Chapter five: Like father, like daughter?

"Ooh, is that from Mainar?" a girl asked.

"Yes, thank you," Yallara replied as if someone had complimented her on a dress. She pocketed the letter Kuri had just given her to read later.

Despite the fact that Kirem, Justin, and Naomi's intention was that of friendly teasing, the word had spread to other, less than friendly people that Yallara was receiving letters from Mainar. For several weeks she had been mercilessly teased about it. However, her serious, and polite yes and no answers had taken away much of the fun and only a few determined people said anything about it anymore. Her friends didn't even peep. She expected they felt bad about having caused all of it. She didn't blame them but thought it better not to bring it up.

"We are going to have a lot of fun today," Kirem commented casually.

"And why is that?" Naomi asked, immediately suspicious.

"Different training today," he said.

"What?" everyone at the table gasped. It had been the same old thing since they started. A mention of change caught everyone's attention. Kirem grinned and Yallara rolled her eyes at him.

"You have too much fun at other people's expense," she informed him.

"I won't argue with you," he replied.

"What about the new training?" someone else asked.

Kirem wasn't able to answer.

"Everyone put you trays away and report to the training yards, NOW!"

The trainees hurried to obey Sarge and were out in the yard three minutes later. Another three after that and they were divided into two groups.

"You may be wondering why you're out here lined up instead of giving your ponies a work out," Sarge walked up and down the rows as he spoke. "This is a special exercise that was put into practice just a few years ago. Lord Wyldon thought it up for the pages he was training. The purpose of the Riders is not quite the same, however. So we have modified this pleasant experience to fit our needs."

"Did Sarge call it a 'pleasant experience'? Now I'm worried," Kirem whispered in my ear. He was standing next to me. Unlucky for him, Sarge heard.

"Trainee Rubaan, you can head up the first group. Trainee Cordel will take the second," Sarge ordered. "Trainee Rubaan your job is to get your group to the 'safe zone', marked on the map we will give you, within two hours. Trainee Cordel your job is to stop him from getting there. You will all be given padded practice weapons coated in blue or red chalk according to your group. If you are hit you are out of the 'game'. Is everyone clear?"

"Yes, sir," everyone shouted.

"Good. The other trainers and I will be monitoring your actions and judging your performances. Saddle your ponies and get back here."

Yallara hurried to the stable debating which pony to use. She decided on Sunfire and began to saddle him even as she started thinking about the best way to catch Kirem, which reminded her,

"Your last name is Rubaan?" she asked.

"Yeah," Kirem answered in a dignified voice. "Is there something wrong with it?"

Yallara just shook her head and lead her pony out of the stable.

Kirem got a fifteen minute head start to confuse the trail and get as far away as he could. She sat on her pony, her fingers itched to start. Finally Thayet gave the go ahead. Yallara gave the signal to start forward at a quick trot.

The trail was easy to track at first. The other group had been trying to make speed. After five minutes or so they had slowed down and started to confuse the trail by having ponies break off the main path and rejoin it later or some other trick they had been taught.

Small tricks didn't throw Yallara off their trail, however, and they kept up a good pace until they came to a river. It was narrow; the problem was that the bottom was rocky. Ponies could travel up and down that river ten hundred times and you wouldn't be able to tell. Without footprints or broken branches that hung over normal paths Yallara wouldn't be able to tell which way they had gone. What's worse Kirem wasn't stupid enough to make a straight heading for their goal he had been weaving the path back and forth since he'd started, making it hard to determine his ultimate goal.

Yallara hopped down from her mount and signaled for the two people she had picked to be second and third in command, Kala and Justin, to do the same. The others she signaled to stay quiet.

"I've looked over the bank of the river and they didn't cross to the other side of the shore. They definitely took the river. The question is, which way?" she told them. "I've tried to figure where they are going. The safe zone would have to be somewhere with a landmark. But there are just too many. A clearing is not far from here, there's a house further ahead, an old shrine to the south. I don't know what to think."

"Perhaps we should split up," suggested Kala.

