x
They left the building behind and Crystal pointed her towards a bench that stood a bit further up the road, not far from where she had spotted the training field before. Sitting down, she could see that it was no longer empty, around a hundred men had gathered and were loudly laughing and talking while waiting for their training to start.
Almost immediately she saw herself step out of her family home and onto the exercise field where she had trained with her men for years. After her father’s death and her betrayal, her mother and sister never returned home. Giving Lidea the advantage of having a fort to defend her position from. In those years, the king hadn’t been too aggressive and more focused on convincing her to stop her rebellion. They were good years that were filled with learning and comradery. As young as she had been, the men had almost adopted her. Taking the place of the father and family she so dearly missed.
However, these were not her man.
To her keen eyes, they looked like amateurs. Almost all of them missing the muscled build that characterized most trained sword masters. Were these the men that Warchief wanted to fight with?
She got distracted by Crystal who started to apply the oil liberally to the ends of her hair. Lidea could only admire her as she patiently got to work, armed with only a comb.
A commotion pulled her attention back and she saw a figure running down from the main structure. The men started to collect themselves, yelling welcomes and small taunts about their commander's tardiness. Dressed haphazardly in loose leather pants and a jerkin, and with the laces of his boots not even tied, Warchief looked as if he had just rolled out of bed. Even from here, she could see that foolish grin of his again and Lidea couldn’t help but judge the man in silence. No wonder his men were in such a state. Training was mostly driven by discipline, how could he install that in them without caring about it himself.
A tug on her scalp made her wince and she glared at the healer behind her. Crystal in turn just raised an eyebrow while continuing to work on the stubborn knot.
“Don’t look at me like that. I’m doing this for your sake. Anyway, what is a pain like this to a warrior like you?”
Lidea wanted to argue that she had already said to cut it off, but thought better of it and focused back on the field below. She was taken by surprise as she saw Warchief looking at her. He nodded in greeting before turning back to his men. Lidea wondered if he had not said anything to avoid calling the attention of the others to her. She appreciated it if that had been the case.
“All right everyone, settle down. Welcome to morning practice, I thought to focus today on general stamina. In other words, we will be doing exercises until you drop.”
A collective groan came from the group and Lidea couldn’t suppress a smile. Nobody liked to do physical exercises. She herself would rather do three hours of sparring matches instead of even a half hour of doing exercises.
“Can’t we do sparring instead?”
Lidea frowned and tried to find the owner of the voice among the group. The idea that someone would dare to talk back to their commander’s training schedule, was inconceivable to her. They were either brave or more probably, conceited and stupid.
“No. There isn’t much point to you guys sparring if you can barely lift a sword.”
Warchief’s no-nonsense answer pleased her. At least he seemed to have some spine. Some mumblings of malcontent followed his reply, as was to be expected but what Lidea didn’t see coming was that the same voice spoke up again.
“But don’t we become stronger through sparring anyway?”
The short-sightedness irked Lidea as she now pinpointed the young man that had spoken. He had a slender build and Lidea doubted that he would be able to last more than ten minutes into a fight.
“Yuron, we are doing physical exercises. If you do not agree then feel free to sit out.”
Warchief’s voice had taken on a frustrated tone and Lidea suspected that this hadn’t been the first time that his methods had been questioned. At least the troublemaker seemed to have understood his position as he kept quiet after that.
“No more complaints? Then let’s start.”
Lidea watched with interest as Warchief led them into doing a series of exercises to help develop their overall muscle mass. They were good exercises, some of which she recognized while others were new for her too, but she wasn’t impressed by the men doing them. Most of them were just going through the motions, trying to get away with putting in as little effort as possible. She couldn’t help but compare them to the men she had trained with and eventually led. Though she recognized that they had been professional soldiers while these people must be civilians, she almost got angry at their attitude. It was as if they did not understand that training was necessary to help their chance at survival and not some annoying task given to them for no reason. Her hands itched as she tried her best to ignore their attitude and watch their technique instead. Though, that didn’t better her mood as it was as bad as their way of training. Hadn’t they been training for years now? How could they be this bad? Then she remembered that they had never played an active role in the fighting and instead had focused on helping people escape.
Bringing her intention back to the man who was wanting to change that. Unlike his trainees, he carried the build of a seasoned knight and his movements showed a fluidity that only came from years of practice. She wondered where he had been trained. He did not speak with an obvious accent, and his brown hair and sun-kissed tan were traits too common to direct her to any specific country or people. If it hadn’t been for Crystal, Lidea might have thought him to be from Lynoës.
The only thing that made him different were those orange eyes. Although she doubted that it would be obvious to anyone if you didn’t see him up close.
