Welcome to my seemingly endless journey.
A trip that will take you to places I might have visited many moons ago.
It´s a tale that came back to me when I meditated on one of my past lives. A life I told you about in my unbelievable true story.
As promised in that story I will now share this story with you.
Chapter 13
Where do you draw the line Dear Reader?
Every night I smuggle in some of the food with a long shelf life to my place unnoticed. With the rations we receive at the end of winter, it proves impossible to stack enough food like this. I needed another way and I see only one option.
I am not proud at all of what I came up with, but I need a supply of dried fish and meat, flour, and beans. It will be difficult because these supplies are well protected.
In the end wasn't so bad, after all some of that food was meant for me and what I am going to take is less than what is due to me until the first harvest. That I would claim it in one go and not inform anyone about it was perhaps not neat, but at least it wasn´t theft I tell myself.
My plan was simple the night of my departure I would sneak into the cave. I would be far gone by the ti, the count was taken as that always happens late in the afternoon. Only then they would discover that a part was missing. Not much later they would discover that I am no longer there either. The link will be made quickly, though they would be guessing why until the day I return.
I plan not to inform anyone in the village of my trip. Neither would I talk to Numico's parents, I couldn't involve a child in this dangerous venture. Besides, they would never approve. It would entail too many risks.
What would I say to Numioc?
The idea of having to keep it a secret for him, or worse, to lie, cut through my soul like a jagged arrow, piercing at full force. I had trouble swallowing and a tear welled up. Leaving Numico behind, I didn't want to, but I had to protect him. Was it my head, my heart, or my ego who wanted to take him, and who stopped me?
In view of the risks, it was also necessary to familiarize myself with current weapons. It was years ago that I had used a bow, and it was only to hunt. Nothing in our tribe is as subject to innovation as the weapons of the young men and women.
Our bows are for hunting, as none of us has ever faced another human being with them. Yet we are all trained in hand-to-hand combat. The military side of our tribe was traced back to the sea devils who drove us out. Since then, our community has armed itself.
Both men and women are trained in the art of the defensive blow from the age of twelve. Disarm and incapacitate the enemy, with and without a weapon. However, it should be clear that the fight is inevitable, it is never allowed to be the aggressor. That is the golden rule, an oath that each of us takes.
Generation after generation, the techniques have been perfected to such an extent that those who master them well have very lethal hands. Unfortunately, my last training was long ago. I need a very good reason to join the young once again.
Because why should I?
I who never left the village anyway.
The idea came quite quickly, I would join in order to keep my mind and body sharp and active. I told the trainer that I felt out of shape and because I didn't have a wife yet I thought it necessary to improve my muscles and condition. That would make me a more attractive party. The trainer, gilded with his own body, could understand this all too well and so I was admitted.
During the training, I kept to myself being too fanatical would attract attention. After training, I would spend the afternoons I normally used writing and meditating with intense workouts in a densely wooded area just outside the village.
The sword was still the same, but there were new lighter, and smaller throwing axes that were more effective and more deadly than the big axes of my time. In addition, the old bow I had learned to use had evolved into a lighter and more powerful model. Daily I trained myself in the use of these weapons out of sight of the tribe.
Days passed like ships in a storm, the nights passed even faster. Sometimes a week had already passed without me realizing it. Pleasant is different, but I feel stronger and more dexterous. It is as if I am appropriating my body more and more, something I had failed to do before.
The physical had never been my strong point, my preference was the spirit. Now I learn that this is also about finding balance in order to achieve a more balanced being. Because even though I'm dead tired and falling asleep early in the evening, my choices in recent times are becoming increasingly clear to me.
It started with my own aloofness. Because I was locked up in my own mind, she could also have seized power over the feeling. She had protected me from the tears of the past by letting my feelings remain silent and giving me only reason.
I never understood why I couldn't find love with the women of my tribe, couldn't build deep friendships with the men I grew up with. I told myself that it was because I was different. Now I see that it was my wish not to let them closer.
Then something had snapped in spite of my resistance, forcing me to look my sorrow in the eye, to conquer it instead of moving away from it. Would this upcoming journey free my heart enough to open it to warmth and gentle caresses?
It required weeks of intense training but now I was as physically strong as most of the young men of my tribe and had mastered the combat techniques to such an extent that I could blindly fend off an attacker.
This also meant my last reason not to leave was hereby gone. I now had to take the step I had been preparing for so long. Three nights from now there would be no moon. This would be the ideal night to leave.
Still, there was this one thing, something that would not let me go. The eyes with stars, the child's face with the wise voice.
Numico had asked me to take him and I had more or less given him my word. Was it my secret desire not to leave the village that made sure every possible straw was grasped to prevent my departure? Or was it the boy's wish, which he cherished so much that I was constantly confronted with it?
I had to tell him face to face. I could not live with myself I would leave without telling him.
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