Belly of the Beast by Warren Thomas (story books for 5 year olds txt) 📕

            Not that he would say anything.

            Raven’s grumbling while making her bunk caught his attention. Tane saw she was doing a sloppy job, and nowhere close to what the corporals taught him and the others the day before. Stepping up and apologizing for his rudeness, he quickly tore apart her bed linens and remade her bed, pointing out what the corporals would be looking for. She eyed him sharply at first, but softened once she realized he was only trying to help.

            “Thank you,” she said.

            Tane wanted to say more, but she turned her back on him and started dressing. Her tunic and trousers were considerably oversized for her, even though she was almost as tall as him, with the tunic falling to her knees. He didn’t say anything when she sat on his bunk to tie up her boots, but did point out how the corporals wanted the boots laced up. She listened quietly, and followed his instructions, but said nothing. She didn’t seem like she wanted to speak to anyone. He just waited for her to finish and head for the chamber pots before going back and smoothing out the wrinkles and tightening his bunk up again.

            “You keep jumping out of your butt to wait on her, and she’ll have you so firmly wrapped around her little finger by noon, you’ll start to think you’re a pinky ring,” Joelle warned none too quietly as she slipped past Tane. “If Raven can’t pull her weight, we don’t need her.”

            “I was just being nice,” Tane said. “She’s new, and hasn’t been taught the same things we have.”

            “Let her learn the hard way, like we did,” Joelle shot back. “That’s the only way to get through to the likes of her. Tyrians are the most pig-headed, most opportunistic bunch in creation.”

            “Totally amoral,” Armin said.

            The same has been said about the Vikon, Tane thought.

            The Vikon were Tyrians driven from the Tyr Mountains centuries past, and forced to roam the world, the open road now their only home. Aside from their renown as witches, they still behaved much like their Tyrian cousins.

            Suddenly, with much bellowing and cursing, another Tyrian custom claimed everyone’s attention. Everard Boarsbane’s beloved beard had to go.

            Tane saw Quinn urgently trying to talk some reason into the man, but Everard would have none of it. His beard was his mark of manhood. To shave it was to admit he wasn’t a “real man.”

            “My friend,” Raven said. She was holding her hair protectively in both hands, then she pursed her lips in thought. “I understand. These Godsforsaken Lelts have no honor. They try to belittle and shame the very people they desperately need to save them from certain doom.”

            “Yes!” Everard said, eyes blazing.

            “But, we have sworn an oath to obey, and that would be a greater dishonor to break,” Raven said. She grimaced. “My blood runs cold to think about it, Everard, but you have to shave your beard.”

            Sergeant Gareth and the corporals stepped out of their rooms to see what the problem was at that moment. Everyone was deathly silent as they looked back and forth between Everard and the soldiers.

            “It would be worse if it was forcibly shaven off by others,” Raven said, turning scathing eyes on the three noncommissioned officers. “I’m here for you if you need me.”

            “I’ll have my vengeance,” he said.

            Everard turned back to the mirror, though sullen and growling under his breath. He took the straight razor from his army issued kit and turned to the mirror. Once he began to shave, everyone returned to what they had been doing. Tane breathed a sigh of relief as he watched Quinn begin to shave as well. Tane didn’t need to shave himself, making him painfully aware of his own youth. By Everard, and probably Raven’s, reckoning, he wasn’t a man yet.

            “Do you have a comb, Tane?” Raven asked, surprising him out of his reverie. She was running her fingers through her long hair, and not looking the least bit happy at its tousled state, either.

            “Huh? I...I mean, no,” he stammered, suddenly self-conscious of his own tangled mop of brown hair. “I forgot to pack one before I came to Kestsax.”

            Tane felt his face burning as she gave him a curious look. Her emerald eyes bore into him a long moment, then lost interest. She shrugged and headed for Joelle. He winced when Joelle ignored her request for a comb or brush, and pushed a mop into her hands instead.

            Tane and Quinn fetched buckets of water while Raven and Joelle mopped their half of the bay. Armin cleaned out the chamber pots with a member of Corporal Disa’s squad. All went reasonably well, allowing them to make formation with time to spare.

Chapter 13

            Corporal Pendar met them at formation, and seemed in a worse mood than the day before. Now that they had two women, instead of one, he changed the way they formed up. Quinn remained in the middle, with Raven to his left and Joelle to his right. Armin took up a position next to Joelle, and Pendar allowed it, though not looking like he particularly liked the idea. Tane took the other end, next to Raven. In battle formation, Tane understood that he’d be next to Sergeant Gareth, with Corporal Pendar beside Armin and Disa’s squad on the other side of the sergeant.

            The middle of the action, he thought with a strange thrill. Cousin Jessy would be green with envy when she learned that he was in the army she longed so dearly to join, and of his position in the line of battle. Of course, Quinn held the real place of honor in the squad, halfway between the sergeant and corporal.

            Tane was surprised to hear three reports of missing recruits, and of one missing corporal, given to the company First Sergeant. First Sergeant Dangan took the