Sunrise: Chapter One
The young morning sun cast its jovial face above Eyllis’elrvis, the land of the leaves. Although a quaint village, not many would call the Elrvis a village abundant in wealth. What the village lacked in riches, however, was made up with order, system, and admirable cooperation.
Just beyond its borders grew a large, dense forest, where many of the villagers, as they had done many a day before the present, assumed their daily morning hunt. The nearby river, which trickled down from hilltops high over, was more often than not the first place Elrvis fishermen found themselves conversing with each other, as they waited with baited rods for the first catch of the day.
Inside the village, on the other hand, began the usual hustle and bustle of an average villager’s routine life. Merchants roam the cobble-stone roads, flaunting their goods while hoping to catch a customer’s attention. A baker steps out of his house of breads, greeting familiar faces as he puts his pastries on display. Young children pause to sniff at the rich scents wafting from the bakery, before assuming their game of Heroes and Villains, as excitedly as ever as they brandished their very own, hand made weapons at each other.
Yes, this was the habitual life of an average villager. Prince Taban of house Aleandare, however, was no common villager.
The young prince awoke to the bright rays of run wafting into his room through his marbled stone balcony. He left his sleep-filled eyes closed as he took in his surroundings from his awfully comfortable bed. Taban was filled with a sudden bout of glee as he remembered of his ascension ceremony. Yes, today he would move on, from a boy to a man. Now, he would finally get the all respect he so rightfully deserved since he graced his family with his presence when born into the village’s most prosperous house.
With keen ears he listened to the birds chirping merrily on his balcony. It seemed like even those little creatures had heard of his ascension already, absolutely marvellous. What a peaceful morning it certainly was; nothing could possibly go wrong on that perfect day.
A sudden, loud crash jolted Taban, prince Taban, from his reverie. The disturbing noise sounded unmistakably like a raging bull attempting to break through the Aleandare gates by throwing itself upon said barrier with all its might.
Oh well, Taban thought to himself. One can only do so much of wishful thinking.
Prince Taban immediately rushed to his porch to demand an explanation from his guards for the commotion, and also to, conveniently, remind them of his coming-of-age for approximately the ninety-third time. As he raced through the corridors, the heated conversation at the porch could already be heard by his much-too-talented ears.
“For the last time, little man, we can’t let you through! Common folk are not allowed on Aleandare property without permission!”
“That’s okay! I just need to see Taban, not his…par…pur…purry-poppity or whatever you call that!!”
“…What?”
“Kid, I’m afraid you are missing the point, the truth is-”
“Today is Taban’s ‘mansion ceremony’, right? Right? Well I don’t know what’s so good about this mansion but I made him a present anyway. Ha ha ha!”
Taban stood frozen as a statue on the steps of his porch. That scrawny build. The shocking mop of red hair. Dintri. Great. Just…great. For consolation, the raging bull was not far a guess from the actual disaster itself. It seemed like his guards actually had a plausible excuse for themselves this time
“P-prince Taban!”
The mentioned excuse paused mid-description of his wonderful present to avert his amber eyes, following the gaze of Taban’s guards. His stare was then followed, after a split second’s delay, by far too many zealous waves from both his hands, making the boy look like some ridiculous justification of a windmill. The young prince cursed under his breath and mentally slapped himself for being so uncharacteristically unobservant. It wasn’t that he didn’t like the attention, but the fact that he actually recognised that lunatic was just…unsettling.
“TABAN! HAPPY MANSION DAY!”
Dintri’s roar must have had awakened the other half of the town that was not already awake. Honestly, Taban did not understand why in the world Dintri needed to scream like that for at that time in the morning. Confound it; He didn’t even know what in the world the boy was trying to say.
“Taban! Boy, am I glad to see-hey! I spent hours thinking of the perfect gift for-oh, by the way I’m really sorry about the gate… it…I-I didn’t think it would be locked…” Dintri grinned sheepishly and brought a hand up to scratch his head, which sported a gruesome bruise, regrettably in the shape of something very, very familiar. As the young prince's guards scratched their heads confusedly, trying to string the three incomplete sentences together, Taban hesitantly looked towards the direction in which Dintri was gesturing and found an equally grievous dent in his otherwise perfect gates.
Forget about the consolation, even a raging bull would have far much more sense than the mad-hatter in front of him.
