Firian Rising

1 Firian Firian inched forward on his elbows to see over the ridge. Rocks cut into his arms, but he barely noticed the pain. When he reached the edge, he crouched down in the moon-shadow of a large tree to his right. Scanning the dark valley carefully, he saw what he had been hunting: a mountain-ghost. It glimmered faintly under the shadow of another tree. Then it drifted on across an open field, unaware of his presence. His stomach flipped. The ghost was huge and tall, with fierce fire in its eyes. Firian squared his shoulders. Maybe others would be afraid. Not him. He moved his eyes a fraction to the left, expecting to find his friend Caedmon lying flat on the tough grasses beside him. But no one was there. Wait, where was he? Firian spun his head around, only to see Caedmon standing sullenly a little way down the hill. “What are you doing?” Firian whispered. “I don’t feel like doing this,” he said in his normal speaking voice. “But right over there,” he hissed, “I found the—” Caedmon idly picked up a rock and chucked it at the tree where Firian was hiding. The rock pinged above him as he ducked. Chunks of bark pattered on his head. He turned back to the ghost. To his horror he found that it had discovered their position and was rushing toward them, faster than any man could run. The edges of its shimmering cloak now burned with a bright light. “i***t!” he screamed as he jumped up and ran back down the hill, dragging Caedmon along with him. They couldn’t outrun it this way. They’d be killed. “Firian! Firian, stop! I don’t want to play this game anymore. Let me go!” Caedmon wrenched Firian’s hand off his arm and jogged to a halt. The night and the mountains melted away, transforming into the bright, stark dirt that hurt Firian’s eyes. Low brown buildings sprang up here and there, the nearest one facing the clearing where a group of children played. He was back at the trade schools of Raewhith. “I don’t feel like playing this anymore. I don’t feel like doing anything,” he repeated. “Are you sick?” asked Firian. After all, Caedmon hadn’t come to school the day before. Looking irritated and tired, he scrunched his forehead down. “Maybe. I don’t know.” “Is that why you weren’t here yesterday?” Caedmon shot him a black look and stalked away to be by himself. It was just a question. Firian was alone again, and fighting a mountain-ghost wasn’t as fun by himself. He imagined other adventures all the time at home. Here at least, he could play with other people. Sure, sometimes he got hurt when he imagined battles, but it was still more fun than trade school. He just couldn’t let his father see his scars. One of his teachers, Mr. Harlenn, stepped out of the small school building. “Come on,” he cried, clapping his hands. “Break is over. It’s time for lesson.” With many groans and derogatory remarks, all the children followed him inside. Firian only realized that he had forgotten to eat lunch after he had been swept inside. Somewhere out in the little dirt clearing there was some bread and cheese and even a cookie that his mother had made. Now ants were probably eating it and he wouldn’t be allowed to have anything else until later that night. If only he’d stowed the cookie away in his pocket. Sighing, he slid down to his section of the long, pockmarked bench. The rough-hewn bench had never been comfortable, but he suspected that that was all part of Mr. Harlenn’s plan to get them to pay attention. His teacher walked slowly up the aisle between benches, inspecting the boys. His eyes rested a little longer on Firian than on the rest. Firian didn’t look back, and instead reached under the seat and took out his lead piece and something to write on. Some drawings were left from the last time he’d sat in that class, so he scratched them out before anyone could see. The teachers thought he had an unhealthy imagination, but he thought it was much more enjoyable than the real world of overbearing teachers. “We’re going to continue talking about multiplication today,” Mr. Harlenn said. This information would probably be important when Firian made glass like his father, but now it was unbearably boring. After all, he was only eleven and his apprenticeship was a year away. “If you sell seven items for three tokens each, how many tokens have you earned?” Mr. Harlenn called on another student for the answer, so Firian focused instead on the globes. Once he had seen his teacher blowing through a long tube with a glowing glob of glass on the end. Slowly, the glob expanded like a soap bubble until it looked like an eggplant. Before that, he had thought glass was always solid, like a sort of rock that his father cut into windows. But it could change and morph into all kinds of shapes. Sometimes he felt like asking if he could try shaping the fiery glass in a new way. But no one would let him do that. The globes were for the palace of Brithnem, the capital of the Western Kingdom. Raewhith, on the very outskirts of the Kingdom, separated from Brithnem by mountains, still had to do their part to support the huge nation. Next to him, Ewin was drawing squares, triangles, swirls, eyes. Firian leaned over to him. “Do you know where Caedmon was yesterday?” he breathed. “He was being tested,” came the quiet reply. “Why?” “To see if he was good enough to be a Tanyu, stupid.” “A Tanyu?” Ewin nodded slightly. “Before he left, he made it sound like he was a Tanyu already. Everyone wanted to slug him by the end of the day.” A smug smile flashed across his mouth. “He didn’t make it. He won’t even talk about it.” “I know that,” said Firian. “You stay if you’re accepted.” “Aw, he deserved it, after talking that way yesterday.” “Have you ever been