With the warning of being dismissed from the elites if he didn’t show progress, Ezra (as well as Leah, Boyd, and Cord) threw himself into the training with as much energy as he could muster. A second day of hard exercise passed, though it was even worse than the first because he knew what was coming and each hour made him more sore. Fortunately, there was enough to keep his stomach full, and instead of taking a nap, whenever he had a spare second, Ezra threw himself into sensing and pulling aura into his inner world. Doing so gave him enough energy to keep up with the best of the veterans in terms of pure dogged determination, though whenever it came to technique, it was clear he faltered.
Boyd and Cord both showed a persistence that inspired Ezra, since he knew that they didn’t have the same access to aura that he did. More than that, though, they could nearly keep up with him when he was pushing himself harder with aura. Leah, though, struggled to keep up through the rigorous exercises. On the other hand, she thrived in training with finesse. She was the first of the four “elite” recruits to understand how to correctly fall in line in retreats, in setting up her shield once she gathered with others, and so on. When the three boys were being abused for their slow reactions, inadequate repositioning, and so on, she was given nods of approval along with the occasional shouted reprimand.
At dinner, Ezra found his stomach twisting at the thought of being dismissed. More than losing his place as one of the elites, which he didn’t want, he knew that his best chance of being tutored by someone who could use aura at all was through continuing to be in Georg’s squad. The thought of having touched aura, using an attack like a Knight, and then becoming a run of the mill soldier burned in his gut. After scarfing down his meal, he threw himself into pulling as much aura as he could into himself before the final training of the night.
“Ezra!” Boyd hissed in his direction, pulling the blue-eyed man out of his meditation. He was the only one of the four with light eyes, and Boyd’d asked about it the first night, before there were any practices. There wasn’t any good answer for it, just that his mother’d been from somewhere further south.
“What?” Ezra snapped back, barely cracking an eye in the other man’s direction.
“Show me how to do what you’re doing. If I can do it too, then they’ll keep me around.”
“No!” Ezra replied. “I need to focus to make sure I don’t get dismissed. Ask me tonight and I’ll tell you. There isn’t enough time to teach you anyways.”
“Tell me now. Just once!” the brother begged.
Ezra threw both hands up. “You sense the aura in the world around you. I felt it for the first time from a fire. I don’t know if you’ll be able to do that yourself. Around here, the strongest aura’s in the snow, but it was harder to sense for me than the fire. Try to understand what makes it snow.”
Then, his instructions given, Ezra closed his eyes to sink back into his meditation.
“Hey, that’s not enough. You’ve gotta give me more than that,” Boyd protested, but Ezra heard as Cord pushed his brother to just shut up. Ezra smiled in gratitude, and continued his meditation for a few minutes. As he’d said, the ice in the vicinity carried the strongest aura around, and Ezra subconsciously noticed as frost grew along his shoulders as he pulled the aura into himself. Only a few moments passed, seemingly, before he was pulled out of his meditation by the sound of the sergeants gathering everyone together to get going on their exercises.
“Stay here, you four,” Georg’s voice cut through the din of people hustling to get in formation to run. The four recruits turned to the Lieutenant as he gave the command, and he stepped forward with his hands behind his back. The nerves that had only faded by a little as he meditated returned in full force, and Ezra felt his face blanch.
“You were told that these past two days were a testing period,” he said without any fanfare or hesitation. “That’s technically true. If you’d decided to sit on your asses and think you had it made, then you’d get the boot. Now, I’ve seen what two days of full effort from you four looks like. I want to see the same level of effort from you every day now, because you’re on probation. If you start giving less than what you have these two days in the future, you’ll get demoted.
“Further, you’ll have to pass muster by the time we leave in twelve days, because at that point, the rest of the elites’ll be together. Nobody thinks or expects you’ll be able to keep up with them at that point, so don’t go trying to compete on that level in only two weeks, but you’ll need to be competent by then. Starting tonight, you’ll all get personalized training in the second and fourth training sessions of the day to help shore up your weaknesses. Clear?”
“Yes, sir!” the four replied, disorganized but enthusiastic.
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“Boyd, Cord, you’re with Amy. She’s going to drill you on footwork more than anything. You’re strong and tough, but if you’re not actively walking, you act like you’ve got no legs. If you’re not dancing on fine porcelain by the end of these two weeks, I’ll have you digging latrines every night until we return from the campaign. Clear?”
“Yes, sir!” both men cried out, saluting. The Lieutenant gestured with his chin that they were dismissed, and Amy tossed a shield and quarterstaff to each brother before she brought them running after her. Ezra didn’t continue to watch them as Georg continued speaking.
