CHAPTER 30: Fronts for Fights and Friendship

Figuring out that she would keep the venom and the monsoongoose cores was easier than deciding who would take the core from the boa. I wanted it because it would give me a unique advantage.

Well, not as unique as some others. It would allow me to steal abilities from beasts if I used it in a weapon. The only thing was, it consumed some of what was stolen the first time, and I would only be able to use the ability a limited number of times based on what was stolen. If it worked the way I thought, I could fight a brilliant boar and be able to use its flash ability a few times without needing to have the beast core for it.

If I could have found a better one, I would have, but this was still a monumental find.

She was reticent to give it to me, but when I sweetened the deal by promising to borrow gear for her, she relented and let me have it. As soon as I touched the core, Kalia asked me if I wanted to consume it and absorb the Constitution points from it, to which I replied no.

“What do you have planned for the night?” Xanile asked politely as I put the boa core into my blade shuna.

“I plan to have a bath and get some sleep.” I yawned, knowing my body was slowly going to be failing on me soon. “There is a new thing for us to do tomorrow and I have training in the morning before it I think.”

She frowned at me, “You know, you have been training an awfully lot. Who do you train with?”

I shrugged, “The older students in the advanced weapons class in the mornings now until I either advance to the next week of training, or lose my spot in the class. Then there’s you.” She nodded and as I added the girls, she frowned. “What’s wrong?”

“You should not be so…entrenched in the Unseelie, Saemus.” She clasped her hands in front of her stomach, worry on her face. “I know that your situation is far from ideal and there is some room for defiance and wanting to have freedom, but they are the enemy.”

I could understand why she would think that way, but it still bothered me. “I’m a middling elf. My home is your war zone and my people can’t protect themselves as well as your own. Does that make me the enemy?”

She scoffed, “No, of course not.” She frowned when I crossed my arms and stared at her. “What?”

“We aren’t the enemy because we aren’t a court, or because we’re beneath you.”

She rolled her eyes and sighed, “You are cannot be the enemy because your people and mine have not been fighting each other for thousands of years for resources.”

“Of course we have.” I challenged her and couldn’t believe someone so capable was so ignorant. “Your people come into places like mine and steal their crops. Take their hard-cultivated work and use it to feed your soldiers and warriors. Arm your armies and send them traipsing through our trees to fight battles that burn villages to the ground and make my people fear and despise you.”

Her jaw slack, Xanile had nothing else to say, so I pressed on. “My people hate the courts, Xanile. We hate them. And the fact that you can walk into a village under attack, forcibly save them and then claim their children to add to your armies isn’t something that makes you any less the enemy to my kind as their kind is to your’s.”

Once more she remained silent, but the mask that she had worn when we first met had returned somewhat, but I wasn’t done. “And yet still I’m here. I call you friend. I’ve fought with you and done what I can to protect you.”

“Because you have to.” She stated airily and I shook my head.

She raised a brow and I said, “Because I chose to. Just like those girls chose to help me, and in turn you. We’re students here, Xanile. No different from anyone else. They’re here to prove themselves too, or because they were forced to be.”

Now it was her turn to shake her head, “You expect me to what, befriend them?”

I blinked, “I hadn’t thought of that, but now that you mention it, yes.” She frowned and I pressed on, “It’s perfect. They hate the Markis as much as we do for what they did to Coventry, and who knows how else they could help us train?”

“Saemus, what would my parents say? My sister?” She put her face in her hands and shook her head. “They have less control over you but I care what they think. I have to.”

“No, you don’t.” I implored her. “They treat you like trash. Like the Markis, Xanile. You finally have a friend who who’ll treat you well, I think you owe it to yourself to try and gather more. To experience the perspectives out there.”

She eyed me uncertainly, watching me as if I was going to run off in a huff again. “I was hurt before, but now I hurt for you, and not myself. I want my friends to know each other.”

She stared at me for a time, then nodded once and said, “Fine. I will meet them.”

“Yes!”