As they changed exercise, she saw how only half of the men still training, actually knew how to correctly perform it. She kept looking at Warchief, waiting for him to correct them. But he didn’t seem to notice it. Or he did not care. How were they supposed to improve if he didn’t teach them?
Her building frustration got interrupted as the same whiny voice of before, spoke up.
“Warchief, aren’t we done yet?”
Again, she looked at Warchief expectantly. He had to explain to them why this wasn’t okay and that he should learn to follow orders. However, similar to before, he seemed to be ignoring the man’s interference.
“How can he just let this go?”
She must have mumbled her question out loud as Crystal stopped her detangling to look over Lidea’s shoulder at the field below.
“He knows that he is young.”
Lidea frowned at her response.
“Young? He is at least our age or older. But even if he was young, that is no excuse. How can you learn anything if you don’t want to put in the work and complain at every turn.”
She felt how the woman started her work again as she sighed deeply.
“I have told Warchief this as well, but it isn’t in his nature. He is a free spirit and isn’t good at following the rules himself. I suppose he doesn’t want to lead like an army general.”
Her answer angered Lidea as she focused again on the field below where more voices had joined the original commenter. Though they had barely started, none of them were keen on continuing this training throughout the whole day. Finally, Warchief stopped as well, not able to keep ignoring them.
“I already said to you, if you don’t want to join. Sit this one out.”
While she was happy to see him sticking to his earlier words, she wasn’t as excited about how he was letting them get away with such behavior. In her mind’s eye, she saw herself standing again on the first major battlefield that she had experienced. She would have died that day if it hadn’t been for Gideon sticking to her as glue. Even though she had trained with them every, she hadn’t been prepared for the real thing. The idea of these men entering the same situation but with less training made her terrified for their life.
As Warchief picked up the practice again, she saw a small group sit at the side. As to be expected, more joined the group throughout the training and Lidea could no longer stand it.
“Crystal, what is the easiest way to get down there?”
The woman paused again and tilted her head to look at her, the men sitting below and again at her.
“You are not up to strength yet.”
Lidea nodded at her remark, knowing that Crystal understood what she planned to do.
“I don’t need to be. Actually, it is better that I’m not. Don’t worry, I know better than to push farther than my limits. I have no desire to delay my recovery.”
This seemed to satisfy her, an impish smile appearing on her face as she started to braid Lidea’s detangled hair and put the whole of it into a messy bun.
“I will help you down, let's show them what a real warrior is made of.”
The climb down tired Lidea more than she would have liked to admit, but it was nothing that she couldn’t handle. A sense of excitement joined her irritation as they finally reached the training field. By now most of the men were sitting to the side. Only a small group joined their commander. Banter could be heard from the men, who didn’t seem to feel any guilt at ditching training. Lidea couldn’t believe that they were so brazen.
She shared a final look with Crystal who found herself a spot on the other side. Lidea could almost see how eager she was to see this play out. Clearly, Lidea hadn’t been the only one to be irritated by their attitude. Admittedly, she also looked forward to taking those lazy bums down a notch.
Nobody had noticed her approach and she rolled up her sleeves, before joining them. Warchief was the first to see her and they briefly locked eyes. She could almost see him questioning why she was there, as his gaze then shifted to the healer sitting on the sideline.
Lidea didn’t pay him any further mind and found a spot on the first row, at the side that was the closest to the men having tea time. From the shocked faces of the couple of men on the field that noticed her, she gathered that Warchief had failed to brief them on her presence.
Perfect.
Her muscles protested as she tried to follow each exercise. It was an enjoyable pain, reminding her that she had much to catch up on. Although she had to take breaks, she still didn’t stop and kept training with them. Soon she could hear the word ‘woman’ coming from the men beside her.
She couldn’t help but grin as they reacted exactly as she had expected them to.
“Commander, why is there a woman on the field?”
It wasn’t the young troublemaker this time but a man of middle age who looked at Lidea with a mixture of confusion and disdain. Both Lidea and Warchief ignored him, as they continued the repeating series of movements.
“Commander!”
As Warchief finished his set, he held up a hand to indicate them to stop. Lidea stopped immediately and went to stand at attention, unlike her peers who immediately sat down to rest.
The men looked on in confusion and Warchief held her gaze. She could see that he started to understand what she was trying to do and played into it. Leaving her to stand at attention for longer than normal. The men around her had grown silent, not understanding what was going on.
“Relax, soldier.”
Only then did Lidea soften her stance but she still didn’t sit down.
“So are you going to keep ignoring us?”
The man sounded annoyed and Lidea had to almost laugh at his gal.
“He should. Why would he respond to someone who does not respect him.”
Even if it was disrespectful of her as well to speak out of turn, she felt it was necessary in this case.
