The time had come for my final test. One more test and I would be able to end my day of training. Bhaltair was waiting for me in the courtyard. It was virtually the only time I ever saw him, and he always greeted me the same way.
“Let's begin,” he said. His devilish smile creeped out from under his dark brown eyes. I knew full well what to expect as he pulled out a wooden staff from a training rack and slowly began walking around me in a circle. After a few moments, he struck me across the back.
I recovered and stared straight ahead in silence as he continued circling. “You're weak, but you don't have to stay weak.” His voice was quiet and had a psychotic ring to it. “I will help you.”
He struck me again, this time across the shoulder. “I will make you stronger.”
He paused for a moment. “You are holding your stance quite well today. I wasn't sure because of the pellet I took, or because I was just getting used to taking a beating, but he was right. I wasn't shaking like before.
I was completely calm and prepared for his attacks.
“you seem to have quite a bit of fight left in you.” His speech was elegant, but every time I heard his voice the only thing I could think of was how much I wanted to punch him.
The only way I endured it was by focusing on that feeling, the anger I felt. The moment it turned to sorrow it was over. I had to stay angry, at least until he was done. Feeling nothing didn't work either, if I did that I would relax, and suddenly each impact hurt far more.
‘Stay tense…’
He set down the staff and continued circling around me. “The kidneys, the liver. And of course the stomach. When you get into a fight, most people will cover their faces, and keep their arms high. Any experienced fighter knows that.”
“Because of that, the first strike will almost always be to the core.” He hit me straight in the stomach with his fist. I took the hit standing, my feet rooted into the ground but even with my core tightened I had to gasp for air.
He struck me again and again, hitting my sides and back. He stretched out my arms and struck those as well.
By the end of it, he had done 100 strikes at each part of my body. They weren't at his full strength, or anywhere near it I imagined, but to me, each strike felt like a brick launched from a catapult.
“No blood this time. That's an improvement. Well done.” he said, inspecting my skin for severity of damage.
“I try not to disappoint…”
He paused and looked at me for a moment. ‘I don't get him at all… At moments like this, he is always so calm, emotionless.’
“Yes well… we're not done yet are we.” There is still your left arm. Since it's bandaged I'd assume you hurt it quite badly, which of course means this will only be more painful. You probably won't be able to hold it up while I do this so I will strap it to the table.
I started shaking my head as he grabbed my hand, dragging me across the courtyard. “It needs to heal, if you do this it will only make it worse!”
“Please, I'm the professional here. I won't hit it as hard as the rest of your body, but I admit it will probably feel like the wound is getting worse. It will start bleeding again too. Although, since it's not broken I can still do this much.”
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I bit my lip, continuing to shake my head as The simple truth was that even though I may have been pretending to resist I wasn't actually fighting back at all. It was like I was a lamb to the slaughter.
He strapped my arm down just like he said, tightening leather straps around it just above the elbow and below the writs.
“100 strikes.” He said out loud before staring. The muscles in my arm tensed and began shaking violently as he struck it until eventually, the muscles failed completely.
It hurt so badly that the tears I had been holding back began to flow freely from my eyes. Even so, I kept my screams to myself. By the end of it, the bandages my brother had wrapped it in were soaked through with blood from the wound.
When it was all said and done he wiped his hands clean with an embroidered towel, as if he was getting rid of the filth after touching me.
There was no possible reason for him to put me through something like that… When I was dealing with Mara things were different. I could somewhat justify anything she did. The brutal training was to make me stronger.
Whenever I was with Bhaltair though, I never saw any real purpose to how hard he would strike me. It often felt like my body was too broken down to ever actually repair itself stronger. It was like he was trying to beat me into submission, rather than actually help me grow…
After wiping his hands, he unbuckled the leather straps holding my arm to the table. I could feel the nerves in my arm burning so intensely that it made my legs weak, and as soon as my body realized it was over I slowly lowered myself to the ground, wiping the tears from my eyes.
He walked over to the middle of the courtyard and kneeled on the ground facing me. “Right. Now that that's over with, come here so we can train your ligaments and your tendons.”
A part of me tried to stand up, but there was too much resistance, a much larger part of me was perfectly content with him being at a distance. He was too far away to hurt me anymore, I didn't want to go closer to him.
I opened my mouth but nothing came out, not even a whimper. ‘If I go over there willingly… I won't get punished…’
“Ahh that's adorable, are you finally having trouble speaking? I guess we put you through some good training today.”
‘Good training? What about any of this was good…’
He patted the ground in front of him like he was calling a dog. “Now, come here, don't make me ask you again.”
Using my better arm I pushed myself back up to my feet and slowly walked over. ‘I just have to make it through this and everything will be fine…’
Ligament training… It was simple, and actually far less painful than everything else I had done that day. At that point, I was only really trying to avoid it out of instinct, rather than it being harsh.
He would move my joints in and out of positions that stressed the ligaments First the knees, then the ankles, the hips and shoulders, the elbows, fingers and toes, and finally the back and wrists. He was too scared to try it on my neck for fear of breaking it, but everywhere else was fair game.
The stress that he put on my joints was immense, and hurt quite a bit, each time feeling like a stretch that went too far, as he intentionally bent everything the wrong way as far as he could without snapping it.
Somehow he never actually tore anything though. I had had nightmares about it happening before, but as years went by none of them ever came true, so eventually I stopped being afraid of it.
I ended up developing a trust of sorts that he wouldn't dislocate or tear anything, but ultimately that trust I had didn't mean anything, because even if he did tear something, I wouldn't be able to stop him or fight back.
My mind went completely blank until he had finished, and when the time finally came that he was done manipulating my body, all of my joints ached. They no longer just hurt from the bruising, but I could feel the internal structures trying desperately to repair and strengthen themselves.
‘It's finally over.’
The ground was cold against my back, but I didn't mind. I just stared up at the sky, finally feeling at peace. At that exact moment in time, I wasn't sure if I would have cared if I was lying on a bed of nails, the euphoria I was feeling was too strong for me to feel anything other than relief.
“One more thing.”
I felt my heart begin to pound, and my adrenaline spike. It had happened so many times that my chest began to hurt as my blood pressure increased.
“It's just a simple test, nothing too serious.”
I pushed myself up to see what he was doing.
He walked over to the training rack and unrolled a small bag that had several knives in it, pulling out the two on the end. “I will have to cut you a few times, but as long as you stay still it won't be that deep.”
I laid back down. “Do what you want, but I'm not standing up again…”
He sighed as he gathered the tools and walked back over. I didn't want to look, so I closed my eyes, but the uneasy feeling of him standing over me with a knife was all too present.
“ I'm going to attempt to cut you at three points. Firstly your forearm, where you have the thickest layer of protective skin. Then in the largest part of your back, where you should have built up the most resistance through training, and finally your shoulder, which will be the most vulnerable of the three sights. I'm not expecting a great result, but I have been training you for a while now, so you should do well, even if you are a relatively young girl.
“Just…” My voice was so quiet I only pronounced half the syllables when I first tried to speak. “Just get it over with.”
‘Go ahead and stab dig into me with those knives you like so much… One of these days I’ll put one in you.’ A chill went down my spine and I looked down at my shaking hands.
‘Put a knife in him?’ the thought made me want to vomit. ‘Could I really do that?’
Playing through it in my mind I came to the conclusion I didn’t have the stomach to kill someone… To get even though? I had been training my whole life to work with weapons. It would be enough to leave a couple scars on his pretty face.