It’s time for daily training, and the knights have gathered in the training yard on the western side of the castle grounds. The captain has yet to make an appearance due to having other obligations, but the knights carry out their training regardless, engaging in exercises, drills, and sparring matches to train both body and mind to better protect the kingdom.

 

All is going well as the knights train tirelessly under the morning sun, that is until someone else steps foot onto the training yard, and one by one the knights fall silent, standing there timidly as they take notice of who exactly is interrupting their training.

 

“G’morning!” Princess Tori cheerfully announces with her hands on her hips.

 

“P-Princess Elise!” Sir Frederick, who had been overseeing the training in the captain’s stead, rushes over and bows to the princess, but makes sure to leave plenty of space between the two of them. “W-Whatever brings you here, your highness?”

 

“What, the future queen can’t stop by to see what her knights are up to?” Tori starts casually pacing forward as she talks, closing the distance between the two. Frederick tenses up as she approaches.

 

“O-Of course you can! We just weren’t expecting you to grace us with your-” He’s interrupted by Tori putting an arm around his shoulder and patting it as if he’s an old friend.

 

“Don’t gotta worry about sucking up to me, Freddie, ain’t really my thing. And hey, hope there’s no hard feelings ‘bout yesterday. Wasn’t anything personal, just wanted to show everyone how hard I’d been workin’ while I was gone, y’know?”

 

“You n-needn’t worry, your highness...” He says awkwardly, wondering if it would be impolite to take a step away so that she’d have to remove her hand. “N-Now, was there anything specific you wished to observe during today’s training?”

 

“Who said anything about observing?” She says with a smirk before releasing him from her grasp.

 

“Hey everyone!” She calls out. “Gather ‘round! Got something to talk to ya about!”

 

The knights look at each other, some of them whispering to each other about what they think she’s going to do to them after what happened with Frederick yesterday, but eventually they all head over. None of them wish to get too close to Tori though, so they end up forming a very wide semicircle around her.

 

“Guess that’s good enough.” Tori claps her hands to redirect their attention to her, and put a stop to any idle whispers. “Okay, so the battle between the bunch of you and my mercs is happenin’ tomorrow afternoon, yeah? I’ve been thinkin’ about that, and I’m not sure it’d be fair if they were the only ones to train with the princess. So, in the interest of evenin’ the odds, who’s up for a special trainin’ session!?”

 

Several knights look at each other, but the training yard remains silent. It does not seem like anyone is particularly interested in taking her up on her offer.

 

“Just to be clear, I’m not gonna be hittin’ anyone today. Won’t be good for any of us if half of you are too injured to fight tomorrow. Didn’t even bring my greatsword with me, just gonna use one of yours to defend myself.” The princess holds an open hand in Frederick’s direction.

 

“Oh, O-Of course, your highness.” He unsheathes the wooden training sword he had on him and hands it to Tori, who gives it a few quick swings.

 

“Huh… Been a while since I’ve swung something this light, used to practising with the real thing, but it’ll do. Now, who’d like to go first?”

 

“...I’ll do it!” A familiar knight says as he steps forward.

 

“Ah, you’re the one from earlier!”

 

“Yes, your highness. I hope the maid you were tending to is okay.”

 

“Yeah, she’s resting up now, be fine in a few hours I reckon.” Tori raises the sword, pointing it in the knight’s direction. “Now, stand over here and see if you can land a hit on me.”

 

The knight moves into position as asked and holds the blade upwards before taking an overhead swing at the princess, but she effortlessly deflects the strike with a wide swing of her own sword.

 

“Saw that one coming from a mile away, don’t hold it in place like that until you’re actually swinging. A slow attack like that’d only work with something big n’ heavy like that your enemy can’t block properly, like my usual sword, but you gotta be fast with a weapon like this. Try again, but one quick movement, really get that momentum going!”

