A touch of fiction

This is a story I wrote in 10th grade. I've been digging around my archives and came up with this. It's perhaps a bit juvenile/Lord of the Rings-ish (I think I read the trilogy the year I wrote this), but when one is 16 I guess that's about right. Be gentle...



The Boy's Golden Lute

Nestled deep in a luscious green valley of rich farmland, pushed up against the Great Smokey Mountains, was a village of Dewnsberry. Dewnsberry being the only sizable town in the surrounding areas posed as a trading town where farmers brought their goods in to trade.
There was one such farmer by the name of Heen, who had a small plot of land a little ways outside the town’s limits. Heen, and Leatha, Heen’s respectable wife, who had a fancy for crochet, bore only one son. His name was Louch. Heen and Leatha were quite proud of Louch. For he wasn’t quite like the other children. Sadly Louch’s legs were withered at birth, which left him with a lopsided gait that many of the town’s kids poked fun at.
Louch tried to fit in, and play the games in the market square with the rest of the children, but his legs just wouldn’t allow it. In the end, he just found it easier to sit aside, and leave the games to the able children.
So, it obviously wasn’t for this reason that Louch’s parents took a liking to him. Louch possessed another gift, the gift of sound. Louch’s life was changed the day Heen brought home a simple wooden lute from the nearby market for Louch. Instead of playing games after the arrival of the lute, Louch was perfectly content to sit aside and just play tunes.
It took some getting used to, but soon Louch could play many songs, beautiful slow songs, or fast delightful jigs, he had a touch for it all, which his parents quickly took a liking to. Often times Louch would manage his way into the nearby woods, and play for hours at a time, to his heart's content. He even managed to make a new lute for himself that he carved out of a fairy tree. He was very proud of his new lute, and rightfully so, for no instrument in the land compared in beauty or sound.
Animals would often come to sit and listen to the beautiful playing of Louch as it floated magically through the still air. While playing in the wood one day, Louch was startled by a voice.
“AHO Laddy, whatcha bee playing there?” Came a gruff voice that sent the entranced animals scurrying.
Nervously, Louch turned to a short stocky bearded man, standing a ways down the path nearby where Louch had been playing. The man was wearing clothing the likes of royalty.
“Ahh………. jus’ mi lute sir.” Louch said weakly.
“Aye, heard yer beautiful playing, had to see what it was for myself.”
“They say these here woods have got fairies in em’. Thought tha’s what I ‘eard comin down the path, you’re quite good with that lute ya’r boy.” “Ya mind if I come an’ take a look at it do ya?”
With that, the man stepped off the path and moved closer to Louch.
“Please don’ come closer.” Louch stammered shakily. For Louch had heard stories of bandits in the wood that would lie in wait for a man to come, then beat him and steal all his possessions. As the man drew nearer, Louch, staggered to his feet and began to run away.
“Now wait there laddy!” Cried the man behind him.
“I wusn’ goin ta hurt ya!” He yelled.
Louch kept right on running as fast as his legs would take him. He ran until his lungs burned. He didn’t stop until he reached his house.
Louch decided not to tell his parents about what happened that day, because he worried they wouldn’t let him go into the woods anymore by himself, and that he decided wasn’t going to happen. A few months passed and harvest time came upon the valley. Heen made a trip over the mountain to Rivendale every year to sell off some of his crop.
This year Heen said Louch could go with him to help out. Louch wasn’t much help though, and spent most of the traveling time on Frederick the donkey. But Louch played his lute as they went, for his father’s enjoyment. Any lack of work Louch had not been able to do was quickly made up for, and even Frederick took a liking to Louch’s playing and bobbed his ears up in down in rhythm with the music.
In a few days time they reached Rivendale, and arrived at the bustling market square in good spirits. Unlike Dewnsberry, in Rivendale there was singing and dancing in the streets. Lovely plays and antics by foolishly dressed men. Banners were hung the length of the street in every color.
Curious, Heen asked a nearby merchant what the commotion was about, and found it was the yearly festival in celebration of a successful harvest. Louch wandered the streets while Heen was looking for a place to sell his crop, and was amazed at the sights and sounds, and the excitement in the air.
Louch stopped at a nearby booth of lutes and was looking them over in curiosity, when a large boy came up behind him and pulled Louch’s lute out of the tight grip of his hands pushing him down.
“Looks like we got ar’selves a durty old thief.” Yelled the boy to the lute merchant.
“No, No, that’s mine, I made it.” Yelled Louch frantically as he jumped to his feet.
“You, make this?” Why that’s preposterous!” Said the boy mockingly.
“Don’ look like yeh could make much of anything, from the looks of yeh.” The boy sneered, eyeing Louch.
Enraged, Louch leaped upon the boy with all his might, knocking him to the ground.
“That’s mine! Give it back!” Louch screamed.
Just then two strong hands like iron grabbed hold of both boys, pulling them to their feet.
“Easy now lads, cumon’ now, straighten up.” Came a familiar gruff voice.
Louch wheeled to face the same bearded face as in the wood, and he noticed that the face was smiling back at him.
“Now then, what’s the problem lads?” Asked the man.
“This one’s been trying to lift a lute off of 'im.” Said the boy pointing towards the lute merchant.
“Let me take a look a that.” Said the merchant taking it from the tight hands of the boy.
“HHHmmm,…….well, it’s not one a’ mine. Sure is a beauty though.”
“Well that settles it, the lute belongs to this one here.” he said taking the lute from the merchant and handing it back to Louch.
“You run along now little one.” The man said, prodding the boy on his way. The boy looked rather disgusted Louch noticed.
“Now, then, les’ talk about you.” Said the man, turning to face Louch.
“Was’ yer name?”
“Louch is my name sir.” Replied Louch quietly. “What’s yours?”
“The names Hellm.” He said gruffly. “I werk for the king. Ya ran off too soon that day in the woods, before I could tell yeh who I was.
“You work for the king?” Louch said in astonishment.
“Yep, I’m in charge of entertainin’ the castle.” Said Hellm. “Which is why Louch, I’m interested in you.”
“I’d like ya, err….the king would like ya ter play in the castle for him.”
“The castle?” Louch said in disbelief. He couldn’t believe his ears. He was going to live in the king’s castle. But a pang of grief swept over him as he remembered his parents.
“What,….” Louch began. “What about my parents? I can’t leave them.”
“Well, Louch, what if I were ta tell ya that yer parents can come too.” Said Hellm, a smile creeping over his face.
Just then, Louch heard his father calling him from afar, and ran to tell him of what happened, and of Hellm and of the castle.
The months slipped by, and Louch grew older. He now lived a life of luxury, with his parents alongside of him with his music never ceasing to please the king in all his years of service. Louch still liked to visit that far away wood from time to time, when the king would allow it, for the wood was Louch’s favorite place to play. The animals came back to hear him, looking all a little older, but still he played on and on, his music drifting into the still air, like magic.


THE END