“Surveillance?” asked Orcus.
“Uh, well, just basic hand-to-hand combat today,” Hazel said. “You know, hitting each other with wooden swords and poles.”
“May I hit small children with these poles?” Quinoa asked. “They can hit me back.”
“No…no,” Hazel said, “just legionnaires.”
“Hmm.” Quinoa glowered. “Very well.”
Hazel’s shoulders sagged with relief. “Great. And I agree with Asterion. I think this is a good start!”
Asterion and his friends headed excitedly out the front door, except for Arielle, who trailed behind, literally dragging her bronze foot. As for Semele, Nico still had no idea if she was absent or observing quietly, but he supposed she could join in later….
They had to beginsomewhere. So why not with a little light hand-to-hand combat training? Nico and Will would be there to supervise. What could possibly go wrong?
He would later ask Johan to file that in the archives underFamous Last Words.
At first, the training sessionwasn’ta disaster.
Hazel handed the reins over to Frank, who usually oversaw training with all the newest legionnaires—orprobationes, as they were called in Latin.
“I’ve got to go deal with some boneheads from the Third Cohort,” Hazel explained.
Nico frowned. “More protests against the mythics?”
“Not this time.” She whistled, and her steed Arion came zipping in from across the Field of Mars at warp six. “They were playing pranks on citizens in New Rome—disguising themselves as bushes in the Forum and jumping out as people walked past them.”
Will stifled a laugh. “That’s actually pretty funny.”
“Hmm.” Hazel scowled. “Okay, yes, but discipline, training, et cetera. You’re in good hands with Frank. You boys have fun!”
Nico heard the relief in her voice. She leaped onto her stallion and disappeared in a cloud of dust.
Meanwhile, Frank paced back and forth, lining up demigods and mythics to spar with each other using wooden training swords calledrudes. The whole Second Cohort wasn’t present—just ten of the newest recruits—but Nico was still amazed how many demigods had joined the legion in the past few months. Among them were Yazan and Savannah—the two sentries they’d met at the Caldecott Tunnel.
Frank had paired off Savannah with Arielle, which was either a great idea to build trust, or a terrible idea given what the praetors had said about Savannah trying to kill the empousa when they first met.
Asterion faced a team of three probatii, which Frank said might even the odds. Quinoa struggled to hold a rudis as tall as him. Orcus, who couldn’t hold a sword at all, just flapped his wings, squawked, and farted, daring his sparring partner to try to land a hit. Johan leaned casually against his wooden blade, trying to engage his two opponents in a conversation about Darjeeling tea. The two remaining legionnaires were paired up—Yazan and a kid named Deion.
Nico and Will stood on the far end of the group, observing.
“Parati!” Frank bellowed. “Impellite!”
Nico knew enough Latin to understand those commands:Ready! Strike!
Apparently, most of the trainees did not.
“Parrots?” Orcus cried in alarm. “Where?”
His opponent whacked him across the beak, eliciting a fart of outrage. “Ow!” the griffin complained. “What wasthatfor?”
Quinoa lunged forward, screaming “Fear me, grain-eater!” He slapped his blade lightly against the probatio’s shin. The probatio frowned and swung his rudis like a golf club, knocking Quinoa on his diapered butt.
Johan kept explaining the merits of loose-leaf tea as his two opponents charged in. The blemmyae sidestepped their attacks with remarkable ease, causing the demigods to crash into each other.
“Oh, dear,” Johan said. “I’m so sorry. Now, if you’re usingorganicDarjeeling…”
Asterion’s three opponents attacked in unison, but all three of their wooden blades shattered against the bull-man’s midriff. Rather than counterattacking, Asterion started picking splinters out of his kilt, looking for snags in the stitchwork.
