I was always good at waiting.

My father thought this was a sign of weakness. He would tell me that if I did not light a fire under myself and learn to reach for things while they were within my immediate grasp that I would never be able to hold onto the things that mattered. My mother, however, scoffed at this and said that victory always went to those who waited and planned since hotheads always burned themselves out before they accomplished anything worth noting.

I hoped she was right.

Hope is the cruelest emotion of all, you know. It has stayed with me all my life, like the cruelest of tormentors, egging me on to shoulder more pain just when I convinced myself that I had finally had enough.

The day my parents died and my village burned down around me was the first day I ever felt hopeless. My world up until that point was my little village and I wanted nothing more than build my own little house next to my mother and father and marry one of the girl's from the village, preferably the dark beauty Leonora.

Leonora died when my parents did and took all my dreams with her. As I stood in the middle of what was left of my village, the black smoke thick and suffocating, my hand still gripped tightly around the sword in my hand, I felt the pain that came with knowing death.

It was a pain that I would spend my entire life trying in vain to expel.

I had taken this sword out of the hand of one of our attackers. The thieves had come to our village expecting us to roll over and were furious to realize that there was actually some fight in us. They made us pay dearly for it, but we were not the only ones who fell today.

The blood on the sword dripped down on my hand and I was transfixed by its owner. The fat man was laying on the ground, his eyes still wide open from the shock of being slayed by a skinny thirteen-year-old farmer. He thought back to all the war stories he use to hear from the knights and killer for hirers who often used the village as a refueling spot. They often talked about the glory of the kill, especially the first one, he knew in that instant that they were liars.

"Are you alright?"

The words of the advancing knight shook me out of my thoughts. He had come out of nowhere, riding up on his black steed right when I needed him. When I had been beaten, scared, outnumbered and alone, he showed up to save me like a hero from an old story. I would be forever in his debt.

"You made quite a showing for a skinny, little farmer. Have you ever wielded a sword before?"

I shook my head no.

"Well some men just have a natural aptitude for killing." He said, surveying the damage.

I looked down at the dead man again. I had never had a natural aptitude for anything.

"Partuse's gang is a nasty lot. Only cowards kill unarmed women and children. I've been chasing the bastard for years, but catching him is not a priority to our king as long as he pays his taxes," he snorted disgustingly, leaning over the body of three-year-old Uniara, "much to our everlasting shame."

"But surely The King cannot know just how bad it is for us on the outliers or he would do something."

He stood up and started picking up all the swords he could find. The fleeing barbarians had dropped some of the meager jewels and coins they pilfered from the villagers and the knight picked them up too. He walked back to me, placing the sword in a bag on the side of his house and the jewels and coins in my hands. So, what are you going to do now?" asked the knight.

"Do?"I asked, looking at the jewels and coins in my hand.

"Yes, do. You can't stay here."

I looked around. I suppose I couldn't.

The knight looked at me, really looked for me at the first time. "What's your name?"

"Lancelot, My Lord."

"Well Lancelot I can take you as far as the next village but then you're on your own."

I nodded, my eyes now fixated on his shield.

"What does that stand for," I asked, pointing to the figure on his chest.

"This boy is the Pendragon crest. I am a knight of Camelot and I wear this shield to honor my Lord King, such as it is."

"That's what I want to do next," I said eagerly. "I want to train to be a knight of Camelot and save those who cannot fight for themselves. I want to fight those who would attack villages and make the kingdom safe for everyone."

The knight laughed.

It stung. "You said yourself I had a natural talent."

"That you may, but only those of noble blood can serve as a knight of Camelot."

"That's stupid."

The knight laughed again."Stupid or not it is the way of things." He climbed back on his horse and held his hand out.

I took it and straightened up as soon as I was behind him. "Why are you helping me, is it because of your knightly code?"

"That's part of it." He whistled at his horse to move.

"And the other part?"

"You remind me of my eldest son, Leon."

"Oh, is he a knight too?"

"Yes," he said, the pride in his voice obvious. "He was knighted last spring with Prince Arthur himself."

I swallowed my bitterness. Men like Leon and Prince Arthur got to be knights merely by luck of birth and I'd probably be ten times better than them if I got the chance to prove it. "Things can change," I said, more to myself then to him. "There may come a day when those with common blood are allowed to become knights."

He chuckled again. "Maybe, but I feel that you'll have a long wait for that."

I said nothing. I knew he was right, but some things were worth waiting for.