The last of the trees parted before Eli like the opening curtains of a mummer’s theatre, and he saw the city. Layman-upon-Waters glittered with warm, orange lamplight in the moonlit dark of night. At the foot of this final rise, the open plains of grass, awaiting the coming spring when the young people would dance away the winter’s chill. Beyond, the scattered homes and businesses of the new Low Town, the city’s early fronds of urban growth beyond her ancient walls. The echoes of laughter, the sharp strings of passionate voices.
Then the wall, and then Layman herself. Her stone roads, made flat by the processional passage of soldiers, cut between the brickwork domiciles of the residential districts. The merchant houses, the inns and eateries, the municipal stables. Then up, up the hill to where the Castle Road met the eastern King’s Road, the bridge-laden Water Road. The beautiful, white stone of the noble district with its grand manors and gilded boutiques.
And at the highest point, surrounded by the ring of roads, the Castle. Castle Layman as it was called in this age, its true name lost to time. The charge of the king’s castellan, and in intent the westernmost edge of man’s military strength on the continent. In truth, the castellan’s garrison was sparse, his walls mostly unguarded. Eli spied only a handful of bannered spears manning the battlements tonight. Layman had seen no conflict in decades, even during the chaos of the Demon Lord’s War. And there was no evidence to suggest that would ever change, not with the protective wilds of the forest so close.
For long moments, Eli breathed in the crisp air and allowed the vista of his home to suffuse him. The breeze tugged at his thick hair, a rich brown with deep wings of grey, and the tangle of his beard. His hazel eyes glittered with the unfettered starlight, his dry lips curving at their corners in obeisance to the jovial atmosphere rippling across the city.
They burst apart as another cough rattled up from his chest. Eli curled his body around the bundle in his arms, desperate to not disturb the baby’s slumber with his hacking. But when the cough descended into a long, painful wheeze, he realised his efforts were in vain. As he straightened himself with the weight of his rucksack, Eli looked down into the bundle of swaddling and met another pair of eyes. Blue eyes, touched with a luxurious sea-green, the unrealised lustre of uncut topaz. And he smiled.
“Sorry, little one. You were so peaceful. How are you feeling?”
The baby yawned, wriggling against his cloth confines, and Eli laughed.
“May I show you something?”
He tilted the bundle upright so the baby’s lovely eyes could witness the splendour of Layman-upon-Waters. At this young age, it was unlikely he could see anything at such a distance. Still, the baby silently stared. He drank in the vista, just as his father had done.
“This is your home, Elliot,” said Eli. “This is your home.”
laymenstory
Ewan Stone 
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