Assassin's Rise

By

C.J. Whrite

Copyright 2012 C.J.
Whrite

Smashwords Edition

Smashwords Edition
License Notes

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you for respecting the author's work.

Special thanks to my
family and friends who have made Assassin’s Rise possible. Without
your valuable input, this tale would not have seen the light.

An axe to the thumb is
surprisingly inspirational.

Thank you doc, for
stitching it back on

* * *

A
pothecary Pelron hurried through
the village, a leather satchel clutched at his side, his brown
cloak flaring out behind him. Villagers called out greetings as he
passed them by, but he gave no signs of acknowledgment. It was not
that he was ignoring them on purpose, but he had matters more
pressing on his mind – he neither saw nor heard their cheerful
greetings.

For nigh on four months
now he had been treating Magda, and he was at his wit’s end. She
had first come to him complaining of frequently breaking water, and
he had been sure it was a sickness of the bladder. Lucerne and
bilberries were the usual remedy, and he had instructed Magda to
ground the purple flowers and take it as a tisane as often as she
could, and to compliment each meal with a handful of berries.
Lucerne and bilberries were both cheap and bountiful, and he had
always had success with the treatment. But Magda did not improve,
and now she was bedridden. He had tried every possible herb and
trick he could think of, but her condition kept worsening. He had
finally written to an old friend of his, a Healer that practiced in
Darma. He had noted the treatments he had tried so far, and had
explained her worsening condition: she was loosing weight rapidly,
grew unusually fatigued with the slightest effort, and her eyesight
was deteriorating.

This morning a rider
had knocked on the Apothecary’s door, handing him a letter and a
leather satchel. The letter was a reply from his friend explaining
that he had successfully treated similar symptoms before. Although
visiting the privy often usually pointed to a disease of the
bladder, in this case, he believed that it pointed to a weakness in
the blood.

Pelron halted in front
of the small wooden house that Magda and her son shared. He could
almost smell the desperation wafting through the small, wooden
shutters. The boy was barely twelve summers old, and with Magda now
bedridden, he had to care for both himself and his mother. The
meagre coin he made from doing odd tasks around the village was
barely enough to keep them fed, yet the boy never complained, and
over the months of treating Magda, Pelron had grown to like
him.

Pelron knocked softly
and pushed the door open, the floorboards creaking as he stepped
inside the dimly lit room. The windows were covered with cloth,
blocking the outside glare, and a single candle burned on a table
that took centre in the room.

Magda was alone,
sleeping on a pallet bed in one corner, and Pelron smiled as he
noted how carefully the boy had placed water and food around the
bed. The boy must be out searching for the means to survive another
day.

Pelron opened the
leather satchel his friend had sent him, sniffing the contents. It
was filled with clover-shaped leaves, although he had never quite
seen such oddly large clovers. According to the letter, these came
from thousands of miles to the east and were from a plant called
Kugua. The letter explained that although the fruit of the plant
held the highest healing properties, it was impossible to preserve
it over such long distances and that the leaves were a suitable
substitute. Apparently the fruit was cucumber shaped with heavy
ridges and extremely bitter to taste.

“Bitter Gourd,” Pelron
muttered as he recalled what his friend had named it.

The satchel held enough
leaves for two months use. He would have to write his friend
another letter requesting more. The leaves were expensive, and
Pelron knew that Magda and the boy could never afford it. He
sighed; once more realising he would never be a rich man.

“Apothecary,” a voice
called from the door and Pelron turned around. The boy was tall for
his age and his breadth of shoulder promised that he would be a
powerful man. His black hair was unkempt and tousled strands fell
to his shoulders and over his dark eyes. He smiled at Pelron,
revealing healthy teeth, and he lifted his hands, each hand holding
a limp pheasant by the neck.

“I don’t even want to
hear where you found those, Roland Belanu,” said Pelron with mock
seriousness. “Light the hearth and boil some water. I have new
herbs to prepare for your mother.”

Roland eagerly set
about his task, striking flint and steel with gusto.

“Will these new herbs
help her?” asked Roland, touching his mother’s wax pale skin. She
opened her eyes, smiling weakly. He handed her a clay cup filled
with cool water and helped her to sit upright.

“Apothecary Pelron,”
she said as her eyes focused on Pelron’s back.

Pelron turned his head
and smiled at her. “Don’t you worry, madam. I have a friend that is
a great Healer and he sent me new herbs from the east. Within a
week you will be up and like new.”

“They must be
expensive,” she said, sinking back onto the bed.

Roland frowned, but
then gritted his teeth and forced a smile. Pelron’s heart went out
to the scruffy boy. “Yes, they are very expensive,” said Pelron,
turning his gaze back to the task at hand, ignoring the look on
Roland’s face. “But, I’m in somewhat of a dilemma. I’m looking for
an apprentice to help me with the gathering of herbs and treating
the villagers. He will of course be paid a weekly stipend ... but I
have no idea where to find such a person.”

“Enough to pay for the
new herbs?” asked Roland, beaming.

“Naturally. There may
even be enough coin left over to pay for pheasants from now on
...”

