“That’s enough, Ingvar,” Hal said quietly.
The others had risen and gathered in a circle around Ingvar and Wulf. Most of them were smiling broadly. Ulf, in particular. Ingvar lessened the pressure slightly and they all heard the droning wheeze as Wulf dragged air into his tortured lungs.
“You think so, Hal?” Ingvar asked mildly.
Hal nodded. “I think so. Put him down.”
“All right,” Ingvar said suddenly, and released his grip. Wulf crumpled to the ground like an empty grain sack, folding up on himself as he collapsed. He gasped gratefully for air and wondered if his ribs were still intact.
“He shouldn’t have elbowed me,” Ingvar said mildly, peering around at them.
Hal couldn’t resist a grin. “Well, I’m certainly not going to argue with you about that,” he said. Then added: “Or anything else for that matter.” He stooped and knelt beside the gasping, groaning Wulf.
“Did you really swap that rope with your brother?” he said. “Just to trick me?”
Wulf nodded. He wasn’t in the mood or any condition to deny anything. “Yes … ,” he groaned. “It was a joke. Just a joke.”
Hal prodded him in the ribs and Wulf doubled up under the touch.
“Does that hurt?” Hal asked.
Wulf nodded several times. “Yes. It does. It really hurts.”
Hal smiled. “Good. It serves you right.” He stood up and looked at Ingvar.
“Ingvar, from now on, you’re our master-at-arms. You’ll be responsible for discipline.”
Ingvar beamed, then thought about what Hal had said. “What … do I have to do exactly?”
“If anyone annoys me, you squash him,” Hal told him and Ingvar nodded happily.
“Yes. I can do that.”
Just then, the horn sounded from the training area, signaling two minutes to lights-out. There was a general scramble to undress and get into bed. As he extinguished the lantern and rolled into his blankets, Hal remembered that he hadn’t rechecked Jesper’s ax. He shrugged and yawned.
I’ll do it in the morning, he thought.
Their training began in earnest the following day.
Breakfast was a hurried meal. They were given half an hour to eat, return to their quarters, make beds, fold blankets and clean up their area, then head back to the training ground with their weapons. It was now that they learned a little more about the scoring methods they would be subject to during their training.
The assessment tasks carried the most points, of course. The team doing best in each task could receive a maximum of one hundred points—less if the instructors decided so. The team coming in second received twenty points. There were no points for the losers.
As they had already learned, points would also be awarded for good performance in their day-to-day training. The Herons had already earned some points for the construction of their living quarters. But now they found out about demerits, or negative points. Points could be deducted for sloppy work, inattention to the instructors, arriving late for meals or a training session or, as the Herons found out to their chagrin, for poor presentation of their weapons.
Sigurd called a snap inspection of weapons as soon as the teams arrived back at the training ground after stowing their kit. He walked quickly along the lines of boys as they held their weapons ready for his examination. He seemed to be barely glancing at the axes and swords as he passed. But as he reached Jesper, he paused for a second, and glared at the boy. Jesper’s reddening face told him all he needed to know. The boy was aware that his weapon wasn’t up to standard. Sigurd flicked a forefinger against the ax head.
“Rust,” he said briefly. “And there’s still a nick in the edge.” He glanced round, caught Hal’s anxious eye. “Twenty demerit points to the Herons. That wipes out the points you won yesterday for your campsite,” he said. He moved on down the line, nodding brief approval at the other weapons as he inspected them, then walked briskly away to inspect the other teams.
The moment he left, a chorus of bickering broke out among the other Herons as they gathered around Jesper.
“Nice work, Jesper,” said Stig.
“Yeah. Now you’ve dropped us all in it, right and proper,” Stefan told him.
“Why should we all lose points because you’re too lazy to look after your kit?” Ulf put in.
Jesper flushed angrily. “Don’t blame me! I didn’t know Sigurd was going to be so fussy. It’s only a speck of rust, after all.”
“Well, if we don’t blame you, who do we blame?” Ingvar demanded. There was an ugly silence for a few seconds as they all glared at one another. Finally, Hal spoke.
“Me,” he said. “I’m to blame.”
He was standing a little apart from them and they all turned in surprise to look at him.
“You?” Stig said. “What are you talking about?”
“You elected me as skirl. It’s my responsibility,” Hal said. His breath was coming quickly and he felt his heart beating more rapidly than normal. He realized he’d reached a defining point. All his life, he’d avoided drawing attention to himself, avoided the conflict that it would bring. Now, he decided, it was time for that to end.
Stig made a dismissive gesture. “Well, yes, we elected you skirl, but that was just …” He paused, seeing Hal’s cold look.
“That was just what?” Hal demanded. “A joke? A game? A bit of fun to annoy Tursgud?”
“No. Of course not,” Stig said uncertainly. The others made corroborating noises.
“You elected me as skirl. I’m taking that seriously, even if you aren’t,” Hal said. “In future, if I give an order, I want it carried out.” He turned to Jesper. “I told you to clean that ax and you didn’t do it. If you disobey an order again, I’ll punish you.”
“You’ll what?” Jesper said incredulously.
“I’ll punish you. I’ll put you on fatigues. You’ll do extra work. You can empty the slop buckets and dig out the drainage trenches—anything I tell you to, in fact.” He looked around the rest of the group, seeing their surprised faces. “Does anyone have a problem with that?” he demanded.
No one would meet his eye. They looked at the ground and shuffled their feet.
“This isn’t a game!” he told them. “This is brotherband training. It’s our future. If you want me as skirl, you have to agree to obey my orders—not just the ones you like or the ones you agree with, but all of them. Otherwise, pick someone else.”
