by R. J. Price
Chapter Four
Aren marched out to meet the guard with Wena in tow. Wena had protested, as she was having second thoughts, but Aren was not. She had wanted to be trained properly for months. If she had been trained properly, Rewel would never have gotten the upper hand. The entire winter could have been avoided.
Which reminded her, she had to beat Av into the ground just as soon as she knew how to.
She came to a stop before the captain of the guard, who eyed her as if she were a deadly predator. Aren stood as straight as she could and motioned to Wena a step behind her.
“We want to apply to the guard.”
“No,” the captain said without skipping a beat.
“Why ever not? It's your duty to review me as any other supplicant. I am now applying to you and you are not reviewing me in the least!”
The captain held up his hands in his own defence, quieting Aren’s protest only because she suddenly felt like a lady throwing a tantrum just to get what she wanted.
“I saw you last year and judged then. I will not take you on to the guard. That doesn’t mean I’m unwilling to train you like the guard, but Lord Av was right, Lady Aren, you cannot be a part of the guard. The guard walks the halls at night, normally to defend you, it stands at the doors of the throne room while you are holding court, it escorts drunks to their beds when you hold balls. It protects the ambassadors, sometimes from you.
“You cannot serve on that which would cause conflict in your duties. So no, I will not take you on as the guard, but I will train you.
“As for you, the handmaid, I won’t take you on to the guard because then you’d have to spend at least six months living in the barrack with the guard. There’s nothing wrong or dangerous in that for a woman, but you can’t very well serve your lady while living out here, now can you?”
“No,” Wena said quietly.
“Even if you’re not on the guard, you come to train at dawn tomorrow morning. That is your training time. Dawn. Not early morning, not afternoon, not whenever you get your fancy backside out of bed—it’s dawn.”
“I can be up at dawn,” Aren said, turning to Wena. “Can you be up for dawn?”
Wena gave Aren a questioning look that seemed to imply she was stupid. “I’ve been a servant for several years now. My rising time is before dawn.”
“Not up at dawn, here at dawn,” the captain said.
Aren frowned at the man, then looked around the training yard, where men—who were usually there throughout the day—had paused in their training to watch Aren and Wena’s conversation with the captain of the guard. She motioned around them, to those men.
“I’ll still be here for dawn, but there are always men training here,” Aren said. “Why is training at dawn, then?”
“It doesn’t interfere with your courtly duties.”
“Does it go all day?” she asked.
“No, only a few hours,” the captain said. He watched as Aren made the motion again. “There are four groups of guards. One serves the early morning, from dawn to early afternoon. Another serves from early afternoon to just before the middle of the night. The third serves from the middle of the night to dawn.”
“And the fourth?” Aren asked. “You said there were four groups.”
“I did. They serve a three-week working rotation: dawn, afternoon, night, then have a week off to do as they please.”
“That’s not very much time,” she said.
“There aren’t very many guards. It’s not a noble profession at the moment—serving the short-lived queens. If we see an increase in numbers and if we gather enough men to create another group, then it will be three weeks on, two off. If there’s enough for yet another group, then it will be four weeks on, two off. Three working at the palace, one working the lands around the palace.”
“How long has the number of guard been low?” she asked.
“Several generations, but each captain is taught how it will go, should the number grow once more.”
“You could make it mandatory for lords at court to serve on the guard once they’re finished,” Wena said from behind Aren.
“But then their fathers will cry out, saying you’d never expect the same of the ladies,” the captain said.
“I would be the wrong person to say that to,” Aren muttered.
“And I wouldn't want any of them serving on this guard. They cannot be trusted to act in the best interest of the throne, or the commoners. Half of them have another queen lined up to take the throne, and the other half are searching for one stupid enough to obey their will.”
The captain of the guard turned and called to one of the ones training nearby. He motioned the man over, who stopped just short of Aren and Wena.
“Sir?” the new man asked.
“You’ve been wanting to switch to the previous shift, no?” the captain asked the man, who went bright red and nodded in response. “Ladies Aren and Wena are looking to be trained as the guard are trained. Can you do that?”
The man looked Aren over critically, then turned to Wena. “This one has trained with us before, so I believe she can be taught. Lady Wena trains with the servants, I assume, given her status as Lady Aren’s handmaid. She can defend, that is absolutely certain, but whether or not she can attack is an entirely different matter.”
“Excuse me?” Aren asked, confused as to what the man meant.
“Guards attack and defend,” the man said, turning his full attention to Aren. “Ladies under Av were taught a little of both, but mainly defence. With Mar here you learned a few of our moves because she insisted, so I’ve seen you on the offence. Lady Wena, on the other hand, is part of the serving staff. They were only ever taught to defend, to hold an attacker off until the guard can arrive.”
“It’s such a waste of their time, to only teach them how to defend,” she said.
