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Training

There were no dreams when I fell onto the mattress and collapsed into sleep, at least nothing that I could remember. A comforting darkness enveloped me, lulling me into the warm embrace of a dreamless sleep. Whether the mattress itself was comfortable or if I was just too exhausted to care, would be a good question to ask on another day.

But that night, I was safe in that land of slumber and I was grateful for the respite delivered by sleep. Faintly, right before darkness overtook me, I had hoped that by the time I awoke it’d be time to go to school in a world where most animals couldn’t speak outside of birds or cartoon animals.

But for now…

Five more minutes… I thought sleepily.

My mind whispered sweet comforts in my sleepy haze, “yeah… five more minutes isn’t so bad… you were always early for class anyways, too early. ‘Could stand to be late once in a while’, Dad always said right before getting into his Toyota and going 60 in a 30 zone”. A stray thought wandered through, wondering if I was becoming a dull man.

A little bit more sleep wouldn’t be so bad, would it? Besides, it had been a really, really long day of…

No…five more minutes… I insisted to myself.

There we go…sleep…just relax Heath, relax while you still can.

A tiny pebble bounced off my forehead and landed against the side of my face, poking against the side of my cheek. I startle grudgingly, my eyes barely squinting open to only view darkness about me. The pebble was the only object to be found within my sight, barely visible, even my own body was still shrouded in darkness.

“Igneous…” I muttered, “Aphantic… good for shards…”

Yawning, I reached out to the pebble and spun it around as I muttered incoherently in my daze.

“Basalt,” I smacked my lips, “yes, basalt… it can be sharper.”

Another pebble struck me in the head, harder this time, causing me to yelp in pain in the dark. Suddenly light began to pour into my world, the curtains of shadows parting swiftly as a shrill voice rattled me.

“WAKE UP!” the voice barked, reverberating throughout the room so aggressively that it caused my spine to vibrate.

I jumped up on the bed out of surprise, my attention snapping towards the source of the sound. The world had been such a frustrating blur that all I wanted to do was get back to bed and surrender once more to the comfort of sleep. But my body had been shocked awake, vibrating from fear and nervousness at the deafening exclamation.

The comforting normalcy of my fantasy quickly faded from my consciousness. This reality was relentless and far more fantastical than my hopes, intent on shaping the world around me into something tangible, noisy, surreal and uncomfortable. Stone walls, metal bars, dust, bugs, and spiderwebs lined the walls. No matter how hard I tried to pretend not to see them through my still hazy vision, the reality of it all could no longer be denied. Worse was the smell of dampness and mold that permeated the room, something I had not noticed before I fell asleep.

And even if I could deny all of this, I doubted that the source of the commotion would allow me to…

“WAKE UP, SLAVE!” amelodic, sharp clangs rang against the bars and my ears. I was not surprised to see the black and white fur of Hogget standing menacingly on the other side, barely illuminated by the dim torchlight. He wore a dull, dirt covered tunic that emphasized his shapely, and hairy, chest. On his hands, or perhaps human-like-paws, he carried a metal prod of some kind which he rattled around the bars gleefully, his shockingly white teeth standing out sharply in the dimly lit room.

“Thought humans slept less? You need some cah-feeee? Bacon? Eggs? Waff-fulls?” the dog’s tongue curled and his muzzle scrunched up with disgust at saying that last word.

“You have coffee and waffles? Really… sir?” I asked hopefully, jolting up a bit at the words, barely remembering to tack on the honorific I had been instructed to use.

“No. What, ya think this castle is made of gold? As likely as fish living in a river of piss.” Hogget growled. “Every damn human who comes through that portal always, always, demands coffee after their first night. The fucking nerve!”

“Sorry, sir,” I winced at his tone, slightly drawing back into myself. I really didn’t want to piss him off and it seemed I stumbled onto a sore spot. “Back home it’s pretty common. Plenty of people drink it.”

Hogget rolled his eyes at my words, “only the Slave Guild can afford the prices the Hyenas sell it for, and only during the most precious of occasions. If Hogget ever hears you asking for coffee again, you’re getting the switch. Now GET UP AND GET DRESSED!”

