The Guardians of the Forest: Book Two by Kelly Napoli
CHAPTER 33
PHYSICAL COMBAT
Kiethara moaned softly as the sunlight shone rather harshly through her eyelids. She had the impression that she had been in a very deep sleep for a very long time, but she couldn’t recall any dreams. She rolled her head to the side, causing her hammock to sway slightly. It had felt nice to be rocked to sleep. Her bed in Redawn had been comfy, yes, but it was nothing compared to her tattered, dirty hammock.
Kiethara took a deep breath. Her eyelids seemed too heavy to pull back and her legs seemed too worn to move. She would rather lay here for the rest of her life than summon the strength necessary to roll out of her hammock.
So she lay there for a few more minutes, unable to fall back asleep. She began thinking about what she had to do today. Training, Aaron had told her. Hadn’t he mentioned that she was behind in her training and that it was time to prepare her? Kiethara didn’t know whether to be excited or insulted. Did that mean that Aaron had not been working her as hard as he could have, indicating that he didn’t think much of her strength? It was a waste of time getting offended, however, even if the thought did disappoint her somewhat.
Now he was going to teach her a lot more and a lot faster. This made her eager for two reasons: her thirst for knowledge was never quenched, and she wanted to have every power she could so events would not repeat themselves.
Of course, lying here in her hammock wasn’t going to get her anywhere. Aaron was probably waiting for her to get up and, because she was being lazy, precious time was ticking away. The more she thought about it, the more anxious she became. It was impossible to relax now. With a groan, she rolled out of her hammock and onto her feet. There was nothing like scaring herself out of bed.
Kiethara made her way towards her lake. It seemed rather plain when compared to the guardian’s lake, but it was just as refreshing to splash her face with water and take a drink. The water was rather cold, indicating that winter was close. She had not bothered to put her robe back on after washing it yesterday. The water had certainly done its job in waking her, though, and the slight breeze only sharpened the feeling of coolness on her damp skin.
With wide eyes and slightly chattering teeth, she hurried to the center of the forest. She was eager with anticipation: what type of magic would she learn today? They had already covered all the basics, but apparently, things were a lot more complicated than that. Maybe they would go a bit more in depth with an element. In her case, she hoped it was water. She felt that she was rather pathetic in that area.
Aaron was already waiting for her. To her surprise, her eyes didn’t really need to adjust at the sight of him. It wasn’t as bright or as blinding as she remembered him to be…and hadn’t his shape been a bit more defined? Kiethara bit her lip. She hadn’t noticed this yesterday and she was unsure whether or not it would be unwise of her to mention on. The last time she had commented on Aaron’s physical appearance, he had gotten annoyed. Not the best way to start out the day—she pushed her observations to the back of her mind.
“Good morning, Kiethara,” Aaron said as his usual greeting. She smiled widely. When had been the last time she had heard that?
“Good morning, Aaron,” she replied.
“I know you are curious about what we will be training today,” he began. “But first we must get something very important out of the way. I warned you yesterday that you must tell me of your…experiences, and the time has come. Please, if you will, Kiethara.”
Aaron beckoned for her to start. She had forgotten about his warning yesterday and she was a little reluctant to keep her word. But he would be able to explain everything that she could not understand, so the price was fair to pay.
What made her angry was that she had already had to do this once, when she had vented her problems out to Navadar. Navadar. The name caused so many emotions that it made her head throb…and her heart.
“Kiethara…”
She took a deep breath and then launched into her tale, pausing only to take a breath or recall a detail. She did not try to downplay the events like she had before and Aaron did not interrupt. She suddenly paused, ending her tale short, stopping just after Navadar had promised to take her home. Everything that happened after that were events she did not want Aaron to know, especially her foolish mistakes with Gandador and Sinsenta. She felt guilty, though; what if something Gandador had said was useful information for Aaron? It had only sounded like insane babble to her, but Aaron understood far more than she did.
“But you didn’t return to the forest with Navadar,” Aaron said, speaking for the first time since she had started talking.
“No, I…” she trailed off.
“I need to know everything, Kiethara, whether you want me to or not.”
“You might not like it,” she warned.
“It matters not. Go on.”
