Chapter Two: Cadets in Training

 

Kyosti Romalidan lowered his bow slowly, the arrow still shivering in the center of the target.

“And that’s how it’s done, soldiers,” he announced.

He turned around to face a jaded crowd of cadets from Roudusty’s Military Academy. They had arrived at the palace’s practice yards as the sun peeked its face over the horizon, and it was now past lunchtime. Many of them had cuts and bruises from practicing with the Queen’s Own Soldiers. They were hungry, dusty, and tired.

One of the young men leaned over to his companion and said behind his hand, “Bet he couldn’t do that with his eyes closed.” He made no effort to keep his voice low, and everyone standing around heard him. Many of the cadets glared at him, but a few stifled laughs. Captain Roudusty would have rebuked the cadet sharply, but she was off conversing with General Raleigh.

Kyosti tried, and failed, to keep a smile off his face. He looked to his side at Rodriguez, who stood straight and tall, legs planted firmly apart, arms crossed. Only someone who knew him well would have recognized the glazed-over look in his eyes.

“What do you think, Roddy?” Kyosti called. “Could I do it with my eyes closed?” The cadets hushed, some looking at him incredulously. Rodriguez had almost managed to impress them earlier in the morning by stoically beating three other opponents in a sword fight, so they probably thought of him as more of a military expert than Kyosti.

Rodriguez’s facial expressions did not change. “You’re free to show off in any way you see fit, Romalidan.”

The cadets laughed, and Kyosti turned away to hide his own smile. “So be it,” Kyosti decided. He beckoned to the young man who had made the challenge. The boy stepped forward slowly, fingers twitching like Kyosti was going to challenge him. The archer pulled his armband with the Queen’s Cross off, and offered it to the boy.

“Blindfold me,” Kyosti said. The boy was taller than he was, so he easily fitted the armband around the archer’s eyes.

“Spin me around,” Kyosti ordered. “Careful of the bow.”

The boy spun him ten or more times. When he pulled Kyosti to a halt, Kyosti made a show of dizziness, grabbing hold of the cadet’s arm to keep upright. The other cadets were laughing for real this time.

Kyosti waved the cadet out of his way and drew an arrow from his quiver with elaborate slowness. Fitting it into the bow, he drew back the string and pointed the arrow straight in front of him.

The cadets gasped. One of them said quickly, “Sir! You’re---”

“Let me concentrate, cadet,” Kyosti admonished.

He was full-blown grinning now. This part got the cadets every time.

Kyosti took in a deep breath, slowly--then, as he released the breath, he let go of the arrow.

The string slapped against his wrist guard right where it usually did. Kyosti could visualize the arrow flying straight and true--right past Rodriguez’s left ear to the center of the target behind him.

The young cadets let out a collective gasp, then cheered. Kyosti turned his head. “What happened?” he asked innocently. “Did I hit it?”

He just knew Rodriguez was rolling his eyes.

“That was beautiful, sir,” a cadet said as Kyosti tugged off the blindfold and tied it around his arm. The others murmured in agreement. “How did you learn that?”

Kyosti beckoned them closer, and they crowded forward eagerly. “A long-lost secret carried from Leonella all the way to the borders of our land. From the great desert to the Ben Sea, there is no technique like this one.”

The young cadets nodded eagerly. Even the skeptical boy from before looked interested.

Kyosti leaned back. “Practice until your arms feel like they’ll fall off,” he said.

At that point, Roudusty called for her cadets from her spot by Raleigh, and the cadets only had time to give Kyosti a couple disappointed and betrayed looks. He watched them go with a smile on his lips.

“You have disappointed so many cadets by using that line,” Rodriguez observed as he came to stand next to Kyosti.

“Well, you told me I couldn’t advise drinking red wine,” Kyosti pointed out. “So I had to go with something a tad less exciting.”

The practice field lay on the west side of the palace, a wide swath of patchy grass, stunted trees, and salty soil. Kyosti was a member of the morning group, which slumped onto the field before the sun had even risen and practiced while the day was coolest and the shadows longest. As he scampered across the field after Rodriguez, the morning group was leaving for their homes and duties, and the afternoon group moved into the field.

“Remember when we were that young?” Reddit, another archer, asked, watching the cadets harrying the arriving soldiers. Kyosti and Rodriguez joined her and a few other soldiers in the shade of the barracks. Kyosti sighed as he moved out of the scorching noon sun. “So young, full of hope and promise . . .”

“Roddy was never like that,” Kyosti replied, unslinging his quiver from his back. “He was born with a straight back.”

“And Romalidan was born to break rules,” Rodriguez shot back with a straight face.

Kyosti laughed, still watching the cadets. How old were they? Fifteen, maybe? He’d also been stuck in a dusty military academy at that age, so he could well imagine their thoughts.

Roudusty marched her band of cadets away for their own training and classes, leaving General Raleigh in their wake. The silver-haired general stood not unlike Rodriguez had: tall, straight, hands behind her back.

Like Rodriguez, she watched Kyosti with narrowed eyes.

Kyosti tried not to squirm. Raleigh had never outright told him to stop doing the blindfold trick, but he got the feeling she didn’t approve of it either. Then again, if she was displeased with something, she was bound to tell him, instead of just staring like she was hoping she could set him on fire with the power of her eyes.

“Why’s the general staring?” Rodriguez muttered in Kyosti’s ear. The archer jumped.

“Probably wants to tell me I really will kill you one of these days if I don’t stop my tricks,” Kyosti muttered, turning back to his gear.

“Why?” Reddit asked. “The cadets love it, and it’s not like you’ve ever hit him.”

“That’s not true,” Rodriguez said.

Reddit rolled her eyes. “Kyosti has never unintentionally hit you. Every arrow he’s landed has been on purpose.”

The soldiers storing their gear burst into laughter; Rodriguez even favored them with a sigh and a slight head-shake.

“Romalidan.”

Kyosti turned automatically at the sound of his military name. The laughter died away.

Raleigh had come closer. Her hands had migrated to her hips. She looked like a stern mother about to give her least-favorite child a dressing-down--and Kyosti could pinpoint that look from experience. He stood up straight, barely catching his quiver before it clattered to the ground. “General,” was the word that swept the barracks.

“Pack your gear and come to my office, Romalidan,” Raleigh ordered. She turned smartly on her heel and marched away.

Reddit materialized at Kyosti’s shocked side within seconds of the general’s disappearance. “You’re in for it now, Romalidan. You’re really in for it.”

Rodriguez’s thick eyebrows drew together. “The general wants to speak with you?” He sighed. “If it’s about your blindfold trick, I’ll go too; I’m complicit.”

“She only asked for me,” Kyosti asked, blinking to clear visions of expulsion, court martial, and other horrible fates from his mind. “Raleigh says was she means.”

Reddit patted his arm. “You’ll be fine,” she assured him. “Just . . . don’t be yourself.”

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Photo by Steve Harvey on Unsplash