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| Me and Alexander talking [note: not a photo of the actual conversation] |
“My God,” I remember saying, “you’re serious.” Even as I said those words, I knew they were redundant with Ravenscroft.
“Of course,” he said with his typical, business-as-usual grin.
There was as much babbling on my part as coherent conversation over the next few minutes, I was completely unprepared to even think about such things. I think the most productive part of the conversation that followed what Alexander’s assurance that he didn't need an answer just then, I was free to think about it. We parted company then, both agreeing to revisit the topic in twenty four hours where and when we could talk about it in more details and in better circumstances. I was still hungry, and I knew that at Gulf, Alexander always has another appointment to head to.
Despite my hunger, I walked past the main camp pavilion and ducked behind a tent so that I could text my wife, who was coincidentally attending our local SCA meeting just then back in Mooneschadowe. A minute later I was on the phone with her, still stunned beyond any reasonable thought just then, recounting what Alexander had said to me. Lillias almost squealed with joy on the other end of the line, excited at the prospect.
Bit it wasn’t a done deal by any means. The ramifications of a foreign Pelican taking a protege from Ansteorra were not as straightforward as a simple yes or no question. Also, there was the question as to is I wanted to go down that road again, the path was not a simple one for me. In the past, I had been both cold and at times hostile towards the peerage as a concept, and concurrent with this, several of my own kingdom’s peers had effectively painted a bull’s eye on my back and acted accordingly. Actions ranged from the passive-aggressive to overt bullying, handing back my first protege’s belt seemed to be just about the only thing that brought a end to the mess.
And, above all of that, saying yes, to Alexander or anyone, would represent a radical change in my own life’s path, both in the Society, and to an extent outside of it. For all that the last five years have taught me, and the overwhelming majority of it was good, positive things, to be sure, it also left me cold and jaded about the idea of advancement within Ansteorra. Some things were my own doing, choices (Mistakes and otherwise) with consequences I had to live with. And others were the overt product of people who’s unapologetic dislike (or even hatred) of me had left its mark. To say yes here would be to change the balance I had come to live with on all of that, and likely lead to me eventually having to reengage with some, if not many of those people once more.
This was not going to be any sort of an easy decision.
The first people I told following the call with my wife were Ainier and Liadan who had retreated into the shelter of the text to relax before the the evening set it. Both of them cheered at the news. Liadan was acutely familiar with the ins and out of protegeship, having taken a yellow belt from Sir Burk several years before. As I ventured back to the main camp pavilion and served dinner for myself, I sat down at the one of one of the long tables and enjoyed the chance to rest. In something of an off-key chorus, a few people asked me how my day had been. One of the askers was Derega Tote, longtime friend, one time resident of Mooneschadowe, and fellow archer.
With my mouth full of pasta, I thought about how to phrase my answer as I chewed. Should I keep the conversation to myself until there is a final decision, or should I tell the people close to me and see what their reactions were?
“Master Alexander Ravenscroft, the war herald for this year,” I said calmly, “just offered me a protege belt.”
Eyes across the tent went wide at that news. “Did you accept?” Derega asked.
I shrugged. “Not yet. I’m still thinking on it. Its a lot to think on.”
“Well, congratulations on the offer then.”
And that was the theme across the dinnertime hour; friends, acquaintances, casual conversations were all met with the same response. The honor, and magnitude of the offer alone was not lost on any. That, coupled with the words of Alexander himself were what first helped me start to get perspective on the whole thing.
It was sometime after dinner when the pieces started to right themselves in my head, letting me put thoughts in some sort of order. One time before, I had donned a yellow belt, and that was after a long conversation with a good friend I spent a lot of time with. In truth, I had first broached the subject. Years, and so much work later, I had just more or less just accepted that I would probably never have that path open to me again. The idea that someone, let alone a foreigner, would see more potential in me that I did when I looked in the mirror now was earth shattering in its magnitude.
Frankly, it left me reevaluating a lot about myself as the evening turned into nighttime.
Exiting the main tent, I ran into Derega again, and as we often do, we started talking. Much of our friendship over the years was built on our vastly different perspectives on most topics, and our ability to typically both argue effectively, and consider the other party’s points. This give and take, back and forth had allowed us to be sounding boards and counterbalances to each other over the years. Walking together, we made our way back towards Five points, and then down towards Scribes point, talking the whole time, both about Alexander’s offer and about a dozen other things.
