“Never enough for you,” I murmured under my breath, stalking toward the combat circle, knowing I needed to just get this over with.
I picked up one of the swords that was laid out for me, the dull-edged weapon shining underneath the sunlight pouring down from the roof. I shook my head slightly, trying to keep my father’s words from echoing obnoxiously in my head and hating that he could affect me so damn much after all this time. One of these days I would learn to block him out completely.
“On the count of three we will begin. The goal is to attempt to either disarm me or to knock me to the ground,” the specialist mused as he took out a sword of his own from the training collection.
Everything in his arrogant, smug tone told me that he knew I wouldn’t accomplish doing either of those things. Nope, he was doing this for his own amusement. No wonder he and my father seemed to be such fast friends.
While I couldn’t recall his name, I was fairly certain his specialty was in ground combat, so I had to assume that was where his cockiness was coming from. I wouldn’t lie, that made me more than a bit uneasy.
When he began the countdown, I braced myself, still determined to give it my absolute all. “Three, two, one?—”
He moved toward me in a lightning-fast motion as I surged forward to meet his attack head on. I held the sword as steadily as I could before bringing it toward him in a hard hit. Or what I hoped would be a hard hit. Unfortunately, it never landed.
With far more skill, and an incredible amount of ease, he managed to not only disarm me but to also knock me onto my back with a sweep of my legs as my sword clattered to the ground. The training sword he wielded was now pointed at my chest as he lorded over me with a smirk pulling at his lips, seeming to take a great amount of pleasure in my wounded pride and obvious embarrassment.
Before I could try to roll out from under his sword or demand that he move it from my chest, something drew the attention of the entire room, silencing those murmuring with one savage sound. A growl echoed through the space, seeming to vibrate the air itself.
Ronan’s wyvern.
It was an intimidating noise, even coming from the wyvern’s much smaller form. While I couldn’t turn my head to look at him, I noticed the flash of caution in the specialist's gaze in response to the wyvern’s growl. With a small movement, his sword shifted from being pointed at my chest to the floor at his side.
The lethal noise of warning from the wyvern instantly stopped.
“Ridiculous,” my father spat.
I knew he wasn’t referring to the beast. No, his words were purely for me. How lucky was I? Especially because my failure in this trial hit closer to home and injured his pride. How hard it must be to see his own flesh and blood fail so epically within hisown placement field. The shame my failure caused was no doubt what was spurring all of his lovely commentary.
“I don’t think that was necessary, Imrodel,” Ronan interjected, stepping forward. “There were better ways to test her than to lord your mastery of combat over her. What incoming angel could ever disarm you? If that was possible, you wouldn’t be head of your division, now would you?”
His words prompted me to roll over, standing up so I could see him. I mentally cataloged that this specialist's name was Imordel.
Ronan glared at Imrodel, who stood proudly with his arrogant and patronizing smirk. The sight of his cruel expression made me irrationally angry—I knew that his glee wasn’t just at my expense, but that he was taking joy in pissing off Ronan too.
I tried to offer the Beast Tamer a small shake of my head, because while his support was refreshing, it wasn’t needed. I just wanted this to be over. Deciding to push for that exact conclusion, I let my wings snap out, releasing them from their confines before shooting off the ground and toward the platforms above. I didn’t bother offering any response to my father’s or Ronan’s words.
This was the last test, so better to just get a move on. I didn’t want to draw my father’s ire to Ronan, either. Despite not having seen one another for years, the Beast Tamer hadn’t hesitated to offer me support during this placement test, so in my mind, the least I could do was protect him. I didn’t trust my father to not use his power within Alfemir to make Ronan’s life far more difficult than it needed to be if he felt disrespected.
When I reached the platform, my gaze briefly ran over Ronan. He glared at Imrodel, lips turned down in a sneer before his eyes flicked up to me.
Imrodel’s voice rang out with the next set of instructions. “Kieran, please put your wings away and make your way across the three platforms.”
He said it like it was the easiest task in the world, and it probably was for him. The three platforms were separated by nearly thirty, if not forty, feet of distance. Those who could perform these moves were sent to the cavalry with the dragons since they needed great agility to mount the beasts and to perform maneuvers with them in the sky.
I pulled my wings in and looked down at the distance to the ground before setting my sights on the middle platform that I needed to land on.
“No wings,” Imrodel reminded me in an almost gleeful tone, like he was looking forward to me falling on my face.
“I’m aware,” I hissed, my mouth pinching together in frustration as I glared at him.
It seemed like he was going out of his damn way to try to patronize and humiliate me. I mean, with my father here and his disdain for every action I took so clear on his face, maybe Imrodel was trying to earn himself some brownie points.That twisted logic honestly wouldn’t surprise me.
Taking several steps back, my body tensed as I narrowed my eyes on my goal before getting a good running start. With a quick bend of the knees, I launched myself from the platform and through the air. For a split second, I felt confident about the move, until I realized that I wasn’t going to even make it halfway across the space between the platforms.
Shit.
Instinct kicked in, and my wings popped out immediately, allowing me to glide to the middle platform. My sense of self-preservation warred with the frustration I felt over not being able to do the trial correctly right off the bat. I wasn’t evensurprised by the comment that came out of my father’s mouth next.
“Again! This timetryto follow the rules.”
