Leaving the Nest - III
A Hunters' Moon Story
Having passed the second trial to join the Gilded Kestrels warband, Maelos and Voth must face one final challenge before they can be accepted. Despite his word, will their father allow them to leave his protection to lead a life outside the safety and structure of the tribe? Whatever the case might be, the twins must hold firm to their dreams.
Check out the previous chapter to get caught up!
Leaving the Nest - II
“There is no lie I can find in either of them,” Guiron confided to Trenuir in a low voice. “The kill was clean and the saiga seemed to have been at peace when it died.”
The warlord rested his chin on one fist. “Who made the shot?”
“Voth says it was Maelos. They tracked the game beyond my sight and brought it down with one arrow.”
Guiron and Trenuir sat under the canopy of the warlord’s tent. The flaps were open, but any prying ears were either too far away to hear them or enraptured by palaver and songs. The pair glanced out towards the center of camp where the twins sat by the fire with their father, half-brother, and the royal entourage. One of the band-lasses, a lithe girl of sixteen named Ernmasi, tended to Maelos. The poor boy had been cut above his brow by the wolf’s claw. She wrapped a gauze lined with soothing herbs around his head.
Meanwhile, Voth turned and fumbled with the saiga’s horn in his hands. He stared into the yellow flames invigorated by a fresh bundle of tinder. The blank look in his eyes betrayed that his mind wandered elsewhere.
“I suppose we will move onto the last trial,” declared Trenuir. “They did what was expected and survived a chance encounter with the cruel bite of the wilderness.”
Guiron frowned. “What of Voth? Does it not seem odd he could exert such strength?”
Trenuir shrugged. “You were witness to his feat, friend Guiron. Such strength is fitting of a champion. He saved his brother and himself when he thought no one else could.”
“But so young a child,” said Guiron, “should not be able to break a saiga’s horn with his hands—with one hand alone!”
“Does it frighten you, Guiron? I have heard of and seen grown men do more brutal things when they were cornered by death. Such stock is what I would have in our band rather than spoiled princes who would let death blanket them so easily.”
Guiron nodded. “I will not question your decree and I will welcome them fully should they succeed at last. The ordeal surprised me and I feared I might have failed my duty.”
Trenuir clapped one hand on Guiron’s shoulder as he rose. “They yet live and their father has not harried you; you need not worry now.”
Trenuir departed his tent and Guiron followed him to the campfire. Ernmasi acknowledged the warlord’s approach, giving Maelos a final pat on the head before stepping aside. The twins looked up at Trenuir, their eyes wide and glittering in the firelight. King Hron maintained a stony face, his gaze locked onto the fire.
“Guiron has told me of your hunt,” said Trenuir. “He says the beast died from the single arrow you cast and I have never known him to say false. What is more, you slew a wolf, stray from his pack, and kept it from taking your quarry and your lives.”
For the first time since before they set out on the hunt, Maelos and Voth’s mouths cracked into broad grins. They shuffled onto their feet and closer to Trenuir.
“We may proceed to the next trial?” asked Maelos.
“To the last trial,” confirmed Trenuir.
“What must we do?” Voth balled his fists, the excitement overwhelming him.
With a wave of his hand, Trenuir beckoned the twins to follow him. He led them towards the middle of the camp, his warriors and other followers making space in the patch of bare ground between the tents. Excited murmurs coursed through the warband as they turned their attention from their evening leisure to the approaching trial. They formed a circle around the center of camp, enclosing the twins and Trenuir within. The warlord looked off to his side and nodded towards a shorn-headed youth, not much older than Maelos and Voth, who rushed off and returned with a bundle of wicker shields and wooden sticks. He set them between the three in the ring and immersed himself back into the crowd.
Trenuir pointed at the heap of wooden armaments. “These are toys,” he said, “and we will fight ‘til they break.” He opened his palm towards the pile, inviting the twins to approach. They heeded him and each took up a shield and stick. Although the warlord claimed them to be simple toys, they were crafted of wood that, in the boys’ hands, felt hard enough to crack bone.
