Vir gulped, craning his neck to stare up at the tallest parts of the structure. He grew dizzy merely looking at the thing.
We’re gonna die here. We’re so gonna die…
He looked to Maiya, who lacked his dexterity and acrobatic prowess. If he was dreading this, then what hope did his clumsy friend have?
It seemed she’d arrived at the same conclusion.
Riyan observed them with a bemused expression. “There is a saying from the Age of Gods. A wise saying, and one that you would do well to remember. ‘Failure is the best teacher.’ Fail, and learn. But do try not to die. I have spent many resources putting all of this together for you. It would be the least you could do to thank me.”
“How could you possibly build all of this in a few days?” Maiya said, changing the topic, determined to quell her unease. Vir somehow doubted her tactic would do what she hoped it would.
“I merely reassembled what already once was. Magic helped, of course,” he said, tossing a utility orb in the air. “None of this would be possible without Lighten Load, Sharpen Edge, and several others.”
Sharpen Edge? Vir thought, taking another look at the rotating swords and the swinging scythes. All of a sudden, those seemingly benign wooden contraptions looked far more lethal.
“Do not worry about keeping the orbs charged. I shall graciously handle that for you,” their instructor said with an evil smile. “You will attempt this course every day until you can clear it blindfolded.”
Blindfolded! Vir did a double take. Impossible. Utterly impossible. Suicidal. For the first time since he’d started training under Riyan, he felt terror. True, abject terror.
He glanced at Maiya, who looked off into the distance with eyes glazed over, her fists tightly clenched.
Ah, Vir thought. So she’s already resigned herself.
“But I am not unreasonable. I would not blindfold you or replace the blades with real ones before you can successfully navigate it,” he said, walking toward the exit. “We can discuss course modifications after that.”
“Uh, Maiya? Did he just say ‘replace the blades with real ones?’ He did, didn’t he?”
“Was that?” came Maiya’s weak reply. “Sorry, I was busy imagining all the ways I’d die. It’s been a good life, y’know?”
Vir ignored his suddenly nihilistic friend.
“Wait!” he shouted to his instructor. “You’re not going to show us how it’s done?”
Riyan dismissed his fear. “Failure is the best teacher.”
“Any tips?” Maiya asked, now fuming with anger.
Riyan grinned. “I meant what I said. Don’t die. It truly took a great deal of effort to build. And I encourage you both to try all the different weapons in this room when engaging the course. While specializing in one weapon is useful, it is prudent to be familiar with them all. After all, one can never know when their enemy’s weapons will become their own.”
With those enigmatic words, their instructor left the room, leaving them alone with his death contraption.
“Well,” Maiya said, “at least it’s sandy. It shouldn’t be too bad if we fall…” She looked up at the highest level of the course, “Yeah, no. We’re gonna die.”
Vir stared at his dear friend who had lost her mind. “Thanks. Very encouraging.”
Maiya failed to hear him. “How do you think these things move, anyway?” She pointed to the rotating swords.
“Riyan said magic helped, right?”
“I dunno if you can use magic to do these things. You see the little puffs of steam coming from the posts with the swords? I think some of this stuff is actually mechanical!” Now she’d grown a bit fascinated.
“Does it really matter? Not like that makes it any less lethal.”
“No,” Maiya said, coming back to reality. “No, I suppose it doesn’t.”
Vir retrieved a wooden katar and a small round dhal shield made of iron from the racks and equipped them.
“Well, here goes nothing.”
He ascended the five stairs to the first platform. The test was composed of three balancing beams laid out in a row end to end, each five paces long and half a foot-width across. They were suspended by long ropes that were connected at the ends and tied to a horizontal log ten paces above. That log served as part of the second level of the obstacle course, but Vir ignored that for now. One thing at a time.
Balance and acrobatics were his forte, so he held a bit of confidence for this first test.
Vir grasped the rope suspending the first beam and attempted to step onto it, immediately discovering what made this test difficult. By holding the rope, he’d twisted the narrow beam. Stepping onto it further magnified the torque, causing the beam to sway. When Vir finally let go of the rope to try and balance, his bare foot slipped off and he fell to the sand below, landing on his toes.
Maiya clapped slowly from the sidelines. “Bravo, Vir! Bravo! At this rate, you’ll finish in no time at all!”
“Don’t act like this doesn’t affect you!” Vir said.
“I know, I know,” she said with an exaggerated sigh. “I’m gonna make an even bigger fool of myself, I’m sure. That doesn’t mean watching you fall isn’t funny… As long as you don’t hurt yourself, of course.”
Vir shook his head and tried again. This time, he gently touched the rope suspending the beam, careful not to rely on it overly much.
It worked. He gingerly placed a foot on the beam, swaying slightly. Then another. Then he let go of the rope and extended his arms to the sides for balance. The beam threatened to sway and slip out from under him with every tiny motion, but he was pretty good at balancing on things. He took another step. Then another. When he made it to the other end of the beam, he grabbed the adjacent rope.
“Now comes the hard part,” he muttered. He had to transition to the next suspended beam, the second of three.
Vir carefully placed a foot on the next beam. He was now straddling both, putting him in a precarious situation as each beam moved separately. To keep his balance, he continuously worked the muscles in his legs, and they were quickly growing fatigued.
Wasting no time, he grasped the rope suspending the second beam and lifted his foot from the first one.
But he put slightly too much of his weight on the second beam’s rope, causing the beam to twist out from under him. Vir desperately tried to muscle himself upright, but he was simply too fatigued. His legs gave out and he once again hit the sand below, this time less gracefully. He hit shoulder first, and his head soon followed, sending crunchy grains into his mouth.
Vir spent the next several minutes attempting to spit the sand out of his mouth while Maiya tried—and failed—to contain her laughter.
“You think you’re hot stuff, huh?” he said. “Your turn.”
Maiya stopped laughing. She heaved another great sigh and plodded over to the stairs as if walking to her execution. She stood atop the platform and carefully placed her foot on the first beam.
“Don’t put too much weight on the rope,” Vir said.
Maiya promptly ignored his advice and grabbed the rope with both hands, clinging to it for dear life. When she let go of the rope to cross the beam, it swayed violently.
She fell, comically faceplanting into the sand.
Vir could only shake his head as she desperately tried to rid her mouth of sand.
He stared up at the death trap his training dome had tragically mutated into. It was now a true dome of horrors.
What have we gotten ourselves into?
24TO STEAL FROM THE REAPER
