Royal Pain ~ Slave to the High Royals

Chapter Twenty-Five

After a few minutes of myself and Rose standing side by side feeling lost, a loud, authoritative voice spoke out over the crowd noise.

''Settle down, recruits. Time for our defence and attack training.'' The voice was female, and as the movements of the teenagers around us settled down, I could just make out the slim form of Lana. She would apparently be our new teacher, which sounded like a nightmare. Especially considering I couldn't fight to save my life.

Literally.

Rose scoffed from beside me, ''Looks like Aiden really is getting friendly with the locals.'' I watched her shake her head in my peripheral vision as I instantly searched the faces around us for his disguise.

I spotted him off to our left in amongst a crowd of four or five others. They were all focused on him as he told some sort of story, smiling unnaturally at each of them. I felt my hands clench into fists without my controlling them, and made a conscious effort to avert my eyes back to the woman in charge.

''Form the circle.'' She demanded, and almost instantly everybody began to separate until we were all stood in a large circle of thirty or so rebels.

I could tell that this wasn't everybody, but it was certainly still a lot. It seemed each of them wore a similar suit of clothing, with space for weapons if the need arose. Turns out what Silvia was wearing earlier must have been the uniform.

''Now, I am going to call each of you into the circle to fight an opponent. This is a chance for you to showcase the skills you have learnt here in both attack and defence. For those who are new to this... let's hope you learn fast.'' Her small eyes raked over the crowds from where she stood in the centre of our circle, ''Anna and James, you're up first.''

Just as she exited the circle to stand with us, two teenagers made their way to the centre. Standing opposite to one another, they crouched into similar positions with their hands raised above their faces. It reminded me of the fighting stance that Rose had shown us earlier when she had shown Josh her skills.

Before my thoughts could continue, the boy lashed out quickly, aiming for the face of the poor girl opposite him. She hurried to block his attack, and did so successfully, a grin forming on her face. She then angled her body and kicked out, catching the boy in the shin before he managed to dodge away, though he seemed mostly unharmed. They continued like this for a few minutes, each attack seeming calculated and powerful, until one of them called that they could fight no more.

I seriously doubted that I would be able to do that.

After a few more couples fought, I was surprised to hear that Aiden had been called into the circle. His partner, coincidentally, seemed to be Silvia.

My eyes narrowed as Rose nudged me, ''Now let's see Aiden get beaten by a little girl.'' She whispered, on the verge of a fit of giggles. Both of us assumed that he would let her win, which of course was the plan for us to fit in.

We were wrong.

They fought systematically for a few turns; each landing hits on each other and Aiden doing well to act as if he were being hurt. That was until he dodged one of her punches, grabbing onto her forearm and spinning her round until she was pinned to his chest.

My eyes widened as he seemed to have encompassed her into some sort of embrace, his eyes alight with mischief. She was breathing hard, some droplets of sweat glistening at her hairline. After a moment of struggling, she broke out a massive grin, and called that she surrendered. I watched on from the side-lines as she spun in his arms, giggling. He was grinning from ear-to-ear, the dazzling smile that I had seen only so rarely had made an appearance.