The Story of Briette Part I
Our story follows Briette the Wood Elf and her experiences in the world of Aurasong. Part one.
Briette's mother is called Lastaiell and her father is called Azilizat. Born on the 15th of November of 979, she brought warmth to her parents hearts in an especially cold winter that year. With no siblings, she was able to soak up all the attention her parents were able to give.
Briette learned quickly as a toddler, her parents were proud of her quick development. Her uncle Melleid and aunt Maethriel were around fairly often to bond with Briette as they had no children of their own yet, waiting until the time was right. Briette's parents were tree guides, someone that shapes living wood through magic and intelligent design to build houses and other structures. This kind of architecture was fairly common in elven cities, they do not cut down trees for wood.
Her uncle Melleid was a member of the Alfalya Armed Forces, working as a scout making sure the borders stay secure. As soon as Briette started walking and talking, just like all other elves, she was starting to learn how to use sword and bow. Elves take great pride in their ability with both and so both girls and boys are taught how to use them from an early age. A small number of years later she was taught painting and singing, art forms her mother loved doing.
Briette spent more time with her mother as her father Azilizat's skills as a tree guide were often sought after by the royal builders looking after and expanding the royal palace. Briette enjoyed painting and singing with her mother, braiding each others long and light blond hair while her mother told her stories about the people outside the magic forest they live in. She told her about the short grumpy people with large beards that live in the mountains which are visible from here far away to the south east. Those people are called dwarves. "They make stone statues taller than the tallest tree."
"They enjoy huge feasts and drink so much ale in a day that it would be enough to put a dragon to sleep." she would say, after which Briette would let out a loud laugh. Briette curiously asked: "What about humans? Uncle told me that they live to the north east but never said much about them." Her mother replied with an inquisitive look: "Humans? Humans look at lot like us, except their ears are rounded off at the top. They build great stone buildings called castles and they make their towns out of stone too. Sometimes they use wood but hurt the trees by cutting them down and sawing their logs into planks which they nail together to build their structures."
Briette looked at her mother in shock. "Why don't they use tree guiding like you and dad do? Why would they hurt the trees like that?"
Lastaiell her mother replied with a slight sadness in her eyes: "They don't know any better, they are misguided."
To which Briette answered with an innocent smile: "Then I will teach them to do it right! And I will teach the dwarves to love the forests too instead of the cold mountains."
Her mother just smiled and hugged her. Briette loved listening to the many stories about humans and dwarves that her mother and father could tell her. She thought maybe she could even go travel the world one day to see them all. From there on she started dreaming about bringing people together and to see the world.
One day after her 14th birthday, her uncle Melleid didn't return home from a scouting mission. Struck down by dwarven soldiers.
Once Melleid's body was recovered, Briette's family organised a funeral for him. To return him to the earth. He was buried under the roots of a large yew tree.
Briette focused more on her on sword and archery training, thinking to herself that perhaps the other creatures in this world weren't as great and wonderful as she imagined through her parents stories. Having seen death caused to one of her family members by the outside world she thought perhaps one way to still see the world and keep her people safe would be to join the armed forces. She always liked the look of the uniforms and hearing about the great skill of the blade dancers, an elite set of troops specially selected from the best soldiers in the kingdom. Briette trained hard, putting her body through much strain to get stronger, more agile and faster. Eventually she joined the armed forces.
Her examiners saw much potential in her and let join as a sharpshooter.
Briette continued training hard, only singing and painting on the odd occasion but still seeing her mother and father whenever she had some free time.
Her parents were concerned for her but encouraged her to follow whatever makes her happy. During her time as a sharpshooter she made a few good friends in the Alfalya Armed Forces and learned about their dreams and aspirations. Most of her duties so far were tree top patrols where she would jump from tree to tree high in the air to keep an eye out for any danger that could have been missed by the border patrols.
Her father Azilizat, having been around many high ranking officials at the palace that he worked at began speaking to the people he got to know over the years. So after sweet talking some of the officials, they agreed to consider Briette for a position in the Alfalya Blade Dancers. Then after a couple of months, Briette was asked to see her commander. She was greeted by an officer of the Alfalya Blade Dancers standing next to her commander.
Briette couldn't believe her ears when she heard them say that she was given permission to run a trial to join the Blade Dancers.
