The Prince's Training

Wooden swords at dawn, the quintain at noon, and the knight's code by candlelight — how storybook Willian is learning to earn his title. All site-written fiction.

The practice yard

A packed-earth square behind the stables, smelling of leather, dust, and effort. Its furniture: the quintain (rotating dummy, beloved and feared), the pell (a straw man Willian has named “Sir Straw” and apologizes to), racks of wooden swords, and the record board — Sir Aldric’s chalked ledger of drill times, where Willian’s name now sits above his master’s on the quintain drill.

Sir Aldric’s method

The arms-master’s philosophy fits in three rules, posted on the yard gate:

1. No royal exemptions. The prince drills like every squire, loses like every squire, and mucks out like every squire.
2. Lose forward. Every defeat is a lesson; sulking is the only true failure. (Willian sulks for exactly four minutes, by long agreement.)
3. The flourish is earned. Style comes after skill — a rule Willian violates weekly and Sir Aldric forgives daily.

The disciplines

• Sword: wooden waster at dawn; footwork, guards, and the famous “about time” bout.
• Lance: quintain charges at the walk, trot, and (supervised) gallop; tournament preparation.
• Bow: Willian is a decent shot and an excellent loser about it.
• Horsemanship: under Maren’s supervision — seat, hands, and the art of not arguing with Moonmane.
• Wrestling: Bram usually wins. This is a long-standing grievance.

The knight’s code (as Sage Corvin teaches it)

Not just the shining verses — shield the weak, speak truth, keep faith — but Corvin’s hard footnotes: mercy as a discipline, restraint as a weapon, and the hardest lesson of all, when not to draw. Willian’s essays on the code are, per Corvin, “surprisingly thoughtful for someone who used the margins for doodles of horses.”

The record board

The chalked ledger is the yard’s public memory: drill times, bout results, and — in smaller chalk — notes like “W. — flourish, theatrical, effective (do not tell him).” Willian checks it every morning. Sir Aldric pretends not to notice.

Source notes

• All training details are site-written fiction (2026-09-26); the app publishes no training lore. See methodology.md.
• Related: his-role.md, relationships.md (Sir Aldric), tournaments-and-games.md.
• Illustration: AI-generated (2026-09-26); see the image credits on this page. AI-generated dramatization art — not a historical depiction.