Nixx
Lokk slowly spins around me. He is looking for an opening to attack. I spin around before stopping, my body frozen sideways at his position. Lokk reaches out and lunges at me. I raise my hand to block a blow aimed right at my face and grab his wrist, pulling him back to the ground with a jerk. He gets out of the way and spins backward, before going back on the attack. We are in the middle of a ground-to-air combat training session with our bare hands.
We did a crossbow shooting session earlier this morning, a discipline we both excel in, but it's always a pleasure to challenge each other with friends on a distant target.
It was a bit of a rough start this morning after last night's late-night celebrations. I think back to Oludd's displayed happiness. He didn't seem particularly anxious about his changed circumstances and even seemed slightly cocky about his good fortune. What a pity that the Winds take away a warrior's judgment, making him subservient to a woman's happiness, without his being able to even choose it.
My thoughts distracted me from the training in progress and Lokk takes advantage of my inattention to hit me with his two feet thrown forward on my chest, propelling me violently backward.
“Trouble concentrating this morning Nixx? Did you enjoy the fermented ignis too much last night?” laughs Lokk.
I immediately resume a straight posture, legs slightly spread, wings relaxed, in total relaxation of all my muscles, but ready to react quickly. Lokk tries a direct blow with his right arm, toward my jaw. I dodge and counter-attack with a quick blow to his head. Lokk pulls guard to protect himself, leaving his right flank exposed. I follow-up directly with a body hook to his exposed flank, shifting him to my stronger side and finishing him off with a right roundhouse kick to the head.
“It seems, my friend, that I should be the one to ask you. You know I never abuse alcohol. I like to keep things under control.”
“Haha, Nixx the wise,” he scoffs. “The king of control in all circumstances. The absolute master of his destiny.”
My friends like to tease me about my ultra-demanding tendencies, especially toward myself, but also toward others, at times.
“Nixx, we have not yet been to the area south of where the object crashed,” Udoo informs me mentally. “We were called this morning to the third village to the west. They reported a band of vorks on the prowl and several Pundits were missing. We chased them down and pushed them back into the heart of the forest. And yes, they did do some damage to the local layer population. But the problem is solved.”
“That's fine. You will make your report and will indicate to the other neighboring villages to provide them some eggs in compensation for a few weeks,” I answer him in the same way.
“It will be done. As for your original request, I plan to take Jaxx and Kurr to go check tomorrow morning where the object we saw last night crashed. There is every chance that it ended up at the bottom of the water, as it often does.”
“Surely, but the purpose is also to check that it was not accompanied by other smaller debris, which could have fallen on an isolated village and caused damage there,” I say. “Remember the time when a rock as big as a fist demolished a house? And the one last night looked bigger. I'd rather we go and check it out. But we'll do that tomorrow. I haven't had any particular alerts yet.”
“Well, I'm with Jaxx and Kurr, we're going home to take a shower and I'll come by and report back.”
“Meet us at the communal baths instead. Lokk and I are finishing our workout, so a hot bath won't go amiss.”
“OK, we should be there in half an hour.”
For now, the training session is over today. I will inform Lokk. We didn't handle the blades today, but we did yesterday. We train daily, more for fun than for necessity. We like these games that keep us fit and strengthen the cohesion between men. The Complex, a series of rooms on the cliff, is accessible by several surface entrances from the high plateau, in addition to the multiple openings on the façade.
Lokk and I head to the edge of the training camp and enter the Complex through the weapons room, the first room to access the interior of the Complex from this side.
The main entrance to the apartments and common areas is on the other side. The rooms come from natural openings in the rock and the walls, whether in the weapons room or elsewhere, have long since been hewn and polished to provide smooth surfaces, more convenient for furnishing. Crossbows and bows share the wall to our right. Underneath are various urns for the arrows. The urns are not marked; each one recognizes its own since the tail of the arrows it contains is made directly from their wings. On the left wall are swords, with guards made of various types of hardwood and blades of the sharpened horn. On the wall facing us, short blades surround the two openings that serve as the access corridors to the hot springs.
We take the one on the left that leads to the baths, then we put our things on the benches and go to the next room where there is a large oval basin. In the hygiene areas, there is no large opening to the front, as in most of the other rooms in the complex. Small ducts carry the excess moisture to the outside and torches provide lighting.
Lokk and I walk down the few steps inside the bath and we settle comfortably on the submerged seats in the center. They are designed to allow us to rest on our stomachs, with our legs on either side of the seat and to allow us to fully spread our wings in the warm water. After a hard workout, it feels great to fully relax your muscles.
Udoo, Jaxx, and Kurr join us and also take place in the bath. We discuss quietly between us, the union of Oludd, about the attacks of vorks that threaten some villages. Kryll then enters the bathing room and settles down with us. No doubt that he hopes to have information that he will be able to exploit to his account. I thus decide to put him under the surveillance of Udoo.
“Kryll, tomorrow you will accompany Udoo, Jaxx, and Kurr to the coastline, to check where the debris that fell from the sky yesterday crashed and to see if it did any damage.”
“There aren't enough? Three of them to go and inspect one unfortunate rock?” grumbles Kryll.
“If they encounter any problems, not necessarily. Maybe you had better things to do?” I ask him.
