33. Sage

CHAPTER 33

Sage

The fall ripped a hole in my pantleg, cut my shin — with a thankfully shallow cut — and scraped both my palms and my chin. The last of the novices ran around the outcropping and into the trees without stopping to help which stung more than the scrape on my chin.

I knew it shouldn't have. I was a nobleman and if most nobles were like Edred then it made perfect sense for everyone else to want to put me in my place. This was their only chance because we were now equals.

But even with the dirty looks I'd gotten in the great hall at the morning and midday meal, I hadn't expected the fae to start it. I'd expected them to be cold and distant, not wanting to bother themselves with a lowly human, and I didn't know if their involvement meant my sin of accidentally endangering their brothers was more serious than I first thought or if they were just being petty.

Whatever the reason, it meant my plan to go unnoticed had failed before I'd even started.

I pushed myself to my feet and ran after them. I wasn't the fastest runner and didn't have the stamina of the fae or those men who'd already been training to be warriors, but I managed to catch up to a few of the others and push past them.

The course twisted around the scraggly tree trunks and past more jagged outcroppings. Then the trees thinned, and the path followed the top of a narrow ridge with a sharp drop on either side. One wrong step and someone would end up tumbling down a steep slope of sharp shale into more scraggly, half-dead bushes on one side or a fast-moving river on the other.

I glanced behind me to confirm the men I'd passed weren't close enough to push me off then hurried forward before they were.

The scrubby side of the ridge rose, and the path plunged back into the trees, but the side with the river remained steep and dangerous to my right and I kept to the left, thankful that the men I'd passed were falling farther and farther behind.

Except I didn't know how long that would last. My body was starting to burn with the effort to keep running and I had no idea how much farther I had to go.

Ahead, the path made another sharp turn, and I ran out of the trees into a clearing as one of the novices ahead of me tried to run across a log bridge spanning a stream and fell the good five feet into the water below. A few other novices — none of them fae or the five trained humans — were wading through the hip-deep water or climbing the almost sheer bank on the other side to get out.

Which meant I was going to have to run across the log and hope I didn't fall, or jump down and then figure out how to climb up without help, since I doubted anyone was going to give me a hand up. Maybe if I got lucky I'd find a foothold?—

One of the men braced his toe in a crack in the rocks but couldn't get a good enough foothold to lift himself up.

"Hey, give me a hand," he called up to a taller guy who'd managed to climb out by himself.

The man reached down and offered him a hand then glanced up and gave me a dark look.

"Me, too," said the man who'd fallen in the water when I'd rounded the curve as he waded toward them.

"Sure, but not the lord ," the taller guy replied, as if his look hadn't been clear enough.

Swell. If I jumped down, I could get stuck in the ravine until someone came to help me or I'd have to risk going up or down the stream to find an easier way out. What were the odds that the easier way out was still within the path's magical protection?

All right. The log bridge then. It was narrow. I could probably straddle it and inch my way along. I'd be ridiculed if the guys on the other side saw what I was doing, but it was the best option since it was going to be impossible to climb the bank on the other side without help.

Straddling meant I wouldn't fall, but it would also leave me vulnerable… which meant I was going to have to wait for the men on the other side to run out of sight before attempting to cross.

Except I could hear the footsteps of the men behind me drawing closer and if they jumped into the stream while I was straddling the log, they could pull me down and I'd be back to the problem on being too short to get out.

Running and praying I didn't fall was my only option… and then praying I could dodge the guys on the other side before they shoved me off the ledge and into the stream.

I sucked in a deep breath and waited for the tall guy to reach to help the second guy up the bank, then ran as fast as I could. I just needed to keep my balance for a few steps, that was all.

My foot hit the center of the log then my other foot hit center, two more steps then I started to tilt to the side. My next step was on the log's edge. I had at least three more steps to go to get across but knew only one more was going to land on the log. Crap crap crap crap.

With a yell, I took that final step and dove for the other side. I flew over the rest of the log and curled into a ball at the last second. My shoulder and back hit the ground, the impact making the bruise on my chest complain, and I rolled up to my feet and kept going, bolting down the path before the men could grab me and toss me into the stream.

I ran, my lungs burning and my body throbbing, determined to put as much distance between us. They'd already passed me once and I hoped they'd only gotten ahead of me because I'd fallen down that first hill and not because they were actually faster than me.

But I didn't want to bet on that. I forced myself to keep moving forward, one foot in front of the other, until I fought my way up another steep slope and looked down on the two boulders marking the path's entrance and the practice field beyond. Lord Rider, Lord Quill, and Talon waited by the boulders while all the fae and just over a dozen humans sat or stood nearby in various stages of trying to regain their breaths.

Talon raised an eyebrow when I jogged off the path and Lord Rider narrowed his eyes.

"You've had your pants less than half a shift and you've already ripped them," he said his voice gruff. "Better be more careful. You won't get new ones until the end of the second rotation."