He barked roughly before pounding against the metal bar angrily. The metal doors flung open and Hogget began to bark and slam his prod against the slats repeatedly. His aggression and the cacophony quickly got me off my ass and straight to the wooden trunk. All of this struck me like a scene out of Full Metal Jacket, specifically the “reveille, reveille” scene. But instead of a drill sergeant yelling the word, there was a dog-man barking at me.

I hastily pulled out a simple white tunic and trousers and scrambled to put them on. The clothes were marginally comfortable enough and would have been easy enough to put on if it weren’t for the damned sheepdog relentlessly barking at me, making my bones and nerves and muscles quake.

And by the time I finally managed to put them on, thinking I’d have a reprieve from the relentless yelling and barking…

“GO AND EAT, NOW, SLAVE!”

More barks and slams followed and I hurried myself out of the cell. Hogget nipped at my heels twice as I passed him by and picked up my pace, surprised to find him crouching on the floor with his hackles raised.

Over the smell of unwashed dog, I picked up the scent of roasted meat and fragrant herbs. Needless to say, it was a pleasant surprise for a fresh slave such as me.

Sitting on the cushions around a rickety dining table were two other figures dressed similarly as me, likely other slaves. One was covered in shadows while the other was an eagle with his claw planted firmly on a bundle of pebbles while his head twitched rapidly, seemingly taking in my face from various angles.

“So it’s true,” the eagle muttered in a distinctly melodic pitch. “It was an assumption that Joback jested. Clearly not.”

A burst of sparks popped around the second slave and a tiny flame danced across his bare fingers. A wooden pipe emerged from the shadows as the slave leaned forward, his pink, furless muzzle appearing in sight, puffing at the pipe as he lit it with his makeshift sparks.

“Well,” that slave blew a ring of smoke towards me and leaned forward into the light, revealing his face. He was one of those hairless cats, the freaky looking ones that looked and felt like raw chicken had a spunky attitude. His eyes were a startling sapphire blue, while his pupils glowed blood red in the torchlight, “ye look like ye had the biscuit! Takitish, s’down and join the potlatch, b’ye. Have a mug up on the dog. You just ‘bout gutfounded, I’m sure.”

I stared back at the cat and could only utter one word.

“Huh?” I asked quizzically, failing to understand most of the words that had left his smooth, fleshy mouth.

Okay, ‘words’ might be putting it strongly, if they were indeed words that could be used and understood by human ears.

“He says, sit. Eat in silence,, human, as you must be hungry” the eagle cut in, flexing his lean, powerful muscles that rippled underneath glossy feathers.

“G’wan! Sure wasn’t what I meant!” the cat patted his paw on the table, drumming his sharp claws on the wood, the many wrinkles of his bare skin made him look like a prune. “Alois here’s sure sumin’ crooked, but he’s a good cocky when the sea’s at yer back. C’mon, s’down before the stampede starts an’ help yerself to the chuck wagon! Tell me now, ow’s she cuttin’, me cocky?”

I took that as meaning I was welcome at the table and to help myself to whatever food I could grab. So I sat down on one of the cushions placed before an empty wooden plate. Hogget sat himself across from me, his blue eyes drilling into mine from across the table as the eagle, Alois, began to spoon up some meat onto his plate.

“Don’t be shy, now. Fire up a scoff,” the cat pointed towards the rectangular serving plate in the center of the table. A few scraps of beef and bread were there, not much but more than I expected. “Ye gutfounded, I’m sure?”

“I’m…hungry…” I reached for the center, “...here, I’ll get-”

“G’wan!” the cat grabbed a thin fork and deftly skewered meat and bread alike, tossing it onto my plate swifty. “So what’s yer name, b’ye?”

“Heath,” I leaned over the plate, sniffing at the food before me. There was a thin gravy coating the beef and a hint of rosemary that tickled my nose. “And you?”

“Sphinx.”

I dropped my fork the moment I picked it up, rattling it on the table.

“Sphinx?” I held back a chuckle.

“Some queer human like yerself called me that, a far ways back on a mausey day, and I took to it well ‘nuff.”

“It uh…” I cleared my throat, “...it means a bald cat. Well, it’s a bald cat.”