“It would really be a waste to teach them both,” the man countered. “In times gone past, the servants and women were the last line of defence against intruders and rebellions. Without training, they massacre those attacking because typically the women contain queens and when a queen is attacked she spreads her magic about, allowing servants to act almost as warriors, they become so enraged.
“Teaching them to defend, but not attack, is how we prevent the servants from ripping apart those we need alive to question.”
“Yet you’re willing to teach me to attack?” Aren asked.
“Av expressed his desire not to teach you. Not only do I believe that you made your point to him quite well, but you are a queen. If you are not taught to attack, you will rely on your magic to defend yourself, which means not only is the attacker splattered across the field, but also anyone who was coming in to help you. Your magic can even turn on yourself.
“So yes, I am willing to teach you to attack.”
“If you want to teach me, you have to teach her,” she said.
“I assumed as much,” the man said. He motioned to the two of them, then to their feet. “Stand with your feet apart, level with your shoulders at least. Hands clasped—no, Lady Aren, behind you, not in front. One who is in training stands with his hands behind his back. Once trained, most men prefer to keep their hands there, out of sight of any who might be watching.”
“Telm stands like that, with hands before her,” Wena said.
“Telm is a trained queen. If she wants to run into war naked we would permit it. If she wanted to go to war, we would encourage it. You are not Telm.”
Aren shifted her weight and placed her hands behind her back. She didn’t like the stance, didn’t like her hands being where she had to move them to stop someone who might come at her from the front. The man who was being assigned to them, who had yet to introduce himself, looked her over and frowned.
“Ladies, let me make this very clear,” he said. “I am teaching you to attack, which means that if a body attacks you—man, woman, child, or spirit—you are to fight back. If I find out you have not attempted to stand your ground, then n
o amount of rank or magic—or Av throwing a bloody fit—will change the outcome. I will cripple you with my own hands, leaving you to live the pauper’s life for your own stupidity. Do I make myself clear?”
“You cannot threaten to cripple the one who sits the throne!” Wena protested.
“Then she had best stand and defend,” the man snarled back at the handmaid.
Aren watched the pair bristle with anger towards one another, certain that at any moment they might come to blows. The man didn’t know Wena would have no problem being on the offensive, but Aren did. She knew it was also best to step in before the two of them began fighting physically.
“It’s all right, Wena,” Aren said quietly. “He’s only making such a fuss because he was, no doubt, around last spring when I had an altercation with the kitchen master. It’s just a man throwing a tantrum because a woman he cares about got hurt.”
“That doesn’t make it right,” Wena grumbled, though the woman said it to her feet, not to any of those present.
“Tomorrow morning, you come to this field and this is the stance you take,” the man said. “If either of you are late, I will come find you, and drag you out of bed. Even the earliest riser amongst the guards is late sometimes. Illness, moodiness, drinking, something effects their sleep. I will give you three days to set yourselves into a rhythm to sleep and be here for morning. If you cannot be here on the fourth day, then I will end my training with you.”
“And you’ll teach us how to fight like guard?” Aren asked.
“I’ll go so far as to teach you how to fight like a commoner in the army,” he said. “If you do well, I might speak to Ervam on your behalf and see if he’s willing to train you to fight like warriors, but I’m told the trainer accepts queens sporadically and under some set of rules that no one else can figure out. Just because you’re the one who sits the throne doesn’t mean he’ll accept you.”
“I should have done this months ago,” Aren muttered.
“If you had, you might have put up a fight when Av came to get you, and then where would we be? Him splattered all over an undisclosed location and you all weepy and annoyed that everyone is upset with you for being angry with yourself.
“We’ll teach you to fight properly, maybe keep you from getting yourself carted off, raped, murdered, or attacked by the barons. But you also have to be willing to take a step back and let the warriors around you do what they were bred to do.”
Chapter Five
Av walked out of the palace, feeling slightly more like himself. He strode towards the guards and passed Wena and Aren as he did so. Confused, he watched Wena as the woman stared back at him. Surprise played over her features, followed by the downcast eyes of someone who had been caught doing something they shouldn’t have been doing.
Frowning after the pair, he considered going after them, but then he might be considered alone with Aren and he wanted no reason to incur her wrath right then. Best to leave it be.
Or get the answer from someone else.
He turned back to the guards—where the pair had just come from—and crossed the distance to them. Annoyed, he growled at the men, causing them to stop what they were doing and skitter out of the way. They knew something was different about him, even if they couldn’t quite understand what.
The captain of the guard didn’t move, didn’t try to hide anything as he stood there speaking with another man, slightly younger, who seemed red as could be. Blushing, eyes downcast. Av had seen the look often enough to realize what was going on between the two men when they weren’t on duty.
Given Aren and Wena just leaving the guard and him coming upon the pair talking quietly when they should have been training, Av ventured a guess as to what Aren had been doing with the palace guard. He took it a step further and made an assumption but didn’t act on it. It was best to hear those sorts of things out loud before acting while on palace grounds.
