No one told me that four years was how long it would take for me to become court-able. After Hala left, Namir and Asad pushed me past the limits with my training—after I spent six months skulking like a stray puppy. It took a year and some change for me to learn how to handle Asad’s armor without falling over myself, and another two years to be able to handle Namir’s devastating blows from his tonfas. I could feel each strike, shuddering and rippling into my core, as if he were trying to knock out the Fiid that had crept into my body when she left. And part of me still believes it was a Fiid that had taken control over me during those six months. I was mean. Worse than mean. I’d become an outright prick to anyone who mentioned Hala around me, getting chastised for it several times when Jamila conveniently brought up a funny little story from our childhood during a nobleman’s housewarming party.
I was insufferable, spitting venom and frothing at the maw over such petulant things; the only reason I stopped snapping and biting at people with my words was because Asad finally had the bright idea of plopping me into the ring with Namir. And part of me wondered if these training lessons were as much a release for him as it was an endurance test for me.
My chest was heaving, sputtering for the tiniest bit of oxygen after being slammed to the ground. I hadn’t the time to take my tunic off before Namir began our first sparring session of the week. The cotton from my shirt was suffocating me, even more than the blow I’d just taken, making my skin feel as restricted as my lungs. No matter how hard I willed my breathing to cater to my requests, each breath I tried to draw in was returned by my chest forcing it back out. And the sun beating down on me in the middle of the summer with that damned tunic on made me feel like mutton being smoked alive, wool and all. Despite being breathless, it felt like my sternum was going to burst, and I couldn’t get to my feet if my life had depended on it.
In, out out out.
In, out out out.
It took almost twenty minutes for me to get a few breaths in and out on my own.
“Get up, Skwayar.” Namir barked.
It was going to be a bad time. I didn’t even have to hear him speak; I could tell by how the gargantuan man squared his shoulders as I walked into the sparring ring moments ago that he was having a difficult day. His eyes…they could sear into me, like a ray of sun through a prism. I laid there, looking up at him in a way I’m sure made him feel nothing but disgust. He clenched his jaw, loosening a breath, and tightened his grip on the tonfa in his left hand. I shot up in response. Namir was always able to scare the shit out of me, it didn’t matter if he was trying to swoon me into going to a social gathering, or tan my hide over speaking too casually with a noble. The King’s presence alone was daunting, enough so that I had to master keeping a straight face within my first year living in the palace. His head cocked to the side as he inspected me and my miraculous recovery, in a way nothing short of predatory, and his eyes narrowed on my poor stance. Namir in the sparring ring was a completely different entity.
“Too wide. Shoulder’s length, boy.”
I adjusted my feet. Shit. He was right. I felt my center of gravity become stronger, more fortified, as my feet became parallel with my shoulders. It was only a few centimeters, but it made all the difference in combat. A few centimeters is the difference between life and death on the battlefield. In a swift movement, I freed myself of the shirt that was about to make me roar out in rage. Soft fabric felt like steel wool on my forearms and chest. In the seconds between the shirt meeting my eyes, and coming over my head, I felt another blow to my abdomen. A familiar gasp came from the other side of the sparring ring. I almost fell again, but my feet were firmly planted in the ground. When I finally realized what happened, Namir was smiling.
“Better.”
I loosed a breath, feeling my diaphragm cramp from the pain his tonfas had inflicted, and he withdrew the baton from my stomach. I made my move. Foolish, but just foolish enough for him not to see it coming. I felt my hand make contact with his wrist, and bend it in on itself until I heard the closest thing this beast would ever make to a yelp. His left hand cocked back, tonfa tight in grip, and I side-stepped it as I readjusted my hand on his wrist. Thank God. The tonfa in his right hand fell. I almost chuckled. He grunted with dissatisfaction before I felt a slam into my nose; cold, hard metal striking it with such brute force it could take down a Yellow Meranti. I had to stifle my groan as I scrambled to regain my senses, my vision blurring as sparks of white floated in and out. I didn’t clutch my nose, I ducked. I knew the next blow to come would have been for my stomach, and if I’d been any slower I’d have gotten that same cold metal to the forehead.
