“You keeping an ear out?” Paul muttered as we resumed training.

“Definitely.” I nodded, splitting my focus between the idiots behind us and making sure I struck the pells properly. I could have been wrong, but it seemed like Instructor Daniels and Instructor Bethany were hovering near our group more than the others. That was a welcome change, as it kept the morons in line. Alas, all good things must come to an end and they eventually had to rotate away. To their credit, they managed about twenty minutes before they tried something, and they were trying to be sneaky.

“Hey. Let’s gradually overcharge.” One of the idiots whispered, getting giggles from his conspirators.

“Watch yourselves guys.” I immediately warned. “They’re gonna increase the amount of mana in each spell.”

“What’ll that do? Bigger boom?” Alfred asked.

“Pretty much. Try and have your shield up when it impacts.” I said. “That should block the extra heat.”

As we went along, the heat started washing over us in waves as they slightly overcharged. The only thing saving us was the fact that they couldn’t overdo it too much, as they would run out of mana too soon. After about six rounds of overcharged fireballs, I could sense something was going to go wrong. Of course, it was Gordian who was going to screw things up. I saw him nudge the others with his elbows, and they took a step back. I dropped my blade and frantically scrawled a heat ward on the back of my shield, finishing just as he overcharged the spell, and sent it right at the back of my head.

“DUCK AND COVER!” I screamed, spinning in place and dropping slightly so that I could try and angle the blast away from my teammates. Paul and Alfred responded immediately, though I was most worried about Alfred. He had to turn the furthest to bring his shield to bear. Luckily he didn’t spin in place, but instead spun while retreating just a bit.

That was all I could manage as I was blown backwards into the pell, slamming into it hard enough to bruise. The heat washed over me, shattering the ward after it managed to deflect about half the heat from the spell. “AAAAAH!” I screamed, kicking the red hot metal off my body. Seeing the smirks on the three idiots, I saw red.

“TRAITOROUS MOTHERFUCKER!” I screamed, sending a trio of blood daggers at each of them.

“BARRIER!” A blue barrier interrupted my attack, cracking as the third dagger shattered against it.

“What the hell is going on?” Daniels bellowed, grabbing Fines by the collar of his robes and shaking him. “Are you trying to kill my recruits?”

“Calm down-“ Bethany started only to stop with the point of Daniels’ blade at the tip of her nose.

“Like fuckin’ hell I will! Your little bastards there just sent an overcharged spell into the back of one of my recruits. If he wasn’t as adept with magic as he is, we would have six dead recruits. Three legionnaires, three idiot mages after I removed their useless heads from their shoulders, and the two of you would be seeing Legion justice from the wrong side of a Court Marshall!”

“I’m sure it was just a mistake. These things happen. What won’t be excused is your recruit using lethal force against my mages!” Fines managed to regain his composure, and used a mana barrier to separate himself from Daniels.

“An overcharged fireball to the back isn’t a mistake ya ignorant cunt!” Paul shouted, looking like he was going to charge Fines. As I struggled to my feet, I noticed almost everyone was divided up. Two were looking to attack Bethany, Joffrey was helping Albert to his feet and guarding him at the same time, and the rest were nearly evenly split between Instructor Fines and the three idiots.

“It isn’t my fault! My concentration slipped!” Gordian whined, getting a glare from everyone. “Look, I’m sorry for losing control there. I’m just not used to constantly casting fireball like this.”

“There, he apologized. Are you happy?” Fines growled.

“No. He tried to kill my recruits.” Daniels growled right back.

“Oh bullshit Daniels. It was a misfired spell, it happens. Especially with training. Let’s just count our blessings and move on. We still have a bit of time left.”

“Only so long as he doesn’t cast another spell.” Daniels finally said after an uncomfortable minute.

“Done.” Fines said with a shady smirk.

I could feel Paul and Alfred looking at me, and I wasn’t about to let this go. But I had to do it within the rules. I mouthed, “I got this” to them, then turned to Dorian. “Hey man, I got some blisters on my shield hand. Mind switching out with me?”

