Seth faced the dummy before him, catching Alnon's departure out of the corner of his eye.
“With both hands, horse shit!” Igor barked, and Seth added his left hand to the hilt.
In the brief period it took from his arrival to the conclusion of this painful event, his minds catalogued the priest called Igor. Igor was an athletic looking man, though Seth wasn’t very sure, considering most of him was hidden by a white cassock that did not hug his body, swaying with every move he made. However, easy to identify was his height. He was of average height, at best an inch or two above average, somewhere on the end scales of five feet closing in on six. He bore a scar on the back of the hand that held his cane which was odd because Seth had never seen a soul mage with a scar. According to Jonathan, their healing factor powered by the reia coursing through them did not allow it.
To best describe Igor, he had strong, squared jaw lines with stubbles scattered all over to give his pale complexion a shadowed outline. He had a mop of dark blonde hair that fell to rest just above his brows and watched each child with eyes the color of a lightless night.
Igor stood before Seth now and Seth noted how the others took advantage of the new silence to rest as he surveyed.
Igor watched Seth with a scrutinizing attention that reminded him of how children who lived in the slums back home watched particularly interesting targets, gauging and calculating, finding exploitable flaws. But where the children watched for a crack in a defense they could exploit, it was clear Igor was looking for one to seal, something to correct. His eyes lowered to Seth’s feet and he opened his mouth. He closed it immediately after without a word, thinking better of whatever he wanted to say.
He glanced at Seth’s feet, again with an odd look. They were as they had always been since learning from Jabari; one mere inches ahead of the other.
“Blue!” Igor barked, and Seth and the other children broke into a false rhythm of strikes. Colors suffered as they bore the brunt of wooden attacks.
The children did this for what seemed like hours, striking at every beckon and command Igor gave. He walked amongst them as they did this, correcting and punishing as he saw fit. Seth noticed he never gave compliments even when he found something acceptable. Igor displayed his satisfaction in nothing but simple nods. On occasion he pulled out his cane and brought it down without mercy, always in a single stroke for a single offense. Seth suffered the brunt of Igor’s disapproval on three occasions and knew he’d have the marks of it to last more than a day. But he was proud to know that he didn’t fall, nothing but muffled cries ever left his lips.
The sun had since peaked on its throne in the sky only to be usurped, teasing at the pale of orange that came with the growing dusk when they were called away from their tasks.
They assembled themselves in a poor cavalcade of a line, twelve children, exhausted and sore. Seth was the only person who looked truly starved when compared to his new peers. He tried not to let it bother him but it would be a lie to claim that he succeeded.
Igor on his part stood before them, cane in hand, observing as watchers do. But there was a certain air to him, one Seth had come to realize within these few hours he hadn’t even counted was the herald of pain.
“Fin Naberal,” Igor said. “Let’s see if you can hold on to yourself just a little longer.”
Fin, the boy who Seth had watched suffer the brunt of the priest’s punishment, walked out as if a prisoner to the gallows. He was a child who had accepted his fate. He held his wooden sword in two hands, and while it trembled, he did naught to object or retreat. He seemed quite accepting of whatever was about to happen.
Igor tapped his cane against his legs. A rhythmic thwack filled the air in some forbidden symphony. It ended once the Fin was properly in place.
“Take your stance,” Igor commanded with disinterest.
Once Fin obeyed, everything changed.
Igor’s stance changed, and something in the atmosphere settled. It was not the changing of the sun to the moon or dusk to dawn. It was not the kind of change that a child notes in the difference between raw ingredients and the finished process of the meal their mother places before them. No. It was a more subliminal change, the kind one did not notice unless they were watching. It was the difference between the color red and ox blood.
But Seth saw it, observed it. It was there in the mild bend in Igor’s knees, the ease in his shoulders, the quiet sharpening in his eyes. What had once held disinterest and the occasional ire now held retribution, as if he was a god whom they had sinned against.
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In a small voice, tiny enough to go unheard, Igor said, “Defend, child.”
Then he moved.
The action was a blur, carrying Igor across the distance between him and the child. When he arrived where Fin was, it was with a crack the likes of which scared Seth senseless. The sound reverberated everywhere. It was the sound of wood meeting bone where it should’ve been wood meeting flesh.
