Nihtan

Cotswald Village has never been more than a peasant village in the shadow of Camelot. Young Nihtan understood this and knew that if he were ever to become a hero, he would have to find some way to get into Camelot society. At first, he tried to get accepted to the Defenders of Albion, knowing that, since he's barely literate, he could never join the Academy or the Church. Unfortunately, he had no great strength to make up for his very small size and was rejected on the first day of training. "Least I was allowed in the city to try," Nihtan thought to himself as he wandered the streets of Camelot that night. As the moon drifted behind some clouds, Nihtan realized that he was lost deep inside Camelot. Darkness closed around him, but he was not afraid. Back home, in Cotswald, he was the only boy he knew that hadn't been afraid of the dark; he found something comforting about the night. Even when clouds shrouded the night sky, he could see well enough to manage his way through alleys and streets. Moving along slowly, Nihtan heard whispers up ahead. Stealthily, he approached a doorway that looked more like a black hole in a black wall. Nihtan stopped for a moment and listened carefully, looking around slowly. "Not e'en a mouse is this quiet. Surely no one has seen me. I should sneak in and find out what these people are talking about at such a late hour," he thought. Moving closer, Nihtan started to peek around the door to spy on the people who were talking inside when a hard object crashed down on the back of his head as if a club hit him from behind. A hazy voice somewhere above him, as if from a dream, spoke softly.

"How did this lad get so close to the guild?"

Another voice, sounding far away, "I don't know. We had our infiltrators watching the area. Do you think he heard anything?"

"Nay, but only because I happened to get here in time. We better not tell Master Eadig about this."

The voices faded away as he lost consciousness. Nihtan woke up the next morning in a stable outside Camelot with a pounding headache and horse maneure on his clothes, but he had a smile on his face. He knew how he was going to become famous in the realm of Albion.