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I wasn't interested in answering the question in his eyes, so I bent over, hands on my knees, my own breathing labored. I wiped sweaty bangs from my face.
"Pick it up," he directed, "and give it to Juliet."
I walked over to where the bokken lay, bent down and picked it up. Juliet stepped forward, and after a sympathetic glance, took it from my hand. Assuming I'd been dismissed, I turned away and rubbed sweat from my eyes.
But Catcher called my name, and I glanced back to meet his gaze once again. He searched my eyes, scanning my irises in a preternatural way I'd come to expect of the answer-seeking sorcerer. Seconds passed before his focus sharpened and he was looking at me again, instead of through me. "Is there anything you need to tell me?"
My pulse pounded in my ears. He had forgotten, apparently, that we'd broached the subject before, that I'd tried to talk to him about my malfunctioning vampire. I was more than happy to keep it that way. I shook my head.
I could tell he wasn't satisfied by that, but he looked at Juliet and prepared to fight.
Catcher worked Juliet through the same seven katas, her moves practiced and precise, the daintiness of her form belying her skill at wielding the lengthy weapon. When he was done with her, he asked us for critiques. The guards, at first with trepidation and then with confidence, offered their observations of her performance. Generally, folks were impressed, thinking that an enemy's underestimation of her slight form would work to her advantage.
Peter was also given a workout before Catcher called the session to an end. He ended with a few parting comments and generally avoided eye contact with me, before shaking Luc's hand, pulling on a T-shirt, grabbing his weapons, and leaving the room.
I gathered my sword and stepped into my flip-flops, intent on catching a post-training shower. Lindsey walked over and put a hand on my arm as she toed into her shoes.
"You all right?" she asked.
"We'll see," I whispered back as Luc crooked his finger at me.
"Ethan's office," was all he said when I reached him. But given the irritation in his voice, that was plenty.
"Should I shower first? Or change?"
"Upstairs, Merit."
I nodded again. I wasn't entirely sure what I'd done to deserve a visit to the principal's office, but I was assuming my performance during training had something to do with it.
Either they'd been impressed by the minute or two I'd allowed the vampire to take control, or they'd been unimpressed by the rest of it. Or, given the shots I'd taken and the fact that I'd actually dropped the bokken, actually offended by it. Either way, Catcher and Luc would have had questions, and I assumed those questions had been sent upstairs.
Scabbard in hand, I trotted up to the first floor and headed for Ethan's office, then knocked when I reached the closed door.
"In," he said.
I cracked the door and found him seated at his desk, hands clasped together on the desktop, gaze on me as I entered. That was a first. It was usually the paperwork that had his attention, not the vampire at the door.
I shut the door behind me and stood before him, stomach fluttering with nerves.
Ethan made me stand there for a good minute, maybe two, before speaking. "Word travels."
"Word?" I asked.
"Merit," he began, "you stand Sentinel for this House." He looked at me expectantly, eyebrows raised.
"That's what I hear," I dryly responded.
"My expectation," he continued without comment, "the expectation of this House, is that when you are asked to improve your skills, to strengthen your abilities, you do so. Upon request. Whenever you are asked, whether during your one-on-one training or in front of your colleagues."
He paused, apparently expecting an answer.
I just looked back at him. I could admit that I looked sloppy out there. But if they'd known the workout I was putting myself through, I guarantee they'd have been impressed.
"We've talked about this," he continued. "I need - we need - a functioning Sentinel in this House. We need a soldier, someone who will put out the effort that is required of her, whose dedication to this House does not falter, whose effort and attention are always given. We need a vampire who gives of herself, entirely, to this cause." He adjusted a silver stapler on his desk, aligning it with the silver tape dispenser it sat next to.
"I would have thought, given the fact that we'd trusted you with respect to the Breckenridges, the raves, that you understood this. That you wouldn't need an elementary lecture regarding the level of your effort."
I looked at him, managed not to offer up the bruise that had blossomed on my left arm - fading but not yet gone - as obvious evidence of my effort. Of my concerted exercise in self-control.
"Am I making myself clear?"
Standing there before him, sweaty in my workout gear, sheathed katana in my hand, I figured I had three choices. I could argue with him, tell him I'd worked my ass off (all evidence to the contrary), which would probably prompt questions I didn't want to answer. Or, I could come clean, tell him about my half-baked vampire problem, and wait to be handed over to the GP for handling.
No, thank you. I opted for choice number three.
"Liege," I acknowledged.
That was all I said. Although I had things to say about his own trust issues, I let him make his point, and I got to keep my secret.
Ethan looked at me for a long, quiet moment before lowering his eyes and scanning the documents on his desk. The knots in my shoulders loosened.
"Dismissed," he said, without glancing up again.
I let myself out.
Once upstairs again, I showered and donned clothes that were decidedly not within the Cadogan dress code - my favorite pair of jeans and a short-sleeved, long- waistedred top with an off-center scooped neck. I had a date with Morgan and a not-going-that-faraway party for Mallory to attend. The neck-revealing top was very appropriate for a date with the vampire boyfriend.
I applied gloss and mascara and blush, left my hair down around my shoulders, slipped into square-toed, red ballet flats, then grabbed my beeper and sword - both required accessories for House guards - and locked my room behind me. I walked down the second-floor hall and rounded the corner.
As I took the stairs, I lifted my gaze from the treads to the boy ascending the other side.
It was Ethan, suit jacket over one arm.
His expression showed a kind of vague male interest, as if he hadn't yet recognized exactly whom he was checking out. Given the change from sweaty, post-workout Merit to pre-date Merit, not surprising that he didn't recognize me.
