"Harder, faster!" he yelled. "C'mon, Jacov! You can do better!"
Jacov went through his sets, repeatedly punching the tree with his full strength behind each blow. He had to set these hits carefully so that he didn't-
"C'mon!" he heard. The bellow from his father distracted him for but a moment, but it was enough.
Jacov heard a sharp crack and pain suddenly radiated from his right knuckles. He cried out, pulling back and clutching his throbbing wrist. He tried to pull off his glove, but it hurt to even barely move his fingers. He bit his lip.
"Jacov!" his father snapped, stalking over. "Why on earth did you stop?"
Jacov looked up at him through sweaty side-swept hair. "I'm really sorry, Da. I think I broke my hand."
His father reached forward and grabbed his hand with annoyance etched onto his face. Jacov bit the inside of his cheek as his father tugged off his glove. His knuckles were already swollen and his wrist had a red-white ring around it. His father turned his hand over a few times and squeezed the knuckles with Jacov gritting his teeth and clenching his other hand, not daring to make a sound.
"You may be right," his father said. "It certainly looks broken. The knuckles, at least. Your wrist seems jarred, too. That'll teach you to be more careful! You're already ten years old, you should know better by now! Of course, now you can work on your left hooks and have no excuse not to."
Jacov relaxed his tightened jaw and spoke with a strained voice. "How am I going to bind it, Da?"
His father sighed and gave Jacov his hand back. "As much as I hate to say it, we might need to seek out a tribe."
Jacov's eyes widened. "But, Da-!"
"Stop!" his father cut him off. "I don't know how to bind joints. Just straight breaks. As disgusting as those lowlifes are, we may need their help."
"But Da, you said that the tribes were-"
"I know what I said!" his father interrupted again, voice snippy. "As messed as the tribespeoples' morals are, they happen to know a few things about healing. I've had to go to them for help before."
Jacov was shocked. His father had asked a tribe for help? His father hated the tribes! Jacov had always been taught that the tribespeople were of the strangest group. They had the most perverse values on discipline, sexuality, and just the concept of a tribe. Man was not meant to follow man.
His father sighed. "We may as well just bed down for the night and head off in the morning. If you can wait that long."
Jacov straightened and looked up at his father. "What ever it is you think is best, Da."
"Well then, let's head back to our things and rest for now. We'll need our energy in the morning to find the nearest tribe border."
Jacov spent the night staring up at the sky clutching his wrist. He wanted to cry but his father hated all forms of weakness and that hate had been passed on. To cry was to tell the world that you were vulnerable and weak. Jacov was NOT to cry. He was not to be weak.
It seemed only moments had passed by since he closed his eyes when his da was shaking him. Jacov started awake blearily and began sitting up, envious of his father's alert expression and ever sharp eyes. His father helped him up and began packing Jacov's bedroll for him. Jacov opened his mouth to protest-his father never did anything for him that Jacov could easily do on his own-but his father put up a hand for his silence.
"Do you honestly expect to be able to roll this with a hand of twice-size swollen fingers and a stubbed up wrist?" he asked, half resigned, half annoyed. "You just keep out of the way and I'll get our stuff so we can find a tribe."
Jacov nodded and stepped aside feeling a bit helpless He was always to make himself of use so things could run smoothly. With a hand that he had broken so stupidly, he couldn't do much.
When his father had finished packing up their things, they set out searching for any sign of a tribe near-about.
It was maybe minutes or hours when Jacov's father suddenly grabbed him and pulled him into the trees. Jacov went silent and still, breathing softly through his mouth.
"Scouts. We're close," his father whispered. "Once they pass, we will head in the direction they came and stop at their border. Copy?"
Jacov nodded, his boyish blue eyes suddenly hardened with seriousness. If they trespassed on a tribe's territory...Jacov couldn't imagine the horrible things that would be done to him and his father. He could fight, of course, but the tribespeople fought to draw blood with their metal weapons. How could Jacov fight through a haze of red? It would be awful.
Jacov's father grabbed his unbroken hand in a rare show of comforting love and protection. It was tiny things like this that always reminded Jacov that the days spent training with his father as a menacing tower over him were just because he was loved. It was a love Jacov wouldn't trade for the world.
They walked through the woods until they reached the border markers of the tribe. There they waited. Jacov was quickly becoming impatient, his hand throbbing in a horribly painful way. He opened his mouth to say as much but when he saw the warning look on his father's face, he gulped and stared back forward.
Suddenly, a tawny haired boy stepped from behind a tree with a confused look on his face. "Why are you just standing there?" he said.
Jacov stared back with a guarded look in his eyes. This was surely a boy from the tribe! Why on earth would Jacov answer him? How long had he been standing there, spying?
Jacov's father raised a hand in a half wave. "Greetings! We've come to ask for medicinal help. If you'll be so kind as to take us to speak to your leader?"
The boy stepped up to the border cautiously. "You're not here to move in on our turf? That's what rogues do, isn't it?" The boy's grey eyes were sparkling with unease but also with a touch of mischief.
Jacov looked at him carefully. He didn't seem so bad. His neatly combed hair and lightly freckled cheeks displayed a clean soul in Jacov's eyes. This was an example of a bloodthirsty tribesman?
Jacov's father raised his hands in a benign gesture. "Only for help. My son broke his hand as we trained and I'm without the proper training to bind this kind of break." Jacov raised his chin with a slight blush. He had broken his hand so stupidly! But at the same time he was proud and impressed at his father's diplomacy. This is the man who's footsteps he must fill.
The boy grinned and gestured inward of the border. "Well, come on in! Welcome to the OakTribe territories." The boy watched as the father-son duo stepped over the border. They began walking deeper into the territory and the boy walked up to Jacov. "Hello!"
Jacov looked at him and away. "Hallo."
"I'm Alon," the boy said. "Today I'm eleven."
Jacov glanced at his father but the man just looked on. "My name is Jacov," he replied. "I've been ten years old for a while now."
Alon looked at Jacov curiously. "You're very tall for your age, Jacov."
It was true! Alon came only to Jacov's mid-bicep. Jacov looked down at Alon. "I wouldn't know. Am I really?"
Alon grinned and looked forward. "Yep! Tall and lanky, you are. You have very fair hair and skin, too."
Jacov felt his face heat in the slightest. "I know what I look like. I just did not know I am tall."
Alon looked at him thoughtfully. "And you speak strangely. Smoother, almost. You elongate vowels. Did you know that?"
Jacob's hand gave another heated throb and he winced with a tiny groan rather than reply.
Alon looked at Jacov's hand. "Goodness, that looks painful! You'll need that fixed."
Jacov rolled his eyes. "As if I didn't know."
Alon shrugged. "Can you blame me for not knowing how to act? I found two strange people on my border and you expect me to not be- Here we are!" Alon halted in front of a vine curtain framed by two large oak trees. With exaggerated elegance, he parted the vines and bowed deeply as he revealed the camp.
Jacov's eyes widened. Never in his life had he seen so many people! Maybe one of them could fix his hand.
Alon took Jacov's arm and began pulling him to a small tent. "I'll take him to see our-" His voice cut off as Jacov's father grabbed Alon's shoulder.
"I will take him, if this will not be a trouble."
Alon grinned. "Sure thing, mister. I'll go tell her you're here." And he ran off.
Jacov looked around. So many people all looking like they belonged. Such a different feel. He didn't know what to call this feeling. It felt...safe?
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A/N: Soo...is this chapter too long? Let meh know! And I simply adore Alon...
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