Prince Taban brought a slender hand up to massage his temples. It seemed like Dintri’s state of hyper activeness was worse than one on a normal day. It would take longer than the time the young prince and his guards usually take in a conceited effort to shun the boy away. Taban cast his sorrow-filled eyes to the sky, and though bitterly to himself how, ironically, a prince like him did in fact resort to a routine at the end of the day.
“Look. Dintri.” Taban averted his eyes back to the subject of annoyance. To his utter horror, while his guards diverted their attention to hear their prince speak, the other boy had seized the chance to make a run for the lavishly-ornamented swings, whereby he sat down and swung himself so violently and so dangerously that even the prince’s most highly trained guards cowered and ducked every time the rapidly-swinging device approached them. As none of the noble elves of the house had used the swings for anything but decoration, the sudden pressure of working hard caused the swings to emit irksome, incessant squeaks.
“You’re not allowed to be here. Nobody said you can come in. Why don’t you make it easy for us today and just go home?” The young prince raised his voice as he ended his order, trying hard to keep his volume on par with the noise the other boy was making without actually looking like it was much effort.
“Okay I’ll just stay here for a little while and then I’ll go-”
“No.” Squeak. Squeak. Squeak.
“Just five minutes and-”
“Go away.” Squeak. Squeak. Squeak. Squeak. Squeak.
“But today’s your mansion day so aren’t you supposed to-”
“FOR GOODNESS’ SAKE, DINTRI!” Taban hollered. The young prince mentally slapped himself for losing his temper. As a noble elf he was required to keep his cool as much as possible, but few could tolerate the antics of the lad in front of him. That, and the non-stop squeaking of the swing, had ultimately pushed prince Taban over his limits. This was still his first day of independence after all, he would be excused for letting out his frustration.
“Why can you not get the fact into your head that this is not your house? You are supposed to listen and comply to my orders obediently! Politely! Quietly! But you don’t seem to care about the rules, Dintri! Ever so often you just skip your way here like you own this place and every time you come you have to make a great din about it! Why don’t you ever listen?!? Didn’t your parents teach you how to-”
Taban abruptly ceased his tirade, as quickly as Dintri had done to the swing, the latter’s eyes widened until they were as large and as round as the dinner plates they used at the grandest of feasts. He hadn’t meant to say the word out loud. Everyone in town new as well as he did that Dintri was an orphan; ‘parents’ was the ultimate taboo word for the hapless boy.
Not knowing what else to do, the young prince could only watch, not unlike his helpless guards, as Dintri hastily lowered his gaze to the ground, unfortunately not quick enough to hide a glimpse of his moist, reddening eyes.
Dintri’s chest puffed up as he took in a large, deep breath. When he lifted his head once again, however, he emerged with a smile, or rather, a miserable excuse for one.
“Hey, erm… you know what? I-I have, uh…something else to do now so I gotta go, okay?” Taban realised that Dintri failed to look him fully in the eye as he pulled out a poorly-wrapped package from his patched-up clothes. Looking blindly around, Dintri placed the present beside him on the seat of the swings before hopping of the swings with a jerk, as if the seat had suddenly caught on fire.
“I’ll just…um…I’ll just leave that there. Happy mansion day, Taban.”
With those words, Dintri bolted out of the gates, gone without a trace.
Ignoring the dubious glances from his two guards, Taban lifted the parcel from the seat and unwrapped it. To his surprise, a carefully whittled flute rolled onto his hand, followed by a small note. Taban peered at the little letter and made out the words through the untidy scrawl.
‘I don’t know why you always complain about your father not lending you his flute to play, but I made you one anyway, so now you have your very own and everything’s okay, right?
-Dintri’
Taban tore his eyes away from the giant happy face drawn at the bottom of the note to examine his flute carefully, where he found his initials carved with what seemed like a lot of effort on the side of his instrument. Ah yes, a flute, the symbol of refined knowledge in art, and dignity in one’s Elvin culture. Taban had longed to receive a flute upon his ascension, but he had never imagined the giver to be a person like that.
Lifting his eyes, Taban stared at the open space where Dintri was standing just a few minutes ago and mentally slapped himself for the third time that day. It was true that he was feeling downright awful, but he couldn’t possibly bring himself to apologise. He was a noble, and Dintri was a commoner. Their destinies were never meant to associate with each other.
Bother his Elvin blood.