She overexcitedly accepted.
The three year long training after the trial was just as gruesome as the original trial itself. Day in, day out, Briette was pushed past her limits and at times she thought that she would just give up eventually as she felt like she couldn't take it anymore. She wasn't even allowed to see her parents as she was ordered to stay in the training camp for the duration of the training. The other people being trained made it look so easy when it was their turn, this discouraged Briette even more as she was struggling so much. However Briette pushed through and succeeded. After the three years were over she graduated from the training program and was given her first rank as a blade dancer and her uniform. As soon as she was allowed, she ran to her parents home wearing her uniform to show it off to them. She told them everything she went through, how she almost gave up and the terrible conditions she had to endure.
Her parents were incredibly proud that their daughter managed to join the Alfalya Blade Dancers, a great honour. The Alfalya Blade Dancers are almost entirely made up of female soldiers Briette noticed, she was never sure why that is but never really thought to ask. Presumable something to do with psychological warfare she guessed.
It didn't take long for Briette to get her first assignment.
She was put into a unit of 8 blade dancers. All equipped with the same equipment, two short swords with one attached to each thigh, a short bow with a downsized quiver with five arrows, throwing daggers, a regular dagger, rope, bandages, a water skin and a small pouch with dried fruits.
While all their equipment was the same their ranks differed.
Briette was one of four 1st rankers, then there were three 2nd rankers and one 3rd ranker called Rostriel. The assignment was as follows, there was a group of mounted dwarven soldiers expected to ride through the magic forest to attack a forward position of the Alfalya Armed Forces. Among those dwarven soldiers is an officer that led a devastating ambush the year before against the Alfalya Armed Forces which ended up killing a friend of the King. The blade dancers are to kill that officer and bring his head back to the palace as proof. "Sounds simple enough" Thought Briette. When it was time to head out, Briette wasn't sure whether she felt excited or scared but there was no time to think about that right now. The 3rd ranker was explaining her plan to the rest of the unit, the 2nd rankers are to figure out the exact path the dwarves will take and how many there are, while the rest are to wait in the trees for information from the 2nd rankers. Once this information has gotten to the unit, they are to take positions in the trees above the expected path.
Everyone except Rostriel is to fire one arrow and drop out of the trees with their dual short swords attacking the regular soldiers around the officer and drive them away from him as quickly as possible. Once the officer is isolated Rostriel will fire an arrow into the officers unarmored face, killing him. Rostriel will then drop out of the trees and remove the officers head before giving the command to everyone to disengage and retreat. Briette ran the plan through her head and the confidence of her comrades calmed her down a bit. It was a sunny day, the forest was calm, the birds and insects singing like they always do. Briette enjoyed the fast paced walk through the forest, almost forgetting where she was going and why. She jerked out of her daydream when one of her companions patted her on the back and told her to focus. Eventually they reached their destination and the 2nd rank members went off to look for the dwarves and gather information to predict their path. Briette was sitting high up in one of the trees like her comrades, waiting. After what felt like an eternity, the 2nd rank members returned. They shared the information they gathered, their target is with this group of soldiers but it is larger than expected. 75 dwarves on battle boars, heavily armed and wielding hammers, axes and crossbows. Thankfully the commander is wearing well decorated and engraved armor so he is easy to spot. They informed everyone of the path the dwarves are most likely going to take, the path of least resistance, following an old creek bed with relatively small amounts of obstacles in the way. Even though there are more dwarves than expected, Rostriel announced that the mission is going to go ahead. "We have the element of surprise on our side so we just need to be quick in our execution of the plan. We are the Alfalya Blade Dancers, if anyone can do it then it's us." Rostriel said. Everyone took up positions, trusting in the path prediction that was made. Luckily the dwarves could be heard, the sound of the battle boars running across the empty creek bed made a lot of noise. Just as expected they were moving right under Briette's unit. Though something seemed off, there were less dwarves than the initial report said though there was no time right now to revaluate. The time was now. Everyone waited for Rostriel's signal. Time felt like it was going in slow motion and then suddenly the signal was given.
