Chapter 7

  The private Rodrigo training yard was quiet that evening. The tall stone walls dully reflected the light of the setting sun in a way Eli found brutally picturesque. The training equipment in the fading daylight cast long shadows that bled across the packed earth of the empty grounds. Ropes swayed gently, obstacle loomed sinisterly overhead, and mundane and enchanted sparring dummies waited with blank faces. Gabriel stepped out first, nodding once to one of the few retainers with enough authority and clearance to maintain the personal training field of the Rodrigo family themselves. These retainers did not linger long as their young master followed quickly behind the Lord of the house. They bowed to both boy and man, then promptly left. This time was for father and son.

  Eli’s pulse quickened as he stretched out his limbs. How many years since he had run the gauntlet? When was the last time he’d been out here with his father? While he’d become infinitely more proficient at casting magic than his mother (though perhaps not as knowledgeable), his father had ever been far out of his reach in terms of weapons mastery.

  It’s not that Eli had lacked the talent, or the opportunity to become truly proficient, it’s that he’d lacked the inclination his first go around. He’d been much more enamoured with magecraft, and the arcane. He’d spent the extra hours that he could have been in the training yard with his father, or with the instructors at the academy inside enchanting labs, libraries, and magical training rooms instead. It wasn’t time wasted considering it was often his arcane proficiency that had saved his life, and the lives of his comrades’, time and time again over the years. Even before the wars had begun and the True Resistance had made its stand, it was his magecraft, and his knowledge of the arcane that had him labelled as a genius, and had allowed him to climb so far. However, he was here now, with one of the most accomplished weapons masters house Alverez had ever produced.

  In front of Eli loomed ‘The Course’. It was the shorthand for the name every martial retainer – and even some of the instructors and assessors – had named the version of the obstacle course that they were run through at selection, and during regular training. House Rodrigo didn’t just train their own retainers; they funded and managed the guard for each official settlement in Adler territory. Of course, ‘the ruling family must lead by example’. It was a phrase his father had often repeated. In this case, it meant that Eli was expected to be not just as good as the dedicated fighters, but better.

  That’s why instead of recreating ‘the course’ that awful trial that had ended the careers of many a promising recruit potential, the house Rodrigo Private training ground had a longer, larger, behemoth of a gauntlet that Eli was expected to complete in less time, and with better scores than the people who guarded the city walls, and regularly culled the wilds.

  Of course, this gauntlet was not sized for a the young, developing Eli, but instead for his father. A veritable giant of a man who better resembled the mountains they lived on than he did to his seven-year-old son. Something a five-year-old Eli had pointed out only once. His father had then taken it as an opportunity to thoroughly demonstrate just how little the world cared for ‘fairness’. After he had been thoroughly ‘instructed’ by his father, Eli’s condition had alarmed his mother enough that there had never been a repeat ‘demonstration’ – at least not one so brutal – however the lesson was one that had stuck with him throughout his life.

  The challenge was set, as Eli once more faced the gauntlet that had haunted him most of his childhood and into his early twenties. If he couldn’t even conquer an inanimate playground, what right did he have to think he could change the outcome of the world’s greatest betrayal.

  “Ready?” It was the only word his father offered him before the subtle click of the timekeeper marked the start of his run.

  The first attempt was beyond awful. He was honestly too shocked at his own performance to even muster up embarrassment.

  When he’d leapt for the rope too short arms had reached out and too weak legs had undershot. Then he’d tried to climb the wall, but he’d fallen backwards, his grip strength inadequate for the amount of pressure he’d applied. Then he’d tried to compensate for his smaller frame by using disproportionally more force than necessary. Something the wooden post that had bloodied his nose had demonstrated to devastating effect. However, he hadn’t let the impact phase him. Instead, he’d scaled the damn thing like an overeager cling bear. That irritating, low level beast was only proficient at tenaciously holding on to whatever they were resting upon, and being annoyingly difficult to dislodge from whatever it is they decided to cling to. Though the creature was otherwise useless, much could be learned from the techniques they used to prevent themselves from being dislodged. If only the whole course could be completed by aggressive clinging.

  On his next leap, he’d gotten the power right, but messed up his balance causing him to smash gut first onto the platform instead of planting on the ledge.

  Every move felt just slightly wrong, and the result of ‘slightly wrong’ in this environment had been immediate and painful. He was glad that his younger self had been diligent and enthusiastic about daily practice. Otherwise, outside of his bruised and battered body, he may have seriously injured himself.

  This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

  Muscle memory was etched into his mind, it was his instincts, honed through decades of action in a bigger, stronger, better trained body that were causing the issues. His mind wanted to do two things at once, and both were correct. By the time he’d reconciled the contradiction, the movements had been bungled, his coordination was off, and it was his poor body that was suffering for it.

