It wasn’t really a question. It should have been Derren saying those words to Rafael, as Derren was the one who had beaten him the last ten times they had crossed swords. The younger of the two was sweating profusely, but he was unrelenting. No matter the number of failures on his end, Rafael could be counted on to ask for one more battle, one more lesson.

      “Haven’t you had enough?” Derren asked.

      “I haven’t won,” Rafael pointed out, raising his sword towards his brother. “That means that it isn’t enough.”

      “Why are you so determined to beat me? You fight well enough, and that’s all that Father really asked for. He didn’t ask for me to make you the greatest swordsman on the entire continent.” Despite the raised sword, Derren’s rested loosely in his hand, the tip of it carelessly in the dirt.

      Rafael wasn’t so sure himself. Taking a step closer, his sword remained in the air, hovering towards Derren’s torso. “One more time?”

      Derren lifted the sword, but turned, moving towards the door that led back into the small farmhouse. He pulled a rag from his pocket, where he stashed it earlier, and wiped the blade clean.

      “Derren, fight me!” Rafael cried, sword shaking in his hand with anger as he thrust it in the air in Derren’s general direction.

      Sword cleaned, the rag had served its purpose and was shoved into Derren’s pocket once more. He reached for the handle on the door, opened it, and moments later the door shut behind him.

      “Derren!” Rafael shouted, his arm slowly lowering to waist level. Defeated once more, Rafael dragged his sword in the dirt towards the barn. He was fully aware of the fact that it was horrible to the blade to run it against the ground like that, but it was his way of protesting. If Derren wouldn’t fight him, then he’d have to have the ground as his opponent.

      Flinging the door open carelessly, the boy flopped back against the nearest heaping mound of hay. Derren had his reasons for denying Rafael—he was merely doing what his father asked, which was to make his younger sibling competent in the use of a sword. Father had always said it was an important thing to be able to defend your family and your farm, but Rafael wanted more than just that.

      A sword was a way out—or a way in, depending on how you looked at it. It meant that Rafael could do something more than just farm. It meant he could join the army, he could travel on his own and defend people with his blade, and he could be a hero. Who could pass up a life like that? It was certainly more interesting than being stuck on a farm doing the same things, day in and day out.

      When his father had requested that Rafe be trained, he was clear on his reasoning.

      “You can’t rely on anyone else, Rafe. You’re young enough to still have a dreamer’s view of the world, and I don’t want to ruin it, but you can’t rely on anyone but your family. Sometimes you might not be able to rely on them either. You take care of yourself and your own, but never think that anyone will come help you in your time of need,” he had said as he showed his son the proper way to hold a sword before shooing him off to learn from Derren.

      Rafael was firmly against this notion. Mother was the kindest person in the entire world. She helped people, both within her family and those who weren’t. She worked hard and people liked her, and many people could certainly rely on her for assistance, if they so asked. He was sure that Father was confused, or had just met a few of the wrong people in the world. If there was a time of need, why wouldn’t someone help?

      Rafe caught a glimpse of a chicken, peeking its head into the barn door that he had left partially open. Okay, maybe Father had been true in some way. He could rely on no one to help him with his chores, especially not Derren. He didn’t mind the chores, but it was a lot harder now that Derren was old enough to be doing “man work”. Why couldn’t Rafe do that too? Gathering chicken eggs and feeding animals could be done by anyone! He was trained in a sword, and that meant he could do anything.

      The smell of smoke wafted into the barn with a stray breeze, and Rafe idly wondered if his sister had burnt lunch once again. She was honestly trying to learn and Mother was a good teacher, but Annet was cursed with the gift of attempting to do too much all at once. If Annet had her way, she’d have the meal prepared, the table set, the floors swept, the pots cleaned, and a vase of fresh flowers on the table in less than an hour. She, too, was an idealist, even if her meals were less than ideal. Her heart was in it.

      Shutting his eyes for a moment, Rafe let himself doze for a moment or two. The chores could wait—they already had some eggs inside and there was a little feed left in the troughs for the animals, which meant that he was in no rush. He could have practiced a little more with his sword, but the temptation to shut his eyes for just a moment was too good.

      He was jolted awake with a strong cough sometime later when the smell of the smoke had become thick. How much food had Annet burned? It couldn’t have been that much? He clumsily got to his feet, moving to the door of the barn, where he stopped and stood, unmoving.

      A haze of reddish gold and smoke covered part of the wheat, closest to the house, with a similar haze along the roof of the house. The chicken coop was almost completely gone, engulfed in a blinding cloud of smoke and fire. Rafe found himself unable to move. How had it started? What should he do? He was about to scramble to pump water into a bucket when he stopped at a familiar sound. There was a clang of metal, the familiar sound that Rafe so often desired, but this time made him sick to his stomach.

      Someone was on his farm, using a sword, while their house and fields burned, and for all Rafael had desired to be a hero and to fight whomever came across his path, he found himself wanting. He knew the proper use for a sword—defense. But somewhere nearby, someone was using a sword wrong.

fanart by Rachel Millar

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