11th of Winter, 519 AV
Reed spent the start of his day raking up shite with a few other squires. They were tasked to clean out the stables that morning in leu of their usual morning run, and Reed found himself regretting his initial enthusiasm for getting out of the run. Even with all the shite cleaned out now, the ripe smell still lingered, coming through the full plate harness he now wore. For reasons unknown to him, they had been instructed to don their armor and begin setting up ladders to the loft, four of them, one for each of the squires. The instructor, a young man whom Reed didn’t recognize hadn’t said anything beyond that, and instead sat on a crate, sawing at a loaf of bread with his dagger. Some of the squires crinkled their nose at that, to which Reed just grinned. He was not stranger to eating with foul smells lingering in the air and knew well enough that hunger comes when it does. Maybe this was all a part of the demonstration, but what the goal was for this activity, Reed had yet to figure out.
When they had all set up their ladders, the man stood up. “Alright, now climb up to the top of those ladders will ya, and I’ll tell you what to do next.” He said around a mouthful of bread. Turning towards the ladder, Reed did as he was asked, and climbed up the rungs. Of course, in armor it was significantly more difficult to angle himself how he would naturally climb, and the added weight made him feel off balance, so the going was slow. By the time he reached the top, he was panting, and his underclothes were more than a little damp.
He was trying to crane his neck to look down, but only could turn enough to look at the other squires when the man spoke again. “Now back down. Repeat till I say otherwise.” Reed hesitated, then felt his way down the ladder, one questing foot after another. Once his foot reached the ground, he worked his way back up, making sure each step and handhold was secure before heaving himself up. While he climbed, he wondered about how this was tactically important, or if it was just to get them acquainted with the weight of the plate. Were there a lot of opportunities to employ ladders on the Kabrin road? He didn’t think so, but maybe this was just a part of things to prepare them for any situation they would encounter. Before he could continue to speculate though, their instructor spoke again.
“Now mucking the stables, that was a lesson.” He started as if he was continuing a conversation from before, and a squire beside Reed hesitated on his ladder. Reed almost did, but his experiences in the pit told him to keep going while the man talked. “If you can tell me what that lesson was, you can stop climbing the ladder, alright?”
“To teach us humility?” The squire that had hesitated piped up, still not moving on his ladder. Their instructor laughed, a harsh barking thing. “No, keep climbing.” Further down, another one spoke up, “To broaden our experiences?” “No, and if y’all keep answering me with questions, I’m going to say petch to the rest of your training today and make you climb ladders the whole time.” The next one didn’t speak up for a while after that, but when she finally did Reed was panting hard at the top of his ladder, raking his brain for his own answer. His panting loud in the helmet, he didn’t hear what she asked as she was the furthest away form him, but he did hear the instructor though. “No again, how about you Reed, you got any of that urban wisdom on you?”
Grimacing, Reed spoke up coming down the ladder. “Just because.” Surprisingly, the instructor patted him on the back as he reached the bottom. “Right, but for the wrong reasons. You did it because it needed to be done, and those were your orders. Your ability to follow orders, and the degree with which you obey them was what has been judged here. Now with you guys being new and all, I don’t expect you to snap to attention like trained soldiers, but rather getting you acquainted with responding to commands appropriately. Reed nodded and started climbing back up the ladder when he felt the instructor grip the collar of his cuirass.
“Whoa not so fast. You guys are done with ladders for now, you got close enough. Now comes the fun part.”
