A New Beginning.

She bowed to the mighty tree in front of the arena, and cut open the sacred thread that was tied to it upon her birth. She was a warrior now, set free from the shackles of birth. Tomorrow would be the day her teacher would recognise her training of seventeen years and bestow upon her the weapon he deemed fit.

As a warrior, she was most fearsome and ruthless. That was the reason everyone in the village had already decided in their heart of hearts that she, undoubtedly the best warrior from amongst them, would surely be given an axe; the symbol of death without a new beginning, of closed doors, of chopped, lifeless trees. She, too, believed in the words of the villagers. Unknown to her teacher, she had been training with the axe for years in preparation of what she thought was inevitable.

The sun was setting. She had to go to the forest soon.

Clad entirely in black from head to toe, she wrapped a black cloth around her face. The only thing one could identify her by was her eyes, left uncovered. She retrieved her axe from a tree hollow that she knew all too well. She cleaned it up and examined its edge. The old axe had finally begun to lose its sharpness. The metal had worn off at the ends and it had become blunt. She smiled dryly; as that night was the last time she would use it.

The next day, they would be acquainted anew.

She swung the axe with all her heart and practiced with it; her every move channelling the energies of the ancient warriors whose tales of fortitude she had heard as a little child. Her every step was like a dance; even with the most ruthless weapon, she moved with grace and poise. She swayed and she charged, she hacked and she danced. At last, she swung her weapon in the air and caught it like it was an old lover.

But woe befell; the axe fell from her hands to the ground, and with it fell her last two fingers. She winced in pain. Blood oozed from her missing digits. She looked at her axe accusingly and then shut her eyelids tightly. It was her mistake. She shouldn’t have underestimated her only childhood companion; for after all, the axe was the only one she trusted after her parents died.

She ripped apart the cloth from her face, exposing her face, and tied it tightly around her hand, grimacing as she did so. When the bleeding stopped for a while, she picked up the axe, and her fallen fingers, throwing them back in the tree hollow. The axe, which had given her so much, had decided to keep a part of her for itself too, it seemed. The axe, once light as a feather to her, now seemed as heavy as the burden of a life.

Tears flowed from her eyes as she was unsure of the future which she had already painted with her colourful dreams. She came to the woods as a woman sure of her ability and knowledge; but life had taught her a lesson to never think ahead of herself.

Dawn came much later than she thought it had.

She trudged to the temple on top of the hill, where her teacher had imparted to her the knowledge of weapons and what it meant to be a warrior. As the familiar, intricate arches came into view, she sighed and stared at the black bandage on her hand, still wet with blood. Thinking that it would attract too much attention in the arena, she carefully unwound it and threw it away below the hill into the forests, where no one went.

Every square inch of the arena was packed with all the villagers and had an air of palpable excitement. Everyone cheered for her as she walked up to the warriors’ pedestal, where a few of the boys were already standing in wait for the ceremony to begin. The others arrived shortly after her, waiting for their teacher.

The teacher came after quite a while and lay down all the weapons on the stand on the pedestal. The villagers were elated to see a shiny, brand new axe among them. The teacher then walked up to face the young people. Everyone waited with bated breath as the teacher called out the names of his students, one by one, acknowledging their presence at the ceremony. He then picked up a sword, and gave it to the tallest boy of the lot. Everyone cheered.

The timid, short boy had been chosen by a spade. The muscular boy received a mace. Subsequently, the other boys were given a trident, bow and arrows, and a dagger.

The master then picked up the axe. Faces plastered with smiles; everyone looked on as the expression on the face of the teacher had morphed into a questioning one. The young warrior, expectant of her weapon, looked towards her feet, her good hand covering her injury. No one noticed the teacher slip his hand away gently from the handle of the axe, revealing a scrap of black cloth tied to it. No one saw that she had finally uncovered her arm, revealing her lost digits. Everyone observed that the teacher put the axe back on the stand, and went forward to his best student instead with a pen. There was a wave of shock and surprise amongst the spectators, the hushed silence slowly growing into a chaotic hissing.

The ceremony had ended. Everyone left with disappointment in their hearts.

She, however, had found a new beginning.