December 3rd

I slept better that night. In the late of the morning, when the sun had risen fully over the pine forest and the birds were singing in the branches, I set off with Davies for wood.

We had been good friends since childhood, and he had been the only person in the village I had really connected with and felt comfortable with for a long time. But a rift was caused in our friendship by the army. At fifteen, we had both tried to get into the Battalions for training. I got in, he didn’t. It was as simple as that. I was then away for two years, not having any contact with the village at all, not speaking to my parents, or my friends.

When I returned, we didn’t speak for a while.

But we soon grew close again; even though we never talked about the military training Davies had been denied.

“Lorelie was looking at you yesterday,” Davies said casually, as we wandered through the snow towards the forest.

“So? You looked at me too.”

He grinned. “Yeah, suppose. You like her, though.”

I looked up into the clear dome of pastel blue sky as two shadow crows flapped overhead.

“Aw come on, Lev, don’t lie to me,” Davies bent down and snatched up a long branch from the ivory blanket, twirling it at his side like a blade.

“I don’t know.” And that was the truth. Sometimes I’d catch myself thinking about her, thinking about how pretty she was, how her fiery personality clashed with mine. Opposites attract?

But other times I’d just think of her as my friend; a good friend, but nothing more. But it didn’t confuse me, perhaps because there were more important things going on.

“Mm,” he looked at me doubtfully. We walked in silence, my boots clearing through the snow and his leather shoes getting soaked. He didn’t mind, though.

Reaching the trees, I decided to change the topic.

“Do you still lie to your mother?”

He nodded, grimacing. “Yeah. I mean, I’m not going to break the treaty. But I still don’t like it.”

We had all made an agreement that we wouldn’t tell anyone what we were up to; that included our mothers. All of our fathers were away fighting on the northern front, save for Buckley’s.

“I don’t know whether mine knows,” I said, watching Davies twirl his makeshift weapon absently. “She doesn’t question my lies anymore.”

“That doesn’t mean she knows.”

“Yeah, but sometimes she looks at me and I wonder.”

“Think fast,” Davies shouted suddenly, and a branch flew in my direction. I hadn’t noticed, but we had reached a clearing in the trees and he was already five metres away from me, his own branch in both hands.

I caught the stick and twirled it over my shoulder into my right hand in one smooth move.

Silence.

As we stared each other down, now completely serious, wondering who would make the first move.

Davies suddenly stepped forward, and I came out to meet him. With a cry we met, the clash of wood echoing through the trees.

As we sparred, my muscles began to tighten, reflexes quicken, grip strengthen. I could feel the fighter in me striving to get out. My senses absorbed everything; the sweet smell of the pine under the crisp snow, each crack of branches, slight taste of metal, the touch of the grain underneath my fingers. Watching as Davies picked through my steel defences, trying to get past me.

But I was quick, too quick for him. I remembered back to my sparring training in the Camp, how I had been defeated by my instructor so many times, and the final fight where I had beaten him.

Keep going.

Keep going.

We had been taught never to give up.

If it was one thing I had taken from my training, it was that.

There was always a chink in the armour, no matter how good the fighter. In my instructor, his chink had been his pride. He thought he was too good for me to beat him. He was wrong.

Davies was an excellent sword fighter, much better than I had been before the military.

Landing three blows left and right in quick succession, I saw his left heel twist slightly in the snow, so I slammed my branch forward, knocking his out of his hand. He fell back on the snow.

For a moment I was unsure whether he’d been hurt or not, but then I saw the wide grin across his face.

“Nice one,” he laughed. Smiling, I held out a hand and helped him up, brushing the snow off his shoulder.

“You’ve still got the fight in you,” Davies noted, a little more seriously.

I nodded. “You too.”

“Let’s just hope we won’t need to use it,” he added, turning away, slinging his branch over his shoulders.