Archery: Straw, Clay and Air

The lesson format seemed to be fairly straight forwards, and dangerous enough to illicit more than a mere cursory interest for Drystan. He was satisfied with his ability to draw, fire and aim the arrows in the past session. Admittedly, he was not as smooth as he remembered. however,  his progress in such a small amount of time was satisfactory, at least. After collecting his 'fake' clay arrow, and handing them in, he took the opportunity to take his own set of properly headed arrows. All 25 of them in their quiver, fastened around his waist for easy access when firing, placed upon his right hip.

Upon returning to his place on the range he took the time to muse upon what the teacher, Talaban, had had to tell them at the beginning of this part of the session. The arrows always skew, usually to the right and in a diagonal path – that, he had learned by himself. He presumed that it had something to do with the way the fletching pushed against the bow on their passage. Fortunately, there was a way to correct for what one knew. If it skewed a particular way then he could merely adjust by aiming slightly to the left and below where he wanted to hit with the arrow. A simple re-calculation of variables that could produce significantly improved results.

 He relaxed his muscles once again, placed his feet in the correct position and prepared to try firing real arrows for the first time in over a year, at least, in his memory. The target was an above average distance away, just enough to stretch the skills of a beginner, or in his case a person re-learning what had been all but forgotten. He gave a gruff grin and pulled an arrow from the hip quiver. Placing it upon the string and pulling back smoothly upon the string came next, almost natural now. He took aim, trying to adjust for skew, as well as the slight breeze brushing across his cheeks, and let fly the arrow. It soared through the air, arcing slowly but surely, until it buried itself into the straw target. It was a poor shot, barely hitting the bottom ring of the target, just left of centre.

Still, it means that hitting centre is easily repeated. The angle just needs to be changed, and the adjustment for skew and wind conditions put in place he told himself forcefully, willing it to happen instantaneously.

He took another arrow and set about letting them all fly, to bury themselves within the distant target, fletching vibrating as the force of the impact was pushed back through the shaft of the arrow itself. The drawing and firing became much easier as he continued, his mind adjusting to the weight of the arrows almost sub-consciously. It was not a perfect display, by anyone’s standards, but by the end he was hitting the inner rings every time, though he only managed a few, overall, in the very centre circle. It was satisfactory, however, and he had to been the last to finish either, but in the middle of the group – a testament, he interpreted, of his returning skills. He took to waiting stoically, in silence, and when everyone was finished he went to gather his arrows and deposited them in the quiver once more.

Then would come the clay discs, thrown in the air for him to shoot with a precision he was not sure he yet possessed. Still, it was expected, and the worst case scenario would be that he missed the majority of them and would be forced into more practice. Before trying to get the attention of the Aes Sedai – Alisse – he chose to limit himself to one shot per clay disc and get a few more practice shots to his total. He fired 5 of his arrows into the target, all in the centre ring and with a growl of satisfaction he awaited the final test of the day.

He waited deferentially for the throwing to begin, and unsurprisingly there was no warning, nor would it be prove to be that the height, locations and speeds of the targets would be constant. The test had obviously not been designed for easy success. He had to force his concentration to as sharp a point of focus as possible, not particularly easy for a man whom had spent the last several years eroding such faculties in a river of alcohol. But he tried his best.

Having left himself with a mere single arrow per disc thrown it was challenging in the least. He missed the first 5 without exception, and rather badly also he thought. He began to doubt whether it had been worth his time trying to revive his archery prowess. However, when he clipped the side of the sixth one, sending it spinning to the ground with a chunk missing from a part of it his confidence flowed back quickly. He went through the motions, pulling the string from his shoulder blades, using the correct hold and a smooth draw. His aim began to improve as he adapted to a moving target. To improve matters the wind also seemed to abate slightly also.

By the end he had missed only half, and hit the other. Of the 10 he had managed to hit only 3 lay shattered from a shot to their centres, the others only missing sections due to being hit along the edges. He was well satisfied with his performance, and he had managed to push through and finish the day’s session with some moderate success.

With a little practise I might be prettygood he thought to himself with the first bit of warmth in a long time.