She pointed at me and growled, “But if they so much as breath in my direction the wrong way, I will challenge them and forbid you seeing them. I swear it.”

I stilled, “I don’t think that it needs to go quite that far.”

She smiled, “No. Trial by fire. If they are worthy of my time as you made yourself out to be, they will prove themselves to me.” She stepped forward so that she could stare me directly in the eyes. “I know that you harbor resentment for my blood and court, Saemus, we just believe that we can do what is right for ourselves and the other Fae. I am glad to know you, and I think we could do well together.”

She nodded to me once and walked into her room from there without another word.

**

The following morning I woke, sore but recovering as swiftly as my body would allow from my evening’s workout with the armor as heavy as I could take it. It wasn’t as easy as I had thought it would be to gain another point before I had to take a level to do it all over again and I wanted one for might to help give me a shot at being a little tougher.

Or at least hit as hard as some of the other students could.

I was up early enough to be able to trudge to the pit thanks to a plant the ivy that grew under my window. Frix had taught me how to make requests of the plants around me, giving them a bit of autonomy—though he warned me not to give them too much. Just enough to have them do what I wanted them to.

The ivy smacked me wherever it could reach when the sunlight hit it where it grew out of the window and allowed me precious time to get up and take care of things for myself and not be rushing to my training.

The armor stunk, but I could always wash it later on tonight. I would, actually. Maybe there was a plant that I could use to make sure it didn’t absorb the smell of sweat so easily?

I tried not to focus on that too much as I trudged through the halls, the weight of the armor at the cusp of what I could handle to move for the moment. Frix and I would see to it that while fighting I had resistance and during the times between, we would focus on strengthening the rest of my body through Might.

It was exhausting, but also the clearest way I knew how to do things.

As the shadows within the pit lengthened, into the hallway, I saw him. Thane.

He stood with his massive sword in front of him, his palms resting on it and his eyes toward me.

Once I entered into the pit, the weight of the armor diminished to about an eighth of the weight. This was also according to plan. While fighting, Frix would trickle mana into it to adjust things on the fly. We had tried it last night and had a little success, but who know how things would go with the elder student.

He smiled and it looked genuine, “Saemus.”

I nodded my head respectfully, “Cadet Thane.”

He just grinned wider, “I see you’ve taken what I said to heart somewhat.”

I frowned, Had I? How could he tell?

I looked down at myself and noticed that both of my weapons were in hand and I stood in a position that I could use to move and fight in. Had I not shown him deference before? Respect?

Had I been blind to that?

“You over think.” Thane tutted eyeing me. “I meant more in that you pay more attention to those around you now. Your betters. You seem all too aware that at any moment something larger could fly from the shadows to devour you and you’ll never know it. You stand ready and already push yourself to fight back without having to hide behind the ignorance of the untested.”

He picked up his weapon and tossed it aside as he sighed, “You once more have that drive within you that I saw initially when you spoke to Master Aldren. That drive is what will make you great, or kill you. Both are your choice. I’ll be teaching you this morning, but first, this.”

He pulled out a large bandage and held it up, “I earned this by disrespecting the weapons given to you, and I lost control in my urge to fix you. For those two things, I apologize. On this bandage, I have written my apology in blood, so that you might know what it cost me to make that mistake.”

I blinked at the older student who smiled, “This is a common practice in my clan of warriors, I forget that the courts and Middling elves think us barbaric.” He put the bandage to the side, neatly folded and placed it on his weapon. “I will give it to you after if you like. For now, let me see that resolve of yours.”

Even with the weight of the armor at an eighth, he moved so fast I could hardly keep up with his movements. Not just physically, but visually as well. At first, it was hard to keep up with him, but eventually his movements began to slow, his attacks exaggerating with small tells here and there.

It didn’t matter that I could see them at long last, because he still connected with every blow, but in a way that wouldn’t allow me to get too injured.

Is he going easy on me? I growled to myself. None of the girls went easy on me. Even Vira had been especially brutal toward me at first. Byron wasn’t gentle, but he focused more on form and allowing me to learn. But these attacks felt…off.

