The young men of the Southern Village stand around anxiously, or with laughter as they waited for training or something—anything to happen.
Only a few of them are bigger than her. Ewa is thicker than most women, with more muscle, but for a man she would have been seen as small. So the newest recruits from the Southern Village are small and pitiful, but that was all they had left to give.
It makes sense to Ewa, though. There isn't much food in their homes, so it's extremely hard to put on weight or muscle, and the poorest village is running out of men to supply.
The training camp is at the edge of the Idanre Forest. So tall green trees, and small animals who came to see what the commotion was, surrounded them.
Everyone stands in their hand-me-down training clothes, with wooden staffs ready to learn. Even Ewa had a wooden staff, though few of them had brought their own metal staff with them. She didn't mind it. The wood felt familiar in her palm as her hand wrapped around it. Wood splinters scratch at her skin.
"What's she doing here?" She hears a whisper.
She looks back at the two boys looking at her with their heads bowed together. The second she glares at them, they scurry away.
She hadn't expected them to gossip like women, but here she was. She met every single sideways glance, head on, and they all hurriedly looked away. All but one group of men who smiled at her while talking about her. She'll avoid them. Didn't want the trouble.
Ewa leans against the Idanre Sentry Tower, letting the pebbles rub against her bare shoulders. Years ago, when it was built, she marveled at its height and beauty. Now she's astonished that it still stands tall and didn't collapse to the ground.
They built the Tower next to the King's Wall, the wall that the King ordered to be built between the Idanre Forest and the Haunted Forest, to keep out ungodly creatures. The wall was a lot older than the Tower by four generations and built from the best materials. They made it to last and keep out everything.
Ewa stares at the wall. Metal and stone reaching high in the sky, hiding the dark withered trees of the Haunted Forest. Ewa couldn't help the feeling of being trapped on this side of the wall.
"Excuse me?"
Ewa glares at the boy the voice belongs to. He flinches, but stays in front of her. His skin is blemish free and as light as the lightest brown of a Tiger's Eye Gem. Almost yellow.
He's not from the Southern Village, where their skin runs from dark chocolate to obsidian. He might be from the Market Village, but the closer to the castle and the docks, the lighter the skin until it was as white as the traders that sailed in from across the oceans.
Before Ewa's great grandmother was born, the King's ancestors came from across the sea and saved Idanre from itself, and the people mingled, creating different colors which created distinct classes.
Ewa wasn't going to judge him for the color of his skin, and how much more wealth he might have, but he stood out from the crowd and she couldn't help but to stare at him.
His eyes are the same brown as hers, but seemed lighter. His hair was pale and curly, but not as kinky as her curls. To her, his face looked bare, like all the character was erased.
"Excuse me?" he asks again.
She just raises her eyebrows in reply.
"I don't think you should lean on that. It looks really old and could fall over."
She notches her head, examining him from top to bottom. He really wasn't from around there. "It's not that old. Just poorly built. It's sturdy though."
He smiles at her, though she continues to glare at him. "I'm…"
"Forgot your name?"
"Dayo! I'm Dayo," he smiles.
"What do you want, Dayo? Come to see if the rumors are true? To see if you could get a taste?"
His head tilts to the side to look at her like a little confused puppy. She rolls her eyes at him. He opens his mouth to say something, but men clad in armour and village patterned cloth fill up the space before a large mat on the ground. The recruits stand up erect and Ewa looks at each young man.
Some look scared. Which meant in a fight, they might be too scared to survive. A few have ridiculous smiles on their faces. They'd be reckless for fun or to impress the higher ups. She'd stay away from both groups.
Ewa looks at Dayo and is taken aback by his serious face.
She looks at the group of men, their superiors, as they stand looking back, waiting. She takes a deep breath, tightens her grip on her wooden staff, walks onto the mat, and stands straight in front of them. She looks into the eyes of one man, and he looks back at her. Everyone else is silent.
"No one," he barks. It takes Ewa everything in her not to jump at the loudness of his voice. "No one but one person knows to line up when officers show up?" He yells.
She tries to hold in her smile as the recruits line up beside her. Dayo stands to her left and one of the smiling boys, the largest of the group, stands to her right. She scans the officers in front of them. Some look at her with confusion, a few with disgust and one with curiosity. The curiosity was the one she avoided. There were only a few reasons someone would be curious after a Sold Girl. Everyone else she met head on.
"From now on, your life drastically changes." The Officer who had yelled at them, walks up and down the side of the mat. "Those who lived a well off life… you'll get an eye-opening experience of what life is really like outside of your mother's arms."
Ewa didn't need to look at the light-skinned boy beside her to know who he was talking to, but she could see the other officers looking in that direction.
"And all of those from the Southern Village. This hell is better than any you've ever known." He takes his time to survey everyone in front of him. "Get your staff and get in pairs. We'll test you out."
Everyone but Dayo turns away from her, and she stands stiff, pretending not to care.
