THE WOODEN SWORDS CHAPTER 3. - PREPARING A PLAN

After dinner, I went up to my room and decided that after my homework I would have to think up a new plan. All leaders need a battle plan. This case with the new boys in Elm Street had really bothered me over the last few days.

But first I had to finish my homework. Tomorrow was going to be a difficult day because every Friday the teacher would pick one of us to explain exactly what we had learned in history this week. Something told me that it was my turn this week, but I thought that every week.

History is one of my favourite subjects at school because our teacher tells exciting stories and I find myself imagining I was really there. He makes the battles and wars so realistic with his sound effects and noises that it sometimes makes the class jump. His stories give me lots of ideas about our own battles, especially the good guys fighting against evil.

Unfortunately, history is also full of names, dates and places that I have never heard of. Some of them sound so funny that I find it so difficult to remember. I don’t remember the year I born, so how I could ever remember what happened one thousand years before.

I was reading my school text book when I saw: “The first thing the army does is secure the frontiers.”

- That’s it!

- Are you all right, Alex?

- Yes Mum, I just thought of something!

That would teach me to close the door the next time, but I had an idea. We would make frontiers, borders between them and us.

Anyway, Mum knows about my little problem with the names and the dates, so she insists upon checking me every night before my history lessons. I don’t know how she remembers my school timetable, along with everything else she has to remember. I think Mum is some sort of magician with information, even Dad jokes about her talent.

- Have you finished your history homework, Alex? Don’t forget that you may be tested by Mr Brown tomorrow morning.

I told her the history lesson so well that she was surprised.

- Well, if you learn every lesson that well every day, you must be the best student in the class!

- Well done, Al!

My father had been listening from his favourite chair while playing with Maria on his lap.

- What do you think, pumpkin? Did you like your brother’s story?

- I want more chocolate!

- I think Maria will become an expert in chocolate history when she grows up.

My father laughed and put Maria down. She ran off to her bedroom to play with Marti, her favourite doll.

- Come now, Alex lad, let’s take your book and read about knights and their shields! You thought I had forgotten?

I went to my bedroom and carried the huge book back downstairs to the dining room table. Dad I spent the next hour studying knights and looking at the detailed pictures of their armour and weapons. There was so much useful information about shields that I was annoyed that I had not looked at the book earlier.

Dad, who knows many things about history, showed me how they used to hold their iron shields by using a cushion from the sofa and Mum gave him the washing up brush to be his sword. He made us all laugh as he demonstrated how difficult it was to ride a horse, hold a sword and a shield by sitting astride the arm of his favourite chair.

- It’s time for you to go to bed now, little knight! Don’t forget to take your book back upstairs.

My sister was already in bed, so I kissed my parents good night and got ready for bed. That night I dreamed of glorious battles, steel armour, white horses, powerful swords and