A/N: Hello my wonderful readers! Sorry this took so long to update, it was hard to write. Yes, poor Patrik, and unfortunately this is all filler,so Patrik and Ana are not in here. sadness The next chapter though...
Thank you to Erutanie for your lovely observations and compliments, and you'll just have to see in time. And RunnerNDA, it's not sad that you knew the answer! Of course, I knew the answer too, so maybe I shouldn't be the one to tell you this... :-P And as always, good insight into the characters and their situations. :-) I hope you all enjoy the chapter, and I promise you the next one will be much more exciting.
Kimi spent the short summer months with her family. It pained her briefly that she wasn't as close with her siblings as she had been when she left for page training, and so she spent a great deal of time trying to get to know her brothers and sister again. Less than a year had passed, and her brothers had changed so much. She used to be so close with Baird, the eldest brother, only to return and find favoritism had changed. Hideaki had taken her place as the favorite sibling, and the two were inseparable.
Kimi felt a keen sadness at the unintentional exclusion from her brothers, but she spent the time learning more about her sister Keladry. Keladry was five years old now, and she was a bit spoiled. She was an adorable little girl, but she was forgotten and the center of attention by turns. Kimi gave Keladry the attention she needed and ignored her when the five year old threw temper tantrums. Soon Kimi found herself the favorite sibling of Keladry, and it warmed her heart to be loved.
The young female page tried her best to continue training, but soon found herself very lazy. I'll train tomorrow, she promised herself, but that tomorrow never came.
"Kimi," her mother said with very slight disapproval in her voice. "You haven't trained in weeks and you return to the palace in less than a month."
Father and Daughter were engaged in a chess game when her mother approached her. Kimi waved her away as she contemplated her next move.
"Yes, yes, I'll get to practicing in a moment. Hold on." She picked up her knight and toyed with it.
"Let her finish the game, Yuki," Neal said. "She has all year to train for knighthood. Let her relax."
Yuki frowned ever so slightly. "Fine," she said shortly. "But when you return and find yourself out of shape, don't blame me."
Kimi tentatively placed her knight on the chessboard. "Check," she said hesitantly.
Neal picked up his ivory queen and knocked Kimi's knight away. "Check mate," he announced.
Kimi made a face. "You cheated. I demand a rematch. I want to be white this time."
"You should practice, Kimi," Neal told her sternly. "I remember how much Kel had to train just to keep up with the rest of the boys."
"I'll practice tomorrow, Papa," she said and rolled her eyes. "Please, one more game?"
Neal sighed and nodded, and the two set up the chess pieces again. Kimi put on her game face. "After you, milady," her father told her mockingly, and Kimi moved her pawn forward.
A month later she and the other pages were back on the practice courts. Kimi was sweating profusely from the heat and the knowledge that she had only trained a few times at the beginning of the last two months. She prayed silently to the gods that none of the other boys had trained either, and that she wasn't out of shape as she feared she might be.
"Welcome back, pages!" the Shang Boar greeted them cheerfully. The pages smiled at him happily. He was one of the better liked instructors at the palace. "Today we are going to warm up all the muscles in the body and try to build up strength again before we attempt anything. New pages, you will be with us today, and tomorrow I will teach you some of the basics," he promised them, and then he began to instruct all in good stretching techniques.
After all the pages had stretched, the Shang Boar said, "We need to get stronger. Let's do pushups together. Twenty sounds good, don't you think?"
More beads formed on Kimi's forehead as she got on the floor and got into the correct position. I can do this, she told herself. It's simple. I did fifty last year, I'm sure I can do twenty easily. By her tenth pushup she wanted to kill the Shang Boar. It occurred to her that she didn't know his name. It was Tarek or Tahir or Tariq, she couldn't remember at all. She managed to get to the twelfth one before she cheated and pretended to do the rest. She was thankful that Hatsumomo wasn't there; because the one time she did this little trick before, Hatsumomo smacked her over the head and made her do all of them over again.
"Good! Very good," the Shang Boar told the pages with sincere encouragement. "Now, we need to work on our hearts and our lungs. I want you to follow me." The Shang Boar dashed off and the pages stumbled to catch up with him.
They ran all over the palace. They were running down the hill on the other side of the palace with the intention of circling the building to return to the practice courts when Kimi felt herself stumble. She wasn't a naturally clumsy person, but her breath came in short and violent spurts and sweat ran down her back and face, and extreme fatigue stole whatever gracefulness she had. Her feet had started to drag and her left foot caught on a rock. In a burst of speed she didn't know she had, she tried to right herself but over corrected it. Down she fell to her knees and her whole body shook. She had already fallen behind, so no one noticed her collapse except the Shang Boar. He called the pages to continue running to the courts and then curved around to return to her.