Everyone fired their readied bows at the dwarves riding underneath them. Most arrows bounced off the dwarves heavy armor, only one finding its way past a gap and into the shoulder of one of the dwarves. Almost lightning quick Briette and the other blade dancers dropped out of the tree onto the ground near the commander, stabbing and slashing at the boars and their riders, twirling and leaping from target to target in a great display of agility to create confusion and avoid the hits of the dwarves as they swung their hammers and axes.
Rostriel fired her arrow but the commander suddenly looked down so her arrow hit the top of his helmet and bounced off. To give Rostriel more time the blade dancers continued their actions, though one of the 1st rankers got hit by a hammer and trampled by one of the battle boars. Suddenly Rostriel yelled something out of the tree she was in but the blade dancers on the ground couldn't make out what she said. Then all the dwarves moved out onto the sides of the creek bed a good distance away from the blade dancers all at the same time.
When Briette saw why that was happening she saw about 12 dwarves riding straight at the blade dancers, they were fast and it happened so quick that almost no one had time to react. The hammers of the riders stuck the blade dancers almost with surgical precision as they rode past. Some of the blade dancers managed to jump out of the way up into the trees but the majority couldn't. Briette was one of the lucky ones, only being struck on the left upper arm, shattering her bone where as some of the others were struck in the head or chest. It seems the dwarves expected something like this to happen and hatched a plan against it, and it worked. Briette jumped out of the way into the trees, not even feeling the pain of her shattered arm only noticing that she can't move it.
Rostriel gave the order to retreat. Briette decided to continue following the dwarven commander and his troops up in the trees. Rostriel noticed Briette ignoring the order and tried to catch up to her. Eventually the dwarves clashed with the forward position of the Alfalya Armed Forces. Rostriel caught up to Briette during this and ordered her to retreat, Briette however voiced that she can still fulfil the mission so that the deaths of her comrades wasn't for nothing. Rostriel protested and giving the order again to retreat but before she could finish talking Briette jumped onto another tree and continue moving as she saw an opportunity.
During the fight with the Alfalya Armed Forces the commander was injured and began moving back with a small number of riders. Briette saw this and followed him. At some point during the fighting the boar the commander was riding was injured and it now lost all its strength. The boar collapsed and threw the commander down a decline. As he fell and rolled, Briette honed in on him, this was her chance as the other dwarven riders had to stop and turn back spending time to get to their commander.
Rostriel continued followed Briette and saw that she was about to manage to save the mission. As the dwarven commander stopped falling down the decline in the landscape, he lost his helmet and weapon, Briette was running along the ground and jumped on top of his chest. Her short sword ready to strike at the unprotected head of the dwarf. Having never taken a life before, Briette hesitated hovering the sword above the dwarf's head, he looked at her not saying a word, just staring at Briette and breathing.
She looked at the dwarven commander, the first time seeing a dwarf up close. The intricate detail of his beard matching what she had heard in her mothers stories, the rough expression of a hard life in his face. Briette looked him in the eyes, it felt wrong to strike her sword at him so she stood there in silence for a moment which felt much longer than it actually was, it felt like looking at the eyes of an injured deer to her, pleading for its life. As she stood there Rostriel saw her hesitation and ran towards her to finish the job, however the other dwarven riders were quicker and so Briette and Rostriel jumped back and had to run away. On the way back once they were in safe space again, Briette started to feel an incredible pain coming from her left arm. As she looked at it, it was heavily bruised and had a piece of bone sticking out of it. Rostriel didn't say anything when they stopped to look at Briette's arm. Once she finished examining it, Rostriel simple said: "We can fix that in the city, come." Briette felt like there was great anger brewing in Rostriel and she knew why, so she tried to apologize but was quickly cut off by Rostriel. "What happened back there?!" She yelled infuriated. "First you ignore my order to retreat and then you hesitate killing our target!" She continued.
Briette didn't know what to say, she tried to stammer some kind of explanation but was again cut off by Rostriel raising her hand at her. "I don't want to hear it but you don't seem like blade dancer material if you pull things like that." Rostriel said with anger in her voice. Rostriel continued walking towards the city.
Briette dropped to her knees and started crying. She wept for a long time and felt this pit in her stomach which almost felt worse than her arm. She knew that this likely ended her career as a blade dancer. Eventually she picked herself up and continued towards the city. When she got there, she was quickly taken to a carers tent to fix her injury.
