"There has been a change of plans."
Having just woken up, those were the last words Irene wanted to hear.
After dinner the previous night when there was a lull in talking and everyone was left to their thoughts, Irene found it impossible to sleep and spent much of the night tossing and turning. Well, at least tossing and turning until Sir Phillip shouted from one of the other beds "if one of you rolls again I’m going to send you to sleep in the stables".
After that, she at least held still even if she couldn’t sleep.
Morning came too quickly and the girl felt exhausted. However, duty pulled her from the warmth of her bed and she sat up.
"Sir Gunnar, what shall we do instead?" she asked.
"Might as well keep moving," the knight announced. "Apprentices, go to the village square for a bit of practice."
The girl slouched for a moment, but she wasn’t the only one resistant to going out in the cold.
When Sir Gunnar cleared his throat, he was met with a barrage of "Yes, sir!" and felt finally satisfied with the responses.
Their change of plans was due to a higher authority from a nearby township to aid in the investigation on request of the King. Of course, His Majesty had been communicated to using magic in a nearby area.
Irene had a pessimistic chain of thought as she wondered if the King sending his children on these diplomatic sorts of trips was on purpose so he wouldn’t have to face harm.
She quickly cut off that sort of thinking knowing that it was because she had been spending too much time around Chemoian knights who felt slighted by the Royal Family for decades.
As the apprentices walked down the hallway after putting on all the gear to keep them warm, they were stopped just short of the stairs because of shouting from the third level.
"You will not leave this room!" a woman shouted. "These are His Majesty’s orders!"
"What is the point in staying put when there are so many knights here?"
Irene realized the second voice was that of the Princess.
"Marie, you will listen!"
And that was the Crown Prince.
Not wanting to be accused of eavesdropping, the apprentices moved much more quickly down the stairs and to the front of the inn where knights were already waiting for them. The men were always much easier to wake in the mornings than the teenage apprentices.
The sheer coldness of winter struck each one the second they made it out the door. Their scarves were immediately pulled over their noses as they found the knights and stood in front of them.
They were somewhat shocked to see more than Sir Gunnar out there. Each apprentice was placed in front of the knight they had been assigned back at the Duke’s Tower. Thɪs chapter is updatᴇd by NoveI-Fire.ɴet
Irene’s head swiveled left and right as she took the scene and then she looked up at Sir Gunnar.
Ever attuned to her expressions even though he could merely see her reddish eyebrows knitting together in confusion, he answered her question almost immediately.
"We all need to blow off a bit of steam," the knight announced. "We will be warming up and working with our partners this morning. What better way to get our hearts pumping than a spar after we’ve warmed up?"
"Sir?" Irene questioned. "There aren’t practice swords here."
"And there won’t be until we reach the Earl’s home," he responded. "I suppose we’ll have to be careful this morning and work with sheathed weapons."
Each apprentice knew that meant the weight of their swords would be even heavier than normal, but they still did their best to remove the sheaths from their belts and attach them back to their waists.
"Shall we?" Gunnar asked.
"Yes, sir!" rang out through the village square.
Warm-ups that morning were done almost as usual but instead of the apprentice hitting into the air, they hit the sheathed weapons of their knights. Even after they spent a lot of their energy on warm-ups, the apprentices were then tasked with being the blocks for the knights who had much more powerful swings than them.
After that, they got to the part where they would have one on one spars and Irene was elated to finally be able to take on Sir Gunnar.
Since the morning practices usually involved other apprentices and Felix was the strongest person she could face, it was nice having someone even more challenging. She wondered if he would actually show her his strength or hold back so he wouldn’t hurt her.
She hoped it was the latter considering their weapons were still sheathed.
All three groups of sword spars were only focused on their opponents ahead.
Irene gently tapped her sword against Sir Gunnar’s before she walked a few spaces backward, wanting to give him space since his reach was far longer than hers.
There was a moment of pause before the girl decided to take advantage of the space and she sprinted forward.
She went low and slid on her knee which was padded with her riding pants and fortunately not on the direct ground since there was a layer of snow over everything.
With that, she caught the knight on top of his foot and thrust her blade upward, attempting a shot at his stomach but he sliced his blade upwards and caused her tip to be thrown off of course. She then blocked his downward swing since he was heavily relying on the upper hand.
It led him down to one knee where he was able to trap her with his blade.
Still smaller than the knight, Irene pushed the foot supporting his weight with both of her feet which helped her to propel away from him and get back to her feet. If he was truly going all out on her, she thought he might have caught her before then but it seemed throwing off his center of balance was enough to gain some time.
However, she didn’t have long to right herself before he went in with a full-on attack and his feint was taken seriously which allowed an opening that he could have slit her throat if he wanted to.
With his blade pointed directly at her throat just above her plate of chest armor, he grinned at her wolfishly—something she could see since his scarf had fallen off of his mouth.
"Left yourself open," he warned her.
"It is my defeat after all," she admitted and bowed in half.
Both of their shoulders were heaving since the spar was fast but it was effective.
Since all they were doing was waiting for Felix and Sir Eitan to finish their spar, the two knights and two apprentices watched the others finish up.
Irene’s eyes drifted to the inn that stood at the west of the village square and she noticed blue eyes staring back at her—well, she only knew they were blue because she had danced with the Princess from close enough to know that the girl had striking eyes.