With great reluctance, she launched back into her tale, although this time she chose to leave out a few choice details. Again, he didn’t interrupt, but she knew that if he had any features to show an expression, they would be molded into a mask of anger. She always knew she wouldn’t have been able to get anything by him.
“Well, Kiethara, I certainly didn’t expect any of that,” Aaron finally said, his tone both surprised and angry.
“I know, I know, but it happened. What do you want me to do about it now? At least we…well, did we learn anything from Gandador?”
“A bit,” he replied. “Not enough to destroy him, per se, but enough to see a weakness. Just as he told you, his greed does play a big role in this, along with a great deal of arrogance. He thinks that he’s powerful enough to force himself to become a guardian. He envies you just as he envied your mother. He does not want to kill you, because he realizes that that will end his power as well. Yet it seemed he finally stopped using reason for his actions, only whims, and we can use that to our advantage.”
“You are forgetting our great disadvantage, Aaron! The necklace! You can’t go near it, and I can’t last for very long by it. If he gets his hands on it I am done for, and so is the forest!”
“I understand,” he said. “That necklace holds great power and a horrifying fate. I don’t know where it came from or how it came to be, but I can still remember the first time it was used against me.”
Kiethara held her breath. She heard in his tone that he was about to talk of his time as a guardian, the first guardian.
“After many years of establishing my reign, I had thought no one would dare stand against me. It took a while to convince people that the forest was mine, but after some time, I became too powerful for anyone to look me in the eye.
“That is, until a rather intense looking woman strutted into the forest. Her expression had been void of any emotion, but her eyes had a jesting glint to them—I can still see it to this day. I approached her, curious and wary. All she did was hold up the necklace and, as soon as the jewel reflected upon my own crystals, my magic was seeping out of me and into the dark jewel. She then smiled with that cruel glint in her eye and took out a dagger from the folds of her dress. I was weak, but she had been foolish enough to lower the necklace. My powers were gone, yet I still had some strength left to tackle her to the ground, knocking the dagger away. She was weak from her own travels, so I overpowered her and killed her.”
Kiethara blinked. Only recently had she uncovered his more aggressive side. She had not expected such a blunt ending to that story. When she had been younger, he had always been so kind and gentle, sheltering her from most aspects of the truth. But her bubble had been popped, and she needed to realize that he had never been as gentle as she had perceived.
“Now, this brings up the reason as to why we are here. Guardians learn to rely on their magic. They become so caught up in their powers that they do not have the foresight to realize that they are not unbeatable. Today, I will help snuff out this arrogance and help you survive against the guardian’s greatest weakness.”
“So what are you teaching me today?” she asked, c
onfused.
“Physical combat,” he replied.
“You mean…we’re not using magic?”
“For now,” he said. “We have a lot on our plate, but I want to get this out of the way so that you are prepared. After this, we will review all of the elements, but we’ll go a little more in depth than you are used to. I am pleased to say you’ve advanced quite well with earth and air, but you’ll need to work hard on the other two.”
Kiethara did not argue, although she really wanted to start water today. She could feel sorrow, not that she wanted to admit who it was from, and she really didn’t want to hold on to it for much longer. It would be sweet justice to use the pain he had caused her to become even more powerful.
“What do you mean by physical combat?” she asked warily.
“Fighting with nothing but your body,” he elaborated. “You will learn techniques that are not very advanced, but the most important lesson you will be learning in physical combat is defense. When your opponent can use magic and you can’t, the best thing you can do is dodge his attacks.”
“Gandador has some attacks that come from nowhere,” she complained.
“Yes, and that brand of magic is something that you cannot avoid and something I will not teach you to use. But he can’t kill you with them; keep that in mind, Kiethara.”
Kiethara felt a little uneasy about not using her powers, and Aaron’s words did not reassure her. Punching and kicking Gandador did not appeal to her, either.
As always, though, she trusted Aaron, and he trusted her to get the lesson done. That was the only way they could function.
With a sigh, she squared her shoulders.
“All right, let’s get to it.”
“That’s the spirit, Kiethara,” Aaron chuckled. “Now, I have made it so that you will be able to hit me.”
Made it so…?
