It was a cool summer morning when young Lord Bidden passed through the fields that surrounded Bartown, Ielara’s main keep. Despite this people were already milling to and from the keep, some heading out to tend to the fields or fishing nets while others made their way to the Old Market quarter in hopes of selling some of their goods. Going through the throng of people was a pair of horsemen who sagged bored in their saddles, cursing their luck for getting stuck downwind of a manure cart.
The tall and handsome rider was none other than the not so young Kon, young Lord Bidden’s guardian on the part of his father. The smaller and average looking rider was the young lordling, Jeremiah Bidden, who in his current guise was truly looking as his father’s son. While Kon’s travel attire spoke of a man accustomed to the rigorous demands made by a long trip in the addle, his young charge seemed to be one step away from falling of his horse.
Still, the impression of commonness that the young lord took was nothing but a guise insisted upon by old Kon who in his middle years had found a taste for safe travel. To the young Bidden heir’s displeasure this was accompanied by a dislike for the more pleasant part of an adventure. So it had been that for the entire duration of their trip the two had made their progress only between inns and did not risk getting stuck on the road in the middle of the night. The satisfaction of always having a hot meal before him at the end of the day as well as a warm bed to sleep in clashed with the disappointment that he felt for missing out on all the parts that made up the adventures of his childhood lectures.
The closest that the youngster came to taking part in a fight on this trip had been when they were forced to stop early in the day due to a troublesome horseshoe and thus he and Kon stopped at a small alehouse in an even smaller village. All seemed clam until the field workers arrived and began to mock the latest series of news from the capital, more precisely the King’s and his Lords’ rulings. A couple of beers later the drunken workers had their share of amusement as they witnessed Kon merrily leading a defeated Jeremiah up the stairs using the youth’s ear to steer him on the way.
So it was that after two weeks of continuous journey the two had finally made the final approach to the King’s Keep in hope of arriving there before the beginning of the late summer tournaments. Dusty travel cloaks and tired horses gave a proper representation of how the road had passed the two in a furry of dust while depriving both rider and horse of the rest due to such a long trip as the one that lead from the northern borders of Ielara to its costal capital. However, that had been the old Lord’s demand and so it would have taken a lot more than a small army to stop Kon from delivering both boy and message to the court.
“Enjoying the view,” was the first question that Kon had asked Jeremiah that morning. Still, his question went unanswered as the young lord sat well asleep in his saddle despite the awful smell that the breeze carried their way. After waiting for a few seconds to see if his young charge would stir out of his slumber or not, Kon took his small horsewhip and started toying with it until it accidentally came down over Jeremiah’s left arm.
Whatever the older man’s intention, Jeremiah’s reaction defied all expectations. Instead of merely startling into wakefulness, the young lad turned his horse hard to the right and went off the road at a gallop, cutting right across the small rock mound that bordered the road and riding strait towards the ditch that carried filth water away from the keep. It was at that point that several things happened at once. The column of travelers picked up pace thus perfectly cutting Kon off from his errant charge. At the same time, Jeremiah’s horse discovered that the difference of height between the road and the ditch was too high for its trained instincts not to attempt to stop despite what its rider wanted. And thus Kon had no way of coming to Jeremiah’s assistance as the youth, startled by the rifle shots that traditionally signaled the changing of the guard at Bartown’s main gate, fell off his horse and head first into the ditch.
By the time when Kon managed to disentangle himself from the throng of people that rushed the keep’s gate and made his way to Jeremiah’s horse he could only use his handkerchief to shield his nose from the distinct aroma that young Lord Bidden spread after his morning soak. Any attempts at aiding the youngster were quickly stilled on his tongue at the sight of the filthy water that ran in rivulets off his clothes. Soaked and with a disgusted look on his face Jeremiah made his way to his horse that was politely trying to decline his rider’s attempts at mounting.
“Don’t you dare even grin,” Jeremiah grumbled while making a grab for his horse’s reigns. Despite all his attempts against exactly such an act, no matter how feeble they were, Kon could not help but begin to laugh at his charge’s stroke of bad luck as well as at the image of the soaking youth’s attempts to catch his reluctant horse while struggling with the weight of his drenched travel cloak. At precisely the same moment Jeremiah abandoned his attempts at catching his horse. Instead, he made a quick lunge and slapped Kon’s horse on its neck thus giving it a sign well known amongst his father’s horse breeders.
The older man’s face barely began to show the shock of finding himself off his saddle and on his way to the same ditch from which Jeremiah had just pulled himself out but a few moments earlier. And it was during those few seconds while he witnessed Kon’s flight towards the water that Jeremiah realized something. “That truly was funny Kon, you have my apologies!” And thus was Kon greeted after coming out from under the water’s surface amongst loud burst of boyish laughter.
***
And so was young Lord Bidden’s entry into the King’s capital. The gate guards found themselves forced to believe that the two atrociously smelling travelers were in fact a young lord and his lordly servant while several old timers that had spread small fruit stands nearby loudly decided that the smell truly was as bad as that of an entire troupe of soldiers that had been marched through a marsh for a day. You see, an army was indeed connected with young Bidden’s arrival into the capital and yet was not. For an army’s stench is but a smell and not a group of soldiers. Still, perhaps those would appear too in some of young Lord Bidden’s other ventures for that season.
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