Book I of III: The Swords of the Sultan (9 page)

The boy replied with pride, “I already did
them, sir!”

“Really,” the drill instructor said with an
impressed tone. As he began to near Baltor and the weapons rack, he
said, “Impressive. Roll left.”

The student easily somersaulted to the
left—in the end his feet were at a perfect ninety-degree angle.

“Roll forward.”

Again, Baltor easily did as told.

“Roll backward. Roll right. Roll left. Roll
forward. Roll back. Roll forward twice in a row. Quite
impressive.”

“Thank you, sir!”

“You are ready to begin lesson five: The
attack,” the drill instructor stated with an even voice.

The student replied with a whole lot of
enthusiasm, “Yes, sir!”

“I shall now teach you the various styles of
punches that utilize the entirety of your body,” Humonus said.
“Once I feel that you are ready to go to the next step, we shall go
onto kicks.”

“Yes, sir!”

For the remainder of the training session,
the drill instructor revealed the four different types of punches
to his student, each punch that began and ended in the same basic
feet stance.

Those four punches that he taught—in
turn—were a straightforward, a twister, a roundhouse and an
uppercut. Before proceeding from one type of punch to the next—not
only did he demonstrate, yet he made his student repeat many, many,
many times over.

It was while this practicing was going on
that Humonus refused to show any more of his feelings—in truth, he
was very much in awe, because the kid got it right after only a few
tries.

The drill instructor next began to teach the
basic blocks to hits and kicks, which blocks did not mean just
using a hand yet the entire body, all the while reestablishing the
feet back into the ninety-degrees at the end of the blocking
technique.

Once the boy appeared to have this all down,
around one in the afternoon, the drill instructor dismissed his
student for the rest of the day.

Trained hardcore, Baltor did. He first went
through the second obstacle course, while occasionally stopping
here and there to practice a roll, throw one of his new punches, or
block.

Just as before, long after the other students
had left the training area, he continued training well into the
night.

The next morning, Humonus found Baltor once
again at the weapons rack.

Without saying so much as a “good morning,”
he instead ordered, “Roll right. Block up. Roll backwards twice.
Throw a roundhouse. Block right. Roll forward three times in a row.
Throw an uppercut. No, no, you need to use your whole body, like
this. Try again! Good! Now throw a twister. No—like this! Try it
again. Much better! Roll left. Throw two straight punches in a row
using both hands. Block down. Throw two twister punches back to
back. Block right. Roll right. Throw two roundhouses back to back.
Excellent! You are now ready to learn the kicks.”

“Thank you, sir!”

The drill instructor taught, “In the same way
as the punches, your kicks must be used by the whole body. If they
are not, then they become pointless. As there are four basic
punches, so are there four basic kicks.”

One after the other, he taught those four
kicks: a straight-up, a roundhouse, a ground sweep and a flying
kick.

The kicks, however, proved to be a lot more
difficult for Baltor to learn and master than the punches. Humonus
had him repeatedly demonstrate the kicks for the entire day.

The following morning, he attempted to test
his student in these areas—however, as he quickly discovered, his
student hadn’t yet achieved the needed leg flexibility.

“Hmmm,” Humonus hummed aloud while shaking
his head a couple of times. “It appears that you are ready to learn
some extending leg stretching exercises. Let’s start with the
splits.”

The boy tried, but could only get himself
halfway down … and that was it.

Therefore, the drill instructor assisted,
pushing his student down another quarter of the way down, until
Baltor yelped out in pain. For the remainder of this day, he
assisted his student with performing twelve additional “painful”
leg-stretching exercises.

That evening around dinnertime, instead of
dismissing his student, the drill instructor again snuck the two of
them to the spa. Fortune smiled yet again, as there was no one
around.

After a week of intense leg stretching
exercises every morning, and another two “top-secret” trips to the
spa at night, Baltor could now comfortably sit in both the side and
front splits.

To increase that flexibility even more, the
drill instructor often assisted by picking up one of Baltor’s legs
and stretching it as far as it could go.

