Day 42: Of girls and giggles

"Looking good, Delling," Lucas said, raising his voice to make himself heard over the racket of wooden training swords clashing against each other. "You keep overextending, though, just a little. Remember your balance!"

Though Lucas' advice hadn't been meant as a hint for the young nobleman's practice partner, Farrien immediately took advantage of it. She deflected Delling's next blow, then stepped in close, twisted her wrist, and landed a blow on his inner thigh.

"Nice move," Lucas said. "Now you're the one who's overextended, though. That blow might've cut the artery, but it wasn't immediately lethal. In a real battle, you'd /both/ be dead."

"Yes, sir. Thank you, sir."

"And I told you to stop calling me 'sir'!"

She grinned. "Yes, sir."

Lucas groaned inwardly. This was his fourth training session with Reinhold, and his third with the other three. At first, only Farrien had called him 'sir', but soon the other three started following her example, despite his best attempts to convince them otherwise.

He didn't think it was meant to mock him; all his other instructions were followed with little more than a healthy grumble, especially when they were already tired. He wasn't sure what they were trying to do. Maybe they didn't know themselves.

Other than that small nuisance, though, Lucas found he enjoyed teaching them. It was a very different experience to training recruits in the army. For one there were only four of them, compared to 32 in a recruitment platoon in the army, which meant he could give them much closer instruction. For another, though they got along just fine—minor squabbles aside—they were relentlessly competitive during sparring. If anything, they were a little over-enthusiastic.

"Easy, Reinhold!" Lucas called. "I know it's just wood, but let's avoid broken bones, all right?"

Reinhold's practice partner was Iselde. Unlike the other three, she wasn't noble-born, it's just that her parents got obscenely rich during the war. She was also the least skilled of the group, but she was catching up fast. Out of all of them, she gave Lucas the most trouble, usually being the first to complain. However, she also hated being outdone by the others, and though she had a slight build, she seemed practically indestructible, jumping back up after blows that would've left many a seasoned fighter dazed on the ground.

He circled the pairs a few more times, occasionally calling out a hint or rebuke, then clapped his hands twice to signal the end of the session.

"All right, that's enough for today."

They stepped back and buried the point of their practice swords into the patchy grass in the courtyard. Then, almost in unison, they sank to the ground, soaked in sweat and exhausted. Even Farrien, the fittest of the lot, was red-faced and breathing heavily.

"Good work today," Lucas said, adopting a wide stance in front of them, hands clasped behind his back. Long ago, his first sergeant used to stand like that when giving his orders. When Lucas himself began climbing the ranks, he had adopted the pose, finding it a good balance between authoritative and casual. He had resumed using it during these training sessions.

"You're all making good progress, but don't let that go to your heads. None of you are ready for a real fight, and you won't be for some time. This is the most dangerous phase of learning to fight. It's all too easy to overestimate your abilities and get yourself hurt, or worse. Your opponent might be a clueless blowhard, or they might be a master duelist, and right now, both are equally dangerous to you. Always remember: the best way to survive a fight is to be a fast runner."

They had laughed the first time he said that, but he ended every session with the same advice and it was starting to sink in that he wasn't actually joking.

"Good. I'll see you all in three days."

The seventeenth bell had already sounded when he ended the training session, and soon it would be getting dark. Lucas didn't want to keep Eldwyn waiting, so he set a quick march on his way home, again hailing back to his army days. Was it a good thing that it was all coming back to him? He didn't know, but it sure felt comfortable.

As he moved, his surroundings changed. He came from the courtyard attached to Reinhold's parents' estate, in one of the richest districts of the city, near the eastern wall. His route took him through the city center. Here too, still on the eastern side of the main trade road were the more luxurious stores, with a guard on every door, the façades bright and colorful to attract customers. As he crossed the main road, that soon changed. Though these weren't slums, the streets narrowed and the people walking them seemed to lose wealth with every block he passed.

The prosperity picked up a little again when he entered his own neighborhood. No mansions and estates here, far from it, but there was a sense of quiet self-respect that was missing in the poorest districts.

Lucas turned into his own street, finding a familiar face on his doorstep.