoulder with a grin. “That was it, Wenzl, we promise. Come on, we’ll drop your things off in the barracks and then take you around Moonfane Forge. I think we’re all hungry and thirsty, so we’ll start at the alehouse.”