You tug your troll through the metal gates, following your Bro to a smaller, fenced-in section of the big area. Your troll's stopped growling, and you're glad; though you cannot put to words how much you respect and appreciate your brother, you don't really want him to have any excuse to hit your troll, because you think he would, given the chance.

You understand trolls are animals. But you never liked seeing people hit their dogs or horses, either. Strangely enough, Bro never seemed to like it either, and he never hit his other animals; yet he kicked his troll today without a second thought.

You're lifted from your thoughts as your Bro speaks. "We're gonna be training them to be fighters, so we've gotta teach them to fight. You know enough swordplay to take yours on." He tosses you two wooden practice swords. You catch them and uncuff your troll, mindful of his actions, and hand him a sword. He looks incredulous, like he can't believe you just uncuffed him and handed him a weapon.

You take his distraction at this to make the first move. You lunge forward with a slash, and he sloppily blocks it with his own sword, making a small noise of surprise, which quickly turns to a growl.

You really wish he wouldn't growl in front of Bro. He's already got enough scars.

Bro seems busy enough with his own troll, though. He's sparing with it nearby, and after the troll blocks incorrectly, Bro takes a step back and shakes his head, showing the correct way to block. The trolls tilts his head, and Bro demonstrates it again. This time, the troll copies his movement. He nods, slashing again, and the troll blocks correctly this time.

You turn back to your troll just as he turns back to you, having been watching them as well. You slash, and he blocks messily. You take a step back, showing him the right way, and he copies it, blocking it the right way the next time you slash. You give him a nod, and he gives you a smirk behind his muzzle.

You don't really care that he's smirking at you; its actually kind of cute, him thinking he's such hot shit after blocking one hit, while you've been training for nearly two years now. But Bro would probably think it's bad, and the fact that you don't worries you a bit, like you might train rebellious trolls.

You can't bring yourself to hit him for it, though. You quiet your fears of training him wrong by justifying that you just started, and maybe this really isn't a bad offense. You guess you'll get more of an instinct for what does and doesn't need to be punished for as time goes on.

As it is for now, you just smirk back at his over-confidence, pushing your shades back up.

You remember that when Bro showed you how to spar, he would physically correct your form; lift your arms more, or push your feet apart with his own. You suppose you can't do that with trolls because they're trolls, and aren't trustworthy enough for close contact while unbound.

You, Bro, and your respective trolls spar for most of the day, occasionally taking water breaks in the warm day. At about noon, you four move back into the barn, you and Bro eating sandwiches and him giving the trolls some sort of raw-looking meat. You re-shackle them to the walls and take their muzzles off for them to eat. You would hate to eat what they have, but they seem fine with it. Happy, actually.

When you go to put your troll's muzzle back on, he frowns and glares at you, but doesn't fight you as much on it. You move back to the training field after eating.

You notice, from the glances you sneak over at Bro, that he never smiles at his troll. You've given your troll grins throughout the day as he gets difficult moves, and your training feels fun, almost like a game. Bro is different; he never smiles at the green-blood, and every interaction he makes with him seems cold and strictly professional.

You worry that you're doing something wrong again, but still can't help smiling when the red-blood finally masters another difficult move.

As the day goes on, you start to hear grunts from where Bro is, and though you try to focus on your troll, both you and the red-blood keep sneaking glances over at what Bro's doing.

He's showing the troll a move the green-blood just can't seem to get, and after the first few feigns, Bro actually starts hitting him with the blunt sword. You can't say for sure, but you figure it's to give the troll motivation to get the move faster, by making not getting the move painful. The green-blood doesn't seem to be able to get it, though, looking tired, frustrated, and more and more angry as the minutes go on.

Your bro hits him in the side with the sword when he fails to block again, right where he kicked him this morning, and that seems to drive the troll over the edge. He drops the sword and launches himself though the air at bro - holy shit can trolls jump.

Bro, unfazed, jumps out of the way and knocks him away easily, and the troll hits the ground instead of Bro. Bro is on the ground next to him in an instant, trapping both arms behind his back and snapping the cuffs that he had on his belt around the troll's wrists.

And he pulls him to his feet, snapping his leash back on and dragging him to another section of the fenced-area. One with a big, vertical board that looks kind of like a wall.

He calls to you in a dangerous tone, "Come here Dave, and bring your troll. Let him see what happens to trolls that try to attack their masters around here."

Not wanting to follow, but afraid not to, you snap on your own trolls leash, having to tug a few times for him to follow. You give him an apologetic look that says you don't want to see this anymore than he does. You and the redblood stand a ways behind Bro, and you only see him shackle the troll to the structure and pull out a whip before you look away.

You can't block out the short, half-suppressed cries of pain from Bro's troll, though.

You look up at your troll, and he looks terrified and enraged at the same time. You're really glad you put his leash on so he can't do some stupid shit like launch himself at Bro as well.

It takes about two minutes in total for twenty lashes - you counted the hiss of the whip and the cries of pain - but it feels so much longer when you're looking at the ground, or the trees, or anything but what's fucking going on.

You look up after the final cry ends and no more come, and fuck is that a lot of green. Bro unshackles his troll and pulls him into the barn. You follow in stunned silence.

"I'll get your's something to eat. Mine's not getting anything, though, thanks to that little stunt he pulled." Bro says, roughly but expertly snapping his troll into the restraints of the stall, closing the stall door and locking it before disappearing into the tack room.

You lead your troll into his stall, shackling his wrists before taking off his leash and muzzle. He's looking anxiously past you into the hallway, watching for your brother, and you feel anxious as well. Bro was always the one who was patient and kind with you, who bandaged you up when you fell, who ruffled your hair after you beat him at a strife for the first time. The one who was good to animals; who wouldn't even kill a mouse that had gotten inside, instead scooping it up in a cup and taking you in the fields with him to let it loose in the fields.

This man who whips trolls is a stranger to you. He's cold and distant in the way he spars, and cruel for a provoked reaction from a grumpy, tired animal.

You hear a voice behind you and jump as Bro calls out, "Here," and tosses you a piece of meat for your troll. You hand it to him, your eyes meeting his for a moment, red on hidden red. Then you rise and follow Bro out, locking the stall door behind you.

You wish you had never wanted to train trolls. You wish you had never seen those slaves in the city as a child, never been interested in them. Then you would have never seen Bro like this. This Bro scares you; this Bro is different.

You hear soft crying coming from the green-bloods stall as you pass it, and you feel a flash of fury, hot and dark and gone as soon as you realize it's directed towards Bro, replaced by guilt, and then anger again.

You're so drained by your conflicting emotions by the time you get home that you almost don't hear him say "good work tonight, lil' man." Sounding like old Bro. Like it was you two strifing; like he didn't beat a troll for overreacting.

It makes you angry again, but you mumble out a careful "thanks" as you abscond to your room.

You lie in bed awake for a long time, too upset to sleep until you're too tired to be upset.

You finally fall into a fitful sleep, and you dream of facing a bright city street with too-big shades on a youthful face, swords forgotten besides you as you stare into red, angry eyes of a young, nubby-horned troll as he walks in a chained line.

Catz: Bro's still a douche potato.

Review m8? :::;)