"I'll do my best," said Curdie, "I'm not afraid."
Curdie- The Princess and the Goblins
He scowled as the carriage bumped along the road towards the orphanage. No matter what he said, his parents didn't believe him that he didn't need a friend, he wanted his sister to come home. It wasn't fair that she had to go stay with their cousins in Caerleon so that she would get better. He wanted to go with her too at least.
No one spoke in the carriage, his parents seemed okay letting him sulk about it. He didn't understand what the point was, and when Mother had told him that they were adopting an orphan so that they would have a better chance than if they'd stayed in the orphanage till they were grown ups, he'd thrown a temper tantrum the likes of which Priscilla had never been able to do. So now they weren't talking to him. They were just marching him to his doom.
He sighed and looked out the window. The mellow countryside rolled by, failing to interest him. He'd seen it all before the very few times they'd gone to court, and he'd had to sit still in clothes that itched and felt too stiff, but he'd tolerated it because Prissy had gone with him. Now he didn't have a sister to do that with.
She would have liked seeing the hills with the flowers dotting it like fallen stars and the sun being chased by puffy clouds. She would have come up with a story for how it all looked like that, even if it didn't quite make sense and sometimes she stopped being able to finish a sentence before she needed to breathe.
"Raymond," his mother said sternly, giving him a look from under her fancy hat to keep the sun off her face, "sit up straight."
He did with a scowl, not looking out the window anymore. At least they didn't have too much further to be able to go. He wanted to get out already and escape from his doom.
The carriage rolled along the road, bouncing all of them up and down and making his teeth hurt. But he thought he could read a sign out the corner of the window as they turned that had "Araphen Orphanage, One Mile" burned into the wood. At least he wouldn't be tortured for too long...until they had to go back with whoever his parents picked.
Soon, the driver clicked his tongue to make the horses stop- he knew they did that from watching them, and the footman climbed off of the front to let them out. First Father, then Mother, then him. As the door was shut and locked behind them, he looked up at the orphanage, hearing the laughter of children outside. His mother didn't even need to tell him to come along as they walked towards the door, he followed along grudgingly.
Inside, it smelled like vomit and chicken stew, though not anywhere near as good as the cook made it. He scuffed his foot on the floor as his parents went to talk to the priest running the orphanage and looked around. Three girls were working on mending, all of them a little older than he was, and there was one boy reading, with brown hair cut short. None of them looked like kids he wanted to talk to. He could still hear laughing, but now he thought he heard jeering as well. Carefully taking a step away from behind his parents, he tried to make out what it was.
"Hey girly!" he heard through one of the windows, a boy older than he was. "Come and play with us, girly!" Raymond couldn't hear what the girl said, but she sounded upset. The other boy just laughed. "What, too good for us, girly?"
It sounded like it could be a fight, he thought as the girl said something again. Maybe it wouldn't be too terrible if he got to get in a fight. And his parents weren't looking. The priest wasn't looking either. In fact, they were talking in quiet voices without looking at anything aside from each other.
Now was his chance. He stepped to the side, towards the door, and then stepped again. No one stopped him. One of the girls looked up, but then looked down at her lap again. Two more steps and he was easing the door open, still listening.
Outside, more kids were running around in the grass, mostly girls, but a few boys. He couldn't see where the laughter had been coming from till a bigger boy went running towards a corner. Following, he saw what had been happening.
Six tall boys, old enough to be working on a farm if someone would adopt them, stood in a half circle around a girl in monk's robes, her long blond hair dirty and matted. Despite the laughter, she showed no signs of crying, she just held her book closer and said "please stop," like they would listen.
One of them kicked dust on her face. "Look at me, girly!" he yelled, looming over her. "You think you're better than us?"
"I just want to be left alone," she said more quietly, wiping at her face with the oversized sleeve. The boys quickly ruined her efforts by kicking more dirt on her.
Raymond glared at all of them, though they didn't see him. He could have handled one of them easily, probably even two. Six would get him in trouble if they didn't recognize him, but it would still be a fun fight. "Leave her alone." he said sharply, trying to get their attention. "Pick on someone else."
The laughter stopped, and they turned around to look at him. He crossed his arms and stared back at them, daring them to just try and bother him. Would they pick on a noble boy?
The one who seemed like he was acting like the leader finally glared and let out a mean laugh. "Is that an order, milord?" he drawled out, looming over him with foul breath. Raymond resisted the temptation to wrinkle his nose in disgust at the stink. The boy spat on the ground and said, "what's in it for me?"
"You not getting your nose broken," he retorted, not caring that the boy was almost a foot taller than he was. "So back off." As the boys grumbled, he spread his feet apart like he'd been taught for his training, so he wouldn't be knocked down by the first punch. "Or else you'll have to fight me."
He could just barely see the girl through the line of boys, but she had stood up with her book still held tightly, a surprisingly gentle look on her face instead of tears. He'd never known a girl who didn't cry when people kicked dirt in her face. Then he turned back to looking at the boys clustering around him. "What, are you too scared to fight a noble?" he asked them scornfully.
The first punch nearly knocked him down. He stumbled and said a word he'd heard the stable boys using and his mother would have lectured him for an hour on how it was not proper to use that word, but it hurt. And that made him even madder.
Forgetting all he'd learned of how to fight in a second, he slammed himself shoulder first into someone's stomach, knocking him down and falling with him. Scrambling to his feet, someone else's fist clipped him, turning him so that the punch he was planning to throw hit the first boy as he got up as well. Raymond shook out his hand and glared at the five boys all planning to beat him up now that he'd taunted them into it.