Using magic and various plants to heal her, it only took two weeks to heal her arm. On her last day in the carers tent, the officer of the Alfalya Blade Dancers, the one that originally allowed her to do the first trail, entered her tent.
She asked Briette how she felt. Briette answered a short and quick reply of: "I feel better thank you.".
The officer nodded at her reply before speaking: "You know why I'm here right?". Briette replied by only giving a sad nod. The officer sat down on the bed that Briette was laying in. She then continued: "I saw great potential in you, I was surprised when I heard what happened." She paused before continuing: "You ignored direct orders from a superior and then hesitated when you were about to kill your target. I suppose I was wrong about you. I am here to inform you that you are no longer a member of the Alfalya Blade Dancers or the Armed Forces. I wish you well Briette." Briette just starting sobbing and crying to herself as the officer left.
However she started thinking to herself that perhaps this wasn't such a bad thing, becoming some kind of killer is not her dream and coming face to face with such a decision made her realize that. Her true dream is to bring people together and see the world. Upon arriving home, Briette told her parents everything. They hugged her and told her that everything will be okay, there are many other fulfilling opportunities in life. She spent a couple years at home with her parents, focusing on the things she loves such as painting and singing. She also spent time with some of her friends from the armed forces from time to time. After talking to her friends and some acquaintances in her life she became interested in becoming an adventurer, this way she can help people and see the world at the same time. She informed her parents of her idea who tried to talk her out of it as being an adventurer is dangerous business but she was determined that is what she wants to do. So Briette started preparing for her journey of being an adventurer. See part 2.
Childhood
Briette grew up in the elven city of Alfalya, which is the capital of a small kingdom with the same name. The kingdom and its city are on a large island called the Island of Kunau.Briette's mother is called Lastaiell and her father is called Azilizat. Born on the 15th of November of 979, she brought warmth to her parents hearts in an especially cold winter that year. With no siblings, she was able to soak up all the attention her parents were able to give.
Briette learned quickly as a toddler, her parents were proud of her quick development. Her uncle Melleid and aunt Maethriel were around fairly often to bond with Briette as they had no children of their own yet, waiting until the time was right. Briette's parents were tree guides, someone that shapes living wood through magic and intelligent design to build houses and other structures. This kind of architecture was fairly common in elven cities, they do not cut down trees for wood.
Her uncle Melleid was a member of the Alfalya Armed Forces, working as a scout making sure the borders stay secure. As soon as Briette started walking and talking, just like all other elves, she was starting to learn how to use sword and bow. Elves take great pride in their ability with both and so both girls and boys are taught how to use them from an early age. A small number of years later she was taught painting and singing, art forms her mother loved doing.
Briette spent more time with her mother as her father Azilizat's skills as a tree guide were often sought after by the royal builders looking after and expanding the royal palace. Briette enjoyed painting and singing with her mother, braiding each others long and light blond hair while her mother told her stories about the people outside the magic forest they live in. She told her about the short grumpy people with large beards that live in the mountains which are visible from here far away to the south east. Those people are called dwarves. "They make stone statues taller than the tallest tree."
"They enjoy huge feasts and drink so much ale in a day that it would be enough to put a dragon to sleep." she would say, after which Briette would let out a loud laugh. Briette curiously asked: "What about humans? Uncle told me that they live to the north east but never said much about them." Her mother replied with an inquisitive look: "Humans? Humans look at lot like us, except their ears are rounded off at the top. They build great stone buildings called castles and they make their towns out of stone too. Sometimes they use wood but hurt the trees by cutting them down and sawing their logs into planks which they nail together to build their structures."
Briette looked at her mother in shock. "Why don't they use tree guiding like you and dad do? Why would they hurt the trees like that?"
Lastaiell her mother replied with a slight sadness in her eyes: "They don't know any better, they are misguided."
To which Briette answered with an innocent smile: "Then I will teach them to do it right! And I will teach the dwarves to love the forests too instead of the cold mountains."
Her mother just smiled and hugged her. Briette loved listening to the many stories about humans and dwarves that her mother and father could tell her. She thought maybe she could even go travel the world one day to see them all. From there on she started dreaming about bringing people together and to see the world.
