by Jay Boyce
She paused, staring at him in confusion once again. “Wait, you mean…we’re the only ones coming?”
Carter laughed at her shock. “Yes. Most of the other students have been using weapons all their lives, and most only take the beginner classes if they want to pick up something new. Archery is something that almost everyone knows, since it’s the safest way to kill monsters.” Well, okay. At least that made sense—teach everyone ranged fighting so that you have a force who can come away with no casualties.
Seeming to ignore her inner musings, he went on, “Jade, meet Jeremy Fifield. Jeremy, this is Lady Jade Winward.”
Jade stepped forward, offering her hand to the skinnier redhead. His hair was combed over neatly, his hazel eyes shimmering with curiosity. He was lightly tanned, which mostly hid his freckles. His physique wasn’t anywhere near what she’d seen from most of the men around here, but it seemed firm and fit as he took her hand, bending over to brush his lips lightly against it. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Lady Jade.”
She smiled, then said softly, “The pleasure is mine.” He obviously wasn’t a noble since Carter had omitted any sort of title for him, but he had a conscientious bearing that spoke of confidence in what he knew. He let go and she let her hand fall to her side, ignoring her new little dot.
Carter was smirking. “Well, now that that’s done, let’s see where you’re at.” Jade watched as Jeremy immediately started putting on his arm guards and checking his bow. It looked like it had been well used before, and she started to feel a little nervous. Noticing this, Carter asked, “Is something the matter?”
Jade smiled ruefully and confessed, “I’ve never used a weapon before… I have absolutely no idea what to do.” She held out the beginner’s bow Camille had bought her. “I have a bow? But uhh… I don’t know how to put the protective stuff on. It’s just straps and leather to me.” She had pulled out the stuff Camille had put with her bow, but she had no idea how to use it, despite trying to surreptitiously watch Jeremy.
Carter came over, shaking his head. “I forgot you’re so new to everything. Here, let me help.” She could smell a weird mix of leather, wood, and something else she couldn’t quite place as he helped her into her gear. He explained the process patiently, double checking it to make sure it was on properly. She took the chance to study him properly. Bright blue eyes and sandy blonde hair tugged back into a short ponytail, he reminded her a bit of the Dread Pirate Roberts, the flowing white shirt and black pants only adding to her imagination. They finally got her buckled in, and Carter smiled. “Let’s have Jeremy go first. Watch his posture so you can mimic it.”
Jeremy smiled at her, having been waiting for them to finish. With confidence, he lifted his bow and nocked an arrow, sighting the target that looked to be maybe thirty feet away. Carter corrected him a little bit on his grip, and then he released, an arrow thunking into the outer ring. “Nine more,” Carter instructed patiently, and they both watched as Jeremy sunk arrow after arrow into the target, only missing entirely once. None of them were particularly close to the center bullseye, but he had at least moved closer from the outer ring.
She was nervous when Carter turned to her. “Your turn.” She walked up the range, having settled her quiver over her shoulder. Carter helped her get a feel for the right way to hold the bow and nock the arrow and then stepped back to let her try on her own. Her first arrow flew way wide of her target, and she flushed. “Calm down. It’s not a competition. Just focus on the arrows.”
His voice was soothing, and she forced herself to take a few deep breaths, centering herself. When she nocked another arrow, it was done much more smoothly. Sighting the target, she let out a breath as she released, and gave a little jump and woot of excitement when it hit the outer ring. Triumphantly she turned to Carter and Jeremy, who were both grinning as well. “You’ve got it! Keep going.”
Elated that she’d managed to hit the target, she began to pull and shoot again. It almost felt like there was an auto-correct on her posture and movements because she found herself sliding into them without thought. It just felt right, and she realized that was probably part of the correction of her siphoning experience. It was subtle, but also very helpful. If she hadn’t been starting from nothing, she might not have even noticed that it was like a good habit ingrained into her body.
Her arrows began to creep closer and closer to the center of the target, until on her ninth and tenth arrows, she hit dead center. Laughing in elation, she turned to celebrate with Jeremy and Carter. To her surprise, they were just staring at her in amazement, and Jeremy managed to choke out, “You’ve got to be kidding me… That can’t have been your first time holding a bow.”
Carter was staring at her in some sort of weird fascination, but there was a weirdly fanatical glint to his eyes. A little unnerved, her smile faded from her face as she questioned them, “Is something wrong?”
Carter shook his head, grinning. “Nothing, just that you’re evidently a genius. It usually takes months of practice to be able to shoot like that.” Oh, oops.
Smiling, she shrugged and tried to pass it off. “Oh, my special ability makes it so things come easily to me, so it’s a bit of a cheat.” She blushed a little, staring at the ground. She now felt a little bad that Jeremy, who’d been practicing for who knows how long, had been shown up by her on her first time on the range.
Carter asked curiously, “Check your archery skill. You should have it now and I’m curious as to what it’s at.”
Startled, Jade nevertheless decided to check.
Archery
Beginner 9
86%
She laughed a little nervously, then said haltingly, “Beginner 9, 86%.” She heard Carter whistle as Jeremy shook his head.
