Chapter 88 – Levisia’s Training

Levisia bit down on her tongue to hold back a curse as her wooden sword flew from her grip, the rope wrapped around the hilt rubbing against the palm of her hand. The sword clattered to the ground as she looked down at her throbbing hand. Angry red marks streamed across her rapidly swelling hand.

“How many times are you going to mess this up?” asked Merril, as she picked up the wooden sword. She set it aside and approached her. Beads of sweat were beginning to form on Levisia’s palm, cooling them off and easing the pain.

“Wrap her hand up a bandage.” Merril called out to the nurse waiting at the side of the training yard. The nurse retrieved a tub of healing cream from her satchel and began rubbing it into the rope burn. Immediately Levisia felt better, and tried to pull her hand away, but both Merril and the nurse were having none of it.

Merril clicked her tongue and crossed her arms, like a strict parent watching a child. The nurse finished her work and scuttled off back to the side of the training ground.

“Really, I didn’t expect you to be this weak,” Merril mumbled. True, it was Levisia’s first time wielding a sword so all she had done was swing it lightly a few times and practice on some training dummies. During the short training session, she had dropped the sword three times.

The first time, she hadn’t been able to handle the recoil after hitting the training dummy and lost her balance. The second time was because her grip had been too weak, swallowing the sword to fly from her gap. And now, the third time, her grip had been too much as she hit the dummy with enough force to give herself a rope burn.

Levisia wanted to rub her hand but, if she did that in front of Merril, she’d only get a scolding from her.

“You think you can handle my training like this?” Merril said, shaking her head with a look of disappointment on her face.

Levisia, with nothing to say, had Merril drag her out to the training yard at the far end of the palace ground early in the morning, mentioning that her training would begin. As a first-time trainee, she had no idea how intense Merril’s training was going to be. Even if it was just swinging a sword around.

She couldn’t deny the helplessness that she felt when she had to face Pel after the necklace was stolen from her. She knew that change would not occur overnight, but her training would be a step in the right direction.

Her hands were aching from barely swinging a wooden sword around a few times. Though Levisia was only a beginner, Merril had definitely not gone easy on her.

“What the hell are you thinking?” Merril said as she tucked the sword away in its scabbard. “You always lose your focus. And then accidents like these happen.”

Merril spoke like she was enraged, but there was a hint of worry on her face.

Levisia hadn’t forgotten what Merril had tested her on many times before. She still didn’t know which were Merril’s thoughts, or what made her keep Levisia around.

“I know, and I’m sorry.” Levisia sighed. “I guess I have been a little distracted lately.”

Merril pulled Levisia over to a set of steps at the side of the training yard and, with a hand gesture, told her to sit down. As soon as Levisia sat down, Merril sat right beside her.

“What did I say, and what did I do?” Merril asked, her arms resting on her knees.

Levisia wasn’t in the mood to go into details, but felt like she had to anyway. She began to talk about Pel and what he had done a few days ago, deliberately not mentioning his name.

The night they had returned from the black market and were dogged by Kraidens, Pel had clearly been different from usual. He had made a face that he’d never ever showed before and had spoken oddly with softness Levisia had never seen before. About how he had a strong sense of pride and was speaking from his heart, and that he did not expect her to reciprocate his feelings.

What was strange though was, not even a day after Pel had confessed to her, he had obviously started avoiding her. She had been shunned by him for a few days, and she unintentionally seemed to understand a little bit of the Kraidens’ feelings, and how it felt to be left in the dark.