TITON

Years Ago

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Titon, the firstborn of two brothers, bore an unfortunate name. His mother had chosen to call him after his father and leader of their clan, Titon son of Small Gryn. Titon’s father was a great man—a giant among Galatai. His presence was such that he towered over all other men, even those few of greater height. He made the walls and frames of normal architecture appear to bend way as he passed, lest they be crushed in his wake. And when his father was near, Titon was able to take some small comfort in knowing that, for the time being, he was not the only one who felt small.

Titon did all he could to better himself—to be more like his namesake. He ate to the point of pain at every meal and washed it down with two cups of goat’s milk in expectation of growing larger. He lifted and pressed stones above his head in his free time with the aim of getting stronger. He taught himself to read and studied the meaning of the words in their collection of pilfered books in the hopes of becoming wiser. But he eventually became all too aware that his father would forever look down at him. Even if Titon son of Small Gryn lived long enough to be shrunken and hunched, he would still likely dwarf Titon son of Titon—both in stature and accomplishment.

“A kiss for the one whose arrow flies truest.”

Stunned near to disbelief, Titon looked to the speaker. It was Red. Considered prettier than most girls her age due to her straight, bright-red hair, Titon knew he was not her only admirer. She made no effort to hide the glee in her announcement, and Titon allowed himself to briefly entertain the idea that she might be so excited because she knew he was the one most like to win.

The contest of skill was open to all the handful of boys present in the woods. The other boys shot their arrows, some missing the intended target entirely, the closest still a hand’s length away. Decker, Titon's younger brother, loosed his arrow which struck a mere finger’s width from the center. His pride in the shot showed on his face. At fifty paces it was a fine accomplishment for even a trained Galatai archer. But Titon had a confidence and coolness that the larger boys like his brother lacked—at least when Titon had a bow in his hand. His smaller size seemed to make him more dexterous, and he took to archery as does a goat to spring buds. Having grown tired of shooting the fungus stumps and such chosen by boys his age, he made games of picking a tiny spec within the target and trying to eliminate it completely with the tip of his arrow. Because of this, few realized his true mastery of the weapon.

Titon nocked and let sail his projectile with a half draw in a gentle arc. It lodged in beside Decker’s arrow, squeezing itself between it and the bull’s-eye. Titon smiled at his accomplishment, then blushed remembering what he’d won. Sweet that it was, it came with a price due to his nervousness when dealing with the opposite sex.

“Axes!” cried Decker. “Any boy can shoot a bow. The way you barely pull yours back, you’d never kill anything anyhow. We will throw axes to see who wins.”

Titon’s eyes went, along with all the others’, to Red for her response.

“Very well. A kiss and maybe more for the winner.”

Something in the way she spoke reminded Titon of her mother—but that was no bad thing. Kilandra was known as the most beautiful woman of the clan. She walked with a fascinating sway in her hips and clad herself in far less than the other women, who dressed with concern only for the cold.

“You throw first this time,” insisted Decker.

Titon, engrossed in a momentary reverie of what “more” might entail, was at a loss for words. He nodded and removed the light axe from his belt and spun it in his hand. He faced a tree fifteen paces away with an obvious rounded knot that could serve as the target. Titon was proficient enough with axes when it came to accuracy, but axe throwing took more than that. It required an intuitive feel for how much power one had to put into rotation so that it would arrive blade first in a target of arbitrary distance. Some simply learned to throw an axe at a specific amount of paces, but a true axe thrower needed to master the nuances that would allow him to make use of the weapon in actual combat.

Titon did as his father instructed, which was to envision the axe in his mind, spinning through the air, the lead edge landing perfectly in its mark. Titon found it easier to see things in his mind with his eyes closed—much to his father’s annoyance—so closed they were as he threw, and closed they remained as he heard the “thunk” of the blade biting into wood, followed by a gasp from Red.

Titon never discovered whether her gasp was due to his accomplishment or because she bore witness to the event that followed. Later he learned that Decker, probably convinced that Titon had tried to make him look foolish, swung with all his rage, smashing Titon’s face with his fist.

The memory of the events leading up to that punch might one day fade, but Titon knew he would always remember, with crystal clarity, the expression on Red’s face as she roused him. Strands of her hair clung to her wet cheeks, darkening its normal red to an exquisite chestnut. On her face, stripped of its usual mask of fake confidence worn attempting to match the expressions of her licentious mother, he saw for the first time an expression of her own invention. It was not compassion in her eyes, it was fear—fear for her own wellbeing. He was well aware that she was desperately afraid of being held responsible and punished for what had transpired, but it only served to magnify his infatuation. Something carnal and primitive stirred inside him as he looked into those frightened eyes, something that wanted both to conquer and to protect, to subjugate and to shelter. He wanted her to be completely his—to remain unsullied by so much as the thought of another laying claim to her.

She wrapped her arms around him. Titon would have been elated had it not been for the realization that he’d wet himself while unconscious. He clumsily pushed her away and tried to run off. A wave of nausea and dizziness hit him, causing him to stumble to his side where he flopped like a fish a few times. He continued his escape from the scene, but it seemed he could not escape the embarrassment, as his only mode of transport was to crawl on all fours due to lack of balance. He thought he heard one of the boys say, “He peed,” but could not be certain. He was certain, however, that the crotch of his trousers was wet enough for all to see, that he reeked of piss, and that tears were flowing freely down his cheeks. Finally able to clamber to his feet, he ran off on wobbly legs.