"I'm not comfortable with that option. He has a full group, if only half of our group comes upon him we won't have enough forces," Yallara explained. "We do need to scout both ways, however. Alright,"

Yallara turned to address the whole group, "I need four swift but quiet riders to scout down both sides of the river. Stay out of the water, we don't want the noise. Scout no more than a mile and return to report any sign of the other group."

Several people stepped forward. Yallara asked Kala to select the four that had the fastest ponies. They were sent and the rest waited anxiously for their return. They waited fifteen minutes before the first two riders returned from the south.

"We didn't find anything to suggest they had passed that way," one of the riders, a girl, reported.

"Very well, give your ponies a drink and a quick rest until the other riders return," Yallara ordered.

After waiting another five minutes Yallara had to take action. Twenty minutes was long enough to run that errand, the riders should have returned earlier. They had been waiting too long doing nothing. Kirem would make sure they got to the safe zone in two hours and one of those hours was already gone.

"We're heading north," Yallara announced. "Mount up and move out."

They followed the stream for nearly a mile before Yallara's private theory was proved. A blotch of blue chalk marked a tree beside the river. Blue was Kirem's color. A little further along Kirem's group had left the river, heading east. The tracks were less than ten minutes old. They were closer than she had thought.

Yallara relied solely upon hand signals now. They had to be absolutely quiet to pull this off. She had Kala and one third of the group to go around on the left side and Justin was to take another third up on the right side. Yallara would take the rest and follow. If Justin and Kala could close the front they could surround Kirem's group. Yallara had given each of them twelve minutes to get into position. On her signal, a bird call whistle, they would attack.

Her only worry came when Kirem started to curve to the right. She hoped Justin had the sense to plan for that. When no fighting sounds came she sighed in relief. One more minute and she would blow the whistle.

Suddenly she heard loud shouting. Cursing she blew the bird call loudly. Hoping that the rest of her party could hear it she led her group forward. Breaking upon the 'enemy' she found Justin already in battle with them. Kala came soon after. It was chaos. Justin's side of their wall was weak, he had lost too many people before Yallara and Kala had gotten there. Yallara led a small group over to strengthen his forces.

Even with Justin's trouble they were winning. Apparently Kirem hadn't known they were that close and had been caught unaware. Soon they had the few 'alive' trainees surrounded (this was more difficult than you might think, because even though the rest were supposed to be dead they were still walking around). Kirem grinned up at Yallara, her bow still trained on him.

"What else should I have expected from a Cordel?" he asked.

"Better," she replied. Two people in the group they had surrounded were not Blue Group. They were her scouts.

Assuming the exercise was over she lowered her bow and dismounted her pony. She found Justin lying on the ground with a nice blue chalk mark on his back. She pulled him up.

"What were you thinking? I bet it never crossed your brain that they might change course, like they have been since we started tracking them. Look at you and your men, you've been thoroughly diced. They almost broke through." Yallara scolded harshly. She may have been taking this first training session a little too seriously but it seemed dead important to Yallara.

"Yallara, this is just training. You can't expect us to be perfect the first time," Justin replied.

"JUST training? We are here to prepare for the real thing. When leading troops you have to be perfect. If you're not, men die," Yallara said vehemently.

No one noticed the judges ride into the trampled patch of under brush that was now a newly made clearing.

"Trainee Cordel, I believe it is our job to do the scolding," Thayet commented. "I agree with you but also Trainee Tyree. You are training for the real thing and it is important to get it right. But you are in training exactly for the reason that you will make mistakes and here you can learn from them so that you do not make them on the battle field. As a matter of fact you all did better than I expected. You did make several mistakes. Trainee Rubaan, you should have picked up your pace after you left the river. You also underestimated the Red Group's speed. You should never underestimate your opponent."

"I tried to pick up the pace but our captives proved to be extremely troublesome," Kirem explained. Yallara looked at her two scouts who were grinning smugly.

"That is just another way in witch you underestimated you opponent," Thayet scolded. "Trainee Tyree," Justin stepped forward. "Trainee Cordel was correct: you forgot to compensate for Blue Groups movement. Do you understand how to fix that problem?"

