Morning had now fully claimed the clearing, the pale gold of dawn had deepened into a warmer glow, sunlight filtering through the canopy above in broken shafts that swayed gently with the wind. Leaves whispered against one another, their shadows shifting lazily across the grass, while the faint chill of early morning gave way to a growing warmth that settled over skin and cloth alike. Somewhere beyond the trees, distant sounds from the tourney grounds carried faintly on the breeze—muted, almost dreamlike—yet here, in this small pocket of stillness, the world felt slower.
Thunder stood idly flicking his tail as he lingered near them. Ser Don still patted the stallion's neck, his hand moving in slow, gentle strokes. The horse huffed softly in response, leaning ever so slightly into the touch.
"That," Ser Don said at last, his voice calm but firm, "is the way the world is."
He did not look at Soap immediately.
"Most of the time, it is cruel. Merciless." His hand stilled briefly against Thunder's neck before resuming its gentle rhythm. "More so to people like Dym."
Then he paused.
His gaze shifted.
"And people like you."
Soap did not answer, but his ears twitched faintly.
Ser Don exhaled through his nose and turned his head toward the horizon, where the sun had climbed just high enough to break cleanly through the trees. Light spilled across the clearing in thin, radiant strands, piercing through gaps in the leaves and illuminating the air itself in drifting gold. Dust and pollen caught in its path, turning into something almost visible—like fleeting sparks suspended between earth and sky.
"But even then..." Ser Don continued more quietly, "...there are still glimmers of hope."
The light shifted again, brighter now, warmer—stretching farther across the ground, brushing against them both as if reaching.
"And those glimmers..." he added, "...can become embers."
His eye narrowed slightly as he watched the sunlight strengthen, watched it chase away the last traces of shadow beneath the trees.
"Embers that shine our path forward."
For a moment, neither of them spoke.
Then Ser Don inhaled again, deeper this time, and his expression changed—not softer, not gentler, but steadier. Grounded.
"And the thing about humans," he went on, his voice gaining a quiet weight, "is that when we are faced with impossibilities... with the demands of life, of the future..."
He paused.
His gaze hardened.
"We do not stop."
A small breath.
"We may falter. We may cower."
Another.
"But we move."
His hand left Thunder's neck, curling slightly as if grasping at something unseen.
"We march on," Ser Don said. "We march forward... and we seize it with our own hands."
The words settled between them, carried gently by the wind.
"Our fortune may be arranged by God," he continued after a moment, more evenly now. "But it still lies upon us—His creations—to reach out and take it."
A faint smirk tugged at the corner of his mouth.
"Fortune favors the bold, after all."
Then, quite suddenly, his tone shifted.
"Do you like fishing, Soap?"
The question caught the boy off guard.
Soap blinked, then nodded. "I do, ser."
Ser Don hummed approvingly, as though that answered something far deeper than the question itself.
"My father once told me something about that," he said, leaning back slightly. "A long, long time ago... when I was about... well, a bit older than Dym's age."
His voice grew distant, touched by memory.
"I was young," he continued. "Desperate. Trying to find work in an unfair world that was not kind to men like me."
A quiet pause followed.
"And I made a mistake," Ser Don admitted. "A costly one."
His jaw tightened faintly.
"One that still follows me to this day."
Soap glanced up at him, but said nothing.
"Of course, my parents were furious," Ser Don went on, a faint breath of humor threading through the words despite everything. "But the, they gave me more advice than I could stomach at the time. About trust. Faith. Honesty. Generosity. Diligence. Kindness..."
He exhaled softly.
"Patience... and more."
His eye softened slightly.
"But there is one lesson that stayed with me," he said.
Ser Don tilted his head, glancing briefly at Soap before looking back toward the sunlight filtering through the trees.
"It was about fishing."
Soap listened closely.
"My father told me that life is much like it," Ser Don continued. "We are all fishing... casting our lines into the waters, hoping to catch something worth keeping."
His hand lifted slightly, mimicking the motion of casting a line.
"And when we catch something bad," he said, "something that does not suit us... we throw it back."
A small shrug followed.
"And we try again."
The wind shifted, stirring the leaves above them.
"We search for a better catch," Ser Don said. "One that fits our needs. Our taste. Our future."
He paused again, letting the thought settle.