“There is no good way to instruct this, so I’m going to let you come at me and slowly guide you away from your mistakes. Here, go at me.”
Aaron beckoned her forward, and she smiled. Never had she imagined that she would have the opportunity to throw a few punches at him. She bent her knees and raised her arms, balling her hands into fists. He mirrored her position. She grinned and then lunged at him.
He knocked her fist away with ease and with his other arm he knocked her to the ground. She felt the air leave her lungs. Gasping, she struggled back to her feet.
“How did you do that?” she demanded.
“Easily. Your attack was predictable, your movements slow, and you had absolutely no defense.”
“Huh,” she said slowly, a bit disorientated with his critic. “And I can fix these things by…?”
“Keeping your fists closer together, moving a little faster, and by not giving away your next move before you perform it.”
Kiethara nodded, and they resumed their previous positions. She ran her tongue over her teeth, thinking hard…
Swiftly, she moved forward. Aaron made the same jerky defensive move he had the last time, but this time, instead of punching him, she brought her leg around to kick him.
Aaron brought his arm down in lightning speed and grabbed her ankle. With a single pull, she was thrown back onto the ground.
“Either you’re very good at this or I’m very bad,” she commented after she had regained her breath.
“Years of practice,” he chuckled.
Right. She didn’t even try to imagine how long that might consist of.
“That’s how long it’s going to take me to hit you,” she mumbled out loud.
“Patience, Kiethara. We have all day. Plus, I have a reward for you.”
“Reward?” she asked, instantly curious.
“You will see. Only if we work all day, though.”
And work they did. Aaron instructed her to slow down her motions, so he could point out crucial angles she needed to make and obvious mistakes. She was surprised to learn how many ways there were to incapacitate an opponent. They learned attack after attack and, to match it, each attack had several different defenses to counter it. The movements took a lot of concentration, along with flexibility, something she realized she did not have. Aaron realized this, too, and decided to devout an entire hour to some painful stretches, which involved a few interesting cracks to her joints. She felt as though they were remodeling her body into new, unnatural positions that allowed her to move in ways she had never moved in before. Before this day, she had never been able to accomplish a split.
It was not easy. The training required everything she had, but most of all, it required patience. More than once she found herself flaring up at Aaron, grinding her teeth and declaring that it was impossible. Of course, he would not let her stop and, in the back of her mind, she felt a strong urge to push herself for him, even if he already was pushing her past her own limits.
But these days she was beginning to believe that she had no limitations, only boundaries that she hadn’t tried to cross yet. She had survived the previous events not because they had been within her boundaries, but because she had been willing to exceed them.
“Now bring your leg around, as though you were going to kick me in the waist,” Aaron instructed her after they had taken a break for lunch.
Kiethara did as he said—he grabbed her airborne ankle. She had to hobble a little to stay balanced.
“Remind me to work on balance with you after this.”
“Right, but if you have a point, make it, because I can’t stay like this forever,” she pointed out.
“All right,” he chuckled. “I have you now, but you can get out of this easily. Lean to the left, and, when I say so, twist your body very fast and use your other leg to kick me.”
Kiethara had a strong suspicion she was going to end up on the ground again, but she attempted it anyway.
After a quick blur, she was face down in the grass again. She groaned.
“You’re all right. Get up so we can try again.”
Kiethara repeated her actions again and he repeated his. She was not surprised when the same result repeated as well.
“How do I know you’re not, well, doing something!” she cried.
“Doing what, exactly?”
“I don’t know!” she said hotly. “You’re not, like, cheating, or something?”
“No, Kiethara,” he said slowly, as though she were crazy.
“Then why is this so hard?”
“You need more speed. If you go too slowly, you lose your balance, strength, and surprise.”
“Fine.”
Eventually she got it, as well as many other difficult techniques. As soon as they finished those, they worked on her balance. She grew a long, thin branch off of one of the tree trunks, making thinner branches off of it as well, lowering them and raising them in elevation. All in all, she made a challenging course for herself, but it did not take her long to master it. Finally, Aaron bid them done for the day, but not without assigning her work that she was to do on her own. Five times a day she had to do push-ups, sit-ups, and pull-ups, and train herself to run. Physically, she had much work to do.