"Seems like everyone is avoiding you, girl. No one wants to hit you, or be hit by you?" The officer asks, walking up to her.
"I'm Sold."
It was simple. Just that one word could stop everyone in their tracks and explain it all. "Sold". It meant that she was undesirable. Tarnished.
In the Southern Village, it was hard to make money. Being poor was the norm. But sometimes, family members got sick, or went into debt, or both, and there was only one way for a girl to make that kind of money in one night.
To sell their virginity to the highest bidder. Men from the Market Village and even some from the Bearing Village had fetishes for Darker, Southern Village women. They liked to see them as less human and got off on it. And in return, the girls got an enormous sum of money, and the title "Sold". And with that title came disgrace. People no longer see you as a person, but trash. Though you make enough money to never work again, no one would ever hire you, anyway. And it's rare for a Sold Girl to get married.
But Ewa is a different breed. The only Sold Girl to ever go broke thanks to the phenomenal amount of debt her father racked up and her Uncle's gambling. She is the only one to ever hold her head up high when she walked wherever and whenever she wanted.
The Officer's eyebrows scrunch down to his eyes, confused. "You don't need money… so you must be here to die," he says. A couple of boys chuckle at his comment.
Ewa bites back her first comment, reminding herself that this is her superior, and she needs to watch her mouth. "My reasons are mine own, but I don't have any intention of dying."
The officer waves her away. "Just try to keep up." He walks to the center of the mat. She tries not to get upset. "We're gonna have a little test. Pair up and spar. When you knock someone one down or get knocked down, you move to a new partner. Do it until you have faced every single person so we'll see how good you are."
Ewa looks around again at the boys to see some smiling, some looking bored, and others about to piss their pants. She wonders if there were any who could beat her. There is nothing she is better at then fighting.
She turns to Dayo, the only one who stands by her side. He smiles at her and it irritates her. She nods at him to acknowledge him as her sparring partner.
"Staff up!" The Officer yells.
Near the corner of the mat, she sees the tall boy twirl his staff around fancily then settle it under his armpit, tip of it pointing out with his grip loose. His other hand is out and open like he's going to fist fight.
Ewa shakes her head and focuses on the target in front of her. She takes a different stance, a simpler one. She has both hands on her staff, spread out with the tip of her staff pointed at her opponent. She shifts her right foot back and turns it sideways.
Dayo matches her stance but with his left foot back. "I'll go easy on you," he says.
Now she's pissed. She's sure he said it out of kindness, but there is nothing she hates more.
"A real warrior gives his all to an opponent as a sign of respect. Would you go easier on a male?"
"I'm sorry," he nods. "I'll give it my all."
Ewa nods back, just as she hears one of the armour clad soldiers yell, "Fight."
Staffs collide and feet shuffle, but Ewa stays still. Waiting. She locks her eyes on her opponent. Watching for any movements in his arms or feet. The second he tries to attack, she'll block and attack his weakness, but he stays still as well. She keeps her focus on his body, but at the top of her vision, she can see a smile on his face.
"You were either raised well or you're scared," he says.
She knows what he means. When warriors say "raised well", they mean how you were taught to fight, but most people who say that Ewa, say it with sarcasm. It shouldn't have irked her, but it did.
"And you? Are you scared?" She asks.
"No." He shifts. "But if one of us doesn't start this, we'll be standing here all day."
She watches as his staff comes towards her but it is slow and easy to block. It was the last straw.
She quickly strikes at his staff with all her strength, knocking it out of his grip, and then smacking the back of his thighs with her staff. He hisses and looks at her, a little irritated.
"You disrespect me by 'going easy' on me. Pick up your staff and fight me. Or is this the best you can give?"
His face darkens, and he walks over to pick up his staff. He walks back to her and quickly slides into his stance. Ewa nods and adjusts her hold.
He attacks first. Again, his shot is easy to block, but it has enough power behind it so that Ewa can't knock it out of his hands. The second their staffs collide, they separate. She goes to attack a perceived weakness, he blocks, and has enough range of motion to try at her openings, and she's impressed. Of course, she's too swift and strong for him to get in.
They keep going back and forth, attacking and blocking and trying to outmaneuver each other. Neither of them winning or losing.
"Enough!"
Ewa and Dayo instantly stop. Standing up from their positions and looking at the officer standing by them. Ewa didn't see him step near them, and she should have been focused on her surroundings as well. She shakes her head at herself and stands straight.
"You two have been going at it for half an hour."
Ewa can feel it. The sweat pouring down her body and the uncontrollable beating of her heart as she tries to catch her breath. She had lost track of time while fighting.
"Sorry, sir," she says.
"Sorry, sir," Dayo parrots.
The officer waves the apology away. "You two are evenly matched, which is impressive, but we don't have time for that. We need to see where you stand against other people. Switch up."
"Yes, Sir!" They both shout.
