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==478-479== [[Gamond]] paced a well-worn pattern, round and round and back and forth. [[Ludwell]] felt like a prison. He hated winter. Hated the way snow weighed everything down, muffled sound, made cells of houses. How [[The Cold|the cold]] would sneak in and bite like a dagger slipped into an armpit. It was impossible not to think in quiet winters. And that was worst of all, thinking. He fled outside, braving the teethsplitting cold. Armed with a shovel he made war on the smothering white ramparts around the longhouse. Dug ditches and moats, shaped murder holes from which one could throw a [[spear]], shoot a bow, or pour oil onto those who would come in the night and kill his family. The [[saxon]] snowman he’d built and demolished with a wood-axe several days past still listed drunkenly over its’ collapsed upper body underneath the awning of the cattle barn. That snowman would be rebuilt and die a hundred different deaths before spring finally put it out of its’ misery. <hr> The older boy was clearly the better swordhand. [[Vagon]] in the spring was a mess of mud and sprouting green. Too many men and [[horses]] always moving, making miserable footing of the practice yard. Around were many other boys who, like [[Gamond]], trained as squires under various lords and knights of [[Salisbury]]. [[Gamond]] didn’t see them, didn’t care to. The circle was one of few places where he could be entirely in the now, focused. The circle that two men make of their blades, as [[Elad]] often put it. He stubbornly stood his ground as the sole focus of his attention, a soon to be knighted boy from the hundred [[Swans]], set a flurry of blows upon his [[shield]] and [[sword]]. Each struck hard enough to send splinters of wood into the mud. Suddenly one slipped past, he didn’t even see it, just a blur out the corner of one eye. The world wobbled, spun, faded at the edges. His head rang like a churchbell struck. He tried to focus. Stay upright. For a long moment it was a not a boy staring at him anymore. A huge beard, red with dried blood. Bulging blue eyes, yellow teeth, tattoos crawling up his neck. The world went from grey to blinding white, a roar like the river Nadar come snowmelt drowning everything else. He couldn’t move his arms. Or legs. Someone was screaming. Screaming his name. “[[Gamond|GAMOND]], SNAP OUT OF IT!” [[Melkin]] and [[Maelgwyn]] had an arm each, Cardry sat on his legs. [[Elad]] was screaming, full throated and red faced, a fingers breadth from his face. He’d damned near killed that boy. <hr> Weightless. Nothing on his chest, or his mind. Just the singing of [[forest]] birds, whisper of trees and leaves and the quiet murmur of the river all around. Luxury, summer. At length he turned from floating on his back, swam downriver. Dove among stones and banks, tickled fish among the reeds. For a time, it was possible to forget the burden of memory.
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