Physically, she was exhausted.
PHYSICAL COMBAT
Kiethara moaned softly as the sunlight shone rather harshly through her eyelids. She had the impression that she had been in a very deep sleep for a very long time, but she couldn’t recall any dreams. She rolled her head to the side, causing her hammock to sway slightly. It had felt nice to be rocked to sleep. Her bed in Redawn had been comfy, yes, but it was nothing compared to her tattered, dirty hammock.
Kiethara took a deep breath. Her eyelids seemed too heavy to pull back and her legs seemed too worn to move. She would rather lay here for the rest of her life than summon the strength necessary to roll out of her hammock.
So she lay there for a few more minutes, unable to fall back asleep. She began thinking about what she had to do today. Training, Aaron had told her. Hadn’t he mentioned that she was behind in her training and that it was time to prepare her? Kiethara didn’t know whether to be excited or insulted. Did that mean that Aaron had not been working her as hard as he could have, indicating that he didn’t think much of her strength? It was a waste of time getting offended, however, even if the thought did disappoint her somewhat.
Now he was going to teach her a lot more and a lot faster. This made her eager for two reasons: her thirst for knowledge was never quenched, and she wanted to have every power she could so events would not repeat themselves.
Of course, lying here in her hammock wasn’t going to get her anywhere. Aaron was probably waiting for her to get up and, because she was being lazy, precious time was ticking away. The more she thought about it, the more anxious she became. It was impossible to relax now. With a groan, she rolled out of her hammock and onto her feet. There was nothing like scaring herself out of bed.
Kiethara made her way towards her lake. It seemed rather plain when compared to the guardian’s lake, but it was just as refreshing to splash her face with water and take a drink. The water was rather cold, indicating that winter was close. She had not bothered to put her robe back on after washing it yesterday. The water had certainly done its job in waking her, though, and the slight breeze only sharpened the feeling of coolness on her damp skin.
With wide eyes and slightly chattering teeth, she hurried to the center of the forest. She was eager with anticipation: what type of magic would she learn today? They had already covered all the basics, but apparently, things were a lot more complicated than that. Maybe they would go a bit more in depth with an element. In her case, she hoped it was water. She felt that she was rather pathetic in that area.
Aaron was already waiting for her. To her surprise, her eyes didn’t really need to adjust at the sight of him. It wasn’t as bright or as blinding as she remembered him to be…and hadn’t his shape been a bit more defined? Kiethara bit her lip. She hadn’t noticed this yesterday and she was unsure whether or not it would be unwise of her to mention on. The last time she had commented on Aaron’s physical appearance, he had gotten annoyed. Not the best way to start out the day—she pushed her observations to the back of her mind.
“Good morning, Kiethara,” Aaron said as his usual greeting. She smiled widely. When had been the last time she had heard that?
“Good morning, Aaron,” she replied.
“I know you are curious about what we will be training today,” he began. “But first we must get something very important out of the way. I warned you yesterday that you must tell me of your…experiences, and the time has come. Please, if you will, Kiethara.”
Aaron beckoned for her to start. She had forgotten about his warning yesterday and she was a little reluctant to keep her word. But he would be able to explain everything that she could not understand, so the price was fair to pay.
What made her angry was that she had already had to do this once, when she had vented her problems out to Navadar. Navadar. The name caused so many emotions that it made her head throb…and her heart.
“Kiethara…”
She took a deep breath and then launched into her tale, pausing only to take a breath or recall a detail. She did not try to downplay the events like she had before and Aaron did not interrupt. She suddenly paused, ending her tale short, stopping just after Navadar had promised to take her home. Everything that happened after that were events she did not want Aaron to know, especially her foolish mistakes with Gandador and Sinsenta. She felt guilty, though; what if something Gandador had said was useful information for Aaron? It had only sounded like insane babble to her, but Aaron understood far more than she did.
“But you didn’t return to the forest with Navadar,” Aaron said, speaking for the first time since she had started talking.
“No, I…” she trailed off.
“I need to know everything, Kiethara, whether you want me to or not.”
“You might not like it,” she warned.
“It matters not. Go on.”