“That’s just crazy. Does all your stuff grow this fast?” Jade considered Jeremy’s question, then shrugged.
“I haven’t been checking the progress of stuff more than once a day. I knew my speed was fast, but that’s it.” Jeremy and Carter were both shaking their heads in awe.
Jeremy said ruefully, “Guess that means you won’t stay in this class very long.” She pondered this, then shook her head.
“Actually, I think I’ll stay here even when my skill advances. If I’m not wrong, the intermediate archery class has a lot more people?” Carter nodded, so she went on. “Besides, it would screw up my schedule. I’d rather have a smaller class so I can get more instruction.” She shrugged and grinned. Perhaps it was selfish of her, but she’d rather have a tutor than class instruction. She’d learn more. “It might change because I think I’m going to have to move my schedule around next week, but a least for now, I’ll just stay here.”
Carter nodded, since her logic made sense. “Alright! Well, the best way to get better is to practice. Once you can hit bullseye ten times in a row, we’ll move you back to the next target.” The rest of the next thirty minutes was spent with her and Jeremy shooting until their quivers were empty and then collecting the arrows while Carter gave them tips and instructions on how to do better.
Both of them had managed to move on to the fifty-foot targets by the end of their class time. Grinning, Jade held her hand up. “High five!”
Carter and Jeremy both just stared at her, and finally Carter asked, “What are you doing?”
Jade groused, grumbling as she walked straight up to Carter as she took his hand, forcing him through the motions of a high five. She mumbled poutily, “Just because you’re old doesn’t mean you can’t have fun.” So Carter wasn’t really OLD, he was probably mid thirties like Stephen and Eric, but still. Both he and Jeremy burst into laughter.
“Is it something from your old world?” Jeremy asked curiously, and she nodded.
“It’s basically what people did to celebrate stuff. Like hey, you did a great job, high five! Or hey, we won, high five! Score, high five!” She didn’t mention the butt slapping. Probably too much for this world. She might give someone a heart attack if she tried, which almost mad
e her want to try.
“I see. Then high five!” Jeremy put his hand up and Jade bounced like a little bunny to hit it, since him holding it at the top of his reach was way too high for her, but she was laughing as she managed to glance against his hand.
Carter was shaking his head, just laughing at her antics, and soon all three of them were giggling helplessly. Carter tried to calm down, but then one look at her and Jeremy would set him off again; it was the same for them. It was only when other people started to show up and look at them laughing madly that they finally calmed down. It looked like the intermediate class was here. Grinning, she nodded to Carter as she said gratefully, “Thanks for the help. See you Wednesday!” Glancing at her pocket watch, she realized she needed to hurry if she was going to make her small blades class on time. Quickly shoving her quiver and bow into her bag, she nodded in greeting to the students she passed.
“Hey Jade!” Jackson cheerfully greeted her as she passed. Adam was by his side and waved a greeting at her as well.
“Hey guys! Have fun with Carter. Catch you later!” They nodded, shooing her out because they also knew she’d be late. She began a slow jog to her next training field destination, a bright grin on her face.
She had sunshine, friends, and new things to learn. What more could a girl ask for?
Chapter Four – Impaling
Having realized that low numbers would be a theme in the beginner classes of essential weaponry, she was less surprised when she got to the small blades training ground and found herself alone with the instructor. It made a certain amount of sense. She’d pretty much seen that everyone carried around at least one dagger with them at all times. It was convenient both for food and as an emergency measure in case one was confronted by a monster. Maybe the commoners didn’t have proficiency with the bow, but all the nobles would at the very least. As for why there were none of the talent students here…well, if they were admitted because they were talented, then them having proficiency with knives wasn’t all that surprising either.
Plus, she figured even stuff like cooking could probably net you some proficiency. The beginner levels went by pretty fast, and most people probably got stuck in intermediate for a very long time, if they ever got out of it. They weren’t like her, who got insane bonuses to everything, it seemed. She couldn’t be sure, but she figured either siphon or adaptable were playing a part in her natural learning too. Maybe both.
Smiling, she dug through her memory for his name as she went forward to greet her private tutor–er, professor. “Hello, Viscount Xay.” He held out a slightly scarred hand to take hers, bending grizzled lips over her fingers. His wiry body spoke of extreme flexibility even as he bent. His hair was short with a few threads of white in the brown mass to signify his age of around forty, if she had to guess. Unlike many of the other professors who wore loose clothing, his was tightly fitted to his lean body. She wondered if he had an ounce of fat on him or if he was just pure muscle and bone.
“Jade, it’s lovely to see you again, but please, call me Brady.” His tenor voice was melodical, and she vaguely recalled seeing singing on his list of siphonable abilities.
Glancing around to make sure there were no other arrivals in sight, she asked cheerfully, “So, do I have you all to myself for training, or are we waiting for more to arrive?” She was barely on time, so she doubted anyone else was coming, but it never hurt to check.
He chuckled softly. “Just you. The rest of the herd was here last hour.”
She smiled apologetically. “Sorry to take so much of your time for just me.” Even though she was glad to have the personal instruction, because she was pretty sure she’d grow much faster this way, she was also sure a viscount had better things to do than teach her to wield the shinies.
