Coming of Age

A/N: Please note, there is attempted sexual assault in this short story. If that is something that might potentially be triggering to you, I ask that you proceed with caution. - Rachel

Blue Jay is arguing with her mother again. It's the same argument that they've had annually for the last three years but this time, Blue Jay isn't going to let her mother win. This year she's seventeen years old, a grown woman by her people's standards. It's time for her to choose a profession and she has known for years what she will choose. It was always her dream to walk in her father's footsteps as a guide, but more to the point, she needs the money. The last of her father's savings has been used now to pay taxes on their land, and if Blue doesn't do something, there won't be enough for the next collection. Her family could get turned off their own farm. Meager as it is, the scant few acres are all they have to sustain themselves. And even if they survived the taxes, they don't have enough supplies put back for the winter months.

“You're still a child and I will not allow it,” her mother insists. Flower hasn't backed down on this position since Blue Jay first started talking about becoming a guide. It's a dangerous occupation. It's the job that got Blue Jay's father killed. “Do you think I want to bury my only daughter like I had to bury my husband? Assuming I saw you again at all. Something could happen to you and I would never know.”

“We'll starve to death this winter if I don't do this,” Blue Jay replies, drawing herself up to her full height, such as it is. She's as tall as her mother at least, though her oldest younger brother is now a head taller than her. It doesn't matter that she's small, what matters is that she knows she'll be good at the work and she has prepared for this. She has studied maps of the realm since she was a small child, learned basic survival skills and some hand-to-hand combat skills as well.

There aren't many nelfkin guides left these days. They'd become unusual even in her father's time, but Oak Grass had always told his daughter that it was the job all nelfkins were born to do. Since she was small, listening to her dad's grand tales of his adventures, she's wanted to be a guide too. The past two years, she has waited at her mother's insistence, but she's grown now, even though her mother thinks she's a kid. It's time for her to strike out on her own.

She has a fine pair of boots her uncle gave her for her seventeenth birthday, and a warm blue overcoat her mother made for her. Her dad's walking stick is hers now, made of sturdy wood and as much of a weapon as she is willing to carry. Part of the code of a guide is to practice nonviolence whenever possible, and to show mercy. Blue Jay takes the code, as passed down to her by her father in his worn leather bound journals, very seriously. She has built her life around it since her father's death.

“You don't know what it's like out there.” Her mother wrings her hands in misery. “Blue Jay, you must understand how we – nelfkins – how we're treated outside of the colony.”

“I know, Mom,” Blue Jay says, rolling her eyes. She's been outside of the colony before, traveling with other nelfkins to nearby markets where they can trade with humans and occasionally other inhabitants of the realm. She's even seen a few elves, and once she saw a fairy. “I don't care what other people say about me.”

“You will care when the taverns won't let you in, when you have to sleep in the gutters and scrounge for food because no one will do business with a nelfkin,” says her mother, waving her hands in the air to express her frustration. “They will call you names! They will spit on you, rob you, do worse things. You will be a target wherever you go.”

Blue Jay will not be moved. This is her chosen path. Her whole life has been leading up to this, she knows it is her destiny. To give up on destiny out of fear would go against her very nature. This time, her mother cannot hold her back.

When she leaves her home, she thinks she knows what to expect and she thinks that she can handle it. It is childish idealism that pushes her forward, but still, in the back of her mind, a voice repeats her mother's warnings to her in a whisper.

She won't stay here in this colony and rot, slowly wasting away like the rest of her people, no matter how dangerous the rest of the world is. In all the realm, she thinks there cannot be a place worse than this, where families cling to one another for warmth in the winter, where parents go hungry to feed their children, where human lords can cast them out or put them to death on a whim. She has been trapped her for long enough already.

The image of her mother crying at the cabin door will stay with her for the rest of her life.

–

At first, things go well. It is a long walk to the nearest tavern past the colony, a couple of weeks at least, but Blue Jay is well prepared. Sleeping outside in fair weather does not bother her, she has done it often enough, and she has plenty of supplies to see her through until she can buy more. The coin she carries on her person is hardly a pittance, but it's all that could be spared to get her started. Now it's her job to make more, by guiding travelers to their destinations.

Some nights she makes a fire, but most nights it is warm enough to sleep under the stars with only her coat for warmth. She is well-suited to this life. It gets a bit lonely, she can admit, and she misses her brothers and her mother, and her extended family back in the colony. However, she has always enjoyed being alone with her thoughts for company. Besides, she has her father's journals to keep her company. She has read them many times before but always finds something new that she hadn't noticed before when she revisits them. Some passages have become like old friends to her. Through these journals, she has gotten to know her father better than she ever did when he was still alive.

She takes pride in knowing that she is helping to preserve her people's heritage, just as her father chose to do. One day, nelfkins won't be treated with such disdain, she is certain. People will respect the guides once more, and future nelfkins will not have to struggle to get by has Blue Jay's family has done. She is still young enough to imagine that she will see such grand change in her own lifetime.

Many days pass by and she sees no one else on the road. She starts to get comfortable. Her mother always warned her of bandits who would rob travelers in their sleep, but Blue Jay has not seen any signs of such criminals in this area. She sleeps unguarded at night, not far from the road as she is wary of the beasts that live in the forest. Wolves and bears are plentiful, not to mention demons and other such monsters that lurk in the deepest parts of the woods. People seem almost harmless by comparison.

She is only a few days out from the tavern when she settles down one night beneath a tall tree. Using her pack for a pillow and her coat as a blanket, she says a few words to Jill, goddess of luck, and soon falls asleep.

