Page 59 of In Her Own Rite

“Cool,” I say as we near the gym. “So I’m by far the least-prepared of the three of us to do this.”

“That’s why we’re in your training pack,” Quinn says, and she leads us inside.

The gym is separate from the rest of the buildings on the street, and from the outside it’s pretty nondescript: white facade with a Dutch gable, like most of the buildings on Halluk. It has a black door and traditional thatched roof, but the inside is dark and modern. It’s smaller but nicer than the gym Seb and Kier go to on Saroe, attached to our common house. There’s a large boxing ring in the center, and next to that, an area with mats on the floor. Around that runs what looks like a small indoor track, separating the inner area from the machinery and equipment that runs along the walls. Along one side are rows of complex-looking black-and-silver machines, and at another, a large weight rack and a few benches, where I see two older men working out.

Seb looks up from the mats, where he was bent over his gym bag.

“Hey,morlaa’. Right on time,” he says.

“Good morning,” Maren says sweetly, walking over to give him a kiss on the cheek.

“Did you bring everything I asked?” he asks. “Water, towel, clothing that can shift?”

I nod nervously. I don’t even own any shift-appropriate clothing, so I had to borrow a top from Maren and some pants from Quinn. I’m practically swimming in Maren’s sweater, but luckily Quinn’s pants are a close enough fit, even if they pool at the ankles.

“Alright, great. I’m gonna have you start up with a few laps around the gym to warm up your muscles, then we’ll stretch and get started. Put your bags down and go.”

I drop my duffle onto the mats and take off my winter coat. Quinn and Maren put their stuff down, too, and I see Maren do some quick stretches: standing on one leg and stretching the other thigh muscle, then switch, followed by some lunges. I try to copy her, but she moves quickly, intuitively, and by the time I get into my first lunge, she’s already done.

“Ready? Go,” Seb says, and Quinn and Maren start a light jog around the gym’s track.

I follow. It’s a pretty slow pace, and for the first twenty seconds I’m already mentally congratulating myself on how well this is going.See? You’re in pretty decent shape. You can do this.But then Seb tells us to go faster, and Quinn and Maren speed up with ease, while I feel an uncomfortable stretch in the backs of my legs.

“Switch. Run in the other direction,” Seb commands, and we turn on our heels and go counterclockwise around the ring.

“Good. Faster,” he says. Quinn and Maren pick up the pace and I try to keep up, but after a minute or two I can feel my breath get raspy, scraping through my throat. My face is hot, and I feel sweat starting to build on my forehead.

Seb calls out more orders, making us switch directions in less and less time. After about five minutes he tells us to stop, and I’m panting, my face red. Maren is just slightly out of breath, and Quinn looks totally fine.

“That was the warm-up?” I ask breathlessly.

“Yep. Now come to the mats and we’ll stretch.”

Quinn leads us through a stretching routine as my heartrate slowly returns to normal. We do something with our arms that feel mostly performative—I can barely feel anything—and then she has us stretch our hamstrings and quads. Those are awful; I can barely get my knees down to the ground when I’m sitting with my back straight, and when she tries to get me to do a stretch on my back, with one leg up in the air using a band, I can’t get it nearly as far as Maren.

“We’re gonna have to work on that,” Quinn says, sitting up with her hands on her knees. “I’ll have you do some foam rolling tonight.”

“Okay,” I say.What on earth is foam rolling?

“It’s good enough for now,” Seb says, grabbing a clipboard and a pen from his bag. “I want to do a test of your current level and then we’ll have your first lesson.”

He takes me on a tour around the gym. Quinn demonstrates how to do a pull-up and chin-up. She lifts herself smoothly into the air, showing me the motion, then has me try. I put my hands on the metal bar above me.

“Good, okay. Now lift yourself from the ground.”

I pull on the bar, but I barely get an inch off the floor.

“Sorry, okay. Let me try again.” This time I try harder, gritting my jaw. I lift myself a little into the air, but I can feel the texture of the bar grating at my palms.

“Is that as high as you can go?” Seb asks. “That’s fine.”

It’s not fine.

“Let me try one more time,” I say, bringing my hands down and wringing them together.

“No, it’s okay, save your strength,” he says, and writes what looks like a zero on his clipboard.

Next we go to the weight rack. How much weight can I handle if I’m on my back, pushing up? We try one set of dumbbells, but my hands shake as I bring them back down towards me, and Maren steps in instinctively and takes them from me, swapping them out for a lighter set. Next they have me leaning forwards over the bench, pulling the dumbbell up towards my chest. Quinn has to correct my form twice, and I glance with embarrassment over at one of the older men, taking a water break on his bench.

---