Chapter 1 : A peaceful life

12 000 years ago, somewhere south of the Neck, Westeros. Near mid-day.

It had happened again. Not that it mattered of course. Breaking of tools could usually come when one would try to make sure the earth was well churned up. It was the third time in four months and Akaras just started to get used to work the earth.

« Patience is always rewarded », he thought. « Yes. Patience and perseverance. Learning from mistakes. Always moving forward »

Having finally decided to move north of the country in order to fulfill his dream : to settle himself and his family away from this pack of people down south, always increasing in number, and starting a new life, now that this part of the country was under men's influence.

A farmer life. After everything he has been through. Reflecting on his past, Akaras never once considered having this life. Back at this time, he despised farmers. And readers. And musicians. All of these useless, cowardly ways. Probably because he considered them as scroungers. Living their petty lives without even knowing that people like him endured terrible things everyday to ensure that they were safe.

He was a soldier, fighting to protect them, these ways. And to expand their territory, taking it back from these forest creatures. Oh, how many of them he saw ! How many he fought, and sometimes killed. These tree prayers, human killers. Them, there trees, their blood sacrifices. Almost having a human appearance but smaller than them, with a strange tree-like skin in the place of flesh, glowing green eyes in their carve-like faces.

When he first saw them, Akaras didn't saw them as truly terrifying. Of course they were different, but still… higher than dwarfs, but not taller than a child of ten. It didn't corresponded to the evil description that the war veterans tell to the fresh soldiers. But it was truly when he saw them fighting that he truly became scared: they weren't strong fighters, and the weapons they used were nothing more but some kind of obsidian swords, daggers and arrows. Almost looked like glass. Capable to pierce flesh for sure but men wore proper armors made of bronze, the finest art of blacksmiths.

No. Their biggest weapons were their beasts. Giants, wolves, cats, mammoths… even birds became a pain in the ass when it came to battle. These sorcerers. Controlling animals minds. Doing human sacrifices to their damn trees. Hopefully they were winning. Always. And each time they would fall back, they made sure to cut these carved trees, and burn what was left of them.

They pushed them back to the north of the continent. Eventually, Akaras grew tired of fighting, tired of risking his life, of seing many of his comrades fell to these monsters. But he never had the strength to leave: this was the only life he knew.

And he was good at it. When other soldiers used swords, axes, shields or arrows, he only trusted his falx: a curved blade which belonged to his father a long time ago. This and sometimes a spear to throw. And the way he fought: where others used brute strength, he allied it with speed and dexterity. And foremost, agility. To hunt down and fight in the forest, he had to be quick and wary.

He considered himself as a competent fighter. But not the higher one amongst the others. He had killed wolves, children of the forest… and even a giant one time. That day, he jumped off from a cliff to his head and pierced his skull through his eye. What a day it was ! But he knew that other warriors killed more than him. And he didn't wish to be well known. A famous man could become a more easy target to the enemy. Besides, this was not who he was. Glory didn't interest him.

But either way, he had enough of all of this. And started to wonder if the easy life he first despised would be more acceptable.

This was until he met HER. Elvendra. Beautiful and sweet Elvandra.

Of women, he only knew the prostitutes living in the military camps who came to bring the soldiers some comfort. And Akaras considered himself as nothing more but a soldier, but had principes, and always took care not to farther any child. A soldier is not a father. Besides, he could end up killed by the children the forest, so any bond would be more than avoidable.

But HER. She saved him. From everything. From these monsters, these beasts these trees, his friends screams, this bloody war. She made him realize that he wasn't only a soldier. He could be something else, someone else.

For the first time since the beginning of they war, Akaras found hope again. He left the army, and went living another life. A more peaceful life.

And now, on his freshly acquired lands, at the age of 35, Elvendra in their house with Sera, their daughter of ten, Akaras considered these war times as nothing more than a bad memory.

« Papa ! », he heard scream in his back. He smiled and turned, dropping the broken pickaxe. He caught her in his arms. He enjoyed when she did that. This was also something new for him at the beginning. Freed from the war, he could finally enjoy the feeling of being a father. He was scared: he didn't know how to raise a child, but apparently, these kind of things can be learned as well as anything else. Besides, he wasn't alone: Elvendra was with him. And they both did well in facing this challenge. But where his wife looked like every much of a woman in behavior, his daughter was another thing really; a boy in the body of a girl. Fierce, curious, adventurer, begging him to bring her to the hunt or taught her how to fight, to climb or even to farm. This was probably one of those things she was just about to ask him right now. He brought her back to her feet.