In the dead of night, she is abruptly woken from her dreams when a hand is clamped over her mouth. She is wide awake in an instant, and struggling against the larger body that keeps her pinned down, crying out only to have her cries muffled. It's hard to breath through the heavy hand covering her mouth and nose but she forces herself to calm down.

Her eyes adjust and she sees her attacker is a human man. He is bearing down on her with all of his weight, keeping her trapped, and no matter how hard she fights, she cannot escape. The man has her right hand in an iron grip but Blue Jay's left hand is free. She jams her hand into her coat pocket while the man leers down at her with a horrible grin.

His breath stinks of alcohol, and it is disgustingly warm against her skin. Her mother has always warned her of the dangers of men. Blue Jay is terrified, only just now understanding the significance of her mother's warning. If she cannot get free... If she cannot get free...

But her searching hand finds the small knife she keeps in her coat and she acts fast, pulling it out and stabbing it deep into the man's shoulder. Her attacker reels back with a howl of pain, shouting curses at her as his hands grab for the blade sunk in his flesh.

Blue Jay doesn't waste time. She grabs her pack and her staff and she runs. She runs back to the road and she keeps running, for how long, she isn't sure. By the time she slows again, her lungs are burning and her mind is in turmoil. Every noise she hears has her on edge and she keeps looking around for the man, but she does not see him.

Even though it seems she has lost her attacker, she cannot calm down enough to sleep again. She huddles beneath some brush, further from the road than usual, and keeps watch for the rest of the night. In her mind, she replays the attack over and over again. It is her fault, she thinks, for letting her guard down. She left herself vulnerable to attack. This thought makes her more miserable than she already was.

The sky opens up and starts to rain and Blue Jay thinks she deserves to be soaked through and cold and uncomfortable. Perhaps it will teach her a lesson. Next time, she won't be so naive.

When the sun rises again, she trudges along with less enthusiasm and she is on the lookout for anything out of the ordinary. After all, she has lost her knife and next time she will have to fight with only her staff. That's all well and good in a fair fight, but if she's caught unawares next time, she shudders to think of what might happen. She tells herself that she got lucky this time and sends up a thanks to Jill for seeing her through, but still she cannot stop thinking about it.

That evening she is tired but she is afraid to fall asleep unguarded. She decides to scale a tree, and upon finding a comfortable branch, she takes some rope from her pack and secures it around her waist and around the tree. This way, if someone does try to get to her, she will hear them long before they reach her.

Even so, it is a long time before she falls asleep and her slumber is restless.

She comforts herself in the knowledge that in a couple more days, she will have reached her destination. At the tavern, she can have a hot meal and maybe sleep in a real bed again. Perhaps she will find someone there in need of a guide.

–

However, when she reaches the tavern, she finds a warning posted on the door. Management has changed hands and nelfkins are among the peoples listed who are no longer welcome. Blue Jay hesitates at the door. If she goes inside, she risks persecution. Maybe no one will notice, but most likely she will be cast out by the owner. It would be safer to travel on to the next tavern, but she does not relish the thought of continuing her journey without replenishing her supplies and she'd hoped to find a job here that could pay her a little money.

She's starting to understand what her mother was so worried about. It might have been better if she'd not left the colony, but she had been stubborn and unwilling to listen. She could go back, but that means returning to the road where she was attacked, and her gut twists at the idea of going back when she does not know where that man might be now.

In the end, she screws up her courage and steps into the tavern. It is a small establishment but when she walks inside, she immediately notices that there are several travelers present, in addition to the barkeep. She finds a table in a corner and huddles down at it, trying to ignore the way everyone in the tavern has turned to look at her.

She hears someone mutter the word “nelf” and her ears prick towards the sound but she does not react. As tired as she is, she does not wish to fight anyone now.

Presently, the barkeep comes over to her table and asks after her business. After she tells him she is a guide looking for work, he asks her to leave. Blue Jay's ears droop as she rises from the table and shuffles out of the tavern. It's starting to get dark outside and she doesn't go far. She leans against the building and takes out her pipe, filling it with tobacco and smoking to ease her nerves.

It doesn't matter, she tells herself. She will go on to the next tavern, and if that doesn't work out, there's a town further on. Eventually, she will find a place where she is not turned away at the door, and then she will find work and make some coin to send back to her mother. She can prove to herself and everyone else that this is worth it if she just keeps going. Now is no time for giving up.

The door of the tavern opens and a cloaked figure approaches her. Blue Jay shivers and has to force herself not to run.

The figure lowers their hood and Blue Jay sees that it is a woman, a human with her hair cropped short and a reassuring smile on her face. She is carrying a mug of ale, which she holds out to Blue Jay as a sort of peace offering.

“Thanks,” Blue Jay mutters, taking the mug. She sniffs it first but it just smells like ale.

“You're welcome,” replies the woman. “I heard you say that you're a guide. I am looking for a guide myself, someone to take me to Straswick where I have matters of great importance to address. I thought you might be interested in the job. I'm Lady Ervine. What is your name?”

The question makes Blue Jay pause. She has always been known as Blue Jay. Her father was fond of her full name, despite the tendency of her people to shorten names whenever possible. But Blue Jay sounds like a child's name and she does not feel like a child anymore, not considering what has happened over the last few days. She does not want to be thought of as a child either.

Standing up a little straighter, she looks the woman in the eyes. She nods and says, “I know the way to Straswick well and I will take you there, for a price. My name is Blue.”

- Rachel