With great reluctance, she launched back into her tale, although this time she chose to leave out a few choice details. Again, he didn’t interrupt, but she knew that if he had any features to show an expression, they would be molded into a mask of anger. She always knew she wouldn’t have been able to get anything by him.
“Well, Kiethara, I certainly didn’t expect any of that,” Aaron finally said, his tone both surprised and angry.
“I know, I know, but it happened. What do you want me to do about it now? At least we…well, did we learn anything from Gandador?”
“A bit,” he replied. “Not enough to destroy him, per se, but enough to see a weakness. Just as he told you, his greed does play a big role in this, along with a great deal of arrogance. He thinks that he’s powerful enough to force himself to become a guardian. He envies you just as he envied your mother. He does not want to kill you, because he realizes that that will end his power as well. Yet it seemed he finally stopped using reason for his actions, only whims, and we can use that to our advantage.”
“You are forgetting our great disadvantage, Aaron! The necklace! You can’t go near it, and I can’t last for very long by it. If he gets his hands on it I am done for, and so is the forest!”
“I understand,” he said. “That necklace holds great power and a horrifying fate. I don’t know where it came from or how it came to be, but I can still remember the first time it was used against me.”
Kiethara held her breath. She heard in his tone that he was about to talk of his time as a guardian, the first guardian.
“After many years of establishing my reign, I had thought no one would dare stand against me. It took a while to convince people that the forest was mine, but after some time, I became too powerful for anyone to look me in the eye.
“That is, until a rather intense looking woman strutted into the forest. Her expression had been void of any emotion, but her eyes had a jesting glint to them—I can still see it to this day. I approached her, curious and wary. All she did was hold up the necklace and, as soon as the jewel reflected upon my own crystals, my magic was seeping out of me and into the dark jewel. She then smiled with that cruel glint in her eye and took out a dagger from the folds of her dress. I was weak, but she had been foolish enough to lower the necklace. My powers were gone, yet I still had some strength left to tackle her to the ground, knocking the dagger away. She was weak from her own travels, so I overpowered her and killed her.”
Kiethara blinked. Only recently had she uncovered his more aggressive side. She had not expected such a blunt ending to that story. When she had been younger, he had always been so kind and gentle, sheltering her from most aspects of the truth. But her bubble had been popped, and she needed to realize that he had never been as gentle as she had perceived.
“Now, this brings up the reason as to why we are here. Guardians learn to rely on their magic. They become so caught up in their powers that they do not have the foresight to realize that they are not unbeatable. Today, I will help snuff out this arrogance and help you survive against the guardian’s greatest weakness.”
“So what are you teaching me today?” she asked, c
“Physical combat,” he replied.
“You mean…we’re not using magic?”
“For now,” he said. “We have a lot on our plate, but I want to get this out of the way so that you are prepared. After this, we will review all of the elements, but we’ll go a little more in depth than you are used to. I am pleased to say you’ve advanced quite well with earth and air, but you’ll need to work hard on the other two.”
Kiethara did not argue, although she really wanted to start water today. She could feel sorrow, not that she wanted to admit who it was from, and she really didn’t want to hold on to it for much longer. It would be sweet justice to use the pain he had caused her to become even more powerful.
“What do you mean by physical combat?” she asked warily.
“Fighting with nothing but your body,” he elaborated. “You will learn techniques that are not very advanced, but the most important lesson you will be learning in physical combat is defense. When your opponent can use magic and you can’t, the best thing you can do is dodge his attacks.”
“Gandador has some attacks that come from nowhere,” she complained.
“Yes, and that brand of magic is something that you cannot avoid and something I will not teach you to use. But he can’t kill you with them; keep that in mind, Kiethara.”
Kiethara felt a little uneasy about not using her powers, and Aaron’s words did not reassure her. Punching and kicking Gandador did not appeal to her, either.
As always, though, she trusted Aaron, and he trusted her to get the lesson done. That was the only way they could function.
With a sigh, she squared her shoulders.
“All right, let’s get to it.”
“That’s the spirit, Kiethara,” Aaron chuckled. “Now, I have made it so that you will be able to hit me.”
Made it so…?
“There is no good way to instruct this, so I’m going to let you come at me and slowly guide you away from your mistakes. Here, go at me.”