My head was still spinning, but I had to move, move, move. On the battlefield, there aren’t timeouts. There aren’t breathers. There are only strikes meant to hinder, and strikes meant to kill. I had to think. My vision finally returning from its vignette state, I looked around. Nothing. Nothing but a shitty old chain and sickle sat in the far side of the ring. Behind Namir. I cursed under my breath as I realized the lesson for today: lure your enemy away from the one thing you need to escape captivity, or kill them entirely. I had kept my eyes on the sickle for too long, because Namir had begun stalking towards me in that menacing way. Like a tiger, sauntering to its killed meal, he got closer and closer. A glimmer shone in his brown and green flecked eyes, like a fire cracking and releasing embers as he saw my mind working out its plan.
“What will you do, Skwayar?” He asked as his grin grew wider.
His taunt only served to enrage me more as my nose throbbed. The sound of my heartbeat thumped louder and louder, roaring with the thundering anguish my face was feeling. I had to breathe. I looked from Namir to the sickle once more, and back to Namir as I thought.
I was going to do what I did best: run. In a breath’s time I was bolstering towards Namir, and he readied his fighting stance. I had one shot to do this right, to properly execute my plan; or get another tonfa to the face. My knees hit the ground just under a meter from him, and I slid so far I was rather impressed. I went under his right arm, past him, and towards the chain and sickle that lay before me. In another swift movement, I was up and running. I had the weapon within my reach, a hair shy of grabbing it when I felt my neck jerk back as Namir’s tree-trunk of a forearm subdued me, slamming me to the ground once more. How was a man this big so fucking fast?
I groaned in pain, feeling the earth shift beneath me. If the folklorish creatures I’d read about existed, he’d be one of them. He’d be a Blessed One, with the size of a mountain and ferocity of a panther. Powerful enough to shatter worlds with the snap of a finger, and bury kingdoms beneath the pits of the earth’s chasms. If he were a folklorish being, he’d have been sang of and depicted in theatre plays I’d have no business being a part of. In comparison, I’m nothing more than a Fiid, sucking the energy out of those around them.
The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.
I knew by the look in Namir’s eyes that he could see the self-defeat in my expression. The fire in his eyes dimmed a bit, as he offered a hand to help me up. We spent many days like that: with him in a sour mood, beating me senseless, only to soften when he’d gone too far. Sometimes, his mood was because of things I’d done as an emissary; vitriolic statements aimed at noblemen who treated women like prized possessions, or watched them like hungry animals. Sometimes, his mood was due to missing Hala. I could always tell by his eyes—whether the green shone in a more amber hue, or dulled in a muted jade amongst the majority-brown outer pupil.
——
It was a regular occurrence over that fourth year of training for more of the palace maidens to spend their free time watching us. Even when Fatiha came to visit with her sisters, they’d watch me in a tangibly lustful manner. I always felt odd, considering I’d known them since I was ten. They saw who I was as a boy, and it made it even more difficult to comprehend how their demeanors had shifted. They once looked right past me, and now here I was—being gawked at as if I were a noble, myself.
“You’ve started getting quite the audience, haven’t you?” Namir smirked as we entered the sparring ring. It had been so many days in a row of training at that point, that I didn’t have the energy to spit back in kind with a smart ass remark.
I grumbled, taking my tunic off and hearing a few murmurs. My cheeks grew hotter, and I hoped it could be seen as the sun’s warmth bringing a flush to them. In a matter of minutes, we were sparring. It was so fast that I had a hard time keeping focused, partially due to the whispers of the sisters and another familiar voice—one I’d heard so many months before when I’d tried taking that wretched sickle from behind Namir. Jamila. Her voice was no longer mocking in tone, but sultry and thick with desire. She didn’t keep her voice down when talking to the tradesman’s daughters.
“I truly don’t understand why he keeps ignoring me.” She whined.
A whisper just audible enough for my ears to catch spoke up: Fatiha. “Maybe because you went out of your way to make Al’Hala’s courting process a living Hell?”
I bristled before Jamila’s voice rang through the air once more, one of Namir’s tonfas landing on my upper ribs. “I did no such thing.” She replied.
I had to keep my attention on the task at hand: don’t get the shit beaten out of me. Side step his right, duck when he cocks back for the left. Get behind him. Try to aim for the pressure point. I had stopped listening to the conversation by now, bobbing and weaving Namir’s attempts to hit me. I knew he could hear the conversation, and I wasn’t entirely sure what distracted him enough to illicit him turning his head towards the girls. I made my move, striking the pressure point at his neck with my right hand and watching his left arm go limp. He looked at me over his shoulder, both impressed and pissed off.