“No problem.” He said, carefully flipping and sliding my shield with his so that it was out of the way. He was nice enough to hand me my dropped blade as well. “I’ll back your play, whatever it is. We are Legion.” He whispered as he made a production of checking my hand.

“Assassination.” I whispered, and watched his eyes light up in glee. One of our major lessons on the importance of the shield wall was on how it wasn’t only to block the advance of the enemy, but to also prevent any assassins from slipping through the lines and taking out high value targets. Of course, the two highest value targets from an assassin’s point of view would be either the leadership if they could get there or magical reinforcements. I slipped towards the fence Dorian was resting on, and withdrew my aura as I concentrated.

Blandness. One with the environment. Barren. Boredom. I tried to infuse this into my aura, and wrap it around myself like a loose cloak. I left the edges amorphous, as hard lines would draw attention. I even added periodic fluctuations to match the gentle breeze produced when the fireballs exploded on their targets. Ever so slowly, I moved around behind the idiots. Though Gordian wasn’t participating, he was still in the middle of his two friends. I silently drew my blade, and waited for the one on the right to release his spell.

“ASSASSIN!” I shouted as I unleashed a devastating blow to the side of the idiot on the left’s head. As he dropped in a crumpled heap, I used the backswing to smash into Gordian’s face, grinning at the crunching of his nose and cheekbones under the dulled edge of my blade. He stumbled backwards a bit, gurgling a scream. I dropped my blade down to my hip, grabbing the final idiots shoulder and pulling him between me and the rest of the group as I pummeled his kidneys with the dulled point of my sword. I made sure to spread the love and hit both kidneys, ensuring this bastard was going to be pissing blood for a long time.

“What is thi-“ Fines started to shout, only to be interrupted when I shoved the third idiot into him. Knowing my time was almost up, I went as vindictive as I could and slammed the edge of my blade onto Gordian’s knee. Part of me wanted to guarantee that he would never have children, but I felt our lives would be better if he received an injury that would prevent him from battlefield service.

“AAAIIIIEEEEEEEEE!!!!!” He screamed, hitting an octave usually reserved for someone with genital trauma, dropping and immediately grabbing his knee.

“THAT’S ENOUGH!” Fines bellowed, regaining his feet and pointing a wand at me, only to freeze when he felt the cold steel of Daniels’ blade against one side of his throat and the tip of Bethany’s wand on the other.

“Instructor Fines. You will lower your weapon immediately. Being able to deal with an assassination attempt is something all mages should be trained in, and the fact that they took such grievous injury is further proof that your teaching methods have been less than adequate.” Daniels said in an icy voice. “I am declaring this training session over, but don’t expect this to be the end.”

“I will be testifying against you and these three.” Bethany said. “You have constantly impeded my attempts to correct their behavior, and as far as I and the Mage’s College are concerned, this is their just rewards.”

“Oh, you speak for the college now, assistant?” He snarled at her. “One word to the Chancellor-“

“The Chancellor put me in this position to monitor and report back on you, fool.” She hissed in his ear. “It matters not how many strings you try and pull or how well connected you are. The higher ups are sick of covering for you, and you will find many of your connections are already severed.” Done with her rant, she looked with disgust on the three idiots. “As for you three. You will be brought before the tribunal for your actions here today. At the very least you will be expelled, but it is far more likely that you will have your ability burned out. And before you even think about using whatever family connections you have to exact revenge on these recruits, you and your families will be forced to sign magically binding contracts.”

“Thank you, Instructor Bethany.” Daniels said. “Recruits, it looks like our time is up. Return to base.”

I had trouble sheathing my blade from the trembling of my hand, but finally managed it just as Dorian walked up with my shield. “Your hands good enough to carry your shield, soldier?”

“It’ll be a bit awkward in my off hand, but I’ll manage.” I said, taking the slab of metal and frowning at the slight deformation at the top. “I should have killed him. He almost did it to me.”