Teens
As Briette got older, she learned about the skirmishes her people fight with the dwarves due to their unwillingness to adhere to any sort of tree cutting quota to limit their industrious destruction on nature. This saddened her as she liked imagining the great stone carvings of the dwarves and how she wanted to visit them one day to admire the art of the dwarven people.One day after her 14th birthday, her uncle Melleid didn't return home from a scouting mission. Struck down by dwarven soldiers.
Once Melleid's body was recovered, Briette's family organised a funeral for him. To return him to the earth. He was buried under the roots of a large yew tree.
Briette focused more on her on sword and archery training, thinking to herself that perhaps the other creatures in this world weren't as great and wonderful as she imagined through her parents stories. Having seen death caused to one of her family members by the outside world she thought perhaps one way to still see the world and keep her people safe would be to join the armed forces. She always liked the look of the uniforms and hearing about the great skill of the blade dancers, an elite set of troops specially selected from the best soldiers in the kingdom. Briette trained hard, putting her body through much strain to get stronger, more agile and faster. Eventually she joined the armed forces.
Her examiners saw much potential in her and let join as a sharpshooter.
Briette continued training hard, only singing and painting on the odd occasion but still seeing her mother and father whenever she had some free time.
Her parents were concerned for her but encouraged her to follow whatever makes her happy. During her time as a sharpshooter she made a few good friends in the Alfalya Armed Forces and learned about their dreams and aspirations. Most of her duties so far were tree top patrols where she would jump from tree to tree high in the air to keep an eye out for any danger that could have been missed by the border patrols.
Adulthood
Getting tired of the same old assignments for the last few years she asked for different duties and was told that she would get more interesting duties in the future and to only be patient. Briette vented her frustration to her parents who assured her that her talent won't be overlooked and just have patience.Her father Azilizat, having been around many high ranking officials at the palace that he worked at began speaking to the people he got to know over the years. So after sweet talking some of the officials, they agreed to consider Briette for a position in the Alfalya Blade Dancers. Then after a couple of months, Briette was asked to see her commander. She was greeted by an officer of the Alfalya Blade Dancers standing next to her commander.
Briette couldn't believe her ears when she heard them say that she was given permission to run a trial to join the Blade Dancers.
She overexcitedly accepted.
The Blade Dancers
After running the gruesome trial to join the Blade Dancers, which included holding ones breath under water for several minutes, leaping great distances from tree to tree, staying undetected while moving through a mock "enemy" camp performing various tasks, running great distances at top speed, preparing camouflage in record time to hide in the forest, survive extreme temperatures for long durations of time and many other tests of stamina, agility, strength and mind. Briette barely managed to pass, her body was broken after those tests and took a while to recover. Unbeknownst to her, this was only the start.The three year long training after the trial was just as gruesome as the original trial itself. Day in, day out, Briette was pushed past her limits and at times she thought that she would just give up eventually as she felt like she couldn't take it anymore. She wasn't even allowed to see her parents as she was ordered to stay in the training camp for the duration of the training. The other people being trained made it look so easy when it was their turn, this discouraged Briette even more as she was struggling so much. However Briette pushed through and succeeded. After the three years were over she graduated from the training program and was given her first rank as a blade dancer and her uniform. As soon as she was allowed, she ran to her parents home wearing her uniform to show it off to them. She told them everything she went through, how she almost gave up and the terrible conditions she had to endure.
Her parents were incredibly proud that their daughter managed to join the Alfalya Blade Dancers, a great honour. The Alfalya Blade Dancers are almost entirely made up of female soldiers Briette noticed, she was never sure why that is but never really thought to ask. Presumable something to do with psychological warfare she guessed.
It didn't take long for Briette to get her first assignment.
She was put into a unit of 8 blade dancers. All equipped with the same equipment, two short swords with one attached to each thigh, a short bow with a downsized quiver with five arrows, throwing daggers, a regular dagger, rope, bandages, a water skin and a small pouch with dried fruits.
While all their equipment was the same their ranks differed.
