I Will Be the Greatest Knight
Chapter 71: An Apprentice Like Her

Chapter 71: An Apprentice Like Her

"You made the shot."

At only a few words, Irene was suddenly alert.

Indoor duties that week required her and her group of apprentices in the library after their midday meal and then in the armory towards the evening. With the rainy season coming for them, it was an opportune time for the apprentices and squires to get better acquainted with cleaning armor, weapons, and shields and learning how to preserve them even when it was wet outdoors.

With no further explanation, the apprentices who had been there the day the pile of goblins was found in the forest had been tasked to look through books in the library about monsters and see if there were ever any other strange occurrences such as that. The scent, the peculiar grey or black substance, monsters and humans alike being affected by it—the list went on.

However, the others had left by that point but Irene wasn’t all that hungry for supper so she remained in the library alone a while longer—at least until Sir Gunnar came to interrupt her.

She was immediately on edge.

"Sir?" she questioned, mostly unsure of what he meant.

"The shot on the day the ogre appeared," Sir Gunnar reiterated. "You made the shot. One of the squires cleaning the yard realized the dummies were still out there and cleaned them up for me. Did you realize you made the shot?"

"I did," she responded plainly, closing the book because it seemed that the conversation wasn’t likely to stop there.

Knowing the knight, she would probably be asked to go eat at least a little bit since he didn’t allow the apprentices to go without eating in case they needed to expend energy at an unusual time.

"Why?" he asked from where he stood in the threshold of the open library door.

Irene tilted her head slightly and she felt her newly cut hair fall into her face a little bit more.

"There was an ogre in the forest," she insisted. "Seems a bit unimportant considering the circumstances."

Although it was a bit disappointing that no one praised her for doing something even she wasn’t entirely sure she could do. She still didn’t want to complain after watching how hard the others worked. Such a feat felt insignificant when they were diving headfirst into danger in such a way.

"You are a surprising child," the knight admitted. "A bit of honor over glory for you. Perhaps it’s been a mistake all along that there aren’t more apprentices like you."

There was a certain alarm within her that made her resistant to the knight’s words. She immediately felt it necessary to deflect.

"Small?" she wondered. "Young?"

The knight chuckled and shook his head.

"Go eat supper," he ordered. "There is quite a bit in the armory today after the morning rain."

Irene placed the book back in its correct spot before she nodded at the knight.

"Yes, sir," she responded, agreeable as always, and immediately got up to what she said she would do.

As the girl walked down the hallway, she passed the mage, Stanley, walking out of his guest wing and she acknowledged him with a slight nod. However, her path forward stopped when she was at the top of the stairs, especially when she heard the mage address the knight who was still next to the library.

"Anything yet?" he asked the knight.

"Nothing," Gunnar responded.

Irene’s curiosities further grew, but she had no choice except to continue. They had made it a point that it was none of the apprentices’ business to question what was going on.

+

Things settled for a long while as the weather warmed and the entire order was able to use the practice yard to its fullest extent. Since no one could travel quite yet with the rain and snowmelt still present, the Duke’s Tower bustled with activity as well as the mountains that stood north.

Luckily, the very place that most monsters originated was the mountains so to have the knights all in one place as the weather warmed and the flooding would soon cease wasn’t such a bad thing.

However, Irene having her father around all the time meant that she was always held accountable and couldn’t slack on practices. Everyone was finally able to realize that, even though Irene was the smallest and youngest, her father didn’t hold back when it came to pushing her to the next level. While they had pushed her a lot, he always found a way to push her more.

Even though most had learned by then that she had made the shot during her test, she was still pushed to her limits each day. Her father claimed that it wasn’t a skill she mastered long enough to simply stop practicing.

Since there were so many helpers all around, everyone could afford to do as they pleased as long as they got basic duties taken care of.

Knights took over night duty and apprentices’ schedules continued from winter where they worked all day and slept all night. It would remain as such until knights were sent to patrol the duchy once the floodplains cleared and travel was safe.

For nearly a month, Irene practiced often and even she could tell that she was becoming more accurate which meant she was able to start patrolling with Sir Sven more during jobs that required archers.

One evening, after a long day spent in the foothills making sure that nearby villagers sighting of a griffin didn’t turn out to be true, Irene came back into her room to find her father sitting in a small chair and tending to the small fire in her stove.

It was still getting cold at night and it was a welcome sight to return to.

"What are you doing, dad?" she asked, closing the door behind herself and dropping the tougher facade she wore whenever she was around the others.

"It was a bit cold in here," Arthur admitted quietly but he stared into the fire he managed rather than looking at his daughter.

She caught onto that quite quickly. It was easy to pretend her observing others was because she was finally a big twelve-year-old, but she knew the truth was that she still drew so much of herself from the life she was certain she had lived in the future.

"Is there something on your mind?" she asked quietly.

Arthur finally turned towards his daughter and a smile crinkled his eyes.

"It scares me a bit just how fast you’ve grown up since you’ve been here," he admitted with a sigh as he ran a hand through his fiery hair. "I will be returning to the north central region. Should I bring your grandmother out to train you further in your bow skills?"

Irene contemplated it for a moment but then a grin spread across her lips.

"I am well-trained now," she admitted. "I would simply like to see grandmother and if she needs to be convinced for training purposes then that is alright with me."

Arthur stood up, causing the chair to creak as he did. It was used to holding Irene’s weight and nothing quite as large as him.

He ruffled his daughter’s hair.

"Good girl," he complimented her. "I will leave in the morning and return in a couple of weeks then. Whether or not mother will come with me is another issue entirely."