Dorian grabbed my shoulder and urged me to fall into line, marching beside me. “I’m rather glad you didn’t. Don’t get me wrong, I think he deserved it. But you are already showing what a true Legionnaire is. I’m not the only one who noticed you were calling out when to defend to protect your brothers in arms. You then ensured their safety by removing a threat, and showed mercy to a fallen foe. Unless we are given the order for no quarter, you did exactly what we should have.” He gave a small chuckle. “You even managed to get revenge for all of us within the rules, so there won’t be any political ramifications for this. Instructor Daniels probably would have called in a few favors, but this way he doesn’t even have to. Consider me impressed.”

“Thanks.” I said, nodding at him. I was a bit lost for words, but that was fine as we settled into our march. Short as it was, it worked wonders to calm my nerves. Pity it couldn’t last.

“Brandon. Dorian. My office. The rest of you, grab some food and get cleaned up. The rest of the afternoon is yours. Alfred and Paul, make sure you stop by the infirmary at some point. Dismissed.” Instructor Daniels ordered as soon as we entered the barracks yard.

“We’ll take your shields.” James said, grabbing mine while Lawrence took Dorians. “Don’t take too long. We’ll meet you guys in the mess for dinner.”

“Sounds good, and thanks.” Dorian said, and I echoed his sentiment as we handed over our shields and swords. I should have felt a bit nervous about everything, but after everything I was just numb. As we entered the office, Daniels was already sitting and sorting through some forms.

“Take a seat.” He ordered, pulling out three before looking at us. “Any idea what this is for?”

“None.” I said, shaking my head.

“No idea.” Dorian agreed.

“Well, after that little fiasco today, I have come to a decision that has been plaguing me for a while. We need a Decanus, and I think Brandon here is the one for the job. What about you, Dorian?” He said.

“I agree sir.” He immediately replied, adding to my confusion. “Everyone saw Brandon using all of his abilities to protect the others, and even after he was injured he still found a way to exact revenge. Before today, we likely would have followed him. After? There isn’t a man in our squad who wouldn’t.”

“Sorry, what’s a Decanus again?” I asked.

“Right, we haven’t really gone over positions yet. Decanus is simply the leader of a group of ten men. You won’t have any battlefield duties, that’s for the commanders. You will be in charge of making sure everyone does their watch, where their tent is, things like that. There is no extra pay, but you will be watched a little closer for further promotion.” Daniels explained. “And while it isn’t an official position, I want you to be his Optio, Dorian.”

“Really?” He asked, confused.

“Indeed. You two work well together, and you know some of the political ramifications Brandon will be ignorant of. Having you as his second, even if it is an unofficial position, will help both of you. As for today, I am putting a note of commendation in your file Brandon. If you were actually in the Legion, I would nominate you for double pay. Like Dorian explained on the way back, and yes, I heard you, you did an excellent job of getting retribution within the rules of the training. Mages looking down on the footsoldiers protecting them is a problem we see a lot, and you managed to handle it in a surprising way. Normally we would wait until the second or third practice before slapping mana bands on the mages and having them defend themselves. It’s about the only way to let them feel what it’s like at the end of a battle when they have no mana and their protection has fallen.”

“Are you going to work this in to the training?” Dorian asked, which I was glad for. I was still stuck on getting promoted after crippling a mage.

“No. It loses its effectiveness if they know it is coming. So we leave the loophole open every year, and hope that we don’t need it. I can almost guarantee word will get around about what happened this year, and that no mages will be stupid enough to try what those other kids did. You’ve probably bought us five or six good years.”

“Sir?” I asked, flashing back to Gordian writhing in pain. “What will happen to them?”

He gave a tired sigh. “Like Bethany was explaining, the most likely outcome is to have their magical ability burned away. It’s painful, and as a side effect they won’t be able to truly remember any of their magical lessons. Keeps them from teaching a bunch of low talent people and forming a small army of lesser mages. They have to agree to this sort of punishment before enrolling, so it won’t come as a surprise that it can be done. With their families bound by magical contracts not to seek retribution, you two are as safe as we can make you. It helps that in a few months, we will be heading out. Now, I do believe I’ve kept you long enough with my ramblings. Decanus. Optio. Congrats on your promotions. Tomorrow we will have a small feast to celebrate and give the official promotion, so keep it under wraps until then.”

“Sir, yes sir.” We said, standing and saluting.

“Dismissed.”