Chapter 11 First Blood

Dane woke before the bell.

For a moment he lay still, listening to the quiet breathing that filled the barracks. Three days ago it had been impossible to tell one man's breathing from another's. Now he could already recognise some of them. Bram snored softly until Corin nudged him. Someone near the far wall always coughed before getting up. Boots scraped across the floorboards as the earliest risers began dressing in the darkness.

His ankle ached.

Not badly enough to slow him, but enough to remind him of the hole hidden beneath the trees and the voices that had chased them through the forest.

He rolled onto the edge of his cot and laced his boots before anyone noticed he was awake.

Bram noticed anyway.

"You look terrible," Bram said as he stretched. "Which is encouraging because I feel terrible."

"I slept."

"So did I," Bram replied. "Poorly. But technically still slept."

Corin sat up beside them, rubbing sleep from his eyes.

"You two talk too much this early."

"It's called maintaining morale," Bram said.

"It's called talking."

Bram smiled.

"I knew there was a reason I liked you."

Corin sighed.

"You say that every morning."

"And every morning I mean it."

The bell rang.

Within seconds the room became movement. Blankets were folded, boots tightened and three hundred recruits poured into the cold morning air.

The yard looked exactly as it always had.

Aldric stood at the front.

Rhett stood nowhere to be seen.

Training began before the last recruit reached the line.

They ran until conversation disappeared, then they carried weighted packs from one end of the compound to the other. When that finished they moved straight into formation drills before anyone had fully recovered. Aldric's standards had somehow risen again overnight.

Dane concentrated on the work.

His body hurt. Everyone's did. There was comfort in that.

By mid-morning the recruits were dripping with sweat despite the cold.

A whistle sounded.

"Water."

The yard relaxed by a fraction and Bram dropped onto an overturned barrel with theatrical relief.

"I've reached a point," he announced, "where I'd happily fight Valorn right now if it meant sitting down afterwards."

"They'd probably make you run there first," Corin said.

"They're monsters."

"They're soldiers."

"I'm talking about Aldric."

Corin almost smiled. Dane leaned against the water barrel, taking slow drinks. He could feel eyes on him. When he looked up, Rhett was standing at the edge of the yard.

He hadn't seen him arrive, he simply seemed to be there. Watching. Not the group but individuals.

His gaze passed across the recruits one by one before moving on without lingering. Bram followed Dane's glance.

"There he is again."

Dane said nothing.

"I swear he enjoys appearing out of nowhere."

"He probably walked in through the gate."

"No," Bram said confidently. "I think he materialises."

Corin shook his head.

"Keep drinking."

Training resumed. This time Aldric split them into smaller units and rotated men between formations without explanation. Dane found himself working beside recruits he had barely spoken to before. Some adapted quickly. Others struggled every time the positions changed.

Rhett remained silent throughout. He walked between the groups with his hands behind his back, occasionally stopping to watch a drill from beginning to end before moving on.

Not once did he interrupt. Not once did he offer correction.

That was Aldric's role.

When the final formation finished, Aldric called everyone to attention.

"You think repetition is boring," he said.

Nobody answered.

"You'll repeat these drills until your body does them before your mind has time to panic."

His eyes travelled slowly along the lines.

"On the battlefield you don't rise to the occasion."

He paused.

"You fall to the level of your training."

He dismissed them for the midday meal. The recruits moved toward the dining hall in weary silence.

Bram recovered first.

"I've decided military food is surprisingly edible."

Corin looked at the stew in his bowl.

"That's generous."

"It contains meat."

"I think it remembers meat."

"It counts."

Dane ate quietly while Bram carried the conversation almost single-handedly. Around them, hundreds of recruits spoke more easily than they had a week ago. Names had become familiar. Faces had become recognisable. The uncertainty of strangers was beginning to disappear. It struck Dane that this was probably intentional.

An army couldn't fight if every man felt alone. After the meal they were called back into the yard. Voss was waiting beside Rhett. The conversation between them was brief. Rhett accepted a sealed document, read it once and folded it into his coat.

Nothing changed on his face. Nothing at all.

But Aldric's next command came immediately.

"Formation exercise."

The afternoon became harder. There was no explanation. No speeches. The pace simply increased. They ran faster. Moved faster. Recovered faster. Even Bram stopped complaining. That worried Dane more than anything else.

Late in the afternoon Aldric finally called a halt. The recruits stood where they were, breathing hard. Rhett stepped forward for the first time that day. He looked across the yard, taking in every exhausted face.

"When you're tired," he said calmly, "you find out who you've been training."

The words settled over the yard.

"If you've trained discipline, you'll keep moving."

He looked toward the eastern hills beyond the compound walls.

"If you've trained panic..."

He let the sentence remain unfinished.

"You'll discover that too."

That was all.

He stepped back again.

Aldric dismissed them.

The recruits drifted toward the barracks.

Bram walked beside Dane and Corin in unusual silence before finally speaking.

"I've been thinking."

Corin looked sideways.

"That sounds dangerous."

"I know."

"What is it?"

Bram glanced back toward the training yard.

"I don't think Captain Rhett trains soldiers."

Dane looked at him.

"What do you think he trains?"

Bram thought for a moment.

"I think he trains whatever's underneath the soldier."

Corin frowned slightly.

"What does that even mean?"

"I don't know."

Bram laughed softly.

"But it feels true."

None of them spoke again until they reached the barracks.

As they stepped inside, Dane glanced once over his shoulder. Rhett was still standing alone in the yard. The recruits had gone. Aldric had gone. Even Voss had disappeared back toward the governing hall. Only Rhett remained, looking east.

Toward the border. Toward whatever was coming. For the first time since leaving home, Dane realised something that had never occurred to him before.

The hardest part of becoming a soldier was not learning how to fight.

It was learning to prepare every day for a battle that had not arrived yet, while trusting the man asking it of you already knew that one day it would.