And though his face was eager, I could see that ever exaggeration and slowed strike took something from him. As if doing it was harder than just outright pummeling me. Which was infuriating.

Then there were the moments where he looked like he was waiting for something to happen and when it didn’t his attacks would soften a fraction again.

Frustrated that I couldn’t defend myself despite his apparent lack of bloodlust, I decided that my handicap was no longer just a handicap and was a hinderance. Frix, no more mana to the armor.

“Frolantear.” The word dropped from my mouth like a weight and the strain on my body was gone. I needed to take this more seriously if I was going to learn. Maybe when I was training with my betters like this, the armor was a bad idea.

He blinked and then growled as I activated the brilliant flash of my axe and stepped under his arm, slapping the bare wood of my bladed shuna against his bicep.

He hissed, but there was no mana active on the weapon at the moment, it was more of surprise to me.

He chuckled, closing his eyes, “At last.”

I frowned and cocked my head to the side, then he promptly booted me in the rib cage and flung me twenty feet away from him.

I twisted and waved my arms as I sailed through the air, then tucked my limbs close like how they had taught us to fall in combatives class, rolling to a stomp with a groan.

He looked toward me and his ears twitched, “Vira said you were a little shy about using your weapons to their full extent, but I wondered how long it would take you to use them after figuring out I was being easy on you.”

I grunted and sat up, “That was easy?”

He laughed, “So you can’t tell.” He opened his eyes and stared at me, “You know, that armor is more useful than you think. You’re so light. Makes it easier to kick you.”

That was all he said before I clambered to my feet while he advanced on me slowly, like the snake that had loomed over Xanile’s prone body.

I shook myself out and rushed forward, keeping myself low to the ground. As soon as I was within ten feet, I slid forward on my knees and used the flash again.

He laughed and this time he just kicked me again. Another trip through the air and a landing that was painful but not anywhere near like what happened last time.

I coughed, catching my breath just barely as he squatted over me and looked at me almost curiously. “Still light as a feather.”

I growled and lashed out with my foot, but he just stepped away and backed up a little with a pleasant smile on his face, saying, “You know, I don’t remember you being quite so tall last time. That must have been one painful growth spirt. Almost like my family’s. Took me ages to grow accustomed to the length of my limbs and my height. I know how you feel.”

He grinned at my confusion, “My family grows fast, and explosively, like you. You’re not a freak like some of the other students think. Part of me wonders if you might not be a long-lost member of my clan.”

He just shrugged, “That all doesn’t matter right now.” He rolled his shoulder and settled into a stance with his hands wide. “Come.”

And I did. He would best me at every turn and no matter the trick, or turn of hand I tried, he was just that much better than I was. Even with the flow, there was no keeping up with him, and just when I thought I was beginning to understand the flow of his movements, his footing would shift, or something would change and throw it all off kilter, leaving me on the receiving end of a kick that flung me feet away onto my side or back.

Always resulting in a comment about how light I was.

I blinked as I laid on the ground fighting to catch my breath, even when I caught his kicks on the shuna, I went flying. I was too light. And then it hit me.

Too light. The armor. He had worn this armor before and knew how it worked. It wasn’t just a disadvantage it was how I could adapt to him!

I fed my idea to Frix and though I couldn’t hear him, I could only imagine he was rolling his eyes at how dense I could be.

I had been thinking of it too literally, thinking he was referring to me as small and not to the fact that I wasn’t using the armor to its full advantage.

I stood up again and grunted as the bruising began to set in a bit more, but I stood resolutely.

Something changed on his face and this time instead of me going to him, he came at me. “Frolantear.”

My uttered whisper was soft, but the mana that flowed through me into the armor was enough that I could barely stand as I crossed my shuna in front of the kick he fired at my rib cage.

My arms bucked and bent, the shuna hitting my chest, but this time, I didn’t move.

He grinned as I did, shouting, “Finally!” Then promptly slapped me in the face and snapped my head to side, sending me toppling to the ground in heap. “Get up, we’re going again.”