  He knew this, he knew how to do this. I have mastered this before and will master it again, he told himself. But everything just felt so off.

  He steadied himself against the wall, teeth grit. Of course it feels off. I must be what, two, three feet shorter, and how many years younger? His body hadn’t even finished growing, let alone had centuries to build the kind of physical foundation he was used to. Though his plan was to be much more proficient long before that, if he had anything to say about it. That mastery began here.

  He clenched his fists, trudged back to the start of the course, not even sparing his father a glance. His father wanted him to prove himself at training? He’d do that and more. He shook himself out and closed his eyes. Starting at his feet, Eli tensed his muscles. He began with his toes, then his arches, then his ankles and calves. Up his body he went until there wasn’t any part of him that he hadn’t flexed, squeezed or clenched. Then he shook himself out once again and lined up for another run.

  If there was one thing Eli knew he could do well, it was adapt. He’d go, and go, and go again until his mind and body were in sync, and his instincts had been thoroughly recalibrated. Besides, if he couldn’t adapt quickly, he’d force himself to work relentlessly until he did.

  He didn’t glance at his father, and wouldn’t until he performed adequately to his own standards.

  The second run flowed better. There were stumbles and slips, but overall, he was more aware of himself and was managing to synergize his reactions better. Then came the third run, he faltered and fell, but this time it very little to do with coordination – or lack there of – and much more to do with the fact that the course was designed for people at least a decade older and a foot taller than him.

  But that didn’t matter; not to him, and certainly not to his father. All that would be judged on this training field were the results. Results he was going to get.

  He ran it again. That time, better. Then again, better still. He ran that course until he could predict the sway of the ropes, the precise amount of strength needed to stay on the wall, the exact force needed to carry him over the pit and still maintain his stride. Soon the obstacles blurred together as he challenged them one after another after another. He wasn’t clearing the course with anything close to finesse or ease, but he was consistently making it to the end.

  After a while, Gabriel began getting involved. Eli’s father would throw pebbles at him as he swung across the ropes, or toss sandbags at him as he quickstepped across a beam. Eli would dodge, deflect, or occasionally be pelted and thrown off, but each time, he adapted, and each time, he’d begin again. By the time his body was ready to give out, he could say with full certainty that he was growing at a truly staggering pace.

  From the sidelines, Gabriel’s lips twitched into one of his signature not-quite-smiles. It was a subtle motion, but one everyone close to him recognized. Gabriel Rodrigo, Lord of Adler, and Martial Saint was pleased.

  Eli had impressed the man, but more than that, he had motivated him. In his mind Gabriel was now calculating. Wondering if this relentless drive in his son was caused by his desire for companionship, and if so how could he use this? Perhaps the little butcher’s girl would be just the motivation Gabriel needed to push his son past mere excellence and into the realm of legends. Of course, he couldn’t know that he’d never need to use that leverage to motivate Eli. Foreknowledge of the end of the world as he knew it was more than enough. And so he watched on, a hidden intensity burning behind an otherwise stoic expression.

  Eli never made it to the finish line of the final run that night. It wasn’t surprising that he’d collapsed partway through considering the condition he was in when his father had called for the final run. It wasn’t until his legs were trembling, and he would’ve been forced to dip into his magical reserves to force his body to continue that Gabriel called the obstacle course to a halt.

  Eli looked up from the packed earth to find his father halfway across the yard, and approaching a well outfitted rack of training weapons. By the time Eli had caught up with the much taller man, legs trembling, and muscles screaming, Gabriel had reached the rack and picked up two wooden staves. Both were long and solid, reinforced with an alloyed core, and minimally enchanted for durability. A benefit of having a script smith in the family. With the way his father trained, they would either have been constantly paying for new equipment, or they would’ve had to shell out a ridiculous amount of money for what were, in the end, simple practice weapons. Especially when considering the sheer breadth of weapons Gabriel trained with.

  Hands on his hips, head to the sky and breathing slowly but deliberately, Eli was forced out of his recovery pose when a sudden movement had his reflexes responding before he could even really consider what was happening. His father had thrown a second, child-sized staff at him that Eli deftly snatched out of the air. He threw his father a withering look that the man didn’t even deign to acknowledge. That’s when Eli actually looked at what he was holding. Fatigue bled into resignation as Eli curled his fingers around the weighty length of polished wood.

  It had been too long, and not long enough since he’d last wielded a weapon. His muscles ached, his lungs burned, and the sparing use of mana he allowed himself to dedicate to recovery did little to alleviate his pathetic condition while skirting the edges of what his father might notice. He was a mess, a quivering, exhausted mess. What perfect conditions to see just how far he could push his young body, and just how far he had to go.