What a bothersome girl Hannah was. I really didn´t expect her to run away with tears in her eyes and so I could only look at her back perplexed as she dashed away, leaving the magical dagger behind. I kicked it away, angry that such a thing even existed and slowly walked towards Hannah who seemed to have stopped a hundred metres away. After a few metres, I turned around and used the sleeve of my dress to get a hold of the dagger, which was honestly easier said than done.
Holding it awkwardly, I resumed walking towards Hannah, but this time didn´t stay very silent. The gravel crunched underneath my feet as I overcame the last few metres and dropped the dagger onto the ground. Hannah, still weeping, looked upwards into my own eyes.
“They still live?” I asked, slowly realizing why she wanted to get to the elven forest in the beginning.
“Hmm … they … they were forced to leave me behind …” She mumbled, making it very hard for me to understand her because of all her sobbing. She wasn’t entirely sure if they were still alive, which was probably the sole reason she was still here. “but … they would have gotten me out of this hell …”
I knelt down in the grass in front of her and took her hands.
“When did they separate from you?” I asked, already knowing the full answer.
“Eight years ago. They left me alone for half my life …” The probability was low that her parents were still alive, even she must have understood that. As far as I knew, no human, nor elf would leave their offspring behind like this if they had another choice.
“If they are still alive, we will find them. We will ask the elven king himself to conduct the search and he will make sure that no stone is left unturned.” I claimed, which wasn’t entirely out of possibility. I mean, we had to interact with the elven king at least one more time.
“You swear?” She asked with hope in her eyes.
“Nah.” Just like this, all the hope she had was destroyed. In a matter of seconds, she fell into utter despair once more, sobbing violently, gripping my smaller hands tightly.
“Why … why … why was it you who brought me out of my misery … why are you implying that you help me, but then refuse?” She asked, slowly turning a bit angry, but still largely depressed.
“Hmm … surviving as a goal is simply not enough,” I said drily.
“Eh?” My reasoning may have been a little too convoluted for anyone to understand, thus, I explained it to her so that even a little child should understand it.
“How should I put it. Surviving alone isn´t a great goal in my opinion. You always need a reason for all of your actions, something to strive for and something that justifies all your actions. Without a goal, you are more of a liability than anything else. So strive for this goal, make yourself predictable, but also useful for me. And if you satisfy me, I will grant whatever you wish for.” I said.
“Is that your way of saying you will help me if I do more than agreed upon in the contract we made?” I laughed happily but didn´t confirm her question right away.
“Maybe …” I said, trailing off into the distance.
“I agree,” she said firmly, which honestly took me a bit off guard.
“Huh? That easily?” I asked, perplexed and completely thrown off my intended way of concluding this conversation.
“I will do whatever illegal activities you ask me to do. I will … I will murder, kidnap, whatever. But let me see my parents again.” She let go of my hands, wiped the tears away and looked at me with determination.
“You are willing to make a deal with me?” I asked and scratched my head as her behaviour really didn´t fit with the timid, powerless girl I picked up from the slums. In the first place, the probability of her parents being alive was low, so why did she propose such a thing?
“As long as I can reunite with my parents again.”
“Why haven’t you asked Mary first?”
“I did … but she couldn’t answer.” That was probably because Mary didn´t know how to fulfil her request at all. For that, she would have to steal the crown of thorns before me, which was honestly not something she could do this easily. The timeframe already passed where the plan I laid out for her weeks ago was viable.
“I see … this deal between us … Mary doesn’t need to know, alright?” I asked, looking straight into her eyes to see her reaction.
“My lips are sealed.” Her words were truthful, but she could still go back on them over time.
“I will feed your guts to the rats if you go back on your word.” I said drily.
“Mary won´t …” I glared at her like I never did before. The timid girl was still there, that was for sure after her initial reaction. She shrank back in fear but didn´t rob away from me.
“I will not accept a ‘no’ anymore. I only wanted to parade you around and slowly change the public opinion about the elves, but that changed now. You will do as I say, or you will face the consequences. Understood?” I asked with a smile on my lips.
“… yes.” She said, balling her hands into fists. Honestly, I still didn´t know what to think of her. The time she spent in the slums, made judging her actions incredibly hard. Not impossible, but way harder than expected. Since she was eight, she lived in a harsh environment, similar to what I grew up in. But unlike me, she didn´t try to take the reins back into her hand but rather endured it without any hope in sight. And I, against all the odds, apparently have become her hope, at least somewhat.
“Great. And now for real, why do you want me to train you?” I switched topics quite fast as I didn´t want her to overthink her decision anymore … which also meant spending way more time with her to distract her than I really should.
“As I said, I wanted to pro-“ She started, but was soon interrupted by me.