"But what if we find nothing?" he asked quietly. "What if the waters stay empty... or give us nothing but things we cannot use?"
His gaze softened, though it did not lose its steadiness.
"Then we wait," he said simply.
A small, patient breath.
"We stay, and look for other opportunities."
The sunlight warmed further as it spilled across the clearing, steady and unhurried.
"But we do not rush to achieve it blindly," Ser Don finished.
Soap sat with that in silence for a while, his gaze lowered to the grass between his boots as Ser Don's words settled in him—not fully understood, not entirely accepted, but held onto all the same. The warmth of the sun crept a little further across the clearing, brushing against his shoulders, his cheek, the damp edges of his sleeve where tears had only just dried. Thunder shifted beside them with a quiet snort, hooves pressing softly into the earth as if anchoring the moment in place.
Then Soap spoke again, his voice quieter now, but steadier than before.
"…What if there were no other choice, ser?" he asked, not looking up just yet. "What if… the fishes we get are all… bad?"
He hesitated, searching for the right word.
"Or… disgusting?"
Ser Don did not answer immediately. He let the question hang there, turning it over in his mind as his gaze drifted toward the trees, toward the shifting light that broke between branches and leaves. For a moment, he said nothing—then a low chuckle slipped from him, rough but not unkind.
"Then," he said at last, "we pick the least disgusting one."
Soap blinked, glancing up.
Ser Don's mouth curved faintly.
"And we swallow our pride for a bit."
There was no mockery in his tone—only a blunt honesty, worn smooth by years of living with it.
"Until we find another," he continued. "And then another after that. We keep casting our lines, keep searching… until we finally land something worth keeping."
His eye shifted toward Soap again, steady and grounded.
"Everyone wants the good catch," he said. "But there are no shortcuts to it."
A small breath.
"Only patience. Diligence. Focus. Persistence…"
He paused, then added with a faint huff,
"…and more patience."
The wind stirred again, softer this time, carrying with it the quiet rustle of leaves and the distant murmur of a waking world beyond the trees.
"And we do not give up," Ser Don finished. "Not even when the waters are against us. Not even when everything in front of us tells us to stop."
He leaned back slightly, one hand braced against the log as his face scrunched in thought, brow furrowing as he tried to recall something.
"There was… a saying," he muttered. "From the Nearls… something about hardship and—"
He clicked his tongue lightly, clearly annoyed at himself.
Soap, still watching him, spoke up before the silence stretched too long.
"Fear neither hardship nor darkness."
Ser Don paused.
Then his brow lifted, and he nodded slowly.
"Aye," he said. "That's the one."
His gaze lingered on the boy for a moment longer, something thoughtful passing through his expression.
"The same applies to your master. Dym, and his predicaments." he added quietly.
But even as he said it, there was a weight beneath his words—something unspoken, something that did not quite settle. Concern, perhaps. Not loud, not pressing… but there, lingering at the edges.
Ser Don exhaled softly, shaking his head once as if to push it aside.
"Soap," he went on, his tone easing again, "do you remember what I told you a week ago?"
Soap nodded without hesitation now, his voice coming a little firmer.
"As long as the sun still rises from the east… and sets in the west… there is still hope."
For a moment, Ser Don simply looked at him.
Then a small, genuine smile spread across his face.
"You've a good memory, lad."
He reached over and patted Soap's head—firm, familiar, almost affectionate. The boy's dirty-blond ears folded down instinctively at the touch, though he didn't pull away this time.
Ser Don let the quiet sit between them for a moment longer, his hand still resting lightly atop Soap's head before he withdrew it, rubbing his chin as though weighing how best to put what came next. When he finally spoke again, his voice carried that same grounded steadiness—firm, but not unkind.
"Dymitr is a good man," he said. "A responsible one. As all knights ought to be—to everyone under their charge, and especially to their squires."
Soap looked up at that, ears still slightly lowered, though no longer as tightly folded as before.
Ser Don glanced briefly toward Thunder, then back to the boy.
"Think of it this way," he continued. "Dym has already seen the worst of it. Lived through it, even. Whatever he tells you of his days as a squire under his old master—no matter how much he tries to polish it—there were things there he would not wish to happen upon you."
His gaze sharpened just slightly, not in harshness, but in certainty.
"And that is precisely why he acts the way he does with you now. Why he shoulders things without telling you. Why he makes decisions like the one he made yesterday, even if they are… flawed."