Deep shame filled Kimi and she sat with her head down, trying desperately to slow her breathing. She studied his strong leg muscles that had some scarring around the ankles and refused to look up.
"I know the Shang Falcon well," he said finally. He towered over her kneeling body and spoke softly. "She is rarely complimentary, and she is brutally honest at times. I admire that quality about her more than anything. I talked to her over the summer when she came back to the palace on the way to take a ship back to the Yamani Islands." He paused when Kimi rubbed her hands over her cheeks that were wet with sweat and tears. "She asked how you were. She told me that she believed in you far more than any other student that she had taught." He kneeled down before her and stared into her face. "That, Page Kimiko, is an incredible compliment. Now, I understand that perhaps you are having a bad day. Or perhaps you did not train much over the summer as you were supposed to. But I believe firmly in second chances, and I want you to try again and uphold the reputation that the Shang Falcon is spreading about you. In a month, if you do not exceed my expectations of you, I will write to the Shang Falcon and tell her that her faith you in was misplaced, and I will tell the training master that perhaps it is better that you be sent home. I saw you cheat your pushups this morning, Page Kimiko," he added, as if that was evidence enough to send her home immediately. "Do we have an understanding?"
Kimi nodded. Her tears flowed easily now, but she still picked herself up with dignity and bowed to him. She then went back up to the palace to change her hose that had ripped from her fall.
"I should have listened to my mother and father," she muttered to herself as she healed her knee that had been severely scraped against the sharp stone. Why don't I ever learn? Hatsumomo had taught her that she needed to warm up and practice everyday, but she had conveniently forgotten that lesson over the summer. You have been spoiled, and you have been lazy, Hatsumomo had told her. Hatsumomo was right.
Kimi planned to go down for archery, because she believed the Shang Boar did not want to see her again today. She pulled out her glaive and began some pattern dances to pass the time. Sloppy, she realized unhappily after a particularly easy move was not well executed. She knew that in a month, if she returned to her old ways, she could outdo all the Shang Boar's expectations, buy still she was shamed, and it cut deeper than the thought that the Shang Boar could request she get sent home.
At dinner that night she sat down next to her friends. They talked happily about what they did over the summer.
"I got to see who Patrik's and Furtan's knight masters were when I was here," Gary said. "My father wanted me to come and visit him here. He spends more and more time at the palace instead of home." His last sentence revealed an underlining tension, and the pages skirted the subject quickly.
"Who are they?" asked Kimi. She had received a letter from each of the two squires, but it had been before they made their final choices.
"Faleron of King's Reach is Patrik's, and Cleon of Kennan is Furtan's," Theo answered for Gary. The boys and Kimi shook their heads. How did Theo manage to know everything?
A new boy had joined their ranks due to Gary's sponsorship. His name was Ainsley of Torhelm and he was a very quiet boy. He trailed after the others and kept quiet, and from Kimi could tell, he had an indistinct personality. She decided to give the new boy a try anyway.
"So what did you do this summer, Ainsley?" she asked.
He looked at her, blushed, and ducked his head. He wore a smile that hinted at embarrassment and then the thin boy muttered something. Kimi stared. She glanced at Gary for translation and the older boy shrugged.
"Oh, that's good," she replied lamely.
The rest of the meal was spent discussing Jon's summer, which he spent with his family training the recruits of the Queen's Riders. It was a interesting topic because they all knew different aspects of it: Jon knew plenty because of his grandmother's and mother's involvement, Theo knew all the rumors about the Queen's Riders and their leaders, Gary knew the organization of it through his father, and Kimi knew quite a bit because she once considered joining them when she reached the age of fifteen. Ainsley sat in silence.
"He's very strange, isn't he?" Kimi asked Gary as they were walking to Jon's room to study that night.
"He is rather quiet, but I wouldn't say he's strange. He's just shy, I guess. And you of all people putting him on the spot did nothing for his nerves. Besides, he may have been shy because of Jon."
Kimi shrugged. "If you say so. I was just trying to help."
Gary smiled kindly at her. "I know. But be nice to him. His father died a few months ago, and my family's sort of adopted him. He's an only child, and I bet he's really lonely."
Kimi looked down at her dusty brown boots. "Oh, I didn't know." She felt ashamed that she had called him strange. Today's a bad day, she thought sadly to herself. I get shamed twice.
"Come on; let's go invite him to study with us." he said and walked up to Ainsley's door and knocked. "Ainsley?" he called and knocked again. The door slowly creaked open. "Do you want to study with us tonight?" The boy nodded slowly and turned to gather his books. "See?" Gary whispered to Kimi. "He'll open up in no time."
"If you say so." Kimi decided not to wait for them in case Gary was right, and that she did make him nervous. She rushed off to Jon's room and prepared for a night of studying.