Quinn
It was a drill. A hard one. I could sense that the men were tired but I wasn’t about to stop. I wasn’t about to let them go. I was angry, not at myself, not at the men or at their leader but at their enemies.
What nonsense! I didn’t think someone could be as daft as that, asking that someone on give up up his wife to save his people. I didn’t think anyone could have dared to say that and expect that he would listened to. Did he truly think that Ethan would do that and he would get what he wanted?
If someone asked me to give Mia up, I would kill the person a thousand times over before I thought of doing that. That was to show that I was never going to do that.
I thought that anyone who became kings or rulers were the wisest of a clan. That was my first time ever of meeting someone who was dumb and I was both shocked and mad.
I didn’t know what else to do except to geek pity for the people that he was lord over – he would definitely lead those people to hell with his bunch of wrong decisions – and … train the men that I was in charge of so they wouldn’t be anything liked him or have to lose to a big joke like him.
I heard the loud of their boots against the ground and knew they had concluded the lap. “Again.” I shouted, without even looking at them to see if they were some men among them who hadn’t gotten it right yet.
I knew there wasn’t. There wasn’t any man who hadn’t gotten the moves I just taught them yet but they would have to do it again, not till I was satisfied but till they wouldn’t groan anymore at the sound of doing it again and snapping to action.
They were good men and also brilliant that I was impressed by them within the first three minutes of training them. They had learned the moves so fast but they didn’t have the stamina I needed in them yet. They had learnt the moves so fast because they were intelligent but intelligence alone never worked in battles except with strength, and they lacked that yet.
They were men who had lived in peace all their lives and didn’t know what it was to be at war. They had only trained to be called soldiers but not to be one. They had to train harder to be one and also to beat that idiot who had dared to covet Ava and his men.
This wasn’t any longer a matter of survival for me. It was a matter of pride. I couldn’t let them lose to that scoundrel. We couldn’t lose to that idiot. I was now part of the group, not because Ethan had asked me but I couldn’t stand to see the men I was training lose and be lorded over by an overzealous idiot such as that.
If I was to avoid that, I needed to make them stronger and the only way to do that was to train them harder. If they didn’t have enough strength to make it through tough trainings, I didn’t see how they were going to make it through the battle if they get tired easily.
The battle could last for hours and I didn’t see the chance of men who got weak after two hours of intense trainings getting tired winning it. I scowled as I placed my fingers on my chin and stroked it as I looked at the men. I believed they had mastered the moves but I wasn’t ready to release them yet.
They halted on the last move and I smiled at them just to encourage them. In training, a little push and a bit of a pull was needed to keep the men going forward as you want them to.
“You can stop now.” I said.
Relief flooded their eyes but they didn’t openly show it. They stood still at alert and it was their eyes alone which told me that they loved them decision I made. I smiled at them. They were coming up. They had learned fast. The other day after seven rounds of drills, I had told them to stop and they had been so excited about resting that I had been disgusted. It seemed to me like they didn’t understand what was at stake and had immediately ordered to start again and do five more rounds.
I was glad that they had learned. My talk hadn’t been for a waste. I had given them a pep talk that day, telling them of how hard I was going to drill them and why I had to.
I checked my time. It was almost ten in the night and that meant the men had been training for five hours, just one hour after they got out of their houses. I believed I was done with them and they wouldn’t have slacked off on all that I had trained them on till the next time that I was going to see them. It was a different batch of men that I was going to train tomorrow and I didn’t want to start wondering if the men I had trained had forgotten what I taught them while I trained another set.
These men I was training would move on to Rudolph tomorrow and I would be training men that Jack were training today.
I checked the time again and realized that it was few minutes to the end of my session with them and waved at them to sit and rest for a while. They had deserved it. They bowed and sat, stretching their bones and chatting among themselves.
I watched them stretch and nodded to myself. They were getting used to the training. They had spent a whole lot of time stretching their bones the other time when I had first started to train them. Now, they only needed few minutes of stretching before they stopped. They were doing well and I was proud of them.
“General Quinn.” I heard Mia’s voice behind me and turned.
I chuckled as I saw her, excited to see her. I didn’t think I could ever get tired of the sparkle in her eyes whenever she looked at me.
“General Quinn.” She said again as she got to where I was, teasing me.
“His mate.” I replied, winking at her. I glanced at the vampires but they were too tired to bother with us.
She chuckled. “Let me get the other generals so we can go home.”
The vampires would still be out for two more hours to train but we always leave them outside. They were the ones who didn’t have to be in the sun and could sleep as late as they wanted during the day but the same wasn’t applicable to us. There was no way we would sleep in as late as the vampires so we had to get started on our sleep early. We always used that time that the vampires were still sleeping to exercise and do our own trainings.
“I thought you were keeping the queen busy.”
She snorted. “It seems like you don’t know pregnant women. She has dozed up and I got bored of watching her fall in and out of sleep.”
I chuckled. “I can’t wait to see you fall in and out of sleep as you say.”
She snorted. “You will be bored.”
“I believe that is my call to make.” I replied.
She chuckled as she moved forward and I followed her to where Jack and John were. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”