The Forest Archer

Training Day

CHAPTER 4:

We had come back to the forest from the village of Nottingham at the break of midday.

When the wagon came to a stop I quickly jumped out, ready to start training.

Robin and everyone else hopped off their horses and tied them up. Robin started to rummage around in the wagon, until soon enough he produced a wooden bow.

It had carvings at the ends and the strings were frayed from the amount of usage.

It looked beautiful.

"Now this here, is your bow. This will be your best friend when in battle. You think of this as your child. You take care of it, you make sure nothing happens to it. Ok !"

I nodded and he handed it to me.

It was heavy in my arms. I thought I was carrying 80 kilos !

Robin gave me some arrows. I observed them thoroughly running my fingers through the feathers at the ends. They had been finely sharpened from the look of them.

Robin took out some targets from the wagon that I didn't even know were in there.

They were normal sized wooden targets with the rings in the middle symbolising the points.

He leant them all against trees making sure they were stable enough for me to shoot at.

He walked over towards me and showed me how to hold the bow.

First he grabbed the bow from my hands and put his left hand in the middle where the ditch was. He pulled the string back right up to his jaw, and I couldn't help but look at the muscle lines pushing on his shirt.

He turned around to make sure that I was understanding everything.

We weren't going to use arrows first because Robin wanted me to get used to the idea of pulling back on the bow.

After he demonstrated he handed me back the bow and I tried it out...

Putting my left hand in the ditch and pulling back the string all the way to my jaw with the other hand.

I could straight away feel the strain in my arms. The string was so hard to pull back !

"Now it should be a little hard to pull back at first because these strings are strung tightly on the bow, so your arrow can go flying when you release."

I nodded and he went on with the demonstrations.

"When you pull back on your first go it will be hard, but when you get used to the idea it becomes much more easier. You start to build up the muscle in your arms."

No wonder Robin had so much muscle !
We practised this for a while until Robin decided I was ready to pull back with an arrow.

The men stepped aside and I thought to myself as I was giggling. 'I'd do the same thing if I were you!'

Robin showed me how and then I took over.

I did all the steps that I had learnt so far... Putting my hand in the ditch and pulling back the string to my jaw.

The top of the arrow was rested on my left hand and I had my right hand placed underneath the end of the arrow; where my 3 fingers were pulling back the strings.

Robin said, "Try closing your left eye so you can get a better aim of the target."

I did so, and after a few seconds of waiting, and aiming...

I released.

The arrow went gliding towards the target, and with a great thud, it landed near the centre.

It wasn't in the middle but it was damn good for my first go !

A smile raced to my face and all the men cheered and applauded.

Robin looked very satisfied and happy.

I tried a few more times and I got 'mostly' all bullseyes. I was very happy with myself.

When we were done Robin interrupted all the cheering, "I think we're done in this category. Why don't we start on the sword fighting now." .... "Little John.. I think this is your area of expertise."

I faced him and he grinned. "Finally," he said with his Scottish accent.

He chucked me a sword and I caught it at the handle.

"Ok. So I'm gonna show ya the first few steps of sword fightin'. You've clearly masted how to hold the sword, so we are gonna go through the guard positions."

"Position one is the 'Plow' and thats where ya sword is positioned at ya opponent in a striking manner, 'Ox' is where ya raise ya sword up high/horizontal pointin', 'Fool' is low pointin', and 'Roof' is high pointin'."

We practised all these positions until I was ready to go on.

"Those were ya four basic guard positions." Little John explained.

"There is a fifth guard position that I will show ya as well, but it is bit more complicated."

... "The fifth position is called the 'Near ward' and this is where ya rotate the sword down and to the side from above."

He demonstrated and I practised the position.

I practised a few more sword positions until Robin called it a day.

I was a little relieved because my arms were hurting so much. The sword was actually really heavy... heavier than I thought it would be.

I now just had to memorise all the positions cause Little John said we would put them to use for tomorrows lesson.

I was a little excited !

Afterwards we packed all the equipment away back in the wagon and sat down near the fire.

Friar had cooked us up some chicken and we sat there and gnawed at the bone. Yes, we were very hungry after the busy day we had experienced.

We sat around the fire and sang a few folk songs until I was ready to go to bed.

I decided to sleep out under the stars like everyone else. So I grabbed a blanket, spread it out along the ground and quickly enough, fell asleep.

I couldn't wait to put my awesome skills to work tomorrow. !!!

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YAY !!!! Finally finished this chapter. It took me ages to research everything for the sword fighting but the archery category was super easy considering I do archery !!

This chapter might be a little boring but the next chapter definitely won't be.

Super excited to start writing chapter 5 !

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