"Yes, ma'am," Justin replied.

"Good," Thayet nodded. "You lost more men than you had to because of that carelessness. Trainee Cordel, what about you, do you realize your mistake?"

"Yes, your highness," Yallara admitted. "I didn't take into account that Blue Group might have taken my scouts prisoner. I automatically assumed they had killed them. Now that I've caught Blue Group they could have used the prisoners as hostages to barter for safety or they could have been killed in the skirmish."

"Yes," Thayet confirmed. "Trainee Rubaan I commend you on your use of the river and for taking the hostages. Trainee Cordel solved the problem the river posed excellently and compensated for Trainee Tyree's mistake. Now, head back to the barracks. Switch mounts and we'll run through some regular exercises.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

"I can't eat," Yallara pushed her tray away.

"Don't worry yourself to death. I'm sure Justin is fine," Naomi attempted.

"If he's fine then why didn't he come to dinner?" Yallara argued.

Naomi looked down with a small shrug.

"Sorry. I don't know what's going on with me. I just feel edgy. Look, I'm going to go for a walk I'll be back for meditation." Yallara turned in her tray and left the hall.

She ventured outside. It was dark out but the moon lit enough of her way. Turing around a corner of the main building she heard a loud thump. Glancing around sharply she found a door in the side of the building. It was one of the storage rooms.

Yallara eased the door open. A candle flickered, set on the floor inside. A crate lay sideways, apparently kicked, and a young man stood in front of it. He turned to look at her. She slipped in and shut the door.

They stood in silence while Yallara built her courage.

"Justin, listen," she said. "I didn't mean to get how I did. I don't know why I did that. I guess...my father used to say stuff similarly but he didn't have my mother's fire to mix with it."

Justin just stood there, his face too shadowed to read. Then he nodded stiffly and found a crate to sit on. It took him a moment to find his voice as he stared into the small flame.

"It's not that," he finally said. "I understand that."

Yallara started getting worried about him now.

"What's wrong, Justin?" she asked.

"My father..." he trailed off. "...my father was in the Riders, under the command of Farish."

"Farish? I bet that was wonderful," Yallara replied.

Justin sat still for a moment. Then reached jerkily into his pocket and pulled out a letter and handed it to her. Yallara opened it and squinted in the candle light to read the words.

Mr. Tyree,

I regret to inform you that your father has been killed in active duty. On their way to the capital Second Rider Group was ambushed in the night. None were found alive. I grieve with you in your loss. Many good men and women were killed that night.

Sincerely, Commander Buriram Tourakom

Yallara sat in silent shock for several moments. It was rare to lose a whole Rider group and this was Farish's group. She wasn't famous like some but she was good, very good.

Yallara sat down next to Justin. She extended an arm and gently wrapped it around his shoulder.

"I've never been so angry," he whispered.

"You have the right to be. Don't forget, though, that anger is a good vent but that if you let it control your actions it will turn on you. Happens to me every time."

Justin couldn't help a small smile. The bell rang loudly, disrupting them.

"Meditation. Justin, nobody would mind if you sat out," she told him.

"No, I'll come," he said.

He blew out the candle and they hurried around the building not to be late.

When they entered the mess hall, tables and all aside, Yallara could tell by the trainees faces that the news must have been announced.

She found a place to sit and fell into meditation.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

From that day on they had at least one 'game' session every morning and regular training for the rest of the day.

It was exhausting work. Yallara knew that she herself was too tired even to dream. Meditation was becoming easier, though. Sort of like the quiet refuge in the middle of chaos. Anytime Yallara had the chance she would fall into meditation.

Justin never mentioned what had happened after that. Yallara followed his lead and never did either. They were closer friends for it though and confided more often in each other.

She continued to receive letters from Mainar and to send them. The cold season was approaching fast now and Yallara was annoyed at the thought that letters would be impossible soon. Hopefully the fighting at the front would slow down, though. She tried not to think of Mainar fighting savage scanrans. He was very important to her. It was funny to think that just a few months ago (had it been that long?) she had not wanted anything to do with him.