Maelos and Voth backed away as Trenuir took up the remaining shield and stick. He adopted a loose stance, seemingly without any guard. The twins pressed their elbows close to their bodies and bounced between their feet. Their eyes whipped wildly between each other, the crowd, and their opponent. The warlord stared back at them with his head tilted to one side, almost quizzically.
“Well, boys,” he said at last, after a few moments of staring, “the fight is on.”
“Let’s get him at the same time,” Voth whispered to Maelos, however loud enough for most of the crowd and Trenuir to hear him. “He should not be able to fight us both at once.”
Maelos opened his mouth to reply, but his brother already rushed towards Trenuir, holding his stick over his head. He screamed into the back of his shield as he went, his voice met with the sudden rush of cheers from the crowd. Maelos followed before Voth stood alone against the warlord; he too ran with stick and shout raised. The twins swung at Trenuir’s open chest, but their blows clacked against their opponent’s stick. Their arms slid away from their target, both swept away in a single stroke.
The twins retreated and bunched against each other, their shield rims pressed together. They stared dumbly back at Trenuir who maintained his casual stance. He lifted his stick and glanced at it. “Those were not hard enough to shatter,” he said. “The fight is still on.”
Voth darted back with another cry and threw several strikes at Trenuir. The warlord blocked each one with a simple, clever placement of his shield or stick. After the last, he retreated slightly and shrugged, saying, “Those were loud, but I felt no might from them.”
“I will show you might!” Voth cast down his shield and took up his stick in both hands. He leapt at Trenuir, swinging for his head. Before his arms came down, Voth slammed into Trenuir’s shield; he placed it before him while shuffling backwards. Voth landed on his feet, tottering from the impact. Another shove from the shield sent him onto his seat before he could steady himself. He glowered up at Trenuir and spat, “That is not fair!”
“A shield is not only for blocking,” said a Kestrel in the crowd. “Pick it back up and use it against him, Voth.”
Maelos came beside his brother as Voth rose to his feet. He ignored the bystanders advice and clenched his stick tighter in both hands.
“We will not best him, Voth,” said Maelos.
“We can!” Voth growled through his teeth. “We must! If we don’t, they would not let us in.”
Maelos frowned. “That is not—”
Voth shouted again and essayed once more against Trenuir. He loosed a flurry at the warlord, seeking and striking for each open gap in his defense. Every blow was met with a ward and resounding clack that shook from Voth’s fingers all the way to his teeth and eye sockets. Pieces of both sticks shivered off in splinters, showering around the combatants feet.
Trenuir smiled. “There,” he said, laughter shaking his voice, “that is the strength I was looking for.”
Voth stepped away from the exchange. His face had turned crimson, his breaths came out ragged, and his eyes moistened. He looked to Maelos, still stood in place, and said in a tone that fought his tears of frustration, “Fight him with me, Maelos.”
Maelos nodded shakily, wary of his brother’s brimming rage. He made to flank Trenuir with Voth, yet he parried each of their blows from either side they came at him on. The warlord slid like a rivulet of water on stone across the arena. Each time he moved, the brothers followed and hammered at him with unskillful assaults. Trenuir returned their strikes with wide, obvious blows, several of which thumped the two dully on the thicker parts of their arms and legs. The warband cheered them on, their voices rising as chips and splinters flew off the armaments. The twins ground their teeth against the reverberations of their own blows, their faces reddening and visions blurring. They backed away after one engagement, heaving as sweat soaked their hair and rolled down their burning cheeks.
“We have not landed a blow,” Voth said, stammering. He clutched his stick, which looked as if it had been chewed by a kennel of dogs. Maelos’ own gear was splintered and frayed; the weave on his shield stuck outward like the base of a bird’s nest, ready to rupture at the next severe blow.