He paused, giving them a few seconds to let his words sink in.
“Well?” he said. “What’s it to be?” He was surprised when Jesper was the first one to speak.
“All right,” he said. “You’re the skirl.”
There was a muttered chorus of agreement from the others.
“Good,” Hal said. “Just remember, we’re a team. We’re all rewarded together and we’re all punished together.”
Again, they mumbled their consent. He looked around the ring of faces, searching for any sign of rebellion or disagreement and seeing none. Finally, for the first time in several minutes, he relaxed, letting out a long sigh of air. He was surprised to find that his hands were shaking with tension and he hurriedly thrust them into his pockets to conceal the fact.
“Now let’s get on with it,” he said.
Out of the corner of his eye, he had seen Gort approaching. The instructor had the look of a man who was about to make them suffer.
For the next hour, they were put through a grueling session of physical exercise.
Jogging round the perimeter of the training area, then breaking into a sprint for fifty meters, then jogging some more. Then sprinting. Then jogging, with no letup until their breath came in heaving gasps and their sides were sore.
Then, on a signal from Gort’s whistle (and how they grew to hate that whistle!), they would drop to the ground and perform twenty slow push-ups.
Slow push-ups were the worst. By the twelfth, most of them were trembling in the arms as they raised their bodies from the ground, then slowly, slowly, lowered them down again.
As the count hit twenty, there was no time to relax. They were on their feet again and running to the spot where a long, roughly trimmed young tree trunk was waiting for them.
They would work with this. Lifting it high above their heads, then lowering it slowly onto the right shoulder. Then up again, slowly once more. Then down onto the left shoulder. They would repeat this pattern ten times, then raise the log high again and turn to face in the opposite direction, their hands clawing onto the rough bark surface, forced to change their grip as they turned, scrabbling to keep control of the heavy, unwieldy piece of timber.
Stefan, seeing the other two groups already exercising with their logs, quickly positioned himself behind Ingvar in the line. As the bigger boy hoisted the log high above his head, Stefan could barely continue touching it with his fingertips. In effect, Ingvar was doing the work for both of them. Gort, however, had trained hundreds of boys in his time and was alert to this trick.
“You!” he called, pointing to Ingvar. “Move to the end of the line. Don’t lift the log higher than the rest of them.”
Ingvar complied, standing at the rear of the line and hoisting the log with his elbows bent.
Gort smiled at Stefan. “Nice try,” he said. “Ten demerits.”
There was a mumble of anger from the other boys. Except for Jesper, who was standing behind Stefan. He looked around, made sure Gort wasn’t looking and kicked Stefan in the seat of the pants. When Stefan turned angrily, Jesper grimaced at him.
“That’s one from the team,” he said.
They worked with the log until their arms ached and their knees were trembling with fatigue. They kept in time to a series of short, shrill blasts from Gort’s detested whistle. Finally, a long blast signaled that the exercise was over.
“That’s it!” Gort said. “Put the log down.”
Thankfully, they tossed the log to one side, sending it thudding onto the grass. A piercing shriek from the whistle startled them.
“Put it down, I said. Not chuck it away! Now pick it up again!”
Wearily they stooped and worked their fingers under the rough wood, trying to get purchase. Exhausted as they were, it was much harder to lift the log off the ground than it had been before. But they managed it, bringing it up to waist height.
“Now, shoulder height!” Gort ordered and they raised the log to their right shoulders.
“Left shoulder!” he ordered, emphasizing the command with a whistle blast. They complied, groaning as they lifted the log above their heads and brought it down on the other shoulder. Somehow, the effort seemed much harder since they had stopped, thinking the exercise session was over.
“Right shoulder!”
Peeeep!
Again, they obeyed. “Waist height!”
Peeeep!
They lowered the log to waist height again, changing their grip as they did.
“Now lower it slowly. Sloooowly!”
Peeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep!
They obeyed the long, drawn-out whistle blast, slowly lowering the log until it hovered a few inches above the ground.
“And down!”
Peep!
This time, they made sure they lowered the log the last few inches before releasing it. Inevitably, one or two of them caught their fingers underneath and swore quietly. Then they straightened, rubbing their sore backs, rolling their shoulders to ease aching muscles.
“Right! Collect your weapons. Double-time to the weapons area.”
And so the pattern of their days was set. Hard physical exercise, followed by equally hard work, training with their weapons.
Hal would stand before a pine post wrapped with tattered, frayed old rope. In addition to his sword, he had been issued a heavy wooden shield. Sword drill consisted of a sequence of pretend attacking and defensive moves. He would swing the heavy sword overhand to thud against the frayed, tattered rope padding, then raise the heavy shield to protect himself from an imagined counterstroke. Then swing the sword again, this time in a sidestroke, to hit the rope-padded pole. Again, raise the shield. Then spin to hit the pole backhanded. Then raise the shield. Then strike overhand again and begin the entire sequence once more.
It was dull and repetitive and hard work. The others around him performed similar actions with their axes and a few swords. The weapons area was filled with the dull thud of blades striking rope-padded pine. Occasionally, a richer note would ring out as an ax or sword blade struck bare wood, where the padding had finally been chopped away.
And all the time, the tempo was set by the continuing, and infuriating,
peep-peep-peep!
of their instructors’ whistles.
By the end of the session, Hal’s right wrist and arm would be aching from swinging the heavy, unbalanced sword and the continual impact with the training post. And his left shoulder and biceps would be on fire from the weight of the massive shield. Most of the others felt the same. Although some, notably Tursgud, Stig and Rollond, seemed to take the grueling weapon drills in their stride.