Ewa moves on to the next person, and then the next, and then the next, taking them all down. Depending on how they reacted to her when they first came up was how she treated them. Some men looked at her with disdain, so she ended them fast and hard. Others looked at her with awe at her fighting skills, so for them she gave it her all without purposely knocking sense into them. One poor soul was so terrified that he dropped to the ground the second his staff was hit. She didn't fight after he stood back up, but she was glad he got back up on his own. Then there were three men who looked at her lustfully. It felt like their gaze was red ants, crawling up and down her body as they stared. For those men, she made it last, inflicting as much pain as possible. Until they were all finished but one.
The one from earlier, who was overly flashy with his fighting smile, strolled to her with an enormous smile on his face. He stood in the middle of the mat and pointed his staff at Ewa.
"So. Only the Sold Girl left for me?"
She looks around to see everyone else standing or sitting around the mat, looking at them, quietly waiting. This was the last showdown.
She looks to the boy and nods, walking to the middle of the mat. They stand face to face and he sneers at her. He's much bigger than all the men here, even the superiors. His shoulders are broad and about the length of Ewa's arm. His muscles bulge under his tunic. His skin is dark and worn, and his hair is light brown—sun-bleached. This is what Ewa meant when she said faces had character. They have marks and cuts that describe the life they were living.
The boy in front of her must have been a farmer from the Southern Village. Being under the sun and lugging crops to the market made him strong and dark. Ewa could see that from his body, and the smirk on his face meant he knew it as well.
"Should I finish you like I did your well-matched friend?" He nods over to the right.
She looks over to see Dayo sitting down, leaning against the tower with a busted cheek and holding his arm.
Something slams into the left side of her face and before she can register, she's already on the ground. She can feel blood trickle down her face as she looks to the boy smiling and swinging his staff around.
"Ibi!" an officer yells.
The boy, Ibi, just chuckles out, "sorry," as Ewa stands up, ignoring the pain in her cheek. Probably the same thing that he did to Dayo.
Ibi flips his staff in the air until it's under his left arm and his right hand is out for combat.
"Fine," she says, "let's do it your way." She takes her staff, spinning it in a circle at her side until it becomes a blur. She lets go, and it still spins on its own, and she easily grabs it again out of the air. For added effect, she spins it over her head and stands in her normal stance.
Everyone is quiet as they watch the show in front of them.
He strikes first, as she knew he would, but the strength of his attack takes her back a couple of steps as she blocks it. She looks him over as he attacks more and fiercer, making it hard to block each time.
Ibi is a man, biologically born to be stronger than her, plus they probably raised him on a farm, putting him in a higher power class than her. Strength he naturally had, she'd have to work twice as hard to get. But that's all there was to him.
Ewa smiles. Ibi knows some basics and some fancy tricks, but he is sloppy. He is relying on his strength to disarm his opponents, and he is getting tired and steadily slower. Ewa, fortunately, had the brains and stamina to outlast him. So instead of attacking back just yet, she blocks and dodges, staying just outside of his reach, causing him to do more work, to use his sloppy footwork to get to her.
Sweat is driving down his face, and his breathing is heavy. This was it. The end.
Ewa smiles even wider at him, and she laughs as he huffs like a bull ready to charge. She sticks her tongue out at him and winks. She can almost see smoke coming out of his nose as he gets angry and takes her bait. She hears the chuckles from around the mat and she's sure Ibi is getting angrier.
"Ashewo!"
That word: Sold Girl, was just a pleasant word for what she did. But that's not what they really wanted to call her. Ashewo: prostitute.
He charges again, but before he can touch her, he swings his staff up, leaving his body unprotected. He's slow and open. She swings her staff at his arm, making him drop his, and she squats low and sweeps his feet out from under him. When he hits the mat, she cracks him across the face, giving him a matching cut to her and Dayo.
"Enough."
The officer walks up to Ibi and looks at him, tsking, and not helping. "What's your name?"
"Ibi—"
"Not you. The winner of this match," he says, looking to Ewa.
"The winner?!" Ibi yells, getting up from off the mat. "All she did was prance around."
"No, she used your weakness against you and tired you out. There's more to a warrior than just attacking."
"Ewa Akinyemi," she answers, bringing the attention back to her.
"Beauty," he translates, "fated to be a warrior." The Officer looks at the rest of the recruits around the mat. "Ewa Akinyemi, undefeated, ranked first. Then Ibi second, and Dayo third. The rest of you can find your rankings on the list posted to the towers. The higher your rank, the more benefits during training. Now… you have joined the King's Army. All life before this and titles are gone. You are a new person and who you become starts now. Rest up. Training starts at dawn. Dismissed."
Ewa steps past Ibi and walks to pick up her belongings that lay by the tower where Dayo is waiting.
"It's nice to meet you, Ewa Akinyemi. I'm Dayo Adeokun."
"Related to the royal family?" She asks, recognizing the surname.
"No," he says, looking down.
Ewa ignores the obvious dodge. "We can train together, but I don't plan to die here. So keep up, or stay out of the way."
"Yes, ma'am."