R
oland opened his eyes and took a
deep breath, relishing the fresh mountain air. He stood up and
stretched, looking toward his village. From his viewpoint high in
the mountain, it felt like he could see into tomorrow if he so
chose.

The sharp call of a
mountain eagle shattered the morning silence and Roland watched as
the large bird dived through the air. He felt a kindred spirit with
the predator: both of them were celebrating the new morning and
looked forward to things to come.

He crouched and rolled
up the blanket, tying it with a rawhide string to his shoulder. He
had finished gathering the required herbs for Pelron yesterday, but
the sun had caught him and he had decided to spend the night in the
mountain. There were traitorous rock faces he had to navigate down,
and doing it in the dark asked for a broken leg or worse.

He chose against
preparing breakfast. Today was summer solstice and he wanted to
hurry back to the village. It was not everyday that you turned
sixteen and became a man.

He double-checked the
contents of the cotton sack used for gathering herbs and tied it to
his belt. The eagle gave a triumphant call and Roland watched as it
flew up the mountain, a bundle of feathers clutched in its talons.
Roland wondered if it had chicks to feed, and then his stomach
grumbled reminding him that he was looking forward to breakfast,
too. Spurred on by the thought he set off quickly; he should reach
the village by early afternoon.

*

Seven Streams was a
buzz of activity.

On the first day of
summer there was no craft or trade, and the day was instead spent
preparing for what was to come. The afternoon held an event where
the men of the village would compete in games and the evening was
reserved for food, song and dance.

Men carried huge, oaken
tables from the Town Hall toward the town square, bantering and
sweating under the new summer sun, while the women already had
fires going, cutting meat and chopping vegetables. The boys coming
of age were especially excited, for tonight would be their
opportunity to swagger around and catch the eyes of pretty village
girls.

The Apothecary was a
small wooden building near the centre of the village and was about
the only business still open on this day. Pelron was inside,
standing behind the oak counter that nearly spanned the width of
the shop, busy re-organising the many shelves on the rear of the
wall filled with jars, sacks and bottles, containing numerous
leaves, roots, and powders, preparing for when Roland returned with
the fresh herbs. This was not really needed, for Roland was adept
at sorting the various herbs, but he wanted to keep busy while he
waited for the boy.

Each container sported
a label with a tiny, hand drawn picture of the contents together
with its name and uses, written in clear, neat script. Four years
earlier Pelron had no need for labels or catalogue, for he could
recognise the different herbs by colour and texture alone, and
after the thirty odd summers of plying his trade, he knew the uses
by heart. At first he had taken Roland in as an apprentice more as
an act of kindness, but he had soon realised that the boy had a
good head on his shoulders and that he was keen to learn about the
different uses of herbs and their specific treatments. Since then,
Pelron had made an effort to impart his knowledge to Roland and
labelling his stock with name and uses was one idea he had come up
with. Teaching the boy to decipher the script was another matter
entirely, but Roland had eventually come up with a method of his
own. He took to drawing accurate depictions of the contents on the
labels, which helped him to memorise the script in turn.

On the whole, Pelron
was satisfied with Roland’s progress and the boy’s natural talent
toward healing reaffirmed his belief that Roland should aspire to
what he did not.

The Apothecary door
opened and Magda stepped inside, greeting Pelron with a warm smile.
“It is good to see you, Pelron,” she said.

“Happy solstice, Magda.
What brings you here? Do you need more Bitter Gourd?”

“Not yet. I seem to be
using it less and less as time goes on.”

“Be careful not to stop
its use too suddenly,” warned Pelron. When he had started Magda on
her treatment of the eastern leaves, she had shown quick and
positive results. After a short while he had stopped administering
it, believing her symptoms cured, but she had relapsed into illness
soon after. He held a suspicion that she would never truly be free
of the disease and that the bitter leaves would be her companion
for a long time to come.

“I want to speak of
Roland,” she said. She was a woman of small stature, but she lifted
her head proudly and her presence filled the room. “You have helped
us out so much when I was down with illness, and even took Roland
under your wing –” she sniffed, and Pelron saw that she was close
to tears, “– and today my boy becomes a man. I just wanted to thank
you, Pelron, for guiding him.”

Pelron kept quiet,
knowing she was not yet finished.

“I was hoping that he
could continue to learn from you. It’s so easy for a boy his age to
waste time and never amount to anything ...”

“I, too, have something
I want to discuss with you,” said Pelron and reached below the
counter. He handed Magda a rolled-up parchment that she took with
unsure hands. He smiled kindly, inviting her to open it.

“I’m sorry, but I’ve
never learned my letters,” she said, blushing, and returned the
scroll.

“How foolish of me,”
said Pelron, flushing as red as she was. “May I?” He unrolled the
parchment and Magda nodded.

After he finished
reading, there was a moment of silence through which Pelron thought
that there might be a problem. But then Magda raised her hand to
her breast, twisting the thin cotton dress between her fingers.
“How could I ever thank you? To think that you have so much faith
in my boy.”

“Then it’s decided,”
said Pelron and rolled the parchment back up proudly. She was
right. He had high hopes for the boy.

*

As Roland neared the
village, he could hear excited laughter and the smell from cooking
fires made his mouth water. He grinned and felt his heart race in
anticipation.