Thirteen Years in One Hundred Steps: Theme 33 – Expectations

Now days grew shorter. Seconds now seemed like seconds. Minutes now equated to minutes, hours to hours, and so on and so forth. All three found it nigh impossible to meet anymore. Marth and Aliana no longer had tactics classes together – the latter’s disobedience had put her in a more rigorous course. Marth had to branch off of tactics to castle etiquette – advanced etiquette – as well as leadership. Mark’s schedule was always an iffy one – not one of the three could predict when Mark could have a break long enough to see his friends.

They were bogged down in their studies, made to force the three to fulfill their various expectations. It seemed too much for them to handle after their carefree lifestyles. When did all of these changes occur? Since when did people expect so much of them? How did life change from carefree to busy?

It seemed like it all happened overnight.

~~+++===+++===+++~~

Marth definitely was not the happiest camper around as he followed his father about the castle, helping with and learning about the responsibilities he would later be burdened with. He could not help but think that it was actually too much responsibility to put on one man.

There was no time to think, though. Already he was expected to be able to make sense of the Articles, the written laws of Altea passed down through the monarchial generations from Anri’s time. He was expected to be able address a crowd of people without faltering.

Fight for himself and leave no one behind.

Treat other members of the court with more respect he would give his friends.

Be a confident leader for his people.

Fulfill their wishes; don’t ignore them.

Those and among others. And some he hated.

Love no one else except those of equal rank.

Marth could not believe he was expected to respect that rule. He could almost guess and assume Cornelius had made that one up, trying to keep Marth separated from Aliana.

The young prince swore he would defy that one.

The other expectations? He did not have too much of a problem with them, but adhering to them? He was sure it would be hard. Much too hard.

~~+++===+++===+++~~

Aliana checked her calendar every moment she could, looking for the year. According to said Akanean Calendar, the year was still 601. May fifth of year 601 was when she had turned thirteen. It was still October of the same year, 601. So she was still thirteen.

Yet what was this mass amount of work she had to do? So many classes, so many expectations! Navigation by the stars. Navigation by the sun. Reading maps. Formulate a tactical plan of assault or defense. Give orders accordingly and in proper fashion.

She was supposed to know the basics of each of those expectations already. And they all each got harder. Of course, as she refused to apply her knowledge before, keeping up with her courses was very difficult for her. She survived through them, but came out a confused mess.

And that was only the knowledge portion of her studies, and only some of the many. Oh yes, only some of the many knowledge lessons she bore through.

The physical training portion of her lessons exhausted her to the point where she went straight home, took her bath, ate dinner, quickly finished her other necessities, and went right to sleep even if it was still around noontime.

Run a mile in seven minutes or less. Complete an obstacle course in nine minutes or less. Build up coordination by running and battling at the same time. Run with full gear through any terrain. Hang from an elevated height for at least five minutes. Complete one hundred right-angle push-ups. Stay in the plank position for at least five minutes.

So of course, she crashed and burned at the end of her physical training classes.

The weekends brought leadership classes her way. Drill the platoon. Know the chain of command. Pass the inspection tests. Memorize the general orders. Follow the Leaders’ Code, the eleven principles of being a leader. Follow the Leaders’ Character, the fourteen traits of the ideal leader. Earn promotions through proper conduct.

Drilling and giving commands were her most reluctant points. Exercising her power was something Aliana was always hesitant on. Lapses passed between her commands, lapses during which she felt her heart racing, increasing her nervousness even more.

Of course, her drill instructor attacked this hesitance whenever possible.

She developed a cold demeanor toward most people as the days and lessons wore on.

~~+++===+++===+++~~

Ellis was stricter than Mark had ever expected her to be. Through her teachings, he soon found he was able to conduct the basic and intermediate spells without a tome.

That spelled certain doom for Mark. Now Ellis expected him to quickly learn advanced light and the healing arts. Both were fields of magic Mark’s old teacher had never dabbled too much in.

He took it to Ellis once, saying there was no possible way for him to learn light magic and the healing arts in as short of a time as she wanted him to. His eyesight was troubling him, he claimed, and he wanted to look into the healing arts to be of use to his friends.

At least Ellis had let him off on that one, focusing her teachings in the healing arts. But in compensation, he was expected to understand advanced healing magic. Definitely a bit more rigorous, but at least he got far enough to the point where he was able to temporarily heal his eyesight. Not permanently: the forced shift of his cornea would actually damage his eyesight even more. Classes in human anatomy made that apparent.

Magic was not the only thing he was trained in, though. “In order to unleash your full potential,” Ellis had told Mark, “you have to build up not only your mind’s endurance, but also your physical endurance. Your body must be able to retain the energy your magic can generate.”

Mark had decided not to ask about what would happen if his being could not retain his magical energy.

He was a bit disappointed when he found out his physical training would not take place next to Aliana. The reasoning? She had to build strength and endurance. He only needed endurance.

