The Tali

Chapter 11 - It's Your Power

Zeke's house was elegant which wasn't surprising if you paid attention to how he dressed and what he drove. It was a two-story country house in the middle of nowhere. Zeke liked his privacy and considering how long he's been alive, it made sense. 

It'd been a week since the break-in and I still hadn't told Andrian. I actually hadn't even heard from him, which was weird. I padded down the stairs into the living room and plopped onto the couch next to Zeke. He was tense. "What's wrong?" He sighed and looked at me. "Whisper wants to meet you today." Now it was my turn to tense up. "No. I'm not ready. Say I'm still traumatized from the break-in." 

"That's exactly why she wants to meet you," Zeke explained. "No. I'm not going to. Not yet. You forced me to meet Zachary and Demetri. I want to meet Whisper on my own terms and you can tell her that." Zeke sighed and rubbed his chin. "Lailai." I glared at him. "No. And that's final." I got up and turned to head to my room.

He whipped his phone out of his pocket and sent a quick text. "It's been a week since you last trained. Call Andrian." It stopped me in my tracks. It wasn't a suggestion. It was an order. I grumbled and texted Andrian for the first time in a week.

Training? I'm staying at Zeke's. -Lai

The response came quicker than I anticipated. 

Can't. I've got family stuff going on. -Andri

I groaned and stomped my foot. "Andrian has family stuff going on. So, I guess it's your turn, Zeke. Don't go easy on me." I barely caught Zeke's movement before he stood in front of me. I jumped backward. "You need to always be aware of your surroundings. You need to know everything that's going around you the instant that it happens." He stepped towards me and I stepped back. "Everyone but witches can move insanely fast, and the witches don't even need physical speed if they can speed cast." 

I gulped. I guess Zeke wouldn't have made fun of me, he'll just train me to death. "Come on." He grabbed my arm and dragged me toward the basement door. The one place in his house I had never been allowed in. "Uh," I dragged my feet and despite my efforts, it didn't slow him down. "Are you going to kill me?" Zeke rolled his eyes and opened the door, flicked a switch and trodded down the stairs pulling me behind him. 

When we hit the bottom of the stairs I was fully prepared to find a dungeon. Instead, there was a gym. It was massive, definitely larger than the house itself. It had treadmills, weights, a sparing area, several different kinds of punching bags, a whole wall dedicated to weapons and in the middle of the gym, a large fighting arena with a cage and weapons spread all over inside. 

"Now I see why you never brought me down here," I muttered, shocked. "You're gonna learn to kick, punch and dodge today." I groaned and followed him over to the area with all the punching bags. I watched as he picked up a long padded stick, and a handheld punching pad. "I'm going to swing and try to attack you, while you try to attack this pad. You can kick, or punch, but you must dodge my stick. If not you have to do 15 pushups." 

Two hours and 300 pushups later I couldn't get off of the floor. Everything was sore. I had no energy to pick myself up off the floor and still, Zeke insisted on continuing. "Zeke, I literally can't move. We have to stop for today." Zeke reached out his hand to pull me up off the floor. "No. The Kamatayans won't stop when you're tired and your muscles are screaming, so I won't either." I took his hand and he pulled me up. "I'm still human. Humans need breaks." Zeke laughed.

"You're not human. You're a Tali." I rolled my eyes. "Yes, but my abilities are equal to that of a human's." Zeke laughed again. "Wrong. Again." I looked at him. "Uh. I haven't turned so what are you talking about." I followed him as he moved over to the treadmills. "All Tali have access to their abilities. It's just a million times harder to access them before you've turned. So, it's not really talked about." 

I gaped at him. "How do I access them?" I wanted to know so badly. It would be so much easier to defend myself. "We have to push your body past its breaking point. And then a little further. You have to literally be helpless in order for you to access them. Even then, it's not full strength because your body can't handle it yet."

"Soo, half-strength?" I asked hopeful, as I stepped onto the treadmill. "No. About one-tenth the power of a normal Tali." I groaned. "But, it's significantly better than where you're at now so," He never finished the sentence, just hit start on the treadmill and I had to sprint to not fly off the end. 

About three hours later Zeke and I were standing in the middle of the fight cage. Zeke wielding a small dagger, and myself, weaponless, and barely holding myself up. My legs felt like limp noodles and my arms hurt so bad I could barely lift them. "This is real. So you better dodge me." I didn't even have a chance to tell him that he's crazy before he was moving towards me. I forced myself to move my legs just enough to step out of his way before he struck. "I don't think this is gonna work," I pleaded. My entire body felt a million times heavier than normal and I could still move. 

He swung at me and it took everything I had in me to kick his arm out of the way. "Good. I'm going to go faster." His next swing was so powerful that even though I kicked it out of the way, the force shoved me into the ground. That was it. That's all I had. I'm done for. Zeke was headed my way and I didn't even care. I couldn't move a muscle. Even if I could it would hurt so bad that it wasn't even worth it.

His foot connected with my stomach and I cried out in pain. "Get. Up." I whimpered in pain as a response. "I told you I was going to treat you like the Kamatayans would. They'll torture you to death unless you can defend yourself." He grabbed a handful of my hair and started pulling me up off the ground.

I screamed in pain, struggling to stand so I could take the pressure off my scalp. "Come on, Lailah. Fight me." I tried to hit him but it was no stronger than a newborn infant. "I. Can't." I was panting, I was hurting, I was done. I give up. "I give up, Zeke. I guess I'm just gonna die. I can't-" I was flying through the air before I hit the side of the cage and fell to the floor with knives falling off the cage and landing all around me. One cut the side of my face.

"DO. NOT. SAY. THAT." Zeke growled low and angry. I looked up at him and his eyes were glowing. They weren't brown anymore. They were shocking blue. "You don't get to just give up." He picked me up and tossed me across the cage again. I landed with a thud. "You don't get to just die."He grabbed my hair again and lifted me so that I was eye level with him.

I whimpered and tried to free myself from his grip. "You are from the most powerful Tali family that's ever existed. You are more powerful than I am, so you don't get to just die." He held the dagger up to my throat.

"Fend me off, or you'll have a nasty scar." I was genuinely scared of him. His face was twisted up in anger, his eyes glowing bright blue and not to mention the knife pressing into my throat. I had never seen him like this before and I briefly wondered if this is what the Fey who broke into my house saw before his death.

The knife drew blood and it was like something inside me snapped. I screamed in pain and Zeke dropped me to the floor. My body felt like it was on fire. It was easily more painful than all the rigorous training I had just been put through.

"Lailai?" Zeke dropped into my field of vision and I looked up at him, in pain and panic. His eyes were back to normal and his face held concern. "It hurts, Zeke. Everything hurts." I screamed as another wave of pain struck through me, and that's when I realized Zeke was laughing. "We did it, Lailah!"

A/N: In reference to the title of this chapter: If you know you know. ;)