«You broke the pickaxe ! You see ! You need my help ! », she told him gleefully, like this could be the ultimate proof that he needed her.

«And tell me exactly why i would need it ? You think you could do better than me ? », Akaras teased her.

« Yes i could ! And far better ! »

Sera stood in front of him, up for the challenge. He allowed himself a little smug.

« Alright then ! Show me what you can do ! Pick up the next one right here. » He pointed a second pickaxe on the ground. After breaking tools three times, he had token some precautions in taking a second one each time he went farming.

She took it and started to mimic his precedents moves, feeling the weight of the tool and grimacing because of the effort. After few curved strokes on the earth, she gave up.

« Impressive », his father ironised her.

«It is to heavy ! Just you wait i grow up ! »

« Ha ! I can't wait to see that ! » In fact he didn't want it. he wanted her to stay the way she was. A little lovely thing with so much to learn. « Anyway, mama wanted me to tell you that the meal is almost ready. And after, i want you to take me to the hunt ! », she asked full of hope.

« Maybe… », he answered, « or perhaps another time ! Right after, i will bring back this damned thing to Kurush ! This is the fourth time ! Maybe i will ask him to finally give me some good tools ! »

« Or perhaps you should go more easy with your strokes ! You are tiring yourself », another voice spoke. A voice he knew well.

He turned his head to sea the face of his wife. With these caring blue eyes that would make the hearth of any man shatters. She just joined them; waiting them to come to her was ridiculous, knowing that Sera got always distracted with her father.

« I never tire ! The earth is just a bit hard. And i almost finished the plantation ! » And it was true. Despite these problems, he learned. Taking counsels from their farmer friend Kurush who moved in the region a little more sooner than them, he proved himself. He just needed to be more careful when working.

« Yes ! And we will finally live from other things that hunting or coming to buy food to the village. I admit it. But right now, you need to eat ! And so do you Sera ! Come ! Both of you !

He and Sera followed, smiling to each other, impatient about the meal they would surely savor.

Some days later

He was standing on a rock, crouched, bow in hand with arrows ready. Sera beside him. It was the fourth time that she came with him to hunt. She started to improve herself, and he didn't know how to feel about it. Most of the green boys started to use weapons at her age, and were hunting just like them. At first, it is pretty difficult for them to track down an animal, to hide without being seen, to adjust and to shot properly. Sometimes, some of them may not have the hearth to take a life. Even an animal one. Akaras knew this better than anyone. But when they usually get better, they start to like it. To enjoy it. And then… while growing up, the assurance, the arrogance and the habit coming from it could lead them to develop an more dangerous desire. To mesure themselves to other beings, other people, other hunters… to other men. As an adult, the need to prove a valor is important among men.

Would his daughter be the same ? She already wanted him to train her in fighting. He wanted her strong. That for sure. In this world, better being strong, especially for the girls. But he remembered what it was like to fight. To kill someone.

He remembered the children of the forest. How monstrous he considered them. But… in the same way, he recalled himself as monstrous as them during battles. The way he killed, the way he acted… the way he felt. It was the same way he felt when he had killed other men before the war. Akaras could recall perfectly: in a tavern because people wanted to rob him or in his own camp when he killed a soldier who came to kill him because he felt humiliated.

Now, with everything in his past, he looked back and thought that a man could kill a child of the forest or a giant in the same way he could kill another man. He would have never felt this way back at that time.

« Perhaps this new life softened me ? » he thought. « In this case, maybe it is for the better ».

Casting aside these dark thoughts, he watched as Sera took the bow he gave her, and aimed at the deer, standing right at twenty feet from them. She waited for quite sometime, inspiring and expiring her breath, just like he told her. And then, the arrow went by and stroke the flank of the beast which screamed out of pain and was starting to run.

« I've got him ! » She screamed joyfully.

« Yes but it is not enough. See? It is running » Akaras replied. Then, Sera wanted to say something back but he continued. « But well done ! You did hit him pretty well. Considering the wound, it will bleed out quickly. We just have to give it a chase. »

Indeed, they didn't have to walk for a long time, and found it dying near a river. As they cam close, Akaras drew his knife and told to his daughter: « Do it. Finish it. »

Sera stopped, surprised by these words, and watched the dying deer, then the knife. She took it. As they kneeled beside their prey, Akaras could see the hands of his daughter shaking. She didn't want to do it. But in the same time she had to. If she wanted to be a good huntress, she had to pass by this task. As she hesitated, his father took the hand handling the knife and together, they finished the deer. And she did it without closing her eyes. Or crying. How much he was proud of her.

