Alek just shook his head, for once not getting into an argument with Codrin. “You do what you have to do in a small village like mine. Da’s gone and Ma’s too sick to work. Siblings are all too young, so it’s just what needs to be done. The only reason I agreed to come here at all was because the headmaster offered to pay my family a stipend every month.”

“I thought most commoners would jump at the opportunity to come to an academy like ours. Didn’t you ever want to do something else? Surely you didn’t want to just do odd jobs for the rest of your life?” Codrin asked, sounding genuinely confused.

“Me being here means that my family loses their primary income,” Alek answered. “And what else am I going to do in a village of less than fifty people? Become an artist? Travel the world? In our village, if your job doesn’t contribute to the rest of the community, it’s not a job. It’s a waste of time.”

“Makes sense, I guess,” Cira said, brows furrowed as she finished her work. “Never really thought about it before. I’ve never had only one option in life. I enjoy hunting, but if I had to do it every day, and my family counted on it just to survive... I don’t know how I’d feel about it then.”

“Life deals us all different cards,” Alek said simply, shrugging. “Just got to play the game with what you get.” He reached down and hauled up the skinned and gutted carcass with one arm, throwing it over his shoulder without concern for the blood still streaming from it. “We’re going to need another one of these, probably. Volmar eats the same as four men. Maybe we should just get him his own deerkin?” He walked back the way they’d come with their prize in tow. The two nobles followed him, pensive looks on their faces as they stared at the young man’s back in silence.

This was another reason Aldric had wanted all of them to come out here together. Something about being out in the wilderness, with only yourself and each other to rely on, put everybody on the same playing field. Kedrin had wanted commoners in this school to provide them with an education, of course, but he also wanted conversations like this to happen. Too many nobles didn’t know, and would probably never know, what those beneath them on the social ladder put up with daily.

A sky shattering BOOM cut through Aldric’s musings. Every bird within a mile took flight in a cacophony of shrill cries.

“What in blazes was that?” Codrin cried out, all three of them ducking and looking around frantically. They all shrieked in fear and surprise when Aldric abruptly leaped down from the tree right in front of them.