 

The knight strikes again, but much faster this time, in line with the advice he was given. Tori once again parries the blow with a wild swing, however, having not taken her eyes off of her opponent’s sword once since the training started.

 

“Better! Got the speed now, but I can tell your footwork is off. You hurt your right foot a few months back?”

 

The other knight pauses for a moment. “You can tell just from that? It got sprained during a mission, but it’s been fully healed for a while.”

 

“Thought so. Seemed like you’d gotten used to keeping weight off of it. That little habit’s stoppin’ you from putting all your strength into your attacks.”  Murmurs can be heard from the other knights, impressed by how easily she was able to identify what he was doing wrong. “Give it one more go, but fully step into it when you move forward!”

 

The knight steps back and lines himself up for another attack, following Tori’s directions. The sword comes down once more, and a loud cracking sound can be heard throughout the training yard. Tori used brute strength to block the attack, holding her wooden sword out with one hand on each end so that it takes the full force of the blow in the middle. The knight’s strike wasn’t enough to break the sword apart, but the angle it’s now bent at shows that a single hit got most of the work done.

 

“There we go! That’s lookin’ better already, wouldn’t you all say?” Tori holds the broken sword up for everyone to see before turning back to the knight and giving him a hard pat on the back.

 

“Now keep practisin’ that swing, bet you’ll be able to break it entirely before long.”

 

“Thank you, your highness! I’ll start right away!” The knight announces before jogging off to another part of the yard to start practising his swings.

 

“Okay, so who’s up next!?” Tori asks the crowd, and while the knights are still scared of her, a few of them actually raise their hands to volunteer this time.

 

---

 

The training proceeds smoothly for the next hour or so, with Tori continuing to give advice to the knights who are slowly starting to warm up to her. The suggestions and encouragement she provides them, as well as how she’s able to pick up on underlying issues with their form in as little as one or two strikes, goes a long way towards impressing her audience, and it isn’t long before they start eagerly lining up for their turn to spar with the princess. Even Sir Frederick found himself asking for pointers from the person who so thoroughly bested him the day before.

 

The morning goes on, and Princess Tori shows no signs of slowing down. Even after sparring with knight after knight with no time to rest inbetween, she’s still able to deflect or block every strike with wild, flashy manoeuvres that she manages to make look effortless without ever breaking a sweat or dropping the grin that presides on her face. Several of the knights have started to wonder if they’d be able to land a hit on her if a group of them all attacked at once, but between everything they’ve seen from her today, and the spectacle that was the fight against Frederick the day before, they’re not sure how many of them they’d actually need to manage such a thing.

 

The end of daily training draws near, however, and the few knights left who haven’t had a chance to spar with the princess may have to wait for another day to get their turn, as someone else has decided to visit the training yard this morning. An older looking man with short, neatly trimmed, black hair and a thick moustache paces towards the area where the princess is, and one by one the knights stop what they’re doing to salute as they see him.

 

“Well, it certainly looks like everyone is having fun.” The man announces.

 

“Good day, Captain Percival, sir!” The knight Tori had been training with yells after dropping her fighting stance.

 

Captain Percival is the leader of the royal guard, and is known as one of the greatest knights the kingdom has ever seen, having saved it from all manner of deadly threats, both man and beast alike, who have stood against him in the past. While his age prevents him from setting foot on the battlefield these days, he still keeps himself busy watching over the current generation of knights, as well as the work he’s taken on as a member of the queen’s council, making use of his knowledge of military tactics to bolster the kingdom’s defenses.

 

“Ah, Captain Percy!” Tori says with a smile. “Been wonderin’ where you were.”

 

“I had a prior engagement as part of my council duties, princess. Not that you’d know much about that sort of thing, considering your absence last night.” He replies with a judgemental look on his face

 

“Come on now, no need to get so worked up about a silly thing like missing a single dinner.” The princess tries to put a hand on Percival’s shoulder, but he steps back before she gets a chance to do so.