tested, Ewin?” “No.” Caedmon hit him on the back of the head. “Yes, you have, you liar!” Ewin turned very red. “Sorry,” Firian said. “Shut up,” Ewin replied. “Ewin!” Mr. Harlenn said next. “If you’ve earned twenty-one tokens, how many coins does that equal? And how many coins will you need to earn to create the same amount of stock?” Firian bit his lip and looked down. The first question was easy, but the second was ridiculous. Did Mr. Harlenn ever say how much the items cost to make in the first place? He didn’t think so. There was a short pause. “I think Firian should answer that question, sir,” Ewin said. “Why is that?” “Because he was making me talk in your class, Mr. Harlenn.” “Is that so, Firian?” “He thinks it is, sir,” he replied, tight-lipped. He clamped his jaw tight and looked down. The room felt hot, and he twirled the lead piece in his fingers. The teacher peered down at him. “Well. Same question.” “Two coins, one token, sir.” He took a breath and felt anger choke him. He knew he should stop there, but he couldn’t. “You never said how much the items cost to make so there’s no way I can answer the second part. Make your questions clearer next time, sir. Most of the time you don’t even teach us the answer before you ask. You just assume we weren’t listening to anything you were saying, sir.” A few boys giggled under their breath at his boldness. Mr. Harlenn set his mouth in a hard line and lifted an eyebrow. His eyes became flecks of black stone and his rigid body was framed starkly against the wall of globes. “I believe that you want to leave this room as much as we want you to,” he said coldly, pointing toward the door. “You may go now.” Everyone watched Firian as he deliberately set his things back under the bench and left, closing the door behind him. The air was colder and less musty outside. With calculated breathing, he marched to the nearest tree and punched it as hard as he could. The bark scraped the skin off his knuckles but the pain helped to soothe his rage. It wasn’t fair. He’d told the truth. But his teachers never wanted the truth. He looked around. He couldn’t go home early again. So he found his lunch in a little grove of trees. The bread was a little dirty but ants weren’t swarming it. Even the cookie was still there. He stuffed it in his mouth whole. A few crumbs spilled from his open mouth as he chewed. His mother would have been angry with him for eating his sweets first, but he didn’t care. Gripping the rest of his lunch, he took everything past his trade school and across the dirt road. Several shops where real tradesmen worked lined the street. He kept his face aimed straight ahead toward his sister’s school, but he still felt the eyes of Rhys, the town’s rope and basket maker, following him. Sometimes he told on him, the sneak. Finally out of sight of the road, he found a stump where he could eat the rest of his food in peace. Several hours later, boys and girls started pouring out of the school buildings, most of them eager to be gone. Firian stopped sucking his stinging knuckles and perked his ears for the sound of his sister’s voice. He stood up, dusting off the seat of his pants, and ran to entrance of the girls’ school. There she was, saying goodbye to a few friends. Brett was always surrounded by friends. He didn’t like them. Brett had been his best friend for a long time when they were younger, but now she was almost thirteen and had other friends. He ran up to her, ignoring the other girls. “Come on, Brett. Time to go home,” he said as he began to lead her away. “You’re out early,” she replied, pacing after him. She waved backward to a girl with short black hair, and then jogged up to match his fierce pace. “I walked fast,” he said, irritated that she would mention it. Her soft brown eyes filled with concern. He had her full attention now. “Is something wrong, Firian?” “No. I’m fine.” “Did you get out early again?” How does she always know? “It’s not your business what I do,” said Firian sullenly. Pursing her lips, Brett tossed her long glossy hair back over her shoulder. “That’s the third time this month. Mother and Father won’t be happy about that.” “They won’t learn about it.” A strain passed over her fine features and Firian knew she was torn between siding with her him or their parents. “I’ll let you have all the rest of the cookies if you won’t say anything about this one time,” he said. “Well… all right,” she conceded, breaking into a smile. “But if you do it again, you’ll be in trouble. What do you do to get the teachers so mad all the time?” He shrugged. “I don’t know. They just don’t like me.” “Sometimes I think that Miss Dasa doesn’t like me, but she never throws me out of her class.” Brett didn’t understand. Firian shook his head, wishing he could get angry with her, but… he loved her too much. Just like everybody else. “You just don’t understand,” he told her. “I don’t like trade school and they don’t like me there either. I wish I could be twelve now and get away from all those people.” But then he would have to be Father’s apprentice for six years before he’d be considered a man and could start his own shop. He squinted down at the road. Awful choices. “I’m sorry, Firian,” she said, and she meant it. Cresting the top of the hill, a horse and rider clomped toward them, pulling a cart behind. Firian grabbed Brett’s hand and dragged her to the side of the road. Her face twisted in an amused grimace, but she went with him anyway. Firian put himself between her and the rider as it passed. From the top of that hill, they could see their little cottage. It sat back from the road, but part of the roof peeked out from the trees. Small, with a wooden roof and a wooden door, it was just like