It was midday when Drak finally woke up. His head was spinning so fast it felt like it was actually running in circles—or at least he thought it was. He was actually still sick enough to projectile vomit one more time on his way to the spot by the creek where he should’ve met his friends hours ago. He wasn’t entirely sure what to make of the turn of events. Something big was about to begin, and from what he could tell, he had some part to play—even if that part was merely to stay alive.
The idea of leaving his parents should’ve held some appeal. He didn’t want people to know who he was. He wanted to get out of the shadow of being the youngest child of twenty, but he had never actually considered what having no family would mean and what full detachment would bring, and now he was faced with never seeing them again. So why wasn’t he elated; happy to build his own path? He’d finally gotten what he prayed to the gods for all his life: the chance to be his own man and not heir to the throne and to not be the good queen’s son—to just be Drak.
Drak knew why he couldn’t be happy, though he did his best to not think about it. The truth of the matter was that he knew he would be the last. There would be no family to be detached from if this dream came true.
“Are you okay?” Janon asked, but before he could respond, Tilal had an answer.
“Really, Janon. Sometimes I wonder if you’re as smart as you pretend to be—I mean, as you come across.”
“Is that an insult?”
“If you consider asking someone who we just observed vomiting on a bush if he’s okay ingenious, then yes. I am insulting your intelligence.”
“What was I supposed to ask him?”
“You could’ve said are you feeling better.”
Drak loved when they went at each other. It was entertaining, and Janon’s accent was intriguing. A lot of his W's sounded like V’s. He put an ‘h’ sound before a lot of his A's, no matter where they were in a sentence; even the E's that sounded like A’s like in eggs. And words like “him” and “simple” sounded more like “heem” and “zeempal”. It was a stark comparison to Tilal, who was raised in Atorath. Being that she was half Atorathian, she had perfect command of the common tongue and only an accent from the town or sub-province where she was from. She would usually win these arguments, and Janon would end up shouting at her in a string of curse words in his native language.
Drak, for his part, could understand the frustration of speaking in the common tongue. When he said a word like “simple,” it sounded more like “sompal”. “Him” was a cross between “ha” and “him”, so it sounded kind of like “ha-im”. It came out as a marriage between a one- syllable and a two-syllable word. The sounds weren’t quite separated enough to make both sounds distinctive from the other. The real reason he enjoyed it was because his friends made comments about him usually, so it was a happy break from the normal to not be the butt of the jokes.
He took his usual seat between them. He wasn’t entirely sure it was a safe position at the moment, but it was instinct. Sometimes, he wondered if they would destroy each other if they weren’t trying so hard to instil confidence in him. He called it protecting him, but they insisted they were only helping him be more confident. There was no point in arguing with friends that are more powerful than him. Janon immediately started playing with Drak’s hair and Tilal started playing with his hands.
“You’ve spent time in the shops, haven’t you?” Drak was taken aback by her question. Tilal didn’t seem in any hurry for him to answer. She just continued to admire his hands.
“Yes. I spent a lot of time with my brother there. He’s an expert weapons-maker. I can make a few things. I can’t build like a builder, but he says I have the gift of a weapon-maker. And I can carve a thing or two, but I’m not nearly as good as he says I am.”
They both gave him a reproving look that he didn’t appreciate. They were always telling him not to speak that way. It was almost like he wasn’t talking to children his age. Sometimes, they could be more childlike than infants, and other times they seemed so old and mature to him.
“It doesn’t matter if people believe in you—if you don’t.”
“I know, Tilal.”
“Will we get to meet this brother?”
“I suppose. He is my favourite sibling. None of the others pay much attention to me.” Drak hated saying it, but all of his doubts and anxieties weren’t self-imposed. His family seemed to believe that he wasn’t worth anything at all as well, so how could he not come to these conclusions? Even his father had little to say of him.
“I don’t understand you sometimes. How can you have such ill will towards your family?” Janon asked. Drak just refused to answer. How could either of them understand? They got along amazingly well with their siblings.
“My family is going to be destroyed.” Neither of the others seemed willing to venture down this road of conversation. And maybe it was for the best. Why should they encourage him down the path of disaster?
“Again with the playing with my hair.” Janon never took it seriously. This irritated Drak almost enough to care. Clearly, Janon knew he liked it on a certain level. Drak found himself equally comfortable and upset that he knew him so well.
“I’m going for a swim.”
“Just like a Dani. Where there’s water—” Tilal didn’t have a chance to finish before he had jumped into the water.
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