Rebellion: Prince of Dawn

Chapter 10.1: The First Turning Point

---

TRISHA PAYNE

When I was a little girl, I was told that a woman would challenge the world to prove her independence. But the moment she births an infant, her whole world will revolve around them. That independence would disappear in favour of nurturing her child.

That happened to me when Ilias was born.

I had lived twenty years of my life without him, but the moment Dr Creed handed me my infant son, I wanted to stick by him and give him the world. So when he made the decision to head to the Capital to take the State Jynxist exam—a dangerous event which would separate us for a little under three months—every emotion one could feel swirled inside me.

This would be the first time he'd ever be separated from me.

But instead of reassuring him that he'd be fine, the roles were reversed. He would go on about how Ray and Heloise were with him, how he himself was a better jynxist than I was, and he promised not to act recklessly during the exam. He also explained that my growing anxiousness would disappear soon, especially since I was going to be taking care of Jaime while they were gone.

Ilias was spot on about that.

If I was going away for three months, I had enough trust in my son to take care of the house by himself. Ray, however, didn't share the same trust with his daughter.

He had asked me to take care of Jaime while he was away, and being the caring friend I was, I agreed and gave her Heloise's room. Ray also gave me the key to his house just in case Jaime wanted to get something from there.

He has absolutely no trust in his daughter. Just how much trouble does this little girl make?

I found out the answer to that not long after.

The day I started taking care of her, she left the house to play just like any child would and only came back for meals. She returned in the evening sticky and smelling of fruit. It turns out that she had used the vineyard Mrs Uva was growing on her property's outside wall as sword practice, practically destroying them. Luckily, I got to the vineyard and healed the plants in time.

"Jaime, you must apologize to Mrs Uva tomorrow," I told her. "She worked hard on growing them so they can bear grapes. Please don't go around tearing down plants."

"I thought they were weeds," Jaime explained, her pointed ears tucking themselves behind her head. "The colonel and Ilias are going to be gone for three months and I don't have anyone to practice my swordsmanship with. I don't want to forget the things I learned."

"That's fine. We have a lot of space in the backyard and scrap materials in the shed. We'll ask the lieutenant to spare some soldiers tomorrow and have them build dummies for you to practice on. I'm sure some of them will even practice with you."

"Thank you, Auntie..."

The next day, she was frightened to apologize to Mrs Uva by herself, so I accompanied her.

A week after the vineyard incident, mothers came complaining to me about how Jaime had been going around beating up their kids. One of them even showed up with a bruised eye.

I apologized to them and sat Jaime down when she got home.

"Do you know why I'm in a bad mood?" I questioned.

"Is it because I dragged mud in here? I mopped it though."

"It's not that." I held out an open hand. "Give me the sword."