Aaron beckoned her forward, and she smiled. Never had she imagined that she would have the opportunity to throw a few punches at him. She bent her knees and raised her arms, balling her hands into fists. He mirrored her position. She grinned and then lunged at him.
He knocked her fist away with ease and with his other arm he knocked her to the ground. She felt the air leave her lungs. Gasping, she struggled back to her feet.
“How did you do that?” she demanded.
“Easily. Your attack was predictable, your movements slow, and you had absolutely no defense.”
“Huh,” she said slowly, a bit disorientated with his critic. “And I can fix these things by…?”
“Keeping your fists closer together, moving a little faster, and by not giving away your next move before you perform it.”
Kiethara nodded, and they resumed their previous positions. She ran her tongue over her teeth, thinking hard…
Swiftly, she moved forward. Aaron made the same jerky defensive move he had the last time, but this time, instead of punching him, she brought her leg around to kick him.
Aaron brought his arm down in lightning speed and grabbed her ankle. With a single pull, she was thrown back onto the ground.
“Either you’re very good at this or I’m very bad,” she commented after she had regained her breath.
“Years of practice,” he chuckled.
Right. She didn’t even try to imagine how long that might consist of.
“That’s how long it’s going to take me to hit you,” she mumbled out loud.
“Patience, Kiethara. We have all day. Plus, I have a reward for you.”
“Reward?” she asked, instantly curious.
“You will see. Only if we work all day, though.”
And work they did. Aaron instructed her to slow down her motions, so he could point out crucial angles she needed to make and obvious mistakes. She was surprised to learn how many ways there were to incapacitate an opponent. They learned attack after attack and, to match it, each attack had several different defenses to counter it. The movements took a lot of concentration, along with flexibility, something she realized she did not have. Aaron realized this, too, and decided to devout an entire hour to some painful stretches, which involved a few interesting cracks to her joints. She felt as though they were remodeling her body into new, unnatural positions that allowed her to move in ways she had never moved in before. Before this day, she had never been able to accomplish a split.
It was not easy. The training required everything she had, but most of all, it required patience. More than once she found herself flaring up at Aaron, grinding her teeth and declaring that it was impossible. Of course, he would not let her stop and, in the back of her mind, she felt a strong urge to push herself for him, even if he already was pushing her past her own limits.
But these days she was beginning to believe that she had no limitations, only boundaries that she hadn’t tried to cross yet. She had survived the previous events not because they had been within her boundaries, but because she had been willing to exceed them.
“Now bring your leg around, as though you were going to kick me in the waist,” Aaron instructed her after they had taken a break for lunch.
Kiethara did as he said—he grabbed her airborne ankle. She had to hobble a little to stay balanced.
“Remind me to work on balance with you after this.”
“Right, but if you have a point, make it, because I can’t stay like this forever,” she pointed out.
“All right,” he chuckled. “I have you now, but you can get out of this easily. Lean to the left, and, when I say so, twist your body very fast and use your other leg to kick me.”
Kiethara had a strong suspicion she was going to end up on the ground again, but she attempted it anyway.
After a quick blur, she was face down in the grass again. She groaned.
“You’re all right. Get up so we can try again.”
Kiethara repeated her actions again and he repeated his. She was not surprised when the same result repeated as well.
“How do I know you’re not, well, doing something!” she cried.
“Doing what, exactly?”
“I don’t know!” she said hotly. “You’re not, like, cheating, or something?”
“No, Kiethara,” he said slowly, as though she were crazy.
“Then why is this so hard?”
“You need more speed. If you go too slowly, you lose your balance, strength, and surprise.”
“Fine.”
Eventually she got it, as well as many other difficult techniques. As soon as they finished those, they worked on her balance. She grew a long, thin branch off of one of the tree trunks, making thinner branches off of it as well, lowering them and raising them in elevation. All in all, she made a challenging course for herself, but it did not take her long to master it. Finally, Aaron bid them done for the day, but not without assigning her work that she was to do on her own. Five times a day she had to do push-ups, sit-ups, and pull-ups, and train herself to run. Physically, she had much work to do.
Physically, she was exhausted.