Rangers of Linwood (The Five Kingdoms Book 1) (3 page)

After the jog came some sort of chore. If Tesni hadn’t seen all of the other Rangers, including Arya herself, doing chores as well, she would have thought it was the only reason Arya had brought her here. It didn’t take long for Tesni to grow an affinity for the horses and for brushing them down to become no longer a chore but something she enjoyed.

After morning chores came lunch, which was followed by any number of lessons. Arya had reiterated that Tesni was too young to officially begin training, but there was no such thing as too young to learn things like plant identification, cooking, and basic sewing. “After all,” Arya told her, “you never know when you’ll have to fix something on the road, and quickly. Some thread and a needle or two should always be in your pack.”

Needles and thread were two items on a long list of things that Arya felt should always be in a Ranger’s pack. The list also included dried fruit, berries, nuts, and cooking herbs, medicinal herbs such as white willow bark, a change of clothes, an extra pair of boots, a small pot, a small pan, and a piece of flint for starting fires.

“Why not just pack up a small tent as well?” Tesni asked sarcastically. “And a wash basin to keep clean?”

Arya gave Tesni a look that the rest of the Rangers tended to cower away from. Not Tesni, though. Nothing seemed to scare the girl away from presenting a challenge of some sort at every opportunity. Half of the Rangers were betting that Tesni would eventually drive Arya insane. The other half were betting that Tesni would yet prove one of the greatest Rangers ever and end up proving herself at a very young age.

Arya wasn’t sure, at the end of any given day, which way the bags of gold would be flying when the eventual result came to pass. Her guess was that it would be a mix, and that the smartest Rangers would be placing a bet that Tesni would do both. It was certainly where she had placed her money. “Building a shelter in any environment is something you’ll learn before you’re allowed to go on any missions,” she told Tesni. “Keep a bedroll and a cake of soap. A stream or lake is better than any wash basin, anyway.”

Eat dinner. Do her evening chores. Go to bed. This rounded out Tesni’s day. By the end of the week, it has become clear that one could always find her in the stables after dinner, no matter how varied her morning chores might be. “Let her have something constant,” Arya said when the other Rangers commented on the girl’s behavior. “She’s young, still, and I
did
just take her away from the closest thing she’s ever had to normalcy.”

On day eight, Arya took Tesni on a slightly longer run. After about a mile, she stopped, jogging in place. Tesni imitated her, looking at her guardian, confused.

“I need to get back into my own jogging routine. I normally do five miles in the mornings,” Arya said. “Do you think you can find your way back to camp from here?”

“Aye, I can do it. Same path we’ve always been takin’.”

“Go on, then,” Arya said. She took off, then, and Tesni turned in the opposite direction to go back to camp. She never made it, though, and when Arya returned to camp to find that Tesni was nowhere in sight, she got angry. “Why didn’t anyone go out to find her? She should have been back nearly an hour ago!”

“Easy, Arya,” Ryder said. “We saw her head out with you, so it was only natural to assume that she was still with you, that you were pushing her. We’ll find her.”

“I left her by that big tree north of camp that looks like it grew from two trees intertwining. She should have come straight south,” Arya explained, giving her fellow Rangers a good idea about where to look. “Oh…why didn’t she call out or whistle for help?”

Arya was actually worried about the girl, and Ryder knew it. For all that Arya had always sworn that she would never take a protégé so that she would never get attached, she had clearly become attached to Tesni, and Ryder had no doubt that by the time that Tesni was twelve, the bow mistress and the former thief would form not only a mentor-protégé bond, but a mother-daughter bond as well.

More than two hours passed before one of the Rangers returned to camp carrying Tesni, and Arya could see immediately why the girl hadn’t called for help. She couldn’t. The blood matting Tesni’s hair indicated that she had hit her head on something hard. The fact that her left boot was off and her ankle bruised and swollen told Arya that Tesni’s ankle had been broken in the fall.