Fin stumbled back, rivulets of blood dripping from a gash in his skull that hadn’t been there a moment ago, before he fell to his butt. His wooden sword fell from his hand and Seth fought the instinct to look away. He had known Jabari had done a lot of brutal things while bringing him here, but he had never seen any of them.
Knowing was a vastly different thing from experiencing.
After a brief while taken to regain some of his faculties, Fin exited his place in a crawl, remembering to take his wooden sword along with him.
He was replaced promptly by another boy, this one was with hair the color of wheat. He was a lithe thing. He was almost as tall as Fin and moved with an odd sway to hips he did not have.
When he stood in place, he did not tremble. He held his sword in a low stance, both hands in a tight grip around its hilt and the tip of the weapon stayed down and to his right side.
When he crouched into stance with a confidence a child his age should not have, Igor sighed.
“With all your talent, you never listen,” he said. “That stance suits you poorly.”
The child seemed to ignore him. Without preamble or need to respond, he darted forward, sword still held to the side so that it trailed after him as he ran.
Igor shook his head in exasperation. His mop of hair bounced with the action. He stood where he was, cane held out to his side and an arm rested behind him, casual now more than ever. “You are to defend, fool, not attack.”
The child seemed to take forever to meet Igor. When he did, he struck with the difficulty of someone who had been practicing well enough but not long enough.
The clack of wood against wood filled the air as Igor moved his cane to defend himself. The child spun on his feet, changing his point of attack to strike at the priest’s head. Igor’s response was smoother than the attack, and he blocked where Seth knew he could’ve parried.
When the child struck a third time, Igor parried. His parry stumbled the child backwards and Igor made an attack of his own. His cane took the boy in the stomach, doubling him over, then came down on top of his head.
Just as Fin before him, the boy fell. But he did not bleed.
Igor returned his attention to the line of boys, cane returned to his side. “Next!”
Seth noticed the priest hadn’t taken a step during this session against the wheat-haired child, and his free arm still remained behind him.
This process followed with the remaining children and none were able to break the Reverend’s defense, let alone touch him. It was understandable, considering the plan was to defend not attack, in which they also failed. It wasn’t to say that some did not follow in the footsteps of the boy that succeeded Fin, taking the initiative at attack.
In this they failed, too, perhaps worse than the boy they emulated. Still, Fin was the only true casualty.
Seth was not last, but he was somewhere close enough. He preceded the fat boy. When it was his turn, he was called by name.
“Al Jabari.”
…………………………………
Seth walked up to place, moving to stand where the others before him had stood—where they had suffered. His double-handed hold on his sword felt awkward, but it was required. He lowered his knees and even the stance felt odd.
“You stand strangely,” Igor told him, his tone skeptical yet curious.
Seth frowned, not truly confused at the priest’s words. He was simply displeased. Still, Igor must have taken the expression for confusion because he motioned with his head, gesturing at Seth’s feet. Seth looked down momentarily and found their placement as they have always been.
We know this is going to hurt, right? one of his minds asked.
Seth nodded. “I know.”
He leaned forward, intending to attack first when the world around him shifted mildly like the distortion of heatwaves. In its place was something familiar and of molded embers, black as shavings of the night. It lilted in the evening air, a message to an unwilling child.
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Event Inbound
Calculating Event… Calculating Event… Calculating Event…
Calculation Failed.
Divining Events… Divining Events… Divining Events…
Divination Capability Nonexistent.
Divination Failed.
…
…
Recalculating… Recalculating… Recalculating…
…
Event Uncovered.
…
…
New Event: [Four Strikes].
A test has been put to you by Reverend Igor of the Seminary. He has brought it upon himself to test your ability in physical contest. The decision has been made that you defend yourself against him. Do so to the best of your ability.
Objective: [Defend Yourself Against Reverend Igor: 0/4].
Reward: Unknown.
Consequence: Pain.
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Seth had barely finished reading when movement caught his attention. His head tilted curiously, the motes of black ember shattering into nothingness.
Oh, shit! one of his minds muttered, moments before another roared.
DEFEND YOURSELF!!!
Before him, Seth felt something whisper barely a moment after he braced himself for impact and knew that this time his thoughts were not to be ignored.
Something was coming. He knew in his heart that it was something he could not avoid.
Igor moved.