Scribes point was actually relatively lively when we arrived, many of the illuminators and calligraphers seemed to tend towards being night owls during the war. Inside the tent, there was a unique suspension of ranks and titles. There, were were simply two different categories, artists, and friends.
A time later, and with Derega still at my side, we made our way back towards the camps, and as we passed the five points, I suggested we look in on the green Dragon and see what was playing there that night. The Dragon was packed when we got there, and she and I huddled in a corner, I taking an unoccupied high-backed chair, and she absconded with a small stool and we sat and listed for a while to the music as two bard performed from the second story balcony. It was late by then, and after a time, Derega retired for the night. I stayed, but the room was getting a little too crowded for my tastes. I made my way towards the front exit, and found myself looking at the brazier under the gazebo next to the tavern. A circle of people were talking softly across the fire, one of whom I recognized as Mistress Marion (sp?), the same women who, four years before has ushered me up to the Dragon’s balcony for my now famous first herald on site. I walked over, and was warmly welcomed to the circle, greetings being exchanged by all.
I sat and listed as the other talked for a while, and one of the topics that come up was the origins of the green dragon. The founders envisioned it as a public house, a place of neutral ground where people from all kingdoms could come and socialize. A “public house”, of sorts, that would by its very nature invite people of all measures and motivations to come and make merry in good company with one another.
Towards the end of this, Marion put in “I can’t decide what to do next with this, however. I want to do a shine so some sort. Every village in Europe has a shire to this saint or that, but I have no idea what I would name it.”
I chewed on that for a moment, my mind turning at the academic challenge. Then, an idea came to me. I put my hand up meekly. “I might have a suggestion, my lady.” Marion, for her part, eagerly welcomed me to make a suggestion.
I told all assembled my story of the late Mistress Talanna Dustana the Violet, her mentoring, friendship, and work as a teacher. I talked about my offer to help her register her name and arms, and her decision to take me up on that offer over a year later. I started to get choked up when I got to the part about the stroke taking her from us the same weekend I was going to consult with her about a problem registering her name. And then of course, the college of heralds of Ansteorra got together and made a special submission letter just for her name and devices, that way, at least, we could get her arms registered, even if we only had a holding name. And then, of course, the final but small miracle of the whole saga was the fact that someone, somewhere managed to actually register her name as submitted, no changed required.
“Anyway,” I said by way of conclusion. “When that was all done, I was able to message her husband and tell him that we had done it, we had registered the name and heraldry we wanted to do. So, if you were looking for a name, maybe something like Saint Violet?”
Everyone at the circle was teary eyed by then, I had not fully appreciated the magnitude of my tale, even I was sporting a pair of leaky faucets by then.
Marion then suddenly clapper her hands together with a start. “I have it!” he then looked right at me. “I know what I should do!” Eyes all tracked to her with this. “I’m going to build a shrine with a box on it that is open on one end and with hooks on the inside. That way people can hang up the names of people. A memorial for those no longer with us.”
The idea met with instant approval from everyone there, even I nodded at the perfection of it. Then, to my surprise, she walked around to me, leaned over and gave me a hug. “You give me the name of your friend, Ivo,” she said into my ear. “and I’ll make sure she’s the first one up next year. I promise it.”
“God bless you, mistress. God bless you, and I most certainly will.”
~
There is a power to inspiration, and that is perhaps the more poorly kept secret in the human experience. The ability to encourage others to rise up above themselves, even if only for a moment’s time, is both finite, and unpredictable. But it also is not one way. In each thing that we do for others, the same can be visited back upon us.
Something almost supranational had coalesced in my mind that evening, a product of the whole experience, from Ravenscroft’s offer, to the conversation with Derega, to visiting with my friends at Scribes point, to the talk around the fire next to the Green Dragon. For the first time in four years, I felt bathed in the magic of the society. Not since the “Tale of Four Coins” had a seen an event that way. It was a good feeling, but at the same time a bit overwhelming.
Bathed in emotions that I couldn't name, and tired beyond any good reason, I made my way back to camp late that night, glad for the chance to sleep once more.
Wednesday morning was the icy cold wake up I really could have done without. It was painfully cold to wake up and climb out from under the layered covers that morning. Force of will alone carried me to a miserable but necessary shower in the shower house at the end of Queen’s highway.
