Page 15 of Shadow Master
I shrugged. “That’s what they said.”
“You can understand them…” Lloyd’s gaze dropped to my arm. “The mark.”
“It has to be.”
The hounds padded closer until they were surrounding the cadets. Someone screamed—a female academy student.
“They won’t hurt you.” I placed a hand on Athos’s flank to illustrate my point. “They’re on our side. Their knights are dead, and they want vengeance.”
Lloyd smiled, his ice-blue eye lighting up with an inner fire. He fixed his attention on Athos. “In that case, welcome to the army.”
Seven
The day passed training weavers in combat. Yeah … we really needed practice swords for this, but shadow cadets didn’t get practice swords.
After the second time of almost taking off my trainee’s head, I lowered my blade. “This isn’t working.”
“I can try again,” my trainee said. He was slender, pale, and wiry, and he was dripping with sweat.
“No. Take a break. Get some water.”
Around me, the other shadow knights were having a similar problem. The weavers just weren’t fighter material. They weren’t as fast or agile as the moonkissed and the nightbloods. Heck, if not for their ability to use the weave, they were basically human. My gaze snagged on Kash, one of the more promising weaver cadets. He moved fast, dodging Lloyd’s jabs and swipes, but his attack was clumsy, his movements almost jerky. A few weeks of training and we could maybe get him up to speed, but Kash was an exception.
The rest of the weavers were way too slow.
The moonkissed moved easily, aggressive in their attack and diligent in defense. Even though they didn’t have the shadow gene, they were able to counter the shadow cadets’ attack because they had the agility and the instincts of predators.
An idea formed in my mind. We had a variety of skills here. In the past, the shadow knights had all been given equal tasks, but we no longer had that luxury. If we were going to survive, then we needed to adapt. We needed to use the skills we had to our advantage.
I put two fingers in my mouth and whistled. “Hey! Everyone, stand down.”
Swords and axes were lowered as everyone turned to face me.
Aidan and Devon had stripped down to just joggers; they looked at me now, chests heaving, hard pectorals and abs gleaming with perspiration. Carlo’s words came to mind, about distraction and Devon’s abs. My heart squeezed painfully with the memory.
Focus, Justice.
I tore my gaze away from the twins and scanned the gathered. “All weavers will be paired up with moonkissed for day shifts and nightbloods for night shifts for now.”
There was a low buzz of conversation as everyone absorbed this.
I gave them a minute, crossing my arms and watching them. “Facts are, weavers aren’t as strong as the other supes, even feybloods, but you have weaver magic at your fingertips, and we can use that to our advantage. You’ll be trained in defensive and offensive magic.”
A female trainee raised a hand to her face with a wince, whether at my words or at the effort of lifting her aching limbs, I wasn’t sure.
I nodded in her direction. “Yes?”
“Madam Latrou says only the weavers chosen for headquarters need to know how to attack and defend,” she said.
“Things are different now. I’ll speak to her, and you’ll begin lessons tomorrow. For now, all weavers head down to AM post training and send the moonkissed and feybloods up here for combat training.”
Lloyd walked over to me. “You think Latrou will do it?”
“I’m not giving her a choice. We’ve had weavers all along. I mean, why not put weavers into the mist to fight off the fomorians too. We’ve had this resource at our disposal forever.”
“I don’t know,” Lloyd said. “I guess they never needed to. We’ve always had shadow knights to do the dirty work—a breed perfect for this task.”
“Faster, stronger, and able to fight on the other side.”