The only advantage he had was that he was small enough that he could make them hit each other, though he got hit more often than it worked. The ringleader elbowed him in the nose so hard it cracked painfully and he couldn't breathe through it. Blood dripped from his nose as he scrunched up his fists again and prepared to take on all six of them. For the first time since Prissy'd left, he felt good. "Is that all you've got?" he called nasally at them, grinning, "I guess you're just that bad."
The ringleader scowled at him, dirt on his face from one of the few times Raymond had been able to get him to fall over. "You- get him, boys!" he yelled, throwing another hard punch that he guessed would knock him down for good.
It never hit him. Before any of them had a chance to react, the air sparkled around them before a pillar of light smashed them apart as hard as anything real. Three of the boys were knocked out immediately, two more of them couldn't get up. Raymond looked in shock at the girl, who now had her book open, her blue eyes bright as she finished the spell she'd just cast. "Are you all right?" she asked in a rather boyish voice, walking over to him to look at his face. "I've never seen anyone stand up to Paul after the first punch."
He brushed it off. "I don't care," he said thickly, blood still dripping from his nose. "It was fun."
The girl pursed her lips like it wasn't an acceptable answer, but before she could say anything else, the door to the orphanage opened and his parents came out, followed by the priest. "Lucius!" the priest yelled, sounding very angry for a priest, "what have I told you about using magic on other people?"
Lucius, a very weird name for a girl, crossed her arms and said calmly "Paul was bullying the other children again, I stopped him." At least his nose could attest that something like that had happened.
His mother gasped when she saw him, but didn't start scolding him yet. The priest scowled at them both, looking very unpriestlike. "Be that as it may, never attack someone with magic unless they are trying to kill you or someone in your care."
Lucius bowed her head politely. "Yes, Father, sorry Father," she said with genuine regret in her voice. "And I apologize to you as well," she said to his parents.
His father recovered himself first. "Thank you," he said more out of habit rather than actually thanking her, and then looked at the priest and back at Lucius again. "Are you the boy the priest was telling us about? Lucius?"
Lucius bowed her-his head, Raymond corrected himself, feeling very confused. He'd never seen a boy who'd looked so much like a girl before. "I am Lucius, yes, my lord." he answered. "I apologize for this, it isn't how I would have liked a meeting to go."
Raymond tried to sniff as his nose itched, but it hurt too much and he said so before he could stop himself. His mother frowned at him, but handed him her handkerchief so that he could put it against his nose. "What did you do?" she asked him, her voice stern. "I doubt that they just started beating you because you went outside."
He resisted the want to roll his eyes at her, and said thickly "I heard them outside, I went out, I made them mad because they were kicking dust on him." he pointed at Lucius, forgetting that he wasn't supposed to do that. "Lucius cast magic on them after I got them all mad."
All of the adults looked annoyed with him, but he was used to that. Lucius bowed his head again and said "It was what I thought I could do," like a priest would. "I didn't want the young master to be hurt any more than he had already been in my defence."
The priest looked at his parents, "I'll understand if you've changed your mind now," he said resignedly, and Raymond looked back and forth between them and Lucius as he realized that they had been maybe going to adopt Lucius. "I'm very sorry about all of this."
Then his father said "Don't be. I think I understand what happened, and I haven't changed my mind."
"Nor I," his mother said, taking her handkerchief back to see if the bleeding had stopped, which it hadn't. "My son started this, not your boy."
Raymond winced as his mother pushed the cloth square back against his nose and said thickly "They started it, not us," fighting back the want to wince as talking made it hurt more. "They should be in trouble."
The priest nodded absentmindedly, not looking at him. "They will be," he said, kneeling down to check on one of the boys coming around. "Lord Cornwall, Lady Cornwall, have you made your decision?"
His parents exchanged one of those glances that only adults did, and then looked at Lucius. "If we take you in, your responsibility will be to be a companion to Raymond, not a second heir." his mother said at last, letting go of the cloth so that he could hold it on his own. "Are you going into the priesthood?"
"Yes," Lucius answered, his eyes on Raymond so intensely that he felt like he was being read inside and out by someone who he didn't know yet, but something told him that he would and regret it if he pushed him away. "That is my wish, milady," he added politely.
His father nodded in approval. "A noble wish," he said, sounding more approving than his mother did. "We would assist you in working towards that if you come with us, though your first duty would be to Raymond."
As Lucius nodded again, his knuckles turning white around his book, Raymond glowered up at his parents. "I don't want someone who follows me around like a servant," he said sulkily, wiping his nose. "That's boring."
His mother gave him another look that told him to be quiet, but his father said "Lucius will not be your servant, he will be your friend, if you don't push him away as well." The look in his eyes told him not to protest that, or otherwise he wouldn't like it.
"Don't worry," Lucius said quietly, a small smile on his face, "I won't let the young lord push me around." Then he ducked his head and said "Sorry for speaking out of turn."
But his mother didn't look too angry. In fact, she looked almost pleased. "Good," was all she said before walking over to the priest and speaking in a quiet voice as he worked on healing one of the bullies. A moment later, his father joined her, leaving him with just Lucius.
Raymond tested his nose gingerly, it had stopped bleeding, but it still hurt. "You're going to be my friend?" he asked him, not sure what to expect. "Not someone who follows me around and tells me what to do?"
There was a warm look in Lucius's eyes and perhaps a hint of being way more stubborn than he expected. "I'm not sure," he said quietly so that no one else would hear, "but I don't intend to leave."
And he was okay with that.