Arya followed the other Ranger to the medical tent, where the medic moved immediately to cut away Tesni’s beautiful blond locks so that she could get to the wound on her head. Arya stood nervously by, watching the medic clean grit, dirt, and grass from the wound, stitch it up, and bandage it.

“You won’t do her any good hovering over my shoulder, Arya,” The medic said as she moved on to Tesni’s ankle.

“I won’t do her any ill, either, Enid.”

“What I look forward to is hearing how she ended up in this condition,” Enid said. “Why did you let her finish a shorter run unsupervised?”

“She’s been here a week,” Arya said. “I can’t watch her twenty-four hours a day. I have my own routines, and if I had gone much longer on the shorter runs, I would have lost my ability to go on my longer ones.”

Enid shook her head. “Act as cold and as distant as you will, Arya. Everyone in camp knows you’ve started caring about Tesni, likely more than you’re willing to admit.”

Arya snorted. “Of course I care about her. I care about everyone in this camp.”

Enid laughed, wrapping Tesni’s ankle carefully. “Aye, but you’re working too hard to keep distant from her, to keep from getting too attached in case something bad happens, but you’re already attached, Arya Summerbreeze. You can’t fool me one bit.”

Arya just sighed. The next four years were going to be long ones, and she knew it. And that was just the time before Tesni could officially begin training. Silently, Arya pitied whoever ended up the girl’s mentor. “She’ll be alright?” she asked.

“It’s too early to tell,” Enid replied. She grabbed Arya’s hand and placed it on Tesni’s head. Arya hissed and pulled her hand away quickly.

“You could cook eggs on her forehead,” she whispered.

“It was enough time between injury and being brought to me for infection to set in,” Enid explained.

“This wouldn’t have happened if I’d let her stay with the Thieves Guild,” Arya muttered.

“Perhaps,” Enid said. “And perhaps she might have never been injured at all. Perhaps, though, she might have gotten worse. She could have tried to pick the wrong pocket and gotten killed right there in the street.”

“I suppose you’re right. Just… Do everything you can for her, will you?”



Arya spent the next three days in agony, just going through the motions of her daily routine. She told herself it was out of guilt for letting Tesni go partnerless for the rest of her run, breaking one of Arya’s own safety rules, but eventually even she had to admit she had developed a genuine affection for the girl. An almost maternal instinct had kicked in as she spent nearly all her free time at Tesni’s side, which both amused and annoyed Enid.

“You’re still not doing her any good hovering like you are.”

“I’m still not doing her any harm, either,” Arya snapped.

Enid just rolled her eyes. “You’ll be glad to hear that her fever broke this morning. I expect her to wake up soon.” Arya gave a sigh of relief. As if on cue, Tesni’s eyes fluttered open. Just as quickly, they shut again as the girl gave a whimper of pain. “Here, lass, sip on some of this,” Enid said, helping Tesni to sit up and giving her some white willow bark tea.

“Thank you,” Tesni whispered. A wince crossed her features, merely speaking causing her pain. She wrinkled up her nose as she sipped the tea, and Enid laughed.

“I know, I know, it doesn’t taste the best. Here,” she said. She stirred some honey into it.

“That’s better,” Tesni said, taking another sip.

“Tesni, do you remember what happened, how you got hurt?” Arya asked, kneeling down.

Tesni just looked at Arya, her eyes holding more questions than answers. Very slowly, she shook her head, stopping as the pain returned.



Who were these women? Tesni didn’t know. She wasn’t even sure of her name, just what the red-headed woman called her. The older woman, who still had some wisps of brown hair amongst the gray, was very kind. The red-head seemed to have concern for her. Were they family?

Her head still hurt a little, but whatever was in this tea seemed to be helping a great deal. “Are you my mother?”



Arya blinked. What in the world would make Tesni think she was her mother? “No, young one, I’m not your mother.”

Enid laughed. “No, she just acts like it since you don’t have one,” she said, ignoring the look Arya shot her.