“That’s what I am, eh, b’ye?”

I couldn’t argue with that.

“Eat,” Hogget barked as he snapped up a piece of meat and chewed it loudly.

“Agreed, sir,” Alois gumbled as he scooped up some beef and dangled it between his talons. “Too much talk is not good for the stomach. Food is good for the stomach. As is silence.”

Lifting his head up, the eagle dropped the scrap of beef down his gullet, snapping his beak until it vanished from sight. He then grabbed a couple of the pebbles he was clutching and tossed them in his maw, repeating the same action.

“Whoa!” I stood up. “Are you okay!? What the fuck!?”

“Human!” Hogget barked. “Sit down!”

“But he just ate-”

“B’ye…” the cat placed his paw on my shoulder, the side of it brushing up against my neck and feeling just as I expected: like raw chicken, “...some folks start th’ day with a double-double, others grass, and others rocks an-”

“Double-double!? Okay, I know what that is! We gonna have poutine next? Is this a prank, is that what’s goin…What the fuck? He’s eating rocks and…what the fuck…I thought you said coffee was expensive!” I looked over at Hogget before adding meekly. “...Sir.”

“G’wan!” Sphinx said as he laughed jovially, yet even I could tell he was oddly strained. As if he was forcing himself to be jovial. “We’re having a time, ain’t we b’ye? This one; knows ya can’t go.”

Hogget stared back at me with predatory silence. He was always quite threatening to me but right now he didn’t look anything like a sheepherding dog with a particularly aggressive streak. No, his fur was all puffed up and in the flickering torchlight his fur looked dark and wild.

He now looked like a hungry wolf and I was his meal.

“Hogget thinks…” Hogget stood up, “...breakfast is over, thanks to you. We train, now.”

The table groaned and all eyes were upon me and I watched as the cat’s ears drooped down and the bird’s feathers suddenly ruffled.

Fuck.

“The arse is gone out of ‘er,” the cat mumbled.

I’m gonna get hazed to hell and back.

I was not wrong.

“LAAAAAAAAAPS!”

A chorus of barks roared out behind me as I pushed myself forward, breaking out into a sprint. I was unsure how much time had passed since breakfast, but the lack of food inside my belly started to show.

Sphinx bolted down the well-worn dirt path like a cat with the zoomies while Alois kicked off the ground and flew, his talons hanging below him inches from the dirt.

Man, did those sights make me feel inadequate.

My master's, Roxen’s, castle was not in the best shape. When I was told I would be a duelist for a kingdom, I had pictured myself in something along the lines of a gladiatorial arena. I imagined towering stands of stone arranged around a wide, open, oval pit filled with sand and dirt. I imagined a place where men struggled for their lives… fought to the death.

Instead we got a small circle with rough wooden stands, only about two or three rows of benches on each of them. The turf was wet with morning dew, weeds growing wild in the grass, and the running path was covered in loose stones, which, while not quite mud, was certainly not fully solid. It was a far cry from my vision of tall marble columns and…

Wait, did the Colosseum use marble columns? Damn, I’d kill for Wiki-

“AGH!”

I shouted, leaping forward away from the pain that jolted my heel. Picking up the pace, I turned my head behind to spot Hogget, on all fours bounding across the dirt with his tongue lolling out of his mouth.

The moment I slowed my spring, Hogget was on my heel in a flash, his fangs nipping at my flesh.

I resisted the urge to curse and leaped forward again, sprinting as fast as I could.

“Keep moving, slave!” Hogget barked. “Or else you’re my dinner!”

I was already resisting the urge to pant like a dog, but I kept on pushing myself despite my near-empty stomach. I ran, ignoring the aches in my legs from the long travel of yesterday, turning a blind eye to the pains in my sides from hunger, and-

Yelping, I kicked my foot forward, pain and dog saliva clinging to my heel.

Well, that I certainly couldn’t ignore.

I couldn’t help but think that this wasn’t fair. I mean, I knew I was a slave but surely they didn’t expect me to run this fast, this early, and on an almost empty stomach?

“Ow’s she cuttin’?”

