CHAPTER 19 TEACHABLE TIMES
Kat let out a sigh of pleasure as she turned her face to the sky with a beaming smile and closed her eyes.
She relished in the moment.
Savored it just as much, if not more, than when she consumed her father’s peach rum pie …
Though she had no fear that the moment would be over too soon.
Oh, absolutely not.
For it was only the beautiful beginning.
Clasping her hands behind her back, Kat skipped over to a particular corner of the sectioned off courtyard.
“Oh, Seleeeene,” she called out in a singsong voice, her red ponytail bobbing as she pranced.
The Troivackian noblewoman clutched a corner of the barracks wall, her legs visibly trembling as her breaths rasped.
“Darling, what lap are you on?” Kat asked sweetly.
“T-Thirty.”
“Now, now. I only counted twenty-three, and my trusty helper, Sir Cas, says the same.”
“Y-You …” Selene gasped, her face flushed and her eyes tearing in the cold. “Wench.”
“Hey now, that’s hardly fair. You volunteered to come today, and then you also volunteered to join my group, and then you just outdid yourself yet again and insisted on running the thirty laps!” Kat smiled wolfishly at the woman whose hair had been perfect at the start of the training, but now frizzed and waved out from her head wildly.
“Y-You can’t run this … either,” Selene started to say as her knees buckled dangerously.
“Love, I ran throughout the night the very first day of training, and it felt like a splendid warm-up. I’m not human though, so you’re comparing a chicken to a horse. You’re the chicken in this analogy. Just making sure that’s clear.”
Selene tried to glare, but the stitch in her side had her pitching forward. Kat caught her and threw her arm over her shoulder to start leading her back to rejoin the others who had finished their laps and were cooling down with some stretches that Kat had assigned.
“I don’t … need … your help …” Selene began coughing.
“Right. You may want to have a warm bath, but if you can handle it? Jump into a cold one and go back and forth. Honest to Gods, it will save you from more muscle pain than you can imagine. Oh, also drink some warm honey water and eat some chicken. For your throat and for your nutrition. Very important for training.”
“I won’t listen to you … demon.”
Kat stopped and turned to stare at the woman who, as they had started to move, had passively allowed herself to be half hauled by the redhead.
“See, why do you feel the need to hate me? I personally would love to see what you could accomplish with that stubborn nature of yours. As someone with a tenacity that has been called ‘outrageous but effective’ herself, you have my regards.”
Selene’s perfectly sculpted brows twitched, and it was then Kat realized that the woman hadn’t entirely understood everything she said, so she tried to speak more simply.
“You like a challenge and don’t like losing. I respect that about you and want to see you become one hell of a fighter. It’d probably also help you feel calmer on the whole. Trust me, it’s helped me a lot.”
“You think I want to destroy my future to sweat and, and, and train with nothing but poverty awaiting me at the end of the day?”
“Train up, then come to Daxaria. I’ll hire you. No poverty necessary. If it’s what you want? Go for it.”
“You think I need your help? Are you looking down on me?!” Selene seethed while rasping. Her throat was raw from her heavy breathing in the cold.
“Not at all. You strike me as the type who’d bite a man’s ear off, and I’m given to understand that here in Troivack, that is high praise. I consider that high praise as well, but it isn’t quite the same to most Daxarians.”
The noblewoman looked torn between wanting to hold on to her haughty anger and believing Kat … so she opted to fall into silence.
When the two women reached the rest of the students, Kat unceremoniously dumped Selene in the back row, making her release a squawk of surprise. The redhead proceeded to stroll through the rows of panting and sweating young women, grinning without a second glance back. She hadn’t entirely reformed into a mature woman …
“Everyone, I think that should be it for today. Tomorrow, I will have you all begin with push-ups, sit-ups, and then have you run your fifteen laps. Any questions?” Kat asked loudly while giving a small smile of respect to Dana, who stood looking energized. Most likely thanks to all her walks and playing with her dogs, she was significantly fitter than the rest of her peers.
“Can we see you fight again?” one of the women called out despite still being doubled over.
By this time, Sir Cas was making his way over to her with his own group following behind.
Kat raised an eyebrow with a grin.
“Lady Talia, was it? You get bonus points for enjoying violence.”
The noblewoman shifted awkwardly as a few of the women around her avoided making eye contact, though there were several discreet shared glances from under long dark eyelashes.
Their reactions told Kat that they, too, wished to see it again.
“Alright, Sir Cas?”
“Yes, Lady Katarina?”
“Would you like to spar with me for our students?”
The knight smiled, and out of the corner of her eye, Kat spotted several noblewomen lean toward one another and share interested glances as a result.
“A bit more space if you don’t mind.” Kat put her hands up and tapped the air, prompting the group to back up a step, all of them looking excited for what was about to happen.
“Did you want to use your magic?” Sir Cas murmured quietly.
Kat pondered the request while cracking her neck. “How about I try without it first and then introduce it for a second round.”
“It’s nearly the dining hour. How many rounds do you want to go?” The knight looked wary.
“Why? You’re getting tired already?”
“And a little hungry, yes.”
“You’re too young to be worn out already! But fine. Let’s just do the two rounds.”
Smiling again, Sir Cas gave a slight bow of appreciation before addressing their audience.
“We will spar for two rounds. The first round, Lady Katarina will not use her magic, and the second, she will show how, with it, she can easily overcome me.”
By then the women had straightened up and were watching, perfectly captivated.
Both Kat and Sir Cas rounded toward each other and drew their swords.
They tapped their blades together twice and lifted them to take their starting positions.
Then, feeling a mite emboldened by the admiration directed at her, Kat lunged forward.