“Oh,” Tesni said. “An aunt? You look too young to be my grandmother.”

“No, we’re not related,” Arya said. “I’m just your guardian. I’m Arya, you know that. What made you suddenly start asking if we were related?”

Tesni bit her lower lip. “Because I can’t remember anything. I only guess that my name is Tesni because that’s what you called me.”

Arya’s eyes went wide. She remembered nothing? She’d heard that people who hit their head could sometimes forget things, but that didn’t mean that she was prepared to deal with it. “Yes, your name is Tesni, and you have lived with me for over a week, now. You were injured during a run, but you were on your own, so we don’t know all of the details. We just know you hit your head really hard and broke your ankle.”

“Oh.” Tesni looked down, struggling to form a cohesive thought, to remember anything. “Is this my tent?”

“Oh, no, dear, this is mine,” Enid said. “You share a tent with Arya. You’ve been staying here for the past few days, though, while I worked to get your fever down. The wound on your head is healing quite nicely, I must say, and if you’re careful, your ankle will be good as new in a few weeks. I’m Enid, the medic.”

“I can’t move my ankle at all. The bandages won’t move,” Tesni said.

“Well of course not,” Enid said. “It needs to set so that it can heal properly, and for that you need to avoid moving it. I greased up your foot, ankle, and lower leg a bit, mixed up some flour, water, and egg whites, and soaked the bandages in that before I wrapped your ankle. After a few hours it was stiff as wood.”

“Oh.” It was all that the girl said, but at least she seemed to understand.

“Would you like anything?” Arya asked.

Tesni shrugged. “I’m kind of hungry, I guess, and I guess I could use a quick bath.”

Though she didn’t let it show on her face, Arya was relieved. It meant that the girl was starting to get a normal appetite, already, and at least remembered that she needed to take care of personal hygiene. She supposed that Tesni felt a bit grimy, having not had any type of bath since before that last run.

“I’ll go get you something to eat,” she said at last, “and then I’ll help you bathe.”

“Thank you,” Tesni said.

“Make sure it’s something simple!” Enid called out as Arya exited the tent. She sighed and shook her head. “Don’t let her fool you, Tesni. She seems to be matter-of-fact in everything she does, but the fact is, she cares about you a good deal. When she wasn’t doing her chores or training, or any of her other duties around camp, she was in here watching over you and causing me to go insane with all of her questions, constantly asking me if you would be alright.”

Tesni wasn’t sure why, but for some reason this made her smile. Something told her that she could trust Arya and everyone else here in this camp.

It wasn’t long before Arya returned with some broth and a hunk of bread. Tesni ate it gratefully before Arya took her down to the river and helped her bathe. She even went so far as to trim the rest of Tesni’s hair to match the area that was just now starting to grow back in.

“Feel better?” she asked as she brought Tesni back to their tent.

“A bit, yes,” Tesni replied.

Arya set Tesni carefully down on her cot, making sure not to bump her ankle or head. “I can’t be in here all the time, Tesni, but there are a lot of other Rangers. You can call on me, Ryder, Enid, or anyone else. We’ll help you with anything you need. After all, you’re one of us.”

“I am?”

“Aye, you are. You’re too young to train, but you belong here. Your heart belongs to the Rangers. That’s why I brought you here.”

“Where did you bring me from?”

Arya bit her lower lip, thinking about how best to explain to Tesni what little she knew about the girl’s past. She finally settled on the simplest explanation possible. “I brought you here from town. You were living on the streets. You had to steal to survive, and I thought you deserved better. I saw how clever you are, and so I brought you here instead of taking you to the orphanage.”

“Do you really think I belong here?” Tesni asked. “Because right now, I’m feeling useless.”

“You are definitely not useless,” Arya said. “You are injured. There is a difference. Before your injury, you loved the horses. No matter what else the day brought, I could always count on finding you in the stables every evening. As soon as your ankle is healed, I’m sure you’ll be right back in those stables doing your favorite chores every evening.”