“We do respect him. How would you know anyway, I have never seen you here before.”
She turned to the group. Knowing that her appearance did not help give her any semblance of intimidation. Still, she stared them down nonetheless.
“I could see enough from the last half hour that I watched you. If you respected him, then you wouldn’t be sitting there chatting your life away, while he is trying to teach you how to survive.”
“Don’t be so melodramatic. To survive? We are at training, it isn’t like this is a life or death situation.”
Lidea wished that she had her full strength. She wouldn’t ever claim to be the best swordfighter, but she was fairly confident that she would be able to handle most of these men. Although, maybe it was better to not beat them into submission if she ever decided to stay. Bruised egos would chase many of them away. Especially if those bruised egos are caused by a woman.
“You could be attacked at any moment. That is why you are training. What is your plan here? To not take training seriously until you know that a battle is coming? If so, spare yourself and leave here, as you would be literal dead weight.”
“As if we would lose to those magicless fleabags. We would demolish them.”
His arrogance astounded her, and she balled her fist as she tried to hold her temper. He seemed to notice, his grin growing wider by the second. A grin that she would wipe from his face with glee.
“Is that so? How come then that you are in this mess. If you are so almighty, then how did magic get banned. Where were those powerful magic holders when they started to hunt you down and kill you by the hundreds? Were you just not bothered enough to fight?”
“What do you know!?”
His voice had climbed in pitch, and the lack of response was enough for most present to know that she had won the argument. She wanted to answer him but didn’t get the chance as she felt Warchief’s hand on her shoulder.
“This would be Lidea Valkyrea, she is staying with us for the time being.”
A hush spread under the men, and Lidea raised her chin as they stared at her.
“So the magic-less noble that got her men killed and was sent to the execution block. How are you even alive?”
The troublemaker of before had come to stand next to the older man that she had been arguing with. His words felt like a stake through her heart but she refused to show them her hurt. Widening her stance, she looked at the boy without answering him.
“Be silent, you. That girl has been fighting for our asses, far longer than you have.”
Her sympathizer was a man of her age, that had not sat on the sideline. His typical drawl, telling her that he came from the more poor neighborhoods in the city.
“Ow boy, Taylor has his eyes set on the woman.”
The older man was the one to respond, and she saw her sympathizer turn bright red. Lidea speculated if he was that innocent or if the accusation held a kernel of truth.
“That is enough Firon.”
Warchief’s voice managed to cut the tension as he physically came to stand between her and the man he had called Firon.
“I will not allow you to show disrespect to someone based on their sex. Especially not to someone, that I hope to recruit. You are acting like an ass.”
Lidea was surprised that the man immediately stopped his rebellious behavior. Looking from Firon to Warchief, she could see that the man did hold a great deal of admiration for his commander.
However, the troublemaker did not give up as easily.
“You can’t be serious. Recruit her? She is a woman and has no magic! What use is she?”
Warchief sighed at his overdramatic tone as he leaned onto his wooden practice sword. His lack of formality formed a stark contrast to the way Rhodry or herself had conducted their army. He reminded her more of a street brawler than a military man.
“Honestly, I am not even going to bother explaining myself. If she decides to stay, you can get to know and judge for yourself if she is useful or not.”
“At least she will be more useful than him.”
“Hé.”
Lidea smiled as the unknown person at the back took a jab at the pest. The teasing among men felt familiar and filled the hole that opened up after losing her family for a second time. As the tension ebbed away, she started to notice the exhaustion in her body. Although she was happy to have done as much as she had, she knew that she needed to rest now.
“I think that this is all I have in me today. Would it be alright for me to join the training tomorrow as well? At least if my guardian allows me.”
She hinted at where Crystal sat with a broad smile. A grin broke on Warchief’s face and she could see his amusement at her statement.
“I was already surprised to see you up and about. You are welcome anytime. If Crystal agrees of course, she has the last say on everything that goes on in this camp.”
His words caused laughter to bubble up within the group. Clearly, Lidea hadn’t been the only one that had been bossed around by the healer.
“Is that sarcasm I hear, Warchief? Maybe I should consider changing some of my ingredients next time you want help?”
The sugary smile she said it with, made Lidea uncomfortable and she could see Warchief swallow.
“I wouldn’t ever dare. Please spare me, your overlord!”
“Come here you!”
Lidea couldn’t help laughing as she saw the small woman chase after the leader of this camp. She wasn’t the only one, as everyone seemed to be thoroughly entertained. The comfortable atmosphere among them, made her reconsider her earlier opinion. Maybe she had judged them too harshly. They might not be as well trained as her men had been, but they seemed to be amicable enough. Maybe she could help while she was staying here. As a way of repaying them. If Warchief would be open to her suggestions at least.
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