Briette was one of four 1st rankers, then there were three 2nd rankers and one 3rd ranker called Rostriel. The assignment was as follows, there was a group of mounted dwarven soldiers expected to ride through the magic forest to attack a forward position of the Alfalya Armed Forces. Among those dwarven soldiers is an officer that led a devastating ambush the year before against the Alfalya Armed Forces which ended up killing a friend of the King. The blade dancers are to kill that officer and bring his head back to the palace as proof. "Sounds simple enough" Thought Briette. When it was time to head out, Briette wasn't sure whether she felt excited or scared but there was no time to think about that right now. The 3rd ranker was explaining her plan to the rest of the unit, the 2nd rankers are to figure out the exact path the dwarves will take and how many there are, while the rest are to wait in the trees for information from the 2nd rankers. Once this information has gotten to the unit, they are to take positions in the trees above the expected path.
Everyone except Rostriel is to fire one arrow and drop out of the trees with their dual short swords attacking the regular soldiers around the officer and drive them away from him as quickly as possible. Once the officer is isolated Rostriel will fire an arrow into the officers unarmored face, killing him. Rostriel will then drop out of the trees and remove the officers head before giving the command to everyone to disengage and retreat. Briette ran the plan through her head and the confidence of her comrades calmed her down a bit. It was a sunny day, the forest was calm, the birds and insects singing like they always do. Briette enjoyed the fast paced walk through the forest, almost forgetting where she was going and why. She jerked out of her daydream when one of her companions patted her on the back and told her to focus. Eventually they reached their destination and the 2nd rank members went off to look for the dwarves and gather information to predict their path. Briette was sitting high up in one of the trees like her comrades, waiting. After what felt like an eternity, the 2nd rank members returned. They shared the information they gathered, their target is with this group of soldiers but it is larger than expected. 75 dwarves on battle boars, heavily armed and wielding hammers, axes and crossbows. Thankfully the commander is wearing well decorated and engraved armor so he is easy to spot. They informed everyone of the path the dwarves are most likely going to take, the path of least resistance, following an old creek bed with relatively small amounts of obstacles in the way. Even though there are more dwarves than expected, Rostriel announced that the mission is going to go ahead. "We have the element of surprise on our side so we just need to be quick in our execution of the plan. We are the Alfalya Blade Dancers, if anyone can do it then it's us." Rostriel said. Everyone took up positions, trusting in the path prediction that was made. Luckily the dwarves could be heard, the sound of the battle boars running across the empty creek bed made a lot of noise. Just as expected they were moving right under Briette's unit. Though something seemed off, there were less dwarves than the initial report said though there was no time right now to revaluate. The time was now. Everyone waited for Rostriel's signal. Time felt like it was going in slow motion and then suddenly the signal was given.
Everyone fired their readied bows at the dwarves riding underneath them. Most arrows bounced off the dwarves heavy armor, only one finding its way past a gap and into the shoulder of one of the dwarves. Almost lightning quick Briette and the other blade dancers dropped out of the tree onto the ground near the commander, stabbing and slashing at the boars and their riders, twirling and leaping from target to target in a great display of agility to create confusion and avoid the hits of the dwarves as they swung their hammers and axes.
Rostriel fired her arrow but the commander suddenly looked down so her arrow hit the top of his helmet and bounced off. To give Rostriel more time the blade dancers continued their actions, though one of the 1st rankers got hit by a hammer and trampled by one of the battle boars. Suddenly Rostriel yelled something out of the tree she was in but the blade dancers on the ground couldn't make out what she said. Then all the dwarves moved out onto the sides of the creek bed a good distance away from the blade dancers all at the same time.
When Briette saw why that was happening she saw about 12 dwarves riding straight at the blade dancers, they were fast and it happened so quick that almost no one had time to react. The hammers of the riders stuck the blade dancers almost with surgical precision as they rode past. Some of the blade dancers managed to jump out of the way up into the trees but the majority couldn't. Briette was one of the lucky ones, only being struck on the left upper arm, shattering her bone where as some of the others were struck in the head or chest. It seems the dwarves expected something like this to happen and hatched a plan against it, and it worked. Briette jumped out of the way into the trees, not even feeling the pain of her shattered arm only noticing that she can't move it.