all the others in the little town of Raewhith. Behind it was a small garden where they grew vegetables and herbs. Firian bustled inside and kicked off his dusty shoes. Mother set down the rag she had been running over the furniture and gave them both a wan smile. She wasn’t an emotional woman, didn’t hug them as his friends’ mothers did. Instead, she stayed careful and still. She glanced at Brett and then at Firian a moment. Seeming preoccupied, she picked up the cloth again. A hint of pink colored her gray cheeks. “You better start dinner, Brett. Your father will be home soon.” Brett dashed through to the second room, toward the food pantry and the stove. Firian tromped after her. She busied herself with the food and he headed toward the small pile of firewood in the corner. It wasn’t very cold, but Father always liked to have a fire going. He stacked the wood in one arm, a piece at a time. Clonk, clonk. How much could he carry? One time he had carried seven pieces at once. Maybe he could do better. The load grew until it reached eye level. His muscles strained and he finally had to use the other arm to stop all the wood from dropping. He spun around, just able to see over the top log. The knife Brett was holding stopped in midair above a handful of spring onions. Her eyes widened, exasperated, but a smile spread across her face as she turned to chopping again. The door creaked open. Father was home. Firian only hesitated a moment before hefting his load of firewood into the front room. He chanced a look at Father. His tough, thin frame looked bent like a spring. He rarely smiled, but today his lips were pursed. A bad sign. Mother smiled politely and looked around the room a little as if to present it to him. Father followed her eyes and apparently found everything in his house satisfactory. “How was your day at the shop, dear?” Mother asked, moving some of her ashy hair away from her face. At the fireplace, Firian tried to set down his load quietly, but the freshly cut wood went tumbling, crashing out of his arms. He cringed and caught his breath. Not daring to look up, he started putting the pieces gently into the fireplace, his stomach in knots. “Not very good,” Father said with gritted teeth. More of his materials must have been stolen by thieves from Archer’s Point again. Coke for the furnace, molds, cooling windowpanes…. He knew his family couldn’t afford to lose any more. And whenever there was trouble at the shop, they felt it at home. Firian braced himself. “Hello, Father!” Brett’s voice. “Hello, darling.” Father’s voice softened just a little as he greeted his favorite child. Sweet Brett never contradicted him. Ever since Firian could remember, Father had never acted like he hated her. With Brett in the room, Firian could stand up and turn around. Father’s tired gaze strayed over to him. “Yanon,” Mother said quietly, “I have—” “What is that, Firian?” Father was looking at Firian’s scabbed knuckles. One of them was bleeding again. Firian put his hands behind his back, but it was too late. “How have you hurt yourself? Come here. Let me see,” Father said, coming forward and gesturing with a finger. Firian’s pounding heart hurt against his ribcage. Having no other choice, he presented his hands to his father. Mother sucked in a startled gasp. “Oh, Yanon, I’m sorry! How could I have missed…?” Father hummed, like the low growl of an animal. “How did this happen, Firian?” Firian’s blood was pumping. “I…” – he felt the attention of all his family – “I fell,” he said. “And only scraped your hands?” Father raised a dark eyebrow. “You didn’t get in a fight again, did you? You didn’t hurt anyone?” He always seemed to get into fights with his schoolmates. And he would win, which got him into more trouble. That wasn’t the case this time, but how could he tell them that he had punched a tree? It sounded stupid now. Besides, then they would find out why he was so angry and he couldn’t let that happen. “Brett, darling? Do you know why he is hurt?” Father asked, turning to her. All the cookies, Brett. Firian put as much meaning in his look as he could muster without drawing attention to himself. It was a large sacrifice for him for her silence. He knew she could easily assume why he had bloody knuckles. “Brett?” Seeing the indecision on his sister’s face, Mother turned back to Firian, her face drawn with disappointment. “You didn’t get dismissed from school again, did you?” “Did you?” pressed his father. Firian hesitated. Striking him hard across the face, Father snapped, “Answer me, Firian. Did you?” “Yes, I did, sir,” he mumbled. Both his parents rolled their eyes in disbelief. “Firian!” Even Brett seemed amazed that he confessed. He planned on taking at least a few cookies now. Father seized one of his injured hands, and tossed it away in disgust. “What did you do?” “I answered a question correctly, sir.” “Firian! No one asked you to leave for answering a question correctly. I’ve had enough of this. What did you do to your hands?” “I hit something, sir.” “What did you hit?” “A… tree.” “A tree?” “I was angry, sir.” Father huffed out a disgusted breath. “Firian, quit talking back or I’ll pull you out of the school!” “I would like that, sir,” Firian murmured. “That’s enough!” Father roared, grabbing him roughly and dragging him across the room. His fingers dug deep into his thin shoulder. “No dinner tonight!” He hurled Firian away in exasperation. When Firian glanced back over his shoulder, he saw Mother backing away from Father as he stalked toward their room. “How did I get such a scut for a son?” he growled, disappearing into the room. “Firian, go to your room,” Mother said quietly, picking up the rag and starting to clean once again.