A blur of beige flashed by me. Sphinx spun around, waved, and then immediately bolted.

“How the…”

“MOVE!”

My shoulder was clipped by something fast and I spun around, losing my balance, stumbling as brown feathers flew into the air around me, before falling face down in the dirt. A mask of wet clay, loam, tiny pebbles wrapped around my face. The soil here wasn’t great for growing, it really wasn’t even worth fighting over. Not if it weren’t for the iron mines my master mentioned.

A warm mound of fur pinned me down, pushing me further into the dirt. Fangs clamped down on my neck and I went limp as Hogget thrust his hip against my butt twice.

“Giving up already?” drool trickled down the skin of my throat. “Pathetic. Surrender to Hogget, Hogget will be gentle. Least Hogget can do for a weak human far below what Hogget deserves.”

I just wanted to just get it over with. I was never going to succeed at this, I might as well just let the animal people have their way with me and become a doll for them to use. It’d be more than I ever did in life back home!

But I didn’t.

I don’t know how it happened, but I found myself on my feet in a flash. The mud was nowhere to be found on my face and I could see clearly, as if I hadn’t been given an unwanted facial treatment.

And I could see Hogget on the ground, a tiny drop of blood seeping from his black nose down onto his white jowls.

The dog sprang to his feet, puffing out his chest with a huff.

“A fight is it?” Hogget barked. “Hogget accepts! Time to teach you a lesson.”

Whistling sharply, Hogget nodded at Sphinx, “Go fetch the healer. On the master’s tab. Go.”

“Aye,” the cat nodded and darted off in an instant.

Sweat poured down my brow. I hadn’t…at least I don’t think I hadn’t meant for that to happen! Hogget was puffing out his chest, flexing his muscles, and even gyrating his hips and showing off his dangling sheath.

“Afraid?” Hogget laughed and slapped his cream sheath. “Tell you what, if you get on your knees and pleasure Hogget, he’ll let this slide.”

“No, sir.”

The words came out of my mouth without thinking. Were it not for the display of supplication at the end there, I’d almost have considered myself cool.

“So be it.”

Instinctively, I took a step back and my heel caught itself against something, sending me falling onto my back and ruining any degree of cool I might have conjured up by my desperate defiance.

To my credit, I recovered quickly, shoving myself up and onto my feet in an instant. My eye caught the side of a small mound of clay, no bigger than a fist, which had an indent in it from my heel.

I knew that wasn’t there before but I really didn’t have time to ponder the nature of mysterious clay piles. Hogget was bounding towards me, teeth bared and drool flecking from his lips. I mustered what energy I had left and leaped to my right, avoiding Hogget’s incoming pounce. I succeeded, but my win was short lived as the dog-man quickly pivoted the moment he reached the ground, twirling with surprising grace and speed and turned my way to kick me with his hind feet. The force of his blow struck me on the left side of my body, sending my flying into the air before quickly crashing down and rolling roughly on the ground. I had the wind knocked out of me by the blow, and I found myself gasping for breath while struggling to move an inch.

Distantly, I could hear growling and barking approaching me once more. I managed to roll myself over to face the incoming sound and saw the fearsome form of a barking, enraged Hogget bounding towards me. My heart was beating so hard, it threatened to burst from my chest. I was still struggling from Hogget’s initial blow and now my fear reached its peak as I watched a seemingly rabid dog-man race towards me. I didn’t have the energy or breath to scream as he leaped towards me once more, but I still wanted to. With my eyes wide, I felt the scream reach my throat but was stopped by a lack of air as I gasped instead. But the weight of the dog-man didn’t come. Instead, I felt a burst of air leave my body once more and I felt the pressure around me change.

For a moment, it seemed like something exploded out of me, like an invisible pressure or a fast moving wind. It rocked the air around me outwards with such speed and force that it created a pressure vacuum from where I lay on the ground. It held me in place while pulling out the remaining air within my lungs alongside my last gasp. The adrenaline seemed to have slowed down my vision, as I watched Hogget’s body seemingly hit something in midair before it was pushed away with such force that the soil around me also compressed. The last sight I saw before losing consciousness was Hogget’s body roughly crashing into the wooden stands.