Sir Cas, she realized instantly, was not going to treat the match as he did their training. When she attacked, he cast off her blade and, faster than a blink, was already aiming for her throat on a backhand horizontal stroke. Kat barely leapt back out of the way.
He had never fought so efficiently with her before.
Kat regarded him in silent question as she backed up a step, but she saw no emotion in his blue eyes …
She didn’t get the chance to think about this unnerving change in him either, because it was Sir Cas’s turn to come after her. He kept knocking her blade out farther from her body, but he was able to recoil tightly so that he was backing her up while hitting closer and closer to her hand, bearing down on her, the sing of steel and wind whirling around them. But in a single breath, they stopped.
Sir Cas’s blade rested against her throat.
Kat swallowed with difficulty as she stared at her friend’s face and the courtyard remained in suspended silence.
Then … the cold mask cracked, and Sir Cas was himself again. He smiled at Kat, though she could see the sheepishness in his eyes as he stepped back and offered her his hand.
She shook it.
“Er … Right. As you can all see, Sir Cas won that match. He is after all considered the genius swordsman of Daxaria!” Kat informed their audience while giving what she hoped was an easygoing smile.
The women were eyeing the two uncertainly.
With a wince and a contrite smile to Kat, Sir Cas stepped forward.
“I offer you all my apologies for that display.”
The women collectively gasped as the knight bowed to them.
Not only were Troivackian men notorious for not apologizing, but apologizing to their womenfolk was practically unheard of.
“I especially am sorry to Lady Katarina.” Sir Cas bobbed his head to her. “The reason I fought that way was both to demonstrate to you all as well as Lady Katarina that there are times when you will be faced with someone more skilled than you. It will be uncomfortable, and they will try to corner you. I want you all to see that Lady Katarina still fought. She didn’t cower, and she knows the risks. My hope is that you all saw that she held her ground. She will learn from this exchange especially, as I have never fully faced her as a true opponent before as I am still technically her teacher, and I thought this would motivate her to learn from her mistakes and think on how to improve for the next time we spar.”
Kat gaped at the knight.
He had to be bullshitting them. Or maybe he really was trying to inspire them all in his own roundabout way … ?
Had she perhaps caught Sir Cas off guard, and he’d just fought her instinctively?
“Alright, now … I’d like you all to see how, regardless of my own skill set, when Lady Katarina uses her full abilities, I don’t stand a chance.”
“Yes, and … the reason I’m showing you that is … I want you all to get used to seeing magic. I’m not an arsehole who is here working for devils or demons. I want to protect people, and I am perfectly capable of it.”
The women didn’t look as convinced when she offered her explanation as they had with Sir Cas’s.
However, Kat didn’t care. She would wear them down. She would show them her magical prowess over and over until they didn’t give it a second thought.
She sheathed her sword.
Sir Cas raised an eyebrow but seemed to understand what it was she had in mind, as he gave a slow nod of permission.
Kat closed her eyes.
Some of the noblewomen shuffled a little farther away from their teachers.
It was Sir Cas’s turn to attack her first with a downward strike. Only Kat’s aura flared to life, making a couple women shriek, and when her eyes opened, they were filled with golden light.
Kat seized Sir Cas’s sword arm with her left hand, and his throat with her right. She hoisted him in the air and proceeded to chuck him to the ground like a child that had become bored with their toy.
Then, just as quickly as it all transpired, Kat’s eyes returned to normal, and her aura shrank back down.
“Feeling alright there, Sir Cas?” she queried good-naturedly.
“I know I said I wanted to end things quickly … but I didn’t realize I’d have to become acquainted with the cobblestones as a result,” the knight grunted as he sat up.
If Kat were honest with herself, part of the reason she had been so openly brutal was because she was still more than a little put off by Sir Cas’s display earlier.
Even so, she offered her hand to him and helped him stand.
“Right. I think that is all for today, everyone. Remember. Baths. Warm water, then cold, and warm honey water to drink. If you can eat a good serving of meat in the near future, that would also be in your best interest,” Kat informed them seriously.
“What about moonshine for the pain?” one woman called out.
Kat craned her neck over the crowd to grin at the one who asked.
She couldn’t remember the woman’s name, as she had been in Sir Cas’s group and not her own.
The redhead pointed at her. “You. What’s your name?”
“Lady M-Miriam Shelby.”
“Lady Miriam Shelby, you and I should be friends. Feel free to drink with me anytime you want.”
The young woman smiled shyly.
Sir Cas chuckled at Kat’s side as she proceeded to wave her arms theatrically toward the doorway.
“Oh! And spectacular work today, everyone!” she hollered as some of the women limped their way up the steps to the castle while others tried to gracefully lean on an arm of a friend.
It was as she was watching them disappear inside that Kat realized she had had another audience she hadn’t noticed.
There stood her father and her husband side by side, wearing two vastly different expressions.
Her father was staring at her lost in thought, but there was an intensity in his gaze that told Kat there was something he needed to tell her … Eric, on the other hand, was grinning proudly at his wife.
She let out a breath and tried to take comfort in the prince’s positive reaction to her teaching.
Sir Cas leaned in closer.
“Now, that is the actual reason why I did what I did. I wanted to show off how good of a student you’ve become in lasting against me for as long as you did.”
Spinning around, Kat stared at Sir Cas in shock, but this time when she looked at him, she saw the sincerity in his eyes.
Momentarily speechless, Kat rounded on him, her hands finding her hips.
“Wait just a Godsdamn minute. You’ve been holding back this entire time I’ve been learning from you?! I demand a rematch!”