Page 12 of Kingmakers, Year Three

I feel something else: a desire to prove to him that I’m already superior to the rest of these fools. I want to distinguish myself above them all.

“This is not a fundamentals class,” Snow says. “All of you have been selected because you already know how to fight. We will focus on higher-level skills, which are more complicated and precise. You will follow my instructions exactly. Particularly when sparring with your fellow students. Remember, if you fuck up in golf you get a mulligan, if you fuck up in the ring, you’ll wake up eating through a straw.”

We wrap our hands and don our padded training gloves.

Snow breaks us into sets of two, assigning the pairs himself. Though he doesn’t know any of us yet, he’s able to judge our size and skill level with fair accuracy, so that most of us are evenly matched: Leo with Ares, Silas with Bodashka, Kade with August.

However, he matches me with the blond Freshman, which I can’t help but take as an insult. While the kid is tall, he’s obviously young and inexperienced.

He introduces himself in his gentle, accented voice. “Tristan Turgenev.”

“Dean,” I say curtly back to him, facing off across our mat.

He must be related to Claire or Jules Turgenev. I don’t really give a shit which it is. I’m annoyed that I’m babysitting instead of getting proper practice with someone like Jasper or Leo.

I love fighting. I love falling into my stance, easy and natural, knees bent and fists raised. I love the energy that flows through my frame and the knowledge that I can strike and hit as hard as I want. When my opponent answers back, I’ll slip his punches like I can see them coming from a mile away.

“I’m going to assume you all know the basic strikes and footwork,” Snow says, standing in the center of the gym. “Today we’re going to work on the left jab counter. A jab from a right-handed opponent is the most common punch you’ll encounter. To turn a left jab into an attack, you want to slip the punch, sending their glove over your left shoulder. Then you counter with a jab of your own right to their chin.”

He demonstrates the movements against an invisible opponent. Though he slows down his speed for instructional purposes, I can tell how tight and precise he remains, even after a decade out of the ring.

“Begin,” Snow barks.

Tristan and I circle each other. Tristan has a decent stance, but he’s slow and hesitant.

I snap out a lightning-fast jab to his face. He fails to slip the punch. My glove connects with his nose and his head snaps back. He stumbles back a step, shaking his head. A fine thread of blood dribbles down over his upper lip. He ignores it, continuing to circle.

Now it’s his turn to jab. He punches out, straight and true, and I slip it easily, responding with an even harder jab to his lip. Tristan grunts, the lip splitting and beginning to bleed as well.

This happens six or seven more times.

I become infuriated that he’s failing to block my punches, and I jab him harder and harder. I’m annoyed that we’re paired together because it’s ludicrously easy to avoid his blows, not a challenge at all. I up the speed of the exercise, until he’s dizzy and stumbling from a dozen direct hits to the head, while he’s failed to strike me even once.

Finally he can’t even keep his hands up, and I hit him with a hard right cross that knocks him on his ass.

“STOP!” Snow shouts.

He stomps across the mats, jaw set and eyes blazing.

“What do you think you’re doing?” he demands.

“A left jab counter,” I reply. “Exactly as you said.”

“That was a right cross.”

“He’s not keeping his hands up. He needed a reminder.”

“Do you think you’re in charge of discipline in my class?” Snow says, standing only an inch away from me. We’re almost exactly the same height— though he’s ten or twenty pounds heavier—so we’re eye to eye and nose to nose.

“You said everyone here should be experienced. He’s not even in my league.”

“You think you’re better than him?”

“I know I am,” I say, barely holding back a laugh. “I’m better than everyone here.”

“Everyone?” Snow asks, his voice low and dangerous.

I realize too late what I implied. But I won’t take it back now. Maybe I am better than this washed-up has-been. He’s got to be in his mid-forties at least, maybe even fifty. I’m twenty-one years old and a physical specimen. I think I can take him.

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