“Leah, you’re smarter than these boneheads. You were quick on your feet when I tested you, and you know your way around a scrap. You’re clever, even if you’re not in as good of endurance shape as the boys. By the end of your training, you’ll be running a dozen kilometers before breakfast. Petr’ll be sure of that.”
Again, Georg dismissed her with a jut of his chin, and Leah snapped off a salute as she jogged towards Petr.
“Now you, the wunderkind,” Georg grumbled as he stepped in front of Ezra.
“Sir?” Ezra asked, unsure what the word meant.
“Don’t make me regret doing this,” Georg stared into Ezra’s eyes as he said it.
“Regret what, sir?” Ezra replied.
“This. Frankly, you’re a prodigy,” Georg said. “You’re working damn hard, and it’s obvious you’re using aura to push yourself. You’re keeping up with people who’ve been doing this as their job for a couple years, and it’s obvious that it isn’t because you’re in soldier shape. By the time these two weeks are up, I’m sure we’ll see what having so much aura building you up as you exercise will do. You’ll be a beast.
“I’m building you up right now, because it’d be lying if I started talking about how far you have to come. You know next to nothing about actually fighting with a weapon, but of course you do. You’re a kid from the slums who uses a cane as a club to fight back against muggers,” Georg seemed to be building up momentum as he spoke. “If I pushed you on that, I’d just be acting like an arse. So, Ezra, I’m going to push you into direct training as soon as possible, probably tonight. Get your hands on a real spear, not these blunted ones, and see if we can help you develop your aura. By the time we’re marching, there should be an Adept or even a Pseudo-Knight who can give you a little instruction. Until then, keep working hard, okay?”
With each word that Georg’d said, Ezra felt a brighter burn of pride in his chest, and he felt a wide smile cracking his face.
“Alright, come with me,” Georg commanded, walking towards a mostly uninhabited corner of the practice field. “I’ve put in a request to see if we can get you that real spear, but for now, you’re here with a staff. I’ve watched you during the practices, and you’re interested in the weaponcraft, but there’s two kinds of fighting with a spear, at its core. Spear and shield and just the spear. Like with all weapons, if you’ve got a shield, you’ll have less power and maneuverability than if you were only using the spear, but you sacrifice that for being able to protect yourself better.”
Georg looked at Ezra, seeming to wait for a response, so the younger man nodded and said, “Yes. Like we’ve been practicing.”
“Exactly,” the Lieutenant seemed satisfied with that answer. “We have you doing that because we’d rather have you all in a shield wall together and keeping the monsters out than being able to hit the monsters faster. With the spear in two hands, you’re a lot quicker. I’ll show you both.”
Georg picked up a shield and quarterstaff, strapping the shield to his left arm in quick, easy movements. Then, he twisted his body to hold the “spear” overhead to be able to strike from above the shield. He kept the shield between himself and Ezra, and as he walked forward, he demonstrated some attacks that descended with a surprising power. Each strike he made twisted his hips and whole body, delivering blows that Ezra could feel would have broken his nose or ribs if Georg’d used that amount of strength in their spar.
The movements seemed awkward, though, with the overhand hold. Ezra squinted at Georg, who chuckled and explained, “We march together. Holding it this way lets the line lock shields and still attack the monsters ahead. In practice, we’ve called this a shield wall, but there’s a half dozen different methods, strategies, and approaches to use with spears and shields. Shield wall, phalanx, hoplite, turtleshell, and more. There haven’t been any reports of cavalry in this outbreak of Dragonkin, so we won’t be using the phalanx, which is just as well. It’d just get people killed. This is a hoplite formation, letting you protect your brothers with spear and shield.”
Georg didn’t explain any more as he unbuckled his shield and tossed it to the side. He held the quarterstaff in both hands, his right hand on the butt of it while his left steadied it in front of him. The weapon flashed forward a couple times, and Ezra got a flash of his vision going fuzzy under a flurry of attacks like this. He backed off a little, but watched how the experienced soldier did it. Instead of the structured, deliberate movements that he made as a “hoplite”, the spear moved smoothly in his hands, his right thrusting it forward while his left directed it. Ezra subconsciously mimicked it, the smooth haft running through his hands as he lunged it forward.
“Use your hips,” Georg snapped. “You’re only using your arms. That’ll barely hurt if you hit someone like that, and it won’t injure a monster. Twist, give it some strength.”
Ezra did as he was commanded, and could feel the difference in what he was doing. He smiled, and Georg gestured for the recruit to try it on him. Ezra obliged, hoping he could get a solid hit in. Instead, Georg twisted his own staff and knocked Ezra’s high as he then swung the butt of his staff into Ezra’s stomach.
“C’mon kid,” the Lieutenant laughed. “Did you think I would make it that easy for you?”
Instead of getting angry this time, Ezra smiled back. “Will you teach me how you did that?”