During the afternoons of this same week, the
drill instructor either tested his student on his punches, blocks
and rolls, or simply dismissed his student, allowing him to
practice and train on his own.

Once the next week had begun, the drill
instructor reacquainted his student with the four forms of kicking.
This time, Baltor was able to do all of the kicks with total ease.
Once accomplished to the drill instructor’s level of satisfaction,
he tested his student in the rolls, the punches, the blocks, and
the kicks—always in variation.

Once Baltor had passed this final test with
satisfactory results, only two days later, Humonus’s only
congratulatory reply was, “Tomorrow, we begin with weapons.
Dismissed.”

As the boy lay in bed on the verge of falling
asleep, after training and dinner of course, it suddenly dawned on
him that he hadn’t seen Vakshia for some time. In the very next
moment, he happened to look over at the lunch table and saw that
there was only one other student currently awake and eating,
Thesmul.

Thesmul was not only three years older than
Baltor, which made him much bigger and stronger, yet this
freckle-ridden, dark-redheaded teenager was the ringleader of the
social clique, and the meanest bully.

Still, Baltor’s curiosity was greater than
his fears as he asked, “Hey, Thesmul. Have you seen Vakshia
lately?”

Not only did Thesmul not answer the question,
yet he began to laugh cockily as he left the bunkhouse.

Baltor wondered silently to himself, only
moments before he drifted off to sleep,
I wonder if something
happened to her? I’m going to have to find out tomorrow
.

The following morning, just after he had
completed his stretching exercises, his drill instructor arrived.
Without as much as a “good morning,” he first pulled two wooden
daggers from the weapons rack.

He instructed, “Every weapon must be nothing
more than an extension of your own body, and every attack or
defense begins and ends within the confines of your basic stance,
regardless of the size of the weapon or weapons you may be
carrying. For the purposes of learning, we shall start off with the
smallest and lightest of weapons, and gradually work up to the
longest and larg—”

Baltor interrupted, “Sir, before you continue
on, I have a question that I’d like to ask, please.”

“What would…you like…to know?” the drill
instructor breathed out slowly, while clearly sounding irritated at
this interruption.

“There…there was this other student and her
name is Vakshia, sir,” Baltor said. “I haven’t seen her for some
time. Do you know what happened to her?”

With a nonchalant shrug to his shoulders,
Humonus replied, “Nobody knows what happened to her. She abruptly
disappeared a few days ago and hasn’t been seen since.”

“Do you think she escaped?”

“That,” Humonus answered, “is extremely
doubtful. Never before, since the Guild’s origins nearly five
centuries ago, have any of our beginning students discovered the
secret location of the underground latch that opens the tile in the
fountain room. Yes, it is true that advanced students are granted
this ‘classified information,’ as they are free to come and go as
they please. In fact, they have their very own bunkhouse that I’m
ninety-nine percent sure you’re not aware of, which is about a mile
away down that unlit tunnel I’m pointing at. It’s filled not only
with natural pitfalls that can cripple or kill, but booby-trapped
for extra security reasons.”

After looking at the tunnel that Humonus was
pointing out for only a second, Baltor looked back and shook his
head. He didn’t know there was another bunkhouse.

The drill instructor added only a moment
later, “And, yes, it is also true that no advanced student has ever
stupidly revealed the location to a beginning student. And not just
because of the oath that they swore to upon first joining the
Guild…

“Baltor, I have two questions for you. Even
though it has been a little over seven months since you took the
‘Oath of the Guild,’ do you perchance still remember it, and if so,
would you please recite it for me?”

After scrunching his eyes in contemplation,
and getting the answer, the boy cleared his throat before he
answered, “Yes sir, I do remember it, and, yes sir, I will recite
it.”

