Deviant

The smell of the morning dew was nice and refreshing after a nights sleep. Standing at the gates to the castle I watched as more and more men showed up to go to war; I was the only female; once again. A few of the guys gave me weird looks but most didn't even acknowledge my presence.

My uniform fit perfectly the guard obviously didn't know what he was talking about I thought as I pulled out a little cap they wanted us to wear with the uniform. Prince Alvin showed up on his horse as I tried to fit the stupid hat on overtop of my braided hair, I hadn't even noticed until all the men started to cheer. I watched as he took in their cheers and spoke a few words to his recruits.

"Today's, the day men. We go to war to protect our land, to protect what is rightfully ours. We will not let the scarlet's force their beliefs on us. We will die to protect what we know to be true, are you ready!" he says and the men go wild, Alvin then turns and leads us all down through the city. All of us in step with one another and cheering. Civilians come out of their homes and wave their goodbyes, some even cheer with us. Behind us children; a few I trained, follow and pretend they are going with us. I couldn't help but smile I'm off to do what I do best and I get to do it with my best friend.

I look over at him and see hes smiling and going crazy like the rest of us. I let the cheers sink in and I soon join in, my voice getting lost with the rest of them, nothing could compare to this feeling; I loved it! We leave the city way to fast and before I know it we start to climb the steep cliffs leading away from the only place I could even call home. The cheers had died down by this point, in fact no one talked till we got up the cliffs and started our way on flat ground again.

I looked back to see the city gone. I pull the cap down and started to walk again. "I wonder what it will be like." Jeff asked as we walked side by side now. A lot of the men were now whispering to each other, and oddly enough I felt like all eyes where on me. Gulping loudly I pushed the thought out of my mind. "I don't think it would be any different then when we went to train." I whisper back. Jeff just shrugs. "What I'm wondering is why don't we have guns yet? We are completely open with no way of protecting our selves if we come under attack."

The man next to me answered for Jeff, "We get them when we meet up with the camp about a days walk from here, then we head off to the battle field, just we don't walk we go by carriage." The man next to me had a scare over his right eye and one along his arm starting at his elbow all the way to his hand, he looked mean and the size of his arms were four times as big as mine. "Oh, uh... Thanks" With that there was silence through out the trip.

When we got to the camp children came running up to us, I realized that they were handing out weapons. I walked up to one and they handed me a G 36 and four knifes all different size with holders along with a backpack full of stuff. Jeff and I walked away from the crowd and started to put our gear on. I tucked the smallest knife in my boot another two around my waist and the last one I put in my bag. I noticed that their was some empty containers that looked like they could hold some food; rope, a large and small canteen, a few granola bars, a box of matches. Than on the out side was a blanket rolled up tightly.

Pulling the bag on my back along with my gun I walked up to the group of men I came here with.

"Formation!" I hear a man yell and everyone lines up, in the commotion of the group I end up in the line, two people stand in front of me. I try to see whats going on but its pointless, my next objective is to find out where Jeff had disappeared too.

Trying not to draw to much attention to my self I look both left and right, hes not in my line, maybe hes behind me? I slowly turn to look behind me, when I see a boy a little older than my self standing there looking back at me with a questioning look. Blushing I quickly turn back, "wow" I thought to myself, I never saw someone so tanned and toned in my life before. The thought of Jeff completely left my mind, now I have a dark hair, tanned, mystery boy in his place.

"Soldier can you ride?" I haven't even notice the two lines of people going to different groups, now in front of me was a bald man tan and tattooed. He wasn't wearing a hat and had a different uniform on, gray with a green trim, which ment a higher rank.

"uh.. Yes sir." I solute and look straight, face redder than a tomato.

"looks like we got our selves a little lass here." he said with a little accent. "Over there." he points to a group of men and I nod my head and walk quickly to the group, I hate being in the spot light. As I go I hear a small laugh coming from the man who stood behind me. Oh god do I have something on my back? Or maybe I forgot to put pants on. I feel with my hand to my hip, nope their there. I quicken my pase as I get to the group and sink away to the back, maybe no one will notice me now.

The two groups ended up walking in two different directions, Jeff had been put into my group as well, hopefully we can stick together. The man who stood behind me was put into the other one.

Our group walked to a pen of horses and that's when I realized that I actually haven't ever been on a horse. "I thought we were going by carriage not horse, I can't ride!" I whispered to Jeff as he laughed. Taking a deep breath I tried to calm down, why then hell did I say I could ride? What was I thinking. The horses push each other around the small pen as the people in my group pick out their ride. When it was my turn next I stood closer to the gate trying to look at them, they all looked the same to me, brown and mean looking. Gulping I figured I should pick one that looks different, one that I can tell is mine so I wont look like that much on an idiot when trying to find it later on. Looking at the horses legs I see one that has a white strip and I point to that one.

"You sure that's the one you want?" asked a man who stood on the fence with a rope ready to fetch the first one I pointed at.

"Yes of course." I smile and nod like I know what I'm talking about, hopefully he doesn't see through my mask. I watch as the man ropes up the horse and bring it out to where I am. "She's a good girl this one, take care of her." he says as he passes me the brown lead rope; I hesitated before taking it. "Does she have a name?" the rope in my hand felt rough and prickly.

"You can name her." he smiles as he tipped his hat to me and walked back over to the pen to help grab horses out for the other men.

I can name her.... What would I name a horse? Maybe ill have to think on that one. I than slowly walk over to the barn where we tack the horses up. As I hear her big hoofs behind me I quicken my pace worried that she might step on my feet. As we walk I start to get used to her movements, she isn't so bad!

I find two open posts, one for Jeff and one for me, I loosely tied the lead rope around the poll and wait for Jeff, he knows how to put a saddle on a horse, right? I hope so, I thought to my self as I see him come up to the pole next to me with a horse that was compleatly brown and was somewhat bigger than mine.

"let me guess you need help?" he asked as he tied up his horse. "Um, ya I do." he rolled his eyes, "watch closely." Jeff came to my side and showed me how to put the saddle on and how the rains go, it was all so confusing to me. I still don't know if I could do it on my own.

After the lesson Jeff game me, we got on the horses and we showed me the basics, "You catching on well." he said and I laughed; good. By the time everyone was ready to go night had fallen. As tired as I was we started our march; Jeff at my side. This was going to be a long night ahead of us.