“Colt, if you will?” Hilda didn’t take her eyes off me, but at her behest, the ancient male rose from his stool with a creak and a groan. “This is our armorer. He’ll be examining you.”
He lumbered over with the newly polished sword and when barely a foot separated us, he stopped and peered at me through heavy eyes. Without warning, he grabbed my left arm in his non-sword hand and examined my palms, ran a finger over my joints, and moved up to feel my nonexistent bicep.
I couldn’t riddle out what he was testing for; his face betrayed nothing.
He switched to the other arm and repeated the process. I was sure his thumbs would leave bruises, but I gritted my teeth and waited it out. Finally he let go, only to shove a sword into my right hand.
He stepped back and raised his hand. “Up!”
I used both hands and lifted the thin, straight blade. It wasn’t quite a longsword, but it was heavy. Hilda and Colt moved farther back, but Hunter joined me at my side.
“One arm!” Colt growled to my right.
My jaw clenched. Damn it.
I peeled my left hand from the cross hilt and the sword dropped an inch or two.
“Keep the sword level,” he snarled.
Sweat beaded on my top lip with the effort of holding it aloft. As the pain worsened I gritted my teeth, bottling a scream. My body betrayed me anyway, and my arm muscles convulsed. Tremors shook me.
“She’s not awful,” Colt grumbled. “Tall, thin, fit for action, but if she can’t hold a sword without quaking, then her endurance isn’t where it needs to be.”
Hilda grunted in agreement and my cheeks became a firestorm.
“Endurance takes time to build,” Hunter added in my defense.
“She hasn’t got it,” Hilda murmured. “The others have a two-month lead.”
At least she didn’t seem pleased at my failure. Maybe there was still a chance.
“It’d be different if she was starting with the others. She wouldn’t be at such a disadvantage, then.”
As if to prove her point, my arm quivered again and almost buckled. I didn’t need to look at Hunter to know he was disappointed. His silence was everything.
But I wasn’t ready to give up. Not bothering to waste energy on words, my eyesight narrowed to the eye of a needle as I glared at the steel and waged war on the sword.
Focus. Keep your arm straight. Don’t drop it.
I sang those words like a mantra.
Somebody—maybe Hunter—droned on in the background. But I didn’t take it in. Instead, I shifted my weight and slid my left foot behind me. It didn’t stop the fiery ache in my bicep, but it kept me from collapsing. I clenched my stomach muscles and focused on drawing deep breaths in between clenched teeth. Despair sunk in when my arm cramped.
Seconds from dropping it, my necklace flared and heated my skin. A surge of new strength flooded my muscles, my back straightened, and the trembling subsided.
I came out of my silent war with the sword and glared in Colt’s direction. They were all staring at me now.
He nodded once. “You’re stubborn—I’ll give you that.”
I recognized it as a release, a silent command. My arm lowered. I gasped as the blood surged into starved, throbbing muscles, and the full force of the pain hit—I had to gulp down a mouthful of bile.
“You’ll do,” Hilda declared.
Colt snatched the sword from me and vanished into the depths of the armory.
“I can stay?” I asked, dazed.
“Yes.” Hilda frowned. “But you must work twice as hard to catch up: remember that.”
My newfound wave of relief flattened.
“Pick up your money from Bert,” Hilda said to Hunter, her mouth twisting to the side. “Serena, go with him and ask for Liora Verona. She’s one of Bert’s favorites and one of the few humans in your training cycle. She’ll tell you how it all works and show you to your barracks. I’m putting you in Wilder’s class—luckily for you, he has a spot open.”
I nodded and thanked her.
Hilda dismissed the words with a careless shrug and a wave of the hand as if to say it was nothing. “You should know that the recruits will go through an elimination phase in one month’s time. And we can’t offer second chances. Neither will the other camps take you on if you fail, so don’t fail.”
My gut roiled in horror at the thought.
Hunter shifted. I noticed a bob at his throat. “No second chances?”
“No.” Hilda’s mouth fixed into a hard line. “New policy.” And with that, she gave me a cursory nod and took to the skies at a run. With a few flaps of her wings, she was up and gone.
I rounded on Hunter and said in one fearful breath, “You didn’t mention an elimination, and you swore to take me to another camp if I didn’t make it. Now that’s not an option?”
The lines in his forehead deepened. “You heard her, Serena, it’s a new rule. I didn’t know things had changed. And as far as the elimination goes, all the camps run tests during training, but I don’t know the exact set-up. No outsider does.”
Half-truths. I opened my mouth to say so, but Hunter continued. “If it doesn’t work out …” His eyes flooded with intent. “I’ll still come back for you. Bert can always get a message to me if needs be.”
“You told me there’s nowhere else to go, other than the markets.” I cringed at the thought of being sold at auction like cattle.
“We’ll figure something out.”
There was a jolt around my midriff, and any response withered and died on my tongue.
“Come on. I’ll wait with you until you meet this Liora, but after that I should be going.” He twisted toward the ogre’s cottage and reached out as if to take me by the wrist.
I angled out of reach. His jaw worked furiously and the lines around his eyes tightened. I’d no wish to hurt him, but soon he’d leave me to fend for myself. I needed to prepare, to rebuild my defenses.
His arm fell back to his side and he set off without touching me. “Back to Bert’s, then.” His voice had an awful false cheeriness to it.
I kept stride with him, and we lapsed into silence. It hung heavy in the air, splitting us into our separate worlds again. A mix of emotions roared through me. In the space of a week my world had been torn from me—literally. Hunter was a big part of why, and yet without him, I’d soon be alone, adrift in a sea of strangeness. More than that … I hadn’t told him—hadn’t wanted to be that vulnerable—but he was my only friend, too. Maybe I’d even miss his company. A strange thought indeed.
Loud, raucous noises interrupted my brooding and appeared to be coming from one of the bigger buildings nearby. It had double doors, three stone chimneys, and windows that had steamed up, preventing me from seeing inside.
I jerked my chin to the left. “What’s that building?”
“The food hall,” Hunter said, distant; not like his usual self.
Now he’d mentioned it, I could’ve sworn the air carried the whiff of baking bread and sweet things. My stomach rumbled in appreciation. I hadn’t eaten since breakfast. In another heartbeat, the smells gave rise to something else: homesickness, spawned from memories of John’s bakery.
My heart ached fiercely. I didn’t breathe again until the food hall lay behind us. Bert’s cottage came up on the left, and I spotted the doors, wide open in welcome.
We arrived in the doorway to find Bert knitting and puffing on his foul-smelling pipe. Without looking up, and with the pipe clenched in his teeth, he said, “You made it then?”
“Mm.” I couldn’t muster up anything more articulate.
“Hilda said you’d direct us to a recruit named Liora? She’s meant to show Serena around.” Hunter stepped inside and I went after him.
“Aye.” Bert counted stitches, and added, “I sent for ’er the moment you left. She’s already in the supply closet getting you some new togs.”
Huh. “How did you know I’d be allowed to stay?”
Bert peered over his knitting needles and gave me a very crooked grin. “I have a gift for sniffing out the rotten eggs, and you’re no stinker.”
Oddly proud, I responded, “Thanks, Bert.”
“Did Hildy tell you which instructor you’d be working with?”
“Err …”
“Wilder,” Hunter answered for me.
Bert nodded. “Well, tell Liora so she can take you to the right barracks.”
“We’re okay to wait here?” Hunter asked.