“At least you noticed that I was on gravel at the end,” Oreius grunted.
Relam wisely made no reply, knowing he had not performed to Oreius’ standard.
“Lunch time, I think,” Oreius said, glancing at the sky. “Least I can do is feed you since I’m putting you through training. It’s hard enough on a full stomach, let alone an empty one. This will save time too, won’t have to wait for you to go all the way to the palace and back.”
Oreius led the way to the gravel path, moving smoothly and lightly, making hardly a sound save the occasional slight grating noise. Relam felt clumsy and awkward by comparison as the gravel ground noisily under his feet.
“How do you do that?” he finally asked as they circled the fountain.
“Do what?”
“Move so quietly.”
“Oh, that. Like all the other skills you will learn from me, it takes practice. Mostly, it’s about balance and awareness, feeling the ground beneath you before you go and smash your foot down on it, understanding where you are and what sort of noise-making obstructions there are.”
“Will everything you teach me be about awareness?” Relam asked, frustrated.
Oreius turned and looked at him for a long moment. Relam said nothing, shrinking back a little, afraid that he might have annoyed the master with his question. But, finally, Oreius nodded briskly.
“Fair question. We’ll talk about it over lunch.”
With that, Oreius pushed open the back door to the house and entered. Relam followed swiftly and the warrior closed the door behind him.
The house was dark, the only light filtering through windows of an odd type of glass. Relam could not see what was beyond the glass, though he knew the back windows looked out over the garden and the front ones surely looked out towards the River Road. But the ripples and bubbles in the thin sheets kept him from seeing anything more than a blur.
“That’s a special type of glass,” Oreius said, noticing Relam examining a pane. “Keeps unwanted visitors from being able to see in. And me from being able to see out.”
“Wouldn’t you want to be able to see your garden?”
“If I want to see it, I go outside,” Oreius replied as though Relam’s question were absurd.
Relam nodded as though he understood and looked around curiously. To the immediate left and right were two open archways, graceful and curving. The arch itself was of dark wood, the rest of the walls of lighter, honey colored wood. The floors were dark wood as well, the ceiling the same as the walls. The left arch appeared to lead into a dining room, which contained a plain, but highly polished, rectangular wooden table with ordinary wooden chairs standing around it. A circular window looked out over the garden, and a solitary lamp hung above the center of the table on a thick chain.
The arch to the right led into the kitchen, which was centered by a much smaller table that was unpolished but well-scrubbed. The kitchen was immaculately clean, pots and pans standing on shelves and hanging from hooks, large cabinets for storing food standing against the wall closest to the front of the house. A large sink was sunk into the middle of a wide counter, standing just in front of another circular window overlooking the garden.
“You can wait in there,” Oreius said, pointing to the dining room. “I’ll be along in a minute.”
Relam took one last look around, noticing that the hallway he was standing in led right to the front door, intersecting a perpendicular hall along the way. He quickly ducked into the dining room, before Oreius might think that he was snooping. A moment later, the old man returned, carrying a fresh loaf of bread, beakers of cold water, a wedge of cheese and a plate of sliced beef.
“It’s simple,” he said with no trace of apology. “Just enough to keep us going.” He placed another plate in front of Relam and pushed half of the meat onto it. Then, he deftly halved the cheese and bread and gave Relam his share of each.
“Thanks,” Relam said, accepting the plate.
“You’re welcome,” Oreius grunted, producing a dish with a sizeable pat of butter. “Butter?”
“No, thank you.”
“Good manners for a prince. Maybe court protocols have a use after all,” Oreius muttered, ripping a chunk from his end of the loaf and chewing thoughtfully.
“Not really,” Relam replied, shrugging. “I learned manners before court protocols. My mother was a stickler for that sort of thing.” His heart lurched uncomfortably as he mentioned her, and he stopped chewing for a moment. He regained his composure quickly and swallowed, the fresh, crusty bread tasting like ash in his mouth.
“You were wondering what I would teach you here,” Oreius remembered, redirecting the conversation. “If it would all be awareness training. The short answer is no, that’s not all you will learn.”
“What sort of things will I learn then?”
Oreius sat back in his chair, looking up at the ceiling. “Well, we start with awareness. It’s critical to most of the rest of the things I’ll teach you. We’ll mix in learning the next ten practice patterns as well - I assume that Tar taught you