He shook his head, grinning. “Don’t worry about it. It’s an honor to be able to teach a traveler.” Well okay, that kinda fit in with the whole hero worship that went on here, but she was glad not to see a fanatical gleam in his eye when he talked about it. Just humor and respect, which was swell as far as she was concerned.
Grinning back at him, she pulled out her bag and showed him her collection of daggers. “Thank you then! I’m looking forward to learning how to use these without impaling myself.”
He laughed upon seeing her collection. “You have enough there?”
She shrugged innocently. “I didn’t buy them. They were a gift! Was I supposed to say no?”
Shaking his head, he reached in and started pulling them out. “Alright, let’s start by figuring out which ones you want to use regularly. We’ll figure out which ones you’re comfortable wearing and then start with how to pull them out without, as you so eloquently put it, impaling yourself.”
“Sounds like a plan to me!” They spent the next five minutes attaching straps to various locations on her body as she figured out where she wanted to keep her knives. She ended up deciding on two knives that followed the outer lining of her boots, one on her right thigh, and a small pack of throwing blades that could double as her archery brace on her right forearm. She had considered one on her left outer bicep but decided that she probably didn’t need to arm herself to the teeth. She had magic, after all. Her arsenal would grow, and she didn’t need to fill every slot with a knife.
She had thought he might start her with some of the wooden blades she saw in boxes nearby, but his decision had surprised her. “No, we’ll start you with real blades. You’re a healer, and you’ll learn more from your mistakes if they actually hurt.” She had grumped a little bit, then conceded that he was probably right. Pain was a powerful motivator. Not a fun one, but powerful nonetheless.
Still, she did pretty decently and attributed at least part of it to the fact that she had her autocorrect skills in place. She still managed to cut her arm twice, but like he said, she was a healer, so it didn’t matter much other than the sting of pain before she healed herself. It was less pain than she got from siphoning people and barely lasted twenty seconds, so she decided it wasn’t worth complaining about.
After she could properly draw her weapons without hurting herself, he taught her the correct way to grip each one. What followed was a series of demonstrations on how to stab and slash, what to avoid, how to make your movements unpredictable and predict the moves of your opponents… It was like he was trying to shove all his close combat knowledge into her brain. She kept up, barely, but it was something she was going to need to review a lot until it was second nature to her.
In the last twenty minutes, he’d sparred with her, which was the most painful part. He’d scored a series of small nicks across her body, always holding his strength back and not cutting too deeply, but making sure it hurt. Her only consolation was that she had managed to score one hit on him as well, shallow as it was. After healing them both up, she laughed as she looked at her clothing. It was clean, but she still had a bunch of cuts showing the white skin on her legs, shoulders, back, and stomach. He hadn’t shown a whole lot of mercy, but she was grateful. No monster would show mercy, and it had helped her figure out her weaknesses in an extremely clear manner.
Panting with exhaustion, she sat next to him as they both gulped down water. He may have been scoring the most hits, but she’d made him work for it. Her movements were still jerky at times, but that also made them more unpredictable. He laughed, staring at the bright blue sky. “I’m honestly amazed. You made huge progress in just one lesson.”
She grinned, poking his arm. “If I didn’t, you’d have bled me to death! You have no mercy!” In an hour of personal tutoring and cutting each other up, the lines had bled, and he no longer felt like a teacher but an older friend, albeit one who was intent on pounding as much as he could into her brain and body.
He grinned. “You’re not like most of the students I see come through here. Everyone else would have complained if I put them through what I just did with you.”
She feigned outrage. “Wait, I was allowed to say no!?” She met his eyes with a straigh
t face, and then both of them burst into laughter. She plucked at her clothes, saying cheerfully, “You owe me new clothes. Camille is going to have a fit if she sees that I’ve already torn up one of the outfits she got me.” She’d only nicked his arm, so his clothes were fine.
He laughed, saying innocently, “What, I thought all the young girls were trying to show more skin these days?” She punched him softly in the arm.
“What do you take me for, some tramp?” They laughed and stood up, where he offered her his arm.
“Well, little tramp, shall we go get food?” She grumbled and nodded. It was kinda nice that he wasn’t as freaked out about her skin as some of the other people had been, like Raphael. Granted, it didn’t hurt that he was more than twice her age and more interested in raising her up to be a knife prodigy.
“You’re paying for it.”
He laughed. “You don’t pay for food here.” She grumbled again as they began walking towards a large building she’d been told was the cafeteria. With five floors, it had a pretty strict hierarchy. As a first year, she was supposed to go the fifth floor for her food. The only exception was that once a week, each student could invite someone from a lower grade to eat on their floor, and the food got better the closer you were to the ground. The first floor obviously belonged to the professors.
Grinning as he led her to the counter to place their order on the first floor, she said happily, “At least I’ll get the good food with you! It’s worth being cut up for that.” He laughed. The rule was almost the same for the professors, but they could bring one student a day to their level. The small blades training grounds were fairly close to the cafeteria, so they were some of the earlier ones there.