“Don’t go thinking you have me beat.” He chuckled.
In the same heartbeat, he swung around and his right arm was coming for me at full force. Side step. Miss. I didn’t have to duck this time, so I made a blow of my own—one of few I’d ever managed to land on the beast of a King before me. His abdomen was stronger than platinum itself. Paired with my growing strength, the reverberations of the punch sang into my bones. I gritted my teeth and forced the fist deeper into his gut, I heard the closest thing to a groan of pain from him in that moment. Namir actually stumbled a bit—whether for show, or truly sent off balance. My eyes widened reflexively, and I sent my right fist into his stomach, driving even more force into the blow. This was the first time I’d seen Namir falter in training; I didn’t care whether he was doing it to help me impress these women or not—I was going to go all out to claim victory.
I hammered my fists furiously into the man, as if he were that Duke. The same man who had sent us countless letters in response, saying that Hala was doing well—that she was happy. She never came to any Socials, never came to birthday parties Namir held for me; never came to reunions for Namir and Haya’s wedding anniversaries. I was more than angry—I was outraged. Hala wasn’t the type to miss such events, and the only thing I could do about it was send my anger into this training.
“Skwayar.” Namir said, his voice low and threatening as he stumbled further.
I didn’t care. I was sending myself full-throttle into my swings, and seeing Namir lose his footing was satisfying. He must have noticed the distant look in my eyes as I ruminated on Hala’s absence, because once he regained sensation in his left arm I could only see the world spinning as my back slammed into the earth beneath me. The pain wasn’t as paralyzing as it had been when he and I first began training, I actually let out a laugh. Namir’s eyes were serious as they bore down at me, until he heard the laughter. They softened, and he shook his head as he let out a breath of his own laughter.
“Do that to a member of the Sixth Battalion, and they’d be done for.” He smirked, releasing a tonfa and offering me a hand to stand up. I took it, brushing off my pants and snickering at the comment.
“I’d be honored.” I replied, a glimmer in my eyes.
The women who has been watching us fell silent, nothing short of breathless at how we sparred. I looked over to them, purposefully making eye contact with Jamila as I smiled. If she was going to play dirty, I would as well.
————
After training, I made my way back towards the Grand Building. I always walked with more purpose after letting off some steam. I thought I was alone, hearing nothing but my own footsteps as I walked down the paved path. Until a familiar voice called for me.
“Idris!” The voice crooned.
I rolled my eyes before turning around, balling my shirt up in my hand. “What is it, Jamila?” I asked, annoyance lining my voice.
“I just wanted to say hi, Themaz.” She replied. I almost crawled out of my skin. Never did I want to hear her call me that.
“Hey.” I smiled facetiously, shrugging a bit as my hands waved.
“You seem so tense lately…is everything alright?” She asked. Was that…genuine concern in her voice?
No. She was being a two-faced harlot, and I had to play along in order to play her game. I had two ways to play this interaction: a grief-stricken young man who missed his first friend, or a stoic and brooding asshole. I eyed the book she had tucked between her arm, recalling Fatiha telling me about it a few weeks ago. A romance, where the love interest was a harsh man with little regard for others until meeting the main character.
“Life can’t always be masterfully written, Jamila. I’m still upset over the past, is all.” I said, lifting my gaze from the book to her eyes. I wore as mournful an expression I could muster, maybe even showing some of the true pain I felt.
She was a pretty girl, but her personality was enough to make me want as little interaction as possible—unfortunately for me, her brother was still a member of the Sixth Battalion despite her father’s treachery. She looked at me with what may have been pity, as she gripped the book tighter to her chest. I walked back a few steps before she spoke up again.
“If you ever grow tired of the past, and need something to look forward to…you know where my family lives, Idris.”
God, I wished I could earn a new name already. Not that I’d brought the topic up with Namir, or anything, but I still hated my name with a passion. I shrugged, loosing a breath.
“Your company is as soothing as fish brine.” I said, offering a teasing smile as I turned back around. I made my way towards my destination, hearing her footsteps dissipate behind me. Maybe one day I’d bring up how much I disdained my name.