Rostriel gave the order to retreat. Briette decided to continue following the dwarven commander and his troops up in the trees. Rostriel noticed Briette ignoring the order and tried to catch up to her. Eventually the dwarves clashed with the forward position of the Alfalya Armed Forces. Rostriel caught up to Briette during this and ordered her to retreat, Briette however voiced that she can still fulfil the mission so that the deaths of her comrades wasn't for nothing. Rostriel protested and giving the order again to retreat but before she could finish talking Briette jumped onto another tree and continue moving as she saw an opportunity.
During the fight with the Alfalya Armed Forces the commander was injured and began moving back with a small number of riders. Briette saw this and followed him. At some point during the fighting the boar the commander was riding was injured and it now lost all its strength. The boar collapsed and threw the commander down a decline. As he fell and rolled, Briette honed in on him, this was her chance as the other dwarven riders had to stop and turn back spending time to get to their commander.
Rostriel continued followed Briette and saw that she was about to manage to save the mission. As the dwarven commander stopped falling down the decline in the landscape, he lost his helmet and weapon, Briette was running along the ground and jumped on top of his chest. Her short sword ready to strike at the unprotected head of the dwarf. Having never taken a life before, Briette hesitated hovering the sword above the dwarf's head, he looked at her not saying a word, just staring at Briette and breathing.
She looked at the dwarven commander, the first time seeing a dwarf up close. The intricate detail of his beard matching what she had heard in her mothers stories, the rough expression of a hard life in his face. Briette looked him in the eyes, it felt wrong to strike her sword at him so she stood there in silence for a moment which felt much longer than it actually was, it felt like looking at the eyes of an injured deer to her, pleading for its life. As she stood there Rostriel saw her hesitation and ran towards her to finish the job, however the other dwarven riders were quicker and so Briette and Rostriel jumped back and had to run away. On the way back once they were in safe space again, Briette started to feel an incredible pain coming from her left arm. As she looked at it, it was heavily bruised and had a piece of bone sticking out of it. Rostriel didn't say anything when they stopped to look at Briette's arm. Once she finished examining it, Rostriel simple said: "We can fix that in the city, come." Briette felt like there was great anger brewing in Rostriel and she knew why, so she tried to apologize but was quickly cut off by Rostriel. "What happened back there?!" She yelled infuriated. "First you ignore my order to retreat and then you hesitate killing our target!" She continued.
Briette didn't know what to say, she tried to stammer some kind of explanation but was again cut off by Rostriel raising her hand at her. "I don't want to hear it but you don't seem like blade dancer material if you pull things like that." Rostriel said with anger in her voice. Rostriel continued walking towards the city.
Briette dropped to her knees and started crying. She wept for a long time and felt this pit in her stomach which almost felt worse than her arm. She knew that this likely ended her career as a blade dancer. Eventually she picked herself up and continued towards the city. When she got there, she was quickly taken to a carers tent to fix her injury.
Using magic and various plants to heal her, it only took two weeks to heal her arm. On her last day in the carers tent, the officer of the Alfalya Blade Dancers, the one that originally allowed her to do the first trail, entered her tent.
She asked Briette how she felt. Briette answered a short and quick reply of: "I feel better thank you.".
The officer nodded at her reply before speaking: "You know why I'm here right?". Briette replied by only giving a sad nod. The officer sat down on the bed that Briette was laying in. She then continued: "I saw great potential in you, I was surprised when I heard what happened." She paused before continuing: "You ignored direct orders from a superior and then hesitated when you were about to kill your target. I suppose I was wrong about you. I am here to inform you that you are no longer a member of the Alfalya Blade Dancers or the Armed Forces. I wish you well Briette." Briette just starting sobbing and crying to herself as the officer left.
However she started thinking to herself that perhaps this wasn't such a bad thing, becoming some kind of killer is not her dream and coming face to face with such a decision made her realize that. Her true dream is to bring people together and see the world. Upon arriving home, Briette told her parents everything. They hugged her and told her that everything will be okay, there are many other fulfilling opportunities in life. She spent a couple years at home with her parents, focusing on the things she loves such as painting and singing. She also spent time with some of her friends from the armed forces from time to time. After talking to her friends and some acquaintances in her life she became interested in becoming an adventurer, this way she can help people and see the world at the same time. She informed her parents of her idea who tried to talk her out of it as being an adventurer is dangerous business but she was determined that is what she wants to do. So Briette started preparing for her journey of being an adventurer. See part 2.
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