Page 14 of The Daughter of the Scarred Elf

They all headed to the dining hall, which was still missing pieces of stone flooring from where Kolfinna had ripped it up, and ate a hot breakfast of barley porridge, scrambled quail eggs with melted, salty cheese, and a drink made of milk, honey, and ground strawberries. After breakfast, Inkeri took her to the training grounds where the military did their morning training. Around a hundred soldiers were on the grounds, and although they cast her curious looks, she didn’t detect much hostility from them. Mostly curiosity.

The open field full of soldiers reminded Kolfinna of her mornings at the Royal Guards’ headquarters. Where she would “train” with the other guards and essentially be mocked, beaten, and humiliated every morning.

She wouldn’t allow the military to do the same to her.

However, by the third lap around the fort, Kolfinna keeled over, breathing heavily and feeling like she would faint. She was used to running—the Royal Guards had done the same—but the military made her sprint like her life depended on it.

So much for showing them how tough she was.

“You good?” Inkeri sipped water from her flask and watched Kolfinna with a worried crease between her brows.

She was in fact not good. Truthfully, she was sure she’d vomit her breakfast all across her new black boots any minute now, but she put her hands on her knees to force them straight as she stood up.

Inkeri didn’t look convinced but grinned. “You’ll get used to it.”

“The Royal Guards must train like spineless rodents.” Herja snickered to another woman, who hid her laughter behind her hand.

The laughter made the tips of Kolfinna’s ears hot with embarrassment. The other nearby soldiers chuckled, but some were out of breath too, which assuagedsomeof her discomfort.

“All right, everyone, line up,” a firm, monotonous voice called. The dark-haired man who had been giving orders came to stand at the center of the field. He wore a cloak of black feathers that gleamed under the morning sun. Dark circles rimmed his black eyes and he looked bone-weary, almost like the light had been leeched from him years ago. When he spoke again, it was void of emotion. “You half”—he gestured to one section of the soldiers—“will practice mana control by yourselves while you half”—another wave—“will do combat training. When I give the signal, you switch.”

Kolfinna’s section of the group was supposed to do combat. Everyone seemed to know what they were doing. Herja teamed up with another woman, and the others paired up as well. For a few seconds, Kolfinna wondered if she would be left out, but then Inkeri waved to Kolfinna with raised brows.

“Are you ready for combat training?”

Kolfinna glanced at the others. Some were already battling each other, flares of fire and water and lightning zapping the air and filling it with smoke. “Am I … allowed to use magic?”

Inkeri gave her a strange look. “Of course.”

The Royal Guards hadn’t allowed Kolfinna to train with her magic, since Edwin believed she needed to be better at training with the sword before she could even think about using her magic. Kolfinna was sure it was just another tactic of his to keep her leashed and powerless.

“Why don’t you practice with someone else?” Kolfinna asked.

Inkeri frowned and raised her hands. “Are you sure you want that? Because then you’ll have no one to fight.”

“But—”

Inkeri struck first. Wind slapped Kolfinna, shoving her a foot backward. Kolfinna stumbled on her feet and blinked at Inkeri in shock. She could’ve sworn Inkeri was a water elemental, but the wisps of wind circling Inkeri’s outstretched hands confirmed that shewasn’t.

Inkeri laughed at Kolfinna’s shocked expression. “Come on, let’s fight.”

She didn’t have thoughts for that. She readied her mana, feeling the familiarity of it coursing through her body like an adrenaline rush. The cobbled ground was made entirely of stone and she could use that to her advantage. She could also feel the plant life that lived beneath the stone ground, where tangled and gnarled roots lay dormant.

Inkeri beckoned her forward with a taunting grin. Kolfinna had never faced an air elemental head-on, so she didn’t know what to expect, but she wasn’t going to allow Inkeri the first move again.

Kolfinna hurled a stone at her chest, but the other woman jumped out of the way, raising her hands as she did. Wind slashed the air like a lash, hurtling in Kolfinna’s direction.Kolfinna rolled away, but the wind followed her and slashed against her chest. She staggered backward, pain snapping over her body. For a few seconds, she was brought back to that cabin in the woods with Hilda, a leather whip in her wrinkled hands.

That had been traumatizing. And this? It was close to that, and the thought alone made Kolfinna’s blood run cold.

But this is wind, she told herself and dodged the next attack by raising stone barriers. She couldn’t allow herself to crumble every time something reminded her of Hilda and the torture she had endured.

Wind and stone ground against the other; the pressurized wind howled against the grating and groaning of stone, neither relenting. Kolfinna threw stone spears, made stone walls, and tossed chunks of stone at Inkeri, but the woman easily dodged and countered with her own air strikes. They circled each other, neither paying attention to the booms of lightning, the charred smell of burning material, the slaps of water, or the crackling of ice. Everyone had dispersed across the courtyard, giving each other space for their respective fights.

Inkeri sent a barrage of wind slashes at Kolfinna, but she had expected that. She stomped a foot on the ground, pulsing her mana into it. In seconds, the wind crashed on Kolfinna just as the ground beneath Inkeri’s feet rippled and broke. Inkeri yelped as she lost balance, her hands coming up to protect her face.

They both fell at the same time. Kolfinna, with her hair ripped from its braid from the wind attacks, and Inkeri with her hands and knees pressed against the uneven ground. Both of them breathed heavily and watched the other with wide eyes.

Inkeri pushed a strand of hair out of her face. “I’d say that’s a tie, for now.”

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