Ongoing Writing: Where the Arrow Flies

Where the Arrow Flies
by: Catrysa Trakand

The sun rose over the palace aides. A lazy guard stretched and yawned.

"I hate third watch," a guardsman commented, rubbing a ruddy fist into his eyes.

A sword's length away, another guard sighed, "Well, it's almost over." He rolled his shoulder, "The weather's changing."

The was a laugh, "Good old gramps. A better weather vain you never will find." The rest of the wall-guard laughed, while below their long sought after replacements moved out from the castle barracks.

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Rachel Ardent, a young soldier of sixteen, walked with the Dawn's Guard, as she had called them since she was old enough to walk into site of the castle on her own. Her father had been a guard. And his father, and his father. But she was the first woman in her family to become a guard. Not that a guardswoman was anything special, but her family was a bit backwards in that respect. A soft smile, and she begun the climb to the top of the palasaide. 'Today, like everyday. As exciting as the first,' she repeated silently to herself, like a morning prayer.

"Hey, Ardent," a gruff voice called out. An older guardsman, grey beginning to pepper into his hair of thick black locks, his face a sun-weathered red-brown, grinned at her. "You got a rain coat?"

Rachel chuckled softly, remembering his name, "You think I'm going to need it, Melendez?" She stepped to his side, a lean frame towering a full head over his stockier form.

He looked up and winked. "I don't, but Gramps does. Complaining about that shoulder again."

"Oh is he," Rachel replies questioningly chuckling. Thumbing over her shoulder and back toward the barracks adding with a coy grin, "Then sounds like I should head back to my bunk and grab my coat!"