"Yes, my lord," I murmured, dropping my gaze on instinct before remembering I was supposed to look up. Always look up.

I snapped my gaze back up but the damage had been done. Now everyone had seen how I demurred to the Lord Commander, and I could see in their appraising expressions and hard looks the knowledge that I was weak and they were going to take advantage of it. I'd seen that look in Edred's and Pylos's eyes, although their look had been darker, not just determined to show me I didn't belong or where my place actually was, but to take pleasure in hurting and belittling me.

"You all right?" Talon asked, his voice so low I almost didn't hear him, and it still sent a shiver of need rushing down my spine.

I didn't know how it was possible. He'd barely spoken, but just that whisper reminded my body of what I'd seen and felt and desired last night.

"Just tripped," I replied, and I found a mostly flat patch of rocky ground away from the others to catch my breath while we waited for the rest of the novices.

"Stupid and clumsy," someone said just loud enough for me to hear, making the group of men, both human and fae, snicker.

"Do you think he'll even bother to fix them?" someone else asked.

"Probably doesn't know how," another man replied.

The novices I'd passed at the log bridge crested the hill and staggered into the practice area, and a short while later the last group half jogged half walked over the hill, gasping, their chests heaving with the exertion.

"Follow me," Lord Rider commanded before the last group had even passed between the boulders.

He led us along the edge of the practice yard, keeping out of the way of the men sparring with and without weapons, to the archery targets. There were eight targets set up and the last eight people to finish the course were each given a bow and arrow and told to shoot first.

It seemed cruel that the men still out of breath weren't given a chance to calm their pulse. If the Lord Commander really wanted to see how well these men performed, he should have gone with the most rested first. Then he'd get an accurate assessment of everyone's skills.

The first group released their arrows. Six of the ten missed completely, while the other four hit the hay behind the target or the outside edge of the target.

"Next," Lord Rider barked, and Lord Quill called out the names of the next eight, including mine.

I took a bow from the heavy-set apprentice chief and an arrow from Quill — glimpsing into his eyes for a second before managing to heave my attention away — and stepped up to the line in front of a target. The bow was my best weapon even though I preferred the sword, probably because size and strength didn't matter as much with a bow.

I drew in a slow breath and concentrated on calming my body like the armsmaster before Pylos had taught me. Be still, be calm, center myself in my body, and focus. Except everyone was watching me, waiting for me to fail, and while I'd had a bit of time to rest, my pulse was still a little fast from running.

The man beside me released his arrow, the twang of the bowstring biting into my concentration.

I sucked in another breath and released it. There wasn't anything else around, just the target in front of me, the bow and arrow in my hands, and the soft hint of a breeze coming from my right and slightly behind. The twang of more arrows being released grew farther and farther away and my attention narrowed to the small black circle in the center of the target and the whisper of wind.

Another breath in then release, and I nocked the arrow, raised the bow, and drew back the string. My muscles complained, my arms sore from mucking the stables and my chest throbbing from the bruise and falling down on the trail, and my palms and chin stung where I'd scraped them.

I shoved those sensations aside, drew in one final breath, aimed — taking into account the distance and the breeze — and released the arrow. It shot true, landing in the center of the black dot with a solid thud . Perfect shot!

A murmur swept through the men behind me. See, I wasn't completely useless. I bit back a satisfied smile, since gloating was rude and I didn't want to give them more reason to hate me, and turned to hand my bow to the next novice. The other novices looked at me, some clearly shocked that I'd actually hit the target, while Lord Quill's expression turned appraising, and Talon smiled, clearly pleased at my success.

Pride warmed my chest. This was the first time anyone other than my first armsmaster had looked at me with approval for doing the thing I loved that as a woman I wasn't supposed to do. I'd hit the mark and no one was going to yell at me for not behaving properly.

I slid my attention to Lord Rider. He didn't look impressed like everyone else. "That's only a good shot if you hadn't taken forever to make it. A shadow isn't going to let you stand around and wait for you to get ready. You'd have been dead twice over before you'd even raised your bow," he said then looked away from me, his dismissal clear. "Next."

The warmth in my chest chilled as the next group took their positions. This had three of the two experienced humans and a few fae and while they got close to the black mark in the center none of them hit it. Except that didn't make me feel better. They all just raised their bows and fired without taking any time to center themselves and focus, making Lord Rider look at them with gruff satisfaction.

And I couldn't figure out why that stung. I wasn't supposed to be impressing Lord Rider or anyone else. I was just supposed to keep my head down until Sawyer was safe. But I'd made a perfect shot and he hadn't even acknowledged it as good. Of course, he was right. Even if I'd had a bow last night, I wouldn't have had a chance of using it before those shadow monsters had come after me.

But knowing that still didn't make it hurt less. I hadn't done anything right since I'd come here, and while I should have been used to not being acknowledged and browbeaten, a small part of me had hoped it would be different. Here I wasn't a woman. I was supposed to have value. But my fellow novices and probably most of the Guard thought I was an arrogant noble.