Born In The Dungeons

Chapter 16: Training

Alexios told me to meet him in the library for the first part of our training. He offered no further explanation, only to meet to him there in the morning. 

I walked to the grand library that I've seen during the tour of the palace that Reina had been instructed by grandfather to provide for me. It was a beautiful place with carved and painted ceilings, colourful plush carpets, and redwood bookshelves filled with all kinds of books. 

I found it odd that Alexios wanted to start training me in the library. I wanted to learn how to fight, not read.

"Are you certain that he said library, Your Highness? His Majesty has excellent training rooms for his guards in the palace. Perhaps you misheard?" Reina said, walking beside me and pushing a cart with a pitcher of water, and biscuits. Despite my protests, she had insisted on bringing it with us in case I got parched or hungry during training. 

"I am certain I'd heard him right. He told me to meet him in the library." I nodded. 

I saw Alexios leaning against a bookshelf when I walked in. Our eyes met. "You're late," he said.

I raised my eyebrows. "Good morning to you as well. And you never specified the time, so I cannot be late."

"Fair point." He shrugged. He then pushed off the bookshelf and started walking deeper into the room, beckoning me with his hand. "Follow me."

I frowned and followed Alexios as he weaved through the shelves and stopped to pick up a book or two from each one. "Take this." He gave me a pile of five thick books. "And these as well." Another two were added on top. I walked behind him with my arms shaking from the weight of them. "And this."

"Gods, not another one," I huffed and let him add another thick book to the pile. "Is this the first part of training? Am I to carry these books until my arms fall off?"

He took them from me. "No. You are to read them. They each describe the fundamental philosophies of fighting, written by the greatest generals of our time." He put the books down on a table by two chairs. Taking three of the books, he said, "These are for me."

"What will you be reading?" I asked.

"I need to relearn teaching philosophies. It has been years since I trained someone with zero fighting skills." Alexios sat down in one of the chairs and opened his first book.

We read beside each other in silence. The books he had given me to read completely pulled me in, and I did not take a break until I read them all. 

Closing my last book, I said, "Now can we start the real training?"

"Your Highness, you should eat something first. You have been refusing to lift your eyes off those books for hours." Reina, who had sat across from Alexios and I with a book of her own, offered me a plate of biscuits. When I took one, she offered them to the prince. "Your Highness, some biscuits?"

"Thank you." Alexios took the plate. 

Swallowing my first bite, I looked around the library. "Grandfather did well with this place."

"He did. When I first came here, it was my favourite place in the palace. Still is. Kingdom Poseidon has a grand library in the castle as well, but it could only be used by royals and nobles. Unlike this one," Alexios said. 

I turned my head to look at him. "Is it still so? The library in Poseidon."

He sighed. "I'm afraid it is. I had tried to change it. Follow in grandfather's footsteps. But when I went behind my father's back and allowed servants to use the royal library, he did not take it lightly."