Av snarled, causing the second man to jump out of the way, leaving only the captain of the guard, who met his eyes slowly.
It was a challenge, Av knew, but it was also the man’s job to challenge a warrior who came snarling across the training grounds. The other guards had the right to flee, but the captain had to stand his ground.
“You’re training them, aren’t you?” Av demanded.
“I’ve agreed to train them, yes. They’ll be joining Kaelon here on the morning shift. He’ll stay there until they are trained well enough to move on to someone more difficult.”
“I’m supposed to be training her, not you,” Av said, raising his voice.
“She came to me,” the captain said calmly, as if Av was nothing more than a common lord stomping his feet.
“You should have sent her away!”
“I’ll not be told how to do my job by an unemployed tit,” the captain responded in the same cool tone as before.
“I am not unemployed. I do things. Important things. All the things. Why are you assigning an untried tit to teaching them how to fight? She sits the throne. You should be doing it yourself, at the very least.”
“I trust Kaelon with my life,” the captain said.
“Of course you do,” he said. “You’re only moving him to the morning shift so that you’re no longer responsible for him, so you can sleep with him.”
“How dare you question my commands in front of my own men?”
“That’s what it is, isn’t it?” Av asked, elated that he finally drew a reaction out of the captain. “You want to ride that man. You’ve set him on a different schedule so that he can prove himself and take over a position outside the guard. Then you can carry on a relationship with him. This isn’t about what’s best for them, it’s about your cock.”
Av expected to get hit. He could hold his own against a strike. What he didn’t expect was the captain to pick him up and fling him across the training yard as if he weighed nothing at all.
He should have expected it, however.
Captains weren’t just chosen for their capabilities with a weapon and experience with their men, they were also carefully selected for their ability to tap into the throne and draw on magic to take a warrior down. There were times where that magic was the only thing that kept a warrior from starting a massacre.
A captain was also expected to use the magic at his own careful discretion. Drawing too much, or too soon after an incident, could seriously damage the one who sat the throne. It enraged Av that the man would put Aren in danger the way he did.
Yet as the captain strode towards him, Av saw something that he really didn’t expect.
The man had magic of his own. It pooled around his feet, lapped up his legs and began doing things that Av almost recognized. The captain was making certain his flesh didn’t break under the stronger strikes of a warrior. No doubt the man could do what Aren could do when enraged. Pick up a man twice his size, even toss him about like a rag doll, as he had just done to Av.
“You have magic?”
It had never been reported to Av that someone on the guard had magic. The man bared his teeth at Av in an angry smile.
Of course it had never been reported. The guard was not just there to keep the palace safe from commoners, it was also there to protect commoners from warriors. That was why they were trained to take warriors down. Strangers were not the only threat at the palace.
If Av ever went mad, or became power hungry, the palace guard would step up to stop him. There would be no time to call in warriors from the outlying area when people's lives were at risk.
He wondered, briefly, how many other secrets the guard kept. How many others had magic, how many were trained to step up into the role if the captain fell in battle? How many of the guard knew how to draw on magic and when to stop to keep from killing Aren?
As these facts tumbled over in his mind, the captain dragged Av to his feet. Av could win a fist fight against almost anyone, but one who had magic? He didn’t have much of a choice but try, seeing as how he started the fight in the f
irst place.
He pulled away from the grip on his arm and lashed out. The captain caught his arm and gripped it with a force backed by magic. The man could have snapped Av’s bones and knew it, but he relaxed his grip slightly as his foot darted out, taking Av’s legs out from under him.
He was not going to be bested by magic.
Av hopped to his feet and tackled the captain, meaning to disorient and force the air from him. Magic took thought, meaning all he had to do to even the playing field was continue harrying the captain, giving him no time to focus.
They rolled across the ground, neither quite getting the upper hand. Av used muscle he hadn’t put to work in months. The captain used strength honed by daily training. Winter had always been a downtime for Av, but it only gave the commoner a weakness to exploit.
He must have hesitated to contemplate that, because a moment later the captain’s fist made contact with his cheek. His head was against the ground already, and the blow almost hurt. He bellowed his rage and attempted to hit the man back. The captain only used Av’s anger to his advantage and got in another good hit.
Then he squeaked as the air rushed out of him and he was tackled sideways. Av stumbled to his feet and onto the intruder, dragging the man off the captain.
With a handful of breast.
Frowning, Av stared at the breast in his hand, then looked ever so slowly up into the eyes of the—understandably—very angry woman. He had enough time to question why a woman had hopped into the fray, and a stranger at that, when an angry ranked body slammed into him. He struggled against it as another, then another, and another jumped into the fight.
Guards and ranks alike fought and struggled. Av bit the one who dared attack him and was rewarded by a flare of magic, then the woman calling out in rage.
He had just bit the queen linked to the warrior. Av rolled out of the way as a foot came down where he had been lying. Hopping over the commoners, he managed to make it to the edge of the fight before she caught him by the back of his tunic and yanked him close.