“But his stick and shield are growing thin,” Maelos observed. Indeed, Trenuir’s armaments bore as much damage as the twins’, if not even more. Splinters lay all around his feet, scattered in the dirt from his footwork. Sweat beaded his brow and his breath took a little more effort to draw in than before.
“You’re not finished yet!” someone cried in the crowd.
A spur of energy coursed through the twins and they essayed Trenuir once more. The frustration in their shouts suddenly falling away to laughter. The warlord too laughed as he slid and danced around the boys’ strikes. All their blows matched with no less zeal, and the sounding of wood upon wood dulled as each stick shriveled in its wielder’s hands. At last, Maelos’ split in two, the second half bouncing against Trenuir’s shoulder.
He chuckled and said, “There, now you have landed a blow.” Then he swung at the bewildered child. Maelos flinched and shied away from the attack, but Voth parried it before it fell upon his brother. He set himself between his sibling and Trenuir, then exchanged blows.
“You still have your shield, Maelos!” cried Ernmasi from the crowd.
Maelos tossed away his shattered stick and rushed Trenuir with his frayed ward. He swung, bashed, and thrust with its loosening rim. It did not strike as hard in its ruined state, but Maelos would abide by the manner of the trial. At his side, Voth pressed on with another flurry that forced the warlord to slide backwards. Trenuir yet parried every blow and returned them whenever he saw an opening. At the same time, his shield weathered the assault from Maelos; both wicker wards crackled and crunched as they clashed, their bindings spreading out ever more.
Trenuir broke away from the twins’ pursuit and drew long breaths in through his nose. The youths, however, unaware of their own weariness, launched forward and struck at him as one. The sticks shattered and shields burst asunder, their remains spraying everywhere around the combatants.
A heartbeat of silence followed before the crowd erupted into cheers and surged in on the three. Several sets of hands lifted Maelos and Voth in the air, and the warriors declared them “the new fledglings.” Beyond the edge of the crowd, Hron, Kenattos, and the royal entourage watched with mouths flat and brows furrowed. The king folded his arms over his chest, impatience growing on his countenance.
After several moments of celebration, Trenuir quieted his throng with several shrill whistles from his lips. “Although the play is over, they cannot join us yet,” he said, “until their father has agreed to release them from all protection their station within his tribe would grant.”
“We will have no protection?” Maelos asked.
“Not from your tribe,” answered Trenuir, “nor within any territories of settled men. The life of the warband is outside the law, and the sole ward against your demise or persecution is your own skill and your fellow wanderers.”
Kenattos waved a hand at the splinters in the dirt. “Skill? What a joke of a trial! What could such play demonstrate about these brats?”
Trenuir met Kenattos’ gaze and held it, crossing his arms whilst members of his band spoke:
“The tenacity to fight, even with a battered blade,” said Guiron.
“The vigor to see a battle through even when you tire,” said Ernmasi.
“And the joy of victory, even in the face of anger and sorrow,” concluded the red-haired youth who had questioned his warlord earlier.
“My band is the school in which boys become men,” explained Trenuir. “While I look for those who can protect and hunt for themselves on their lonesome, the arts of war are difficult and are mastered only in true battle. I do not expect boys to know how to kill men, but I want them to have the strength to do so when it is needed. They shattered their toys, the play is done, now they may enter the real world.” He looked past Kenattos and locked eyes with Hron. “Only if their father agrees.”
Maelos and Voth rushed out of the crowd and up to Hron. They stopped short a few paces from him, meeting his brooding, stoic glower with beaming eyes. “May we go, Father?” asked Maelos.
Hron glanced towards Trenuir, then back at his sons. He knelt, meeting their gaze—the first time he had ever done so. “You understand that once I release you I cannot protect your for as long as you are with this warband?” he warned. “Even if you are captured for raiding, I cannot pay your ransom. Even if you wrong my worst enemy and he seeks to cut you down there is no aid I can give.”
The twins looked to each other, nodded, then returned their attention to Hron. “We understand,” they said.