Soap's fingers tightened faintly against his knees.
"That is his responsibility," Ser Don went on. "And those are the lessons he is trying—however clumsily—to pass on to you. To spare you the weight he once had to carry. So that one day, you won't make the same mistakes he did."
A small pause followed, the wind slipping gently between the trees again.
"But of course," Ser Don added with a faint huff, "he is not perfect at it. Far from it."
Soap let out a quiet, almost reluctant breath through his nose at that.
"But," the old knight said, "what he did is still good enough for a lesson. For now. For you both."
Then he leaned forward slightly, resting his forearms against his knees as his eye settled on the boy once more.
"But let me ask you again, Soap…"
There was a brief pause, just enough to let the question take shape.
"Does that mean we give up?"
Soap shook his head almost immediately, more firmly this time.
"No, ser."
Ser Don nodded, satisfied.
"No," he echoed. "We do not."
The moment lingered just long enough to settle—then the old knight exhaled, pushing himself up from the log with a quiet grunt. He stretched his back slightly as he stood, glancing up toward the sky where the sun had climbed higher now, no longer soft with morning but bright and assertive, casting shorter shadows across the clearing.
"It's getting late already, huh?" he said, dusting his hands lightly against his dark blue cloak. "Or well—late enough. The sun's nearly overhead."
Soap followed his gaze, blinking slightly at the brightness before standing as well.
"You should head back to Dym, lad." Ser Don continued, turning toward him again. "He's likely been looking for Thunder and his sword by now."
A faint smirk tugged at the corner of his mouth.
"And from what you told me about yesterday… he's already cranky and stressed as it is. Let's not make that any worse, hm?"
Soap huffed a small, awkward breath at that, and nodded.
"Aye, ser."
Ser Don gave a small approving nod in return, then turned slightly as if preparing to leave himself.
"As for me," he added, "I should be heading back to town as well. See if I can catch that old coot Fremont before he buries himself in whatever business he's tangled up in."
His grin widened just a touch, a familiar mischief creeping in.
"And perhaps raid his kitchen and wine cellar while I'm at it."
Soap let out a quiet snort despite himself.
Ser Don chuckled, then stepped closer once more, placing a firm hand on the boy's shoulder.
"But listen well, lad," he said, his tone shifting—not heavy, but resolute.
"If you or Dym ever find yourselves in trouble…"
His grip tightened just slightly.
"I will come."
There was no hesitation in his voice now, no trace of jest.
"Like lightning, if I must."
Soap stilled.
"I swear it upon my honor," Ser Don continued. "There will be no call that I do not answer. No faith that I will betray."
His eye held steady on the boy's.
"I will come," he finished quietly, "and I will help a friend in need."
Soap nodded, "Thank you… ser."
Ser Don gave him one last look—half-smile, half-something older and heavier—before stepping back.
"And when you are in your darkest moments…" he said, almost offhandedly as he turned away, "remember to always look on the bright side of life."
With that, he began to walk, long strides carrying him toward the direction of the town. A moment later, a low whistle drifted back through the clearing—light, almost careless, the melody simple but strangely enduring as it wove between the trees.
Soap remained where he was, watching.
The old knight's tall figure grew smaller with each step, his silhouette slipping between shafts of sunlight and shadow, the whistle lingering even as he faded further into the distance.
Only when he was nearly gone did Soap finally move.
He wiped his face with his sleeve, sniffling once more before straightening himself. Then he turned to Thunder, who had been standing patiently nearby, and began tidying himself up properly. With practiced hands, he strapped Dym's sword securely to the saddle and took hold of the reins.
"Come on, Thunder." he muttered softly.
The stallion snorted once, then followed as Soap began guiding him back toward the camp.
And as they walked, the boy tried—awkwardly, unevenly—to whistle the same tune Ser Don had made.
He failed.
Badly.
But he kept trying anyway, the broken melody trailing behind him as he disappeared into the trees, following the path back to whatever waited next.
A/N:
Sorry for the late update, I had a back injury recently and have to rest for a while... That, and also I've been helping out with renovating my home, so I've been busy for a while... It also didn't help that I've been agonizing on how to do this chapter specifically...
And also I've been spending my time playing Code Vein and Rome 2: Total War so much that I've forgotten about my stories, lol.