The morning and afternoon heralds that day were a little more sparse than I would have prefered, with my having to assign two routes to some people in order to maintain coverage. Of the whole site. In terms of warm bodies, we had enough people, but the skills were not there, with interested by untrained volunteers showing up. On the morning runs, I went down Queen’s highway, and the afternoon I went up towards the archery fields. By the end of it, my back was killing me and my right ankle had been twisted not once, not twice, but three three times.
The interim, however served a critical purpose for me. I went back to scribes point, specifically seeking the counsel of two close friends. Adela Scrijver van Brugge, OL and Landed baroness from Atlantia carried with her the credentials to offer valid, and valued council on the subject of protegeship. And Mistress Mara Palmer OL, and wife of Master Mathais, newly made OP and former Protege to Alexander had both the credentials of the rank, and the personal experience with Alexander to offer he own valuable and important insights on the issue. It was, as I recall, a enlightening Forty minutes worth of conversation just between them, and that’s not counting the added input of people like Lady Vastilia and Lady Finnguala, among others.
So informed, and more or less on the verge of overthinking things, I was satisfied that I was in as good a position to speak again with Master Alexander as I ever would be.
The final lead up to the conversation was “midnight madness” the big sales event on merchants’ row Wednesday during the war. The name is not to far off, not quite Black Friday (which I have mundanely worked security for a few times), it is nonetheless an energizing experience as people flock to the vendors and see what deals are out that night.
As it happened, I ran into Lady Rosma, her lord, Oberon, and Oberon’s sister while I was out and about before meeting up with Alexander. I traveled with them between merchants and laughed and talked with them as they moved this way and that. I hadn’t before met Oberon’s sister, but I’d known Oberon himself for about two years now, and his quirky, but pragmatic sense of humor was always a welcome perspective to things. Rosma, as it happened, was one of the most unique heralds on site as part of the handful of newly misted sign (or silent) heralds in the society. She was, and would be our only sigher for the duration of the war, and was a continuous fixture on Merchant’s row when the cries went out. Fun loving, kind hearted, forward thinking, and an occasional (but subtle) flirt, she and Oberon were proving to be a perfect pairing for each other of late, and their shared humor and good spirits were particularly contagious that night.
After a while, including a dinner stop at the food vendors, I met up with Alexander yet again, this time hear the west entrance to Merchants row. He guided me to the show of the wife of Taran The Wayward, friends of us both, and fellow Meredian’s to Alexander. Ducking behind their canvas walled shop, we sat down in the relative quiet back there and sat in camp chairs as we talked in more detail about the challenges that his proposal would present to both of us.
“I honestly thought I had planned for everything when I set out to come here, Alexander. I even had a plan in case I needed bail money.”
“Bail money,” Alexander blurted out. “Really?”
“Well, the plan consisted of calling my mother and crying, but still, at least I thought that far ahead.” We both laughed at that. “Still, not in my wildest dreams had I thought I would ce contemplating this. Not without anyone, let alone yourself.”
And there were challenges to be addressed, let there be no question about that. How would a man who lived 400 miles away from me advocate for me in an Ansteorra pelican’s circle? How would we correspond, communicate, teach and learn over that same distance? What feedback would he be looking for and needing from me? And how could he get the information I could not provide? Its not there there were not answers, or that the answers were even few, but the distance between vague ideas and solid plans needed to be ironed out before I agreed to any of this.
For his part, Alexander was upbeat about the whole thing, and was optimistic of his end goal. I still feel that he might now understand Ansteorrans as well as he thinks, but all told that would be a small thing to learn compared to what I will have to master in the years to come.
One thing I have prided myself in though the course of my life is the ability to act decisively. Right or wrong, I am inclined to act rather than stand immobile in the face of a decision. Sure, I can wait and think things through, and the decision to do that in itself can be decisive. But after a while, I’ve trained myself to ask “am I waiting for a reason, or am I just putting myself in a ‘holding pattern’ out of habit?” Even though Alexander was perfectly willing to let me wait even longer to make my decision, and even though I had had plenty of people offer critical and accurate statements of the whole idea, I was also persuaded that despite these hurdles, or perhaps become of the, Alexander’s idea had enough merit to try, even if for no other reason than to fail and learn from that failure. But I knew, then and there, that anything I needed to really know to make that decision was already in front of me.
With one last qualifier thrown in, I gave my answer.
“So long as we agree to revisit this agreement in one year’s time, I’m willing to become your protege, Alexander.”
And with that, the adventure was begun.
To be continued...
Part 1 | Part 3
His Lordship Ivo Blackhawk
Kingdom of Ansteorra
"Long Live the King!"
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