Page 59 of An Empress of Air & Chaos

He looked towards her, his emerald eyes dazzling with the rush of his activity. “Your turn.”

“You expect me to do what you just did? Without help?” She snorted. “Without some sort of harness?” Her eyebrows lifted, making her cheekbones more angled. “I am not powerful enough.”

“How do you know you’re not powerful enough if you’ve never tried?” Gideon’s chin stuck out confidently. His long, thin nose flared, causing his lips to part. He looked over his thick lashes at her.

She swallowed hard. “Okay, just show me again.” Her hands circled over each other, trying to focus on the task and not Gideon’s face.

“Come here,” he commanded delicately.

Moving towards him, she took a second to look at him as he turned to position himself so that he could help her angle her body correctly. With his leg, he nudged hers to where it should be. Moving her hips, angling them with his large hands, he positioned her stance. Her hip bones tingled underneath his touch.

She concentrated on the vault ahead. Or tried to.

“Okay, now pull your weight onto your back leg and spring yourself forward. Make sure you are pulling your arms back as you run, it helps with the speed.” He touched the bottom of her elbow and pulled it back to where it should be. “Flatten your back,” he said as he traced a hand down her spine.

Every muscle and bone instantly fell into command, tingling and sparking.

She pulled back on her leg and propelled herself forward into a sprint as instructed. As she neared the vault, she put her hands out, ready to make contact with the vault in order to thrust her legs over.

But it wasn’t enough.

She slammed into the hard apparatus and it knocked the air out of her lungs. Rolling off the vault, she hit the ground, a groan escaping her throat.

“Are you okay?” Gideon shouted seriously.

He stalked towards her and offered her a hand. Emara looked up at him, humiliated, and she placed her hand into his before he hauled her up.

“Let’s try again, shake it off,” he ordered. “You need to use these to pull your legs up over that vault.” He put a hand against the muscles of her stomach.

A red-hot heat swarmed her, but she nodded and kept her eyes on the vault. She disregarded the feelings that started sparking all over her skin.

“Not a bad first attempt,” he complimented. “Again.”

She pulled back and then sprang into action in another attempt. This time, she pounced onto the vault but couldn’t haul her body over to the other side.

She jumped down, frustrated.

“That wasn’t too bad,” Gideon encouraged. “Don’t get frustrated. You just need to believe you can do it. More power this time.”

“Who are you kidding? It sucked!” a deep voice boomed through the empty space. “I didn’t take you as a liar, Gideon.” Torin’s smile was provoking as he strode closer to them. Another hunter walked beside him; he had one blue eye and one green eye. He was like a mixture of both Torin and Gideon, only he hadn’t grown fully into his features yet. “Her technique was off and if you are not going to be man enough to point that out, I will.” He looked over Emara, taking in every detail of her face. “If you want her to get better, you will tell her the truth. She needs to lift her knees and chin. She’s not going to get over it by looking at the ground.”

“Kellen,” Gideon dismissed Torin’s observations, “I can see that you have the misfortune of training with Torin this morning. You know how he gets when he’s hungover.” Gideon didn’t look at Torin as he spoke, but at Kellen, the other Blacksteel brother.

Torin stepped into Gideon’s line of vision, demanding eye contact. “Let’s just hope he can keep up, even if I am hungover.”

Torin made his way across the sparring mats and Kellen followed.

Emara watched as the other Blacksteels walked away, feeling a little strange. The way the lighting that was hitting Kellen was...odd. She looked up to the ceiling. No windows. No beams of light…

Strange. She would have sworn that he had a glow about him.

“Okay, again,” Gideon interrupted her thoughts as he waved to the vault and turned his focus back to the training.

She felt a little uncomfortable as she looked to where Torin and Kellen had started a warm-up.

“Don’t worry about anyone else.” He moved towards her. “You need to zone in on what is important,” Gideon said lowly. “And that is getting over that vault. Okay, try this. I want you to focus on something that makes you angry. Something that makes you want to scream. Just as you think of it, spring back on your left foot and let the anger power into your body. Let it drive you forward.”

Emara took a deep breath and rolled her neck, shaking her hands. She got into the stance she had been shown for the third time. This time, before she ran, she pictured Taymir Solden standing in her room. The arrogance of his face, the venom in his words as he degraded her. She let the thought of his hand smacking across her face build a picture into her mind and she ran. She took off fast and hard towards the vault, clenching her teeth to keep the anger from forming a scream.

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