“I hate to be lied to.” I said and stared her down.
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“I wanted to be strong enough to protect myself.” She said timidly. Somehow, I started to understand how this girl worked. She probably fitted better into a jungle than into society, but whatever.
“Has that changed?” I asked sternly.
“No.” She said, still avoiding my gaze as much as she could.
“Great.” I said happily and clapped into my hands, abruptly ending the dangerous situation she perceived herself in. “Then let us train a bit, shall we?”
I walked away from her towards a walkway with a lot of gravel. She followed me, her dagger in hand and not knowing what I had in mind.
“Where are we going?”
“Nowhere in particular,” I answered and crouched down to pick up a handful of pebbles. With a huge smile on my face, I turned around, threw the first one in the air and caught it with my other hand. The moonlight shone beautifully on her perplexed face as the first pebble hit her forehead lightly.
“What was that for?” She asked, rubbing her reddened forehead, even though I didn´t even throw too fast.
“You are supposed to dodge,” I commented and threw the next pebble, hitting her hand which was still on her forehead.
“I can´t even see them! And they hurt!” She said already turning around and trying to run away as the next one hit the back of her head.
“I could have used daggers as well …” I muttered, remembering how I learned these lessons she was about to learn back in purgatory. My next throw didn´t hit her head but struck her back just enough so that she would notice. My training method was insanely similar to that of Aska, but unlike him, I needed to make sure she would stay in good condition.
After she gained tens of metres of distance, I strolled after her while picking up a few pebbles here and there. She could evade none of them, even as she threw herself on the ground or walked backwards. While she got more and more frustrated, I started to feel a hint of happiness within me. Terrorizing this girl was strangely thrilling, even though I avoided hurting her as much as I could, despite my happiness whenever she flinched as a pebble hit her head.
“Can we do something else?!” She shouted, already exhausted from her training previously and because of her constant unsuccessful dodges. I stopped walking for a moment and looked towards the stars while thinking rapidly about how I should train her.
“Fine …” I said and threw the pebbles over my shoulder onto a few flowers. Panting heavily, she followed me as I strolled towards a hut in the distance. Opening it, I found a treasure, containing every gardening tool I could think of. Most importantly, two shovels, a saw and, much to my surprise, two sharp knives.
I handed her one of the knives with a huge grin on my face, waiting for her amusing response.
“Are we … going to fight with that?” She asked, scared about the possibility of a quick death.
“Eventually.” I chuckled and turned around to retrieve the two shovels and the saw. “But I don´t want you to stab yourself yet.” I handed her the saw, grabbed the shovels and strolled back towards the lamps, still glowing in a gentle light. I had zero problems with the darkness, but she already stumbled on the way back, prompting me to switch out the two knives with the more or less harmless shovels.
Arriving there, I sat down in the grass and saw off the wooden part of the shovel and presented her two perfectly fine wooden poles.
“That´s what we are going to use.” I said, gave her one and picked up one of the knives.
“Aren´t they a bit too wide?” She asked, slowly realizing what the daggers were for as I began to whittle off large chunks of the wood. Realizing what had to be done, she sat down right next to me and started to carve her own dagger out of the handle of a shovel.
“Don’t move the knife towards you. Idiot.” I said as soon as she started. If she wanted to hurt herself that baldy, she could do so after I finished parading her around the city. She changed how she carved the dagger immediately but didn´t say anything for quite some time.
“You are surprisingly considerate sometimes,” she said as I finished an hour later while she wasn’t even halfway through.
“What do you mean?” If she interpreted that I stood up as my intention to help her, she was seriously mistaken.
“Hmm … it doesn’t matter,” she said, to which I could only raise my eyebrow. I walked towards the nearest tree, the saw in my hand and began to break off a larger branch I could use to waste time while she was still busy with her own dagger. My newest toy in hand, I picked up the knife again and began to put my carving skills, which weren’t that fleshed out compared to combat skills, to good use. First, I made a wooden block, around ten centimetres wide and tall. Next I …
“Can I go to bed?” Hannah yawned beside me, her training dagger still unfinished.
“Sure…” I said, concentrating on my work that was surprisingly hard considering I didn´t have the right tools for what I was about to do. She left me shortly afterwards, taking the two training daggers and one knife with her while I continued to carve.
Next I …
“Huh?” Before I knew it, the sun began to rise in the distance, prompting me to search everywhere for my sunglasses. Strangely enough, they laid in the grass right next to me, which was definitely not where I left them. For the first time, the magical ability of these glasses to be always by my side came in handy.
Satisfied, I wore them and looked at the cute thing I created. A little elephant, trumping triumphantly on a wooden stand.
“I haven’t taught her anything, have I?”