As they sat for a little while near the river, the members of the deer tied up, Sera's head rested on her father shoulder, proceeding the fact that she took a life. They stayed silent for a moment.

« Papa » she finally said « Does it feel always like this ? »

Akaras thought before answering. «It depends of the people i believe. But yes, most of the time. You don't have to feel guilty about it, this was your first time.»

« No. It is fine. I still want to hunt with you. But… is it the same thing ? When… we have to kill someone ? »

Surprised by the question, Akaras tensed for a moment. He had the feeling that his daughter almost had heard his earlier thoughts.

« Why are you asking this ? »

« Well… i want you to teach me how to fight. But i don't think i would be ready to kill someone. Even… if it would be the children of the forest. » She added the last part, knowing this was a difficult subject to talk with her father.

The children… from what he heard about the whereabouts of the war, their army pushed them back to the very north of the Neck. But the fightings became rare during the last years. Neither men nor them were eager to battle by now. Despite their overwhelming superiority, and the numerous victory, the chieftains didn't want to send more men to slaughter. This war cost them so much. And wouldn't Akaras leaved it eleven years ago, he would surely be a corpse rotting somewhere. Some people started to even consider making peace with them.

Surely, war was now something that Akaras despised and was happy to hear that it would finally be over for others than him, but peace implied cohabitation. With the children. He still didn't trust them, didn't accepted them and their ways. He remembered what they did.

But he didn't want to worry his daughter about that. War was not something he wanted for her or his wife. So he replied carefully.

« You won't have to kill anyone ! Neither that anyone will ever touch you ! I won't allow it ! As for the children ? None of them will come near you ! By the gods i promise ! Besides… even if i would train you to fight, it would be… to kick asses ! And you will become the stronger fighter this world has ever known ! That way, all those little weaklings will run with their tails between their legs by just seing you ! »

Sera giggled at first, then the giggle became a laugh. And they were both laughing without being able to stop ! Without thinking of the war, the children or any danger anymore. There were just them, the river and the forrest surrounding them. A beautiful place. And Akaras wanted this life to last forever. Nothing else mattered.

After a moment, they stopped and Sera watched her father with determination. She stood and declared proudly:

« Yes ! I will ! And then i will truly end the war ! Defend the weak ! That way, everyone will live like us ! With no issues ! Just us, the hunt, the farm and the forrest ! And… » She paused for a time. « … mama's meals, mostly » she admitted. « We will all live together ! Even the children, because i am sure they are not so bad as everyone tell ! And if they are, i will change them ! And if someone will disagree… i will kick his ass ! »

Akaras looked at her, cowed by those words coming from such an innocent but bold being. Then he sighed. She did not know the true world. How dangerous it is. How cruel sometimes. But he had to admit it: she was surely the only one on this continent who had such thoughts about their enemies. He never considered to interest himself with them. From his point of view, living with them was impossible. What their respective races did to each other was unspeakable. At the very least, they could potentially all give up the fighting and live on each portion of land that now belonged to one another, and never interacting again, like Akaras did in a way. But living together ? No. To much hate. To much painful memories.

Sera had to understand that.

But she was still a child. Akaras had time, plenty of time to do so. And he didn't want to break his daughter dreams. Besides, her resolve was a good thing: she never knew what war was. She was a child of peace and he prayed that would never change !

So, he laughed to that.

« Ha ! I would dream to see that ! With the training i will provide you, i hope you will not disappoint me ! »

She blinked two times before finally understanding what this answer meant.

« So… you say yes !? True ? You will teach me !? » She asked with beaming eyes.

« Do not make me repeat myself ! And by the gods, do not talk about this to your mother ! At least not yet ! You know perfectly why ! »

« Yes, yes, yes ! I promise ! When ? When ? »

She was there, jumping repeatedly on the shore, interrupting the calm sound coming from the river, too excited to believe this could be true.

« Not today i am warning you ! But you better be ready in the coming days ! And now hurry ! Your mother must surely fear that we could have both been eaten by a bear ! »

Adding nothing to that, Akaras raised up and quickly put the deer's carcass on his back, heading home with Sera behind him.