He recited: “‘I, Baltor, do solemnly swear,
never to reveal the secret location of this thieves’ guild, nor to
reveal any of the secrets of this thieves’ guild that are about to
be taught to me. Nor will I ever reveal any of the secret members
of this thieves’ guild under any circumstances—ever! And if I even
begin to think of betraying this solemn oath, I swear that I will
first acquire a dagger, cut my own eyes out, then my tongue, then
each of my fingers and thumbs, and finally, plunge that dagger into
my heart with my feet.’”

“Excellent, Baltor,” the drill instructor
commended not just with enthusiasm, yet also a few enthusiastic
handclaps.

“Thank you, sir,” the boy said with a very
proud smile. For some strange reason, he had never forgotten that
oath since he had taken it, seven months ago. To him, it felt more
like seven years!

Only a few seconds later, Humonus continued,
“Now I shall commence with the second reason that Vakshia couldn’t
have escaped that route. If you recall, it involves the lethally
trained guards that protect all the sets of double doors leading to
the outside world. Even if she had received the secret info from an
advanced student and tried to escape through the fountain room, the
guards would have instantly killed her. They would have then
reported the incident to their commanding officer, of who would
have reported it to the High Council. After all, the guards know
exactly who is allowed, and not allowed, to pass.”

After pointing his left index finger up in
the air, he revealed, “The only other way Vakshia could have
escaped was through a vast underground maze of very deadly tunnels
that easily triples the entire city above us. Furthermore, the
Guild sealed off most of those tunnels intentionally, in order to
make escape nearly impossible. No beginning student has ever
successfully escaped ‘the labyrinth’ since the Guild was first
established.”

“For all these reasons,” Humonus concluded
sympathetically, “it is presumed that she died in a training
accident, Baltor.”

Baltor’s eyes slightly bulged, and his mouth
dropped open in a bit in disbelief. Finally, he muttered, “No.”

“I’m sorry, Baltor,” Humonus said.
“Instructor Jeramone was even called forth yesterday before the
High Council to report what he believed had happened to Vakshia.
Last night at the bar, after we had drunk a few rounds, he told me
all about it.”

After taking a quick look around to make sure
no one else was nearby, he continued, “With sadness in his eyes, he
told me that she had just begun to train through the obstacle
courses at night without his assistance, even though he secretly
oversaw her just about every night in order to make sure she didn’t
get killed. With tears literally flowing out of the man’s eyes, he
informed me that the very night Vakshia disappeared he had been
busy catching up on his own personal errands. Because she is now
‘missing in action,’ he feels so guilty and horrible. I believe
that Jeramone was telling the truth, as I have worked alongside the
man for many years—he genuinely cares about his students! Trust me
that Instructor Jeramone has sought her out to the best of his
ability, but no luck. Sorry, Baltor, these things happen.”

Baltor found tears welling up in the corners
of his eyes, while his face betrayed grief and disappointment.

Curious, Humonus’s left eyebrow raised while
his right lowered, just before he asked, “Did you know Vakshia
personally?”

Sniffing back the mucous that had begun to
accumulate in his nostrils while simultaneously fighting back the
tears that wanted to pour from his eyes, the boy answered, “I only
talked to her once.”

Another look of curiosity crossed the drill
instructor’s face before he asked, “So why the tears?”

After a pause to formulate the right words,
the boy finally answered, “I don’t know, sir. Maybe because I
believed, I wanted to believe that she could succeed.”

The second he had finished broadcasting his
answer, his peripheral vision picked up Thesmul, who was about
sixty feet away from their current position. He was casually making
his way over to the lunch table, which was forty feet behind
Humonus—never did Baltor’s head or eyes turn, but neither did
Thesmul’s.

Humonus replied thoughtfully, “Hmmm….”

Baltor suddenly became quite angry as he
recalled the cocky laugh that this worm had given to him last
night, though he kept his voice tightly under control as he asked,
“Sir?”

“Yes?”

Only because he was sure that Thesmul was now
out of listening range, he threw a cock of his head up and to the
left, and then asked just above a whisper, “What do you know of
him?”

Humonus asked just as quietly, “Who?”

Baltor threw another cock of his head over,
yet only answered, “Him.”