I'm not a physician. My mom is. "Admitting it was like pulling out one of his teeth." I'm just helping her. ”

"She's on her way to the village," said the girl, "and she's called me to come to you." You've got the herbs she wants. ”

Keegan put his pocket on his back and cursed. He stepped over the black dirt and gravel and walked lightly towards her. "I'll go with you. Who is your dad? What happened to him? ”

"He's a sailmaker." Tswana replied as she led the way, "He can't eat or drink." His stomach hurts. ”

"My mom will do it." Keegan said confidently, and walked with her across the trail towards the village below. Every time the girl looked back at him, he felt as if he had been stabbed in the heart. He wondered what the other children in the village would say to her.

He didn't be curious for long. She spoke softly and without prejudice.

"Old Rigne says you're a robber's child. Bandit mongrel. ”

The sun was setting, and the shadow gradually grabbed the two of them. Keegan replied emotionlessly, "Old Rigern is right. ”

"So you're really unlucky? As the legend goes? ”

"That depends on which legend you believe......" Keegan thought the answer was clever enough, but she quickly threw the question back.

"What about you, which one do you believe?" She asked, tilting her head to look at him. In the twilight, he met her eyes, and her gentle gaze was like an axe slashing into his abdomen.

I don't believe any of them, he thought. Those are the fears in the hearts of stupid people who are afraid of real magic.

"I don't know." He said.

She didn't pick it up. But another question popped up.

"If your mother is a doctor, why aren't you?"

Because I don't know how to use magic—he almost screamed, but he thought of a better way to put it. "Because I want to be a warrior."

Tswana stepped lightly over the frosty stones. "But there are no warriors here. Only hunters. ”

"Then, I want to be a warrior."

"People need doctors, not soldiers." She noted.

"Oh?" Keegan spat into the bushes. "Then why can't shamans make friends?"

He knew why, and had heard it countless times. "People are afraid of me." Mother used to say.

But Tswana's answer was different.

"If you save my dad, I'll be your friend."

He discounted Irachi's jaw at the age of sixteen. At the age of sixteen, he already has the skeleton and muscles of an adult. At the age of sixteen, he already knew how to use his fists to persuade others. His mother had warned him repeatedly, and so had Tswana now.

"Keegan, you ...... tempered," she would use in the same tone as his mother.

When he was sixteen years old, the celebration of the Winter Solstice Festival was unprecedentedly grand, and with a caravan and three musicians coming from the Valar Valley in the far southwest, the celebration was even more extraordinary. People swore on the shore, and the promise of eternal love flew all over the sky regardless of it. Young warriors dance in the fire, trying to attract unmarried girls who are watching. Some people are heartbroken, some people are at peace; Some people have grudges, and some people have revenge. Fights can start on all sorts of grounds, whether it's marriage, money, or honor. The unrestrained drinking made the carnival atmosphere uneasy.

When the pale winter morning sun falls, and people with hangovers wake up to see the snow that never melts, many begin to regret it.

But the fight between Keegan and Erachi was not ordinary.

Keegan came out of the fire and sweated profusely as he searched for Tshwana on the beach. Did she see him perform? Did she see that the other young people in the village were panting one by one, and they couldn't keep up with his wild steps?

His mother wore a sealskin cloak like a lanky ghost. Her hair was unkempt, and her unwashed braids were braided with ornaments and bony amulets that hung down beside her cheeks. She grabbed his wrist. The Winter Solstice Festival is one of the few nights of the year when mother and son can be seen in the village, so his mother came with him.

"Where's Tswana?" He asked.

"Keegan," she grabbed his wrist, "you calm down." ”

The heat of the flames and the sweat on the skin were gone. He felt his blood freeze and his bones were like ice cubes.

"Where's Tswana?" He asked again, already a low roar.

His mother began to explain to him, but he didn't need it. He seems to have understood it a long time ago. Maybe it was his instinct at the moment when he was about to get angry. Or perhaps it was, as the mage would later say, a glimmer of light from his dormant magical talents.

Whatever it was, he pushed his mother away. He went out into the sea, and many young men, women and their families were standing in the water, wearing garlands of winter flowers, swearing to each other that they would always be loyal and love each other until death.

As he approached, the people around him began to whisper. He didn't care. As he squeezed through the crowd, they began to block him. He ignored it either.

He wasn't too late. That's the key. There is still time.

"Tswana!"

All eyes were on him, but all he had in her eyes was hers. When she could see the expression on his face, the joy in her eyes was extinguished. The white winter corolla was incompatible with her black hair. He wanted to rip it off.

The young man beside her stood in front of her guardedly, but she pushed him away and faced Keegan herself.

"Keegan, don't do that. It was arranged by my father. If I don't want to, I can say no. Please don't do that. Square peg. ”

"But you're mine."

He grabbed her hand. She didn't react and didn't pull away—maybe she knew she would anger him by doing so.

"I'm not yours," she said softly. The two stood in the center of the crowd, as if the two of them were the ones who were to be united in the presence of the gods. "I'm not anyone's. But I accepted Mauwell's vow. ”

If it was just such a scenario, Keegan could have coped with it. Embarrassment was nothing to him—what was the fleeting shame of a young man who had spent most of his life in humiliation? He could have walked away, or even—against his wishes and prayers—remained in the crowd, pretending to be free and easy to the laughter, celebrations, and blessings of the crowd.

For her, he could do it. It wasn't easy, but he was willing. Just because it's Tswana.

He was about to let go of her hand, ready to squeeze out a smile and take another deep breath to apologize to her. But then a hand slapped heavily on his shoulder.

"Let her go, boy."

The hoarse old voice of the old man Rigon cut through the silence. This man founded the village, and he seems to have grown old when the world was young. He was at least seventy years old, probably almost eighty. But the person who filmed him was not Ragern himself, he just gestured to the people around Keegan.

"Get out, bandit bastard. Before you bring us greater doom. ”

The hand pulled him hard, but the base didn't move. He's not a kid anymore. Now he has the strength of an adult.