Chapter 19 – Free Run

• The next morning I wake up with a groan, because they really did torture us yesterday. It was an endurance competition that lasted pretty much all day. We had to stand on a balance beam with a pail of water, of all things, on our heads and a staff stretched across our shoulders. At regular intervals, the Lieutenants would come around and add weights to our staffs so that it was a test not only of how long you could stand there and whether or not you could stay straight, but also how long you could endure increasing weight on your shoulders.
• It was absolute agony, only compounded by the fact that I somehow got placed next to Jackson during it, so I had the added challenge of enduring his exquisite smoke-and-pine scent the entire time I stood there. And god, the more I smelled it, the more I realized that there was something else layered beneath it – something warm, and rich, and delicious, like…cherries? God, I don’t know, but whatever it is, it works.
• Needless to say, I did not win this competition. I didn’t shame myself – I have good balance after years of ballet and made it somewhere to the midway point of candidates. It was the weights that took me out eventually – when they added a final set of sandbags to the ends of my staff, I just collapsed - completely ate dirt while water from the pail splashed all over me.