Page 62 of The Discount Damsel

“I’m barely awake. Sign that again.”

“Sir Roger has delegated your basic training to me.” Bradley gave her a feral grin.

She paled. “You lie.”

The apprentice wasn’t. After dinner, when Bradley was locking up Sir Roger for the night in the dungeons, the hedge knight had asked for a word.

Sir Roger gripped an iron bar with one hand, braced himself upon the rattan cane with the other. “That little dragon’s stunt with the wind and all those tower quakes have woken some old injuries.” He jerked his head towards the pull-up bar sticking out of the wall. “That yours?”

Bradley nodded slowly, wondering where this conversation was going.

“Figured. That robe barely fits you around the chest, and you climb up and down these stairs like a billy goat. I was wondering, though I’ve got no grace to ask, if you’d put Miss Millie through the necessary paces in the morning. You know, push-ups, squats, core work, pull-ups, and the like. I can’t get her into fighting shape and train her in sword-fighting, at least, not until I’m healed up myself.”

The apprentice’s first instinct was to decline—vehemently—but before he could shake his head, he had an epiphany. This was the opportunity he’d been waiting for. Under the guise of training her, he would break her. Pull-ups would humble her, the stairs would silence her motormouth, and the burpees . . . Bradley almost cackled. The burpees would crush any ideas of piracy to smithereens. The seas he used to sail would be safe from another scourge, and the tula would be crying for the comfort of her castle by the end of the week. Dirk would return her, no more Heroes would come, Bradley could study with some peace and quiet, and the luck dragon’s heart would stay safely in his chest.

It was perfect.

“N-n-no lie,” Bradley crowed as he yanked the sheets out from under the princess once more.

She landed with a mild thump upon the rug and quickly yanked her toes back under the hem of her nightgown against the cold desert air. He handed her a scrap of paper, his grin widening as her eyes frantically scanned each line of Sir Roger’s note. When she looked up at him, she recoiled from the devilish glint in his eyes.

“P-p-push-ups. Now.”

Millie, feeling betrayed yet knowing there was no malice behind Sir Roger’s decision, crumpled the note and lobbed it at her new mentor. It bounced off his thigh and fell pitifully to the ground. “What, sir, is a push-up?”

Bradley rolled his eyes, dropped into a plank position, and pumped out a dozen push-ups.

The princess gaped, and if she was being honest with herself, for more than one reason. The apprentice was still only in his boxer briefs, after all. But the push-ups . . . “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

The apprentice rocked back into kneeling position and shot out a hand to manhandle her into position. She smacked him away. “I got it, I got it.”

Millie, in fact, could not do a push-up, not even on her knees. Well, she could do half of one, since gravity was so willing to help her to the ground. And she would’ve claimed pushing herself away from the rug to be impossible had she not seen the apprentice do it so effortlessly a dozen times already. But for her, it was. So Bradley amended the exercise and made her hold the correct plank form—resting his foot upon her backside to ensure it—for as long as she could.

Which was about ten seconds.

Again, and again, with little rests in between, until Millie’s arms were shaking.

When she collapsed upon the rug, utterly spent, Bradley rolled her over with a nudge to her hip. “S-s-sit-ups.”

Millie learned a new pain as the apprentice stood on her toes, anchoring her as she hinged up and down until her stomach felt like it was sawing itself apart. She flopped down onto her back with a cry.

“Th-th-that was e-e-eight,” her mentor snorted. “Again.”

Millie’s nightgown was sticking to her body in a most uncomfortable fashion when the sit-ups finally defeated her. She lay staring up at the stones of the ceiling, panting, and seriously reconsidered her life choices.

Bradley leaned into her field of vision, not a bead of sweat upon his brow, not a whisper of fog upon his spectacles. “Quit-ting?” he asked.

Mutineer Millie detected equal measure of delight and scorn in those two syllables, and her ire rose. If she could take on that room of tarantulas, she could survive this. She forced herself upright, tugging her nightgown away from where it stuck and smoothing the damp locks from her face. “What next?”

Her mentor wasn’t to be deterred. He stalked over to the bedroom door, opened it, and swept his arm towards the stairwell. Demented delight dimpled his cheeks. “Stairs.”

“Marvelous.” Though she was morbidly sore from all the dashing about she’d done yesterday, she still thrust her nose into the air, crossed the room with all the grace and dignity of a princess, and began her descent.

Bradley grabbed an undershirt and a pair of trousers and followed her.

Millie’s tormentor maintained a steady pace which prevented her from slowing when her legs grew shaky. No matter how many times she flung a murderous glance over her shoulder, the apprentice never got the hint. Millie gripped the guide rope as the lifeline it was and collapsed onto her hands and knees when she reached the sand at the bottom of the tower.

Bradley walked around her without even a wobble in his gait and unlocked the dungeon.