My older big brother married a pretty girl and took over our house and fields. My younger big brother became a hunter and built a hunting lodge up in the mountains. And my big sister was going to marry the fellow from two doors down in a few years. As for me...
My older big brother had told me he’d give me some of his fields when I grew up. But the village priest had explained that it was a bad idea to split up the fields, because that would just make everyone even poorer than we already were. So I’d told my brother I didn’t need them.
Then the priest had asked me if I wanted to become the next priest, but I turned him down. I liked talking to him, but I never really understood the idea of praying to the Earth Mother and how prayers even worked. He’d explained that questioning the gods is part of being a good servant, and that a lot of priests can’t actually hear the voices of the gods, but that didn’t make much sense to me either. Anyway, the idea of becoming a priest just didn’t sit right with me.
“I’m sure it didn’t, Kiri, but that’s no reason to run off to town without a single clue about what you’ll do when you get there. Foolishness is what that is,” Uncle Lehmar said with a sigh.
He gave the donkey pulling the cart a couple of taps on the back. The animal clearly understood the signal and came to a gentle stop before folding its legs under itself to rest for a while.
“That’s why I’m so glad you came along, Uncle Lehmar!” I replied happily. “Even my older big brother didn’t mind me going if you were the one taking me.”
I patted the donkey. What a clever animal it was, stopping slowly to avoid jostling the goods loaded on the cart. Its coat felt coarser and tougher than the animals’ coats back home in the village. This donkey must have been used to weathering the elements on its long journeys.
“Goddess save us...” Uncle Lehmar muttered. “I’m just gonna ask a merchant friend of mine for a favor. I’m not promising you anything, understand? If it doesn’t work out, you’re going straight back to the village.”
“Yeah, I know.”
Uncle Lehmar was a traveling merchant who passed through our village every now and then—maybe a couple of times a year. He’d bring things like salt, iron farm tools, and pots and pans, then trade with us for wheat and animal skins, mostly. Our village hardly ever had any visitors, so it really cheered people up when he came by. It was almost like a festival. Even the priest would come rushing out to see if Uncle Lehmar had managed to get ahold of the books he’d asked for.
My older big brother and his wife were getting ready to welcome their new baby, so I’d been thinking about going to town by myself. But then Uncle Lehmar had shown up at our village to trade with us at just the right time, so I’d asked him to take me. Maybe the goddess was smiling on me after all.
Of course, everyone tried to tell me I should wait until my coming-of-age ceremony. They said nine was too young to be going out into the world. I did want to stay and meet the new baby and see my big sister get married too. But I knew our family was only just making ends meet. In a town, even a nine-year-old could become a merchant’s assistant or a craftsperson’s apprentice. Like I’d told everyone, there were plenty of stories of kids moving in with a different family and working for room and board. Besides, people who’d worked since they were young were respected and valued. At least, that’s what I’d heard somewhere or another, so it had to be true.
And so here I was, on the long road toward town. Having come a little way, I looked back just once.
“I’ve never left the village before,” I whispered to no one but the breeze. I’d be a liar if I said I wasn’t a little anxious, but I was twice—no, ten times as excited.
The first day of our journey went by peacefully, and we continued making our way to town the next day.
“So, what is there in Hiriyenka?” I asked Uncle Lehmar.
“It’s a port town,” he replied. “You’ll see the sea and plenty of big ships.”
“I’ve never seen the sea before. Not once. It’s huge, right?”
“That it is. So big you can’t see the other side.”
“And the ships are really big too?”
“Yep. Gotta stretch your neck to see the tops of the biggest ones. That’s how big ships have to be to sail the wide, wild sea.”
That night, we made camp for the second time in the shadow of a large boulder, gathering up as much kindling as we could carry and lighting it with a flint before laying out animal skins to sleep on. Uncle Lehmar had his own, and he was nice enough to lend me one of the ones he meant to sell.
But I couldn’t go to sleep just yet. “I’ll see all kinds of interesting things in town, right?” I asked.
“No doubt,” Uncle Lehmar replied. “Lively dances, beautiful songs, the best wine you’ll— Ah, you’re still a little young for that. I’m sure you’ll find some fun new toys too, and... Oh, by the way, they were putting on some kind of play last time.”
“A play? Like the one with the warrior?”
“Couldn’t say for sure. I was in a hurry at the time. But there was a dashing young lad with a sword cutting down enemies left and right, so it might’ve been the tale of the warrior.”
Uncle Lehmar patiently entertained my questions as he threw a few more branches onto the fire. The warm light of the flames made his round, ruddy nose look redder than ever, like a rosy apple stuck in the middle of his face. He’d warned me that we must never, ever let the fire go out while we were at camp because it kept wild beasts away. Even monsters, like slimes, wouldn’t approach.
I thought about what Uncle Lehmar had just said. “If it was just someone fighting enemies with a sword, it might not have been about the warrior.”
“Oh?” Uncle Lehmar prompted.
“Yeah, I mean, the play could have been about a hero or an adventurer.”
“Hmm, a hero I could see, but an adventurer?” Uncle Lehmar paused for a moment. “They’re not really the kinds of people who get plays written about them.”
“They’re not?”
“I’ve hired them a few times, see, and they’re not these grand, impressive characters like warriors or heroes of legend. They’re just...” Uncle Lehmar hesitated. “How can I put it? Useful sorts, I suppose. Then again, some adventurers did become heroes, so maybe there are some plays about them after all.”
Wow. So Uncle Lehmar has even done business with adventurers! I could hardly believe my ears.
When I was still just a baby, adventurers had come to our village to kill some goblins. Of course, I didn’t remember anything about it, but I’d grown up hearing from my younger big brother about how amazing they were. Still, I’d never seen an adventurer with my own eyes.
“Now, don’t you go getting all starry-eyed over them,” Uncle Lehmar chided. “Look, next time I’ll tell you some of the dullest stories I know about adventurers. Just go to sleep now. We’ll have to be off before dawn if we don’t want to spend another night under the stars.”
That was easier said than done, since my mind was buzzing with swashbuckling thoughts long into the night.
It was around noon, and the sun was shining down from right over our heads. The trees started to thin out, and the road merged with another. I felt the ground become firmer under my shoes, a clear sign that more people traveled here. Like he’d promised last night, Uncle Lehmar was telling me about the adventurers he’d met on his travels.
“Let’s see now,” Uncle Lehmar began. “I’ll start with the story about the letter delivery. Someone in town had asked me to take a letter to one of the far-off villages. And I fully intended to deliver it myself, but then another job suddenly came in that I just couldn’t turn down. So, I hired an adventurer to deliver it for me.”
“Delivering letters... Huh.” It was a bit of a letdown. The adventurers I imagined slew monsters or explored labyrinths.
Uncle Lehmar continued. “I employed them as bodyguards once too. There was a spot I had to head to on business. But I’d heard that goblins sometimes showed up along the road, so I hired a couple for protection.”
“Wow, goblins?!” I exclaimed.
“Mm-hmm. In the end, we never did see any, though.”
“Oh...” I was glad it’d been a safe journey, of course, but I was hoping for a more exciting story.
“What else? Oh, I’ve hired them to search for missing people once or twice. I knew this dwarf—fine craftsman, very good with his hands, but a bit of an odd duck. Anyway, one day he just threw down his tools and disappeared to who-knows-where. Came back of his own accord after three days, though.”
The adventurers Uncle Lehmar described to me didn’t match up with the ones in my imagination at all. After all, none of them did any adventuring! But I was starting to understand what he’d meant by “useful.” Rather than sticking to one type of work like farmers or hunters, adventurers did any odd jobs people needed.