Alien Paladin's Redemption - Mina Carter

1

This was complete and utter trall.

Nyek S’Vaan sighed as he looked over the training hall filled with a load of bumbling idiots who didn’t know one end of a s’tovik blade from the other. He was an imperial warrior, not a draanthic babysitter, yet that’s what it felt like. He tilted his head back for a moment, concealing his expression and rolling his shoulders to resettle the tightness across the back of his neck. Perhaps the Lady Liaanas would take pity on him and give him some real warriors to work with.

But no… when he looked back again the same group of bumbling warriors in mismatched leathers still filled the hall in front of him. Goddess help them if the Tev’tolath was ever attacked. Half of them were too incompetent to survive real combat while the others were too green to even know they should be scared. Instead, they were buoyed up by being on their first real posting and filled with overconfidence from being the top dog at whatever backwater planet training hall they’d graduated from.

He hid his grimace as the training pair in the circle nearest to him clashed. Both were young, their hair unbraided, but they yelled and attacked each other like they were heroes of the Nine Wastes. Neither of them was in any danger of hitting the other. They were aiming for each other’s blades rather than the real target—their opponent’s torso.

He swept in like an avenging angel, s’tovik in his hands in a heartbeat. With a hard shoulder-barge, he shoved one out of the circle and sent him sliding almost into the next. His blade caught that of the remaining warrior before he could pull the blow. A second later the warrior was on his ass as well. Both looked up at Nyek with wide eyes.

“Which dull-witted master at arms allowed you two infants out of the training halls?” he growled, motioning them both to their feet. His voice didn’t echo back at him, the lower ceiling unlike the high-vaulted halls on an imperial vessel. Another reminder of how far he’d fallen from his original purpose.

“Try a draanthic trick like that in a real battle and you’ll end up trying to hold onto your guts as they spill from your body instead of holding onto your blades.”

Both leaped to their feet, refusing to meet his eyes as they stood in front of him. Bright banners of color decorated their cheeks and he realized the room had gone silent. All the warriors in the other circles had stopped training, watching them instead.

Great, just tralling great.

“What do you lot think you’re looking at?” he snarled, his deep voice reverberating around the training hall. In the face of his anger, they all returned to their training, but he didn’t miss the sideways looks from some as they turned away.

Ignoring them, he returned his attention to the warriors in front of him—if he could even call them warriors after what he’d just seen. This was what his life had been reduced to... Assigned to a garrison on a civilian freighter, training incompetents.

Perhaps it was all he deserved.

“Okay,” he growled, in no mood to mollycoddle anyone, much less males who should know better. Moving into formation with them, he spun his blade around his wrist and assumed a guard stance. “Let’s take this from the top. Position one, now…”

He spent the last two hours of training drilling the younger warriors in the basic sword craft positions and making them repeat the sequences over and over until he was sure they had them. At the end of the training session, their form had been a little sloppy still, but at least they were actually aiming for the correct targets rather than empty air. It was a small distinction but an important one. It would… might… make the difference between life and death when they saw their first real battle. Because one thing was certain, the enemy sure as hell wouldn’t be aiming for thin air. They’d go for any target they could, unprotected or not.

He entered the barracks after his shower, towel still slung over his shoulder and his hair damp. Ignoring the fact that the conversation trailed off and died as soon as he walked in, he headed for his bunk at the end of the room. The one above was empty.

No one wanted to bunk with him, even though on a normal assignment, the warriors would have been falling over themselves to flatter and impress the garrison’s second in