 

“That’s not something for you to decide on my behalf. I took time out of my busy schedule to attend the event held in your honour, but apparently you were too busy drinking in town to even make an appearance! It seems you have plenty of time to play childish games with my knights, however.”

 

“Thought you’d appreciate me giving them some pointers, captain.” Tori says, shrugging. “Gonna be a big audience at tomorrow’s fight, so both sides need to put on a good show, yeah?”

 

“I would have thought you’d be taking this battle more seriously, considering you’re the one who issued the challenge. It’s a competition to prove who trained the better fighters, not some play to entertain the masses! Besides, what makes you think you have the right to train these knights? You swing that sword like a wild animal, you have no grounds to claim expertise on the matter!”

 

“Don’t know about that, capitan. Wouldn’t’ve survived the past two years if I didn’t know how to fight, and besides, my advice seems to be working out pretty well for these guys so far. Maybe once I’m queen I’ll also take over as captain, let you have a bit of a break after all this hard work you’ve been doing.” Tori says with a grin.

 

Percival tenses up. “Training’s over! Everyone get on with your duties for the day!” He yells out. “I need to have a word with the princess.”

 

The knights pack away the training gear in awkward silence as the two of them watch, Tori asks if she can help a couple of times, but the knights insist on taking care of it themselves.

 

“Great work today everyone! Keep working on what I showed you and you’ll be fightin’ machines in no time!” Tori calls out as the knights start to leave, a few of them start to thank her as they leave, but they stop after receiving a fierce scowl from Sir Percival.

 

Once they’re all gone, Percival turns back towards Tori.

 

“Look here, you. I don’t care how close you are to becoming queen, you need to learn your place! When did you take your pledge of honour? How many years have you spent in service to your kingdom? How many times have you put your life on the line for its people!? You are not a knight, you’re not even a squire! You don’t get to tell my royal guard what they should be doing!”

 

“Well…” Tori starts, casually crossing her arms behind her head. “If you’re doing such a good job, why have I been hearin’ talk about a bunch of towns throughout the kingdom dealing with a bandit problem?”

 

Percival goes silent for a few moments, before taking a deep breath.

 

“You seem to know an awful lot for someone who has been back for less than a day.”

 

“It’s nothing special, really. You council folk just spend so much time in your own worlds. You forgot how much you can learn from actually talking to those people you were screaming about protectin’. Bunch of ‘em were talking about it last night, apparently the trade routes are gettin’ hit real bad.”

 

“Well regardless, that bandit problem is under control. Several of my best knights are already on the case, it’s only a matter of time before the villains are dealt with. Once again, I ask you to respect my authority and not meddle in matters that don’t concern you, princess.”

 

“Y’know, you sure do talk a lot about honour and respect for someone who hasn’t done anything to earn either of 'em from me.”

 

“What exactly is that meant to mean?”

 

“Look, tell you what.” She says calmly, taking on a slightly more serious tone compared to her usual confident self. “I did respect you when I was younger, before you got involved with all this council junk. Thought it would be great to be a hero who could fight for what they believed in and save people like you did, so I’ll just say this. Lots of things’ll be changing soon, whether we want ‘em to or not, and there’s no chance I’m letting anything play out how my mother has planned. It’ll be much easier for everyone if you let those changes happen instead of fighting ‘em, Percy, but if you can’t do that, just remember that I’m ready to do whatever I gotta do so that I get to fight for what I believe in too.”

 

Having said her piece, Tori starts to leave, walking away from the captain as he processes what she just told him.

 

“Are… you threatening me, princess?”

 

“Nah.” Tori calls out casually as she leaves. “More of a heads up really. See you at the fight tomorrow, Percy!”

 

“Do not expect your brutes to have an easy victory!” He says, but the princess doesn’t respond, leaving him to consider this warning.

 

He can’t think about it for long, however. He’s a busy man, and there’s still much to prepare for tomorrow.