The Fox Princess And Her White Dog

26: A Life Together

"More, Princess, more. And don't bend your legs, that's cheating," Chow Chow said above her.

"I – I can't!" Snow wailed.

"You're almost there, your fingers are about to touch your toes. Here, let me help you." Standing behind her, he pressed down on her shoulder blades with two fingers.

"Aah!" she wailed even louder.

"This is easy, Princess. Wait till you have to do splits," he said with a sadistic chuckle.

"Why are you making me do all this?" she said in a strained voice, feeling the stretch in her hamstrings. It was only the third night of her training, but she was very close to giving up already. I regret agreeing to this, I regret everything! she thought.

"This is only the beginning, Princess, we're just getting warmed up. I haven't made you touch your forehead to your knees yet."

"What! That's impossible!"

"I can do it, I'm sure you can too," he said cheerily.

Over the next two weeks, he made her run at full tilt, correcting her running technique as he ran alongside her; walk across narrow tree trunks laid across the ground, and balance on one leg on a tree stump like a crane. When she complained of inhumane treatment, he said with barely concealed glee, "I haven't made you carry buckets of water uphill yet. Or balance teacups on your head and hands."

There were moments when she felt like she understood why there were so many stories of kungfu apprentices turning against their masters. Like he promised, her training was intensive.

"Harder, harder, faster!" he'd yell while she practiced punching and kicking, or when she's on all fours from exhaustion, he'd challenge her: "Is this all you've got?"

The physical training was one thing; the shapeshifting lessons were an entirely different matter altogether.

"Concentrate, Princess. Think of your fox form. Imagine yourself as a fox," he told her with his fingers pointed at his temples and such an uncharacteristically straight face that she couldn't tell whether he was joking or serious with her.

"I don't need to learn this," she balked, but Chow Chow was having none of it.

"You don't want to suddenly transform in front of everybody, right? How are you going to remain in your human form if you don't know what triggers you to shapeshift?"

But no matter how hard she tried she tried to imagine herself as a fox with white fur and a fluffy tail, she just couldn't do it. They went back to the fallen log where she had shapeshifted, and he made her run and jump over the log again and again, but to no avail.

"You're not trying hard enough!" he said with his arms crossed.

"I don't want to do this anymore!" Snow cried, sitting on the ground in protest. "You're too hard on me!"

"You cannot quit, Princess. You have to practice as if it's a life-and-death situation," he admonished. "Now, get up."

"No! I can't! I won't! You're a slave driver. I'm not a soldier, don't act like a drill sergeant."

He flinched at her words, and his stern demeanor wavered when he saw her glaring up at him, her cheeks flushed from all the running. They stared at each other for a while, before she turned away from him with her arms wrapped around her knees. "This has got to stop," she seethed.

She heard him exhale, and his silk robes rustling as he sat next to her on the grass. "There's a reason I push you so hard," he said.

"Yeah, I'm sure. I'm just not meeting your expectations."