Hron clasped his sons’ shoulders and decreed, “Then, Maelos and Vothartaikos, sons of Hron, I hereby release you from all protections my status as king may grant you. Go to your new home.”
Maelos and Voth leapt away from Hron with whoops of joy and rushed to the Gilded Kestrels. The young warriors slapped their backs and rubbed their tawny heads, welcoming them into their fold. Kenattos scoffed and spun around, striding back towards the village gates. Several of the king’s entourage followed him as per their duty, the rest gathered around Hron as he rose up. He and Trenuir held one another’s gaze.
The warlord saluted the king and said, “We will away from here by dawn, before either of them can change his mind.”
Hron nodded and returned the salute. “Teach my sons well.” He turned away and departed from the shrinking firelight with his champions into the cold span of night between the warband and the gates of his tribe.
***
The Gilded Kestrels heralded Maelos’ and Voth’s entry with a small celebration. They allowed the twins sips of mead with a small feast and recounted songs and stories of the band’s previous exploits. It was not long before they inquired when their own exploits could begin.
“We are heading south and west,” answered Trenuir, “to find the wisest of us who left to follow a vision. He can hear the whispers of the gods and the spirits of the land.”
“Will we find some chance for glory when we set out?” asked Voth.
Trenuir laughed. “You boys are fresh to the band and the world beyond your tribe. There will be much for you to learn in the coming years and even more chances for glory should you master my teachings. First, you must learn to serve this band.” He turned to Ernmasi and said, “Bring me a bowl of water and two knives.”
The band-lass nodded, then flashed the twins a sly grin. Several warriors nearby sidled up to Maelos and Voth, continuing to sing and jest without heeding the two. Ernmasi returned and handed Trenuir the implements; he nodded to her, then to the warriors beside the boys. Suddenly, they broke from their palaver and took hold of them by the arms. Maelos and Voth shouted and squirmed in their grasp as Trenuir came around behind them and wetted both knives, handing the blades to his cohorts.
“What are you doing?” Maelos’ eyes bulged as he glimpsed the knife flash in the firelight.
Trenuir patted their heads. “It is time to cut those locks you grew as children. As of tonight, you are reborn into the first steps of becoming men.” He doused their hair with the water and his men lowered the knives towards their heads while they protested and writhed.
***
The twins were roused long before the rose of dawn bloomed over the mountains. Trenuir set them to breaking down the camp even as the rest of the warband slept. They set the gear upon the horses, polished spears, swords, and shields, and helped prepare a meal to break the band’s fast. They were also the ones who served out the bowls of food to each of their elders before finally being allowed their own.
They sat a ways off from the central fire while Trenuir discussed plans with the warriors in some droning, rhythmic tongue he explained the twins would learn throughout their travels.
“I suppose this is not so different from life in Father’s house,” said Maelos.
“At least Father let us keep our hair.” Voth rubbed at the dark stubble on his head, wincing at several nicks in his skin.
“We have a destination now,” Maelos countered. “Even if it is as broad as the world itself.”
Voth looked over his shoulder towards the black mountains lined by a sliver of gold and mantle of blue. “And many things inside of it that may be friend or foe.”
As soon as their breakfast ended, the Gilded Kestrels stamped out their cooking fires, gathered up their possessions, and mounted their steeds. The twins were given a small horse to ride together alongside Trenuir. They glanced back at the timber walls of their village and the roof of their father’s hall rising above it as the sun bathed them in a wash of dawning gold. A cool wind rolled down from the north, shaking the long grass around the warband. Two birds soared overhead, carried by the breeze, and glided towards the still nighted mountains in the west.
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“Leaving the Nest” © Ethan Sabatella 2025 – Current Year, All Rights Reserved. Reprinting or replication of this work in its entirety in any form (written, audiovisual, etc.) without express permission of the author is prohibited. Excerpts may be used for review or promotional purposes with credit and acknowledgement of the author. This piece cannot be used for training of Artificial Intelligence programs.
Hopefully, the saga will continue!