Pull-ups and push-ups. Long endurance runs coupled with short walks. Ab stabilizers and curl-ups. All for endurance, and definitely not as rigorous as the physical training his friends were treated to.

Not quite as exhaustive, that is, until he began his studies from the tomes. It seemed the magical side of Altea had a whole other language unto itself. Definitely not common language, but maybe something like the language of the herons. Mark had read about the herons somewhere, and had tried to make sense of their galdrar, but to no avail. Altea’s magic was written in Ancient Scripture, a simpler branch of the heron tongue, but difficult nonetheless.

And at fourteen years of age, Mark was expected to translate and understand this language of the tomes.

He stayed up through the nights at times, trying to decipher the Ancient Scripture to the best of his abilities, making notes to himself to remember certain words and pronunciations. He translated at least three paragraphs a day, often falling asleep over the task. Ellis offered no help – she believed the young sage had it in him to do this himself. And, she decided, it was necessary for him to learn the language himself.

Either that or he would never rise to be an Archsage.

~~+++===+++===+++~~

It was one of those days when time seemed to graciously stop for the three. Mark found his way to the black oak tree, soon seeing that Marth and Aliana were also there, seemingly just sitting together, talking. He controlled his slight jealousy and approached the two, sitting on Aliana’s opposite side.

A silence settled over the three.

“So…” Marth coughed, “how are we all doing?”

“Well…we’re all exhausted,” Mark pointed out. “That’s for sure. I am so tired right now…We need more than a day’s break.”

“We just have to deal with it,” Aliana bluntly stated. “They’ll keep bogging us down in this ridiculous amount of work until we show them we’re masters of what we do.”

Both boys looked to Aliana, surprised that such a statement would come out of her mouth.

“They expect too much from us,” Aliana went on. “They make us do things that we didn’t even think of knowing, and then they yell at us for not being able to do something we don’t know.”

“Are you sure it’s not just because you refused to do anything before?” Marth asked.

“You tell me!”

Marth fell silent. Aliana had never been this cold before.

Even Mark had to protest. “I know things have been rather hard on all of us, but that doesn’t mean you have to be like that toward Marth, Aliana.”

She said nothing, curling up a little.

“She’s right, though, in a way,” Marth murmured. “People have been pushing us rather hard. It’s almost like they’re helping us too much.”

“Helping us?” Aliana questioned, incredulous. “How are they helping us with this crazy amount of work and unreasonable level of expectations?!”

“They’re helping us toward our dreams,” Mark answered, understanding what Marth actually meant. “They know what we want, and they can see what we have. They’re just challenging us so we can go forward to our goals more prepared.”

“That’s stupid,” Aliana stated, obviously livid. “We can get there ourselves.” She rounded on her friends before they could say a word. “I’m getting there myself. I don’t need any help.”

“People have been telling us it’s impossible to go on in life without friends and their help,” Marth protested. “Even the strongest person needs someone there by their side in order to go on. My father is King, but he couldn’t have possibly been able to keep moving forward with his rule without my mother. And you, Aliana,” he went on, turning to the addressee, “you wouldn’t have been alive if I hadn’t found you, or if Master Jeigan hadn’t decided to take care of you.’

Mark blinked – his weakened eyesight was coming back – and looked around at his friends. “We’re all together for a reason,” he said, holding a hand out. “Something told me that when I quit telepathy. And people know what we can do. So they challenge us, and expect a lot from us so we can show them we don’t only ‘do.’ We have to – as Aliana said – show them we’re masters of our goals. The expectations and the challenges will stop when we show that we’re experts of what we do. So I’m not giving up. They can give us as much hell as they want, but as long as you two are there with me, I won’t give up, not until I become Archsage. Are you guys with me?”

Aliana hesitated before snorting and turning away. “It’s too much,” she huffed. “I’ll never get there.”

“I will,” Marth firmly stated, placing a hand over Mark’s. “Father’s going to try and kill me with all of his expectations of the Royal Court, but I won’t give up. When Father dies, I become King of Altea. But I won’t stop there. I’ll be a better king than him. Like Mark said, it’ll be hard…but I’ll do my best. I’ll get there.”

Aliana seemed to glare at the two before turning away again.

Both boys grabbed her hand, though, and forced it on top of theirs. “Come on, Master General,” Marth beckoned. “You’re going to be best of the best, right?”

“It’s too hard though,” she fumed. “It won’t happen. All that crap they think I can do, and all the shit they make me do…”

Mark gave her a quick kiss on her lips, which only made her react in revulsion. “If you don’t want that,” he laughed, “then we’re expecting you to wash that mouth out.”

“And,” Marth added, stifling a laugh at Aliana’s furious look, “you’re expected to know that we’re here to help you. You’ve got us, Aliana. We’ll help you get to the place where you want to go, past the expectations and hardships.”

Hearing that, she could not help but soften up.