5. Past regret

Liberty pov

Whack I try to silence my alarm by hitting in its general direction. I’m not a morning person. Never was never will be. For this very reason I have my alarm on my desk so I have to get out of bed. My body is less stiff and painful than I expected. Olwyn’s ointment sure worked wonders. 

I would love to sleep in on the weekends but sparring starts at 8:30. The Saturday classes are led by Gamma Heath. He’s brutal but fair. In my previous life I avoided him as much as I could. He would ask when I’d join the sparring class, telling me that being a ranked member did in no way exonerate me from the obligation to train. 

If anything according to Gamma Heath as the Alpha’s daughter I needed to set the pace and show that training was to be taken seriously. I laughed at him then. Now I’m doing my best but he kind of ignores me. 

/He’s probably making sure that we’re serious about training before he invests his time in us,/ Naveah remarks with sadness and regret in her voice. 

/I’m sorry, I know you always wanted to put in more effort. It was me who was entitled and lazy,/ I sigh. There’s so much I regret. I can only hope that my current effort is enough. 

Sometimes I feel like giving up. That the timeI have until the trials is too short. That even with my current efforts I’ll fail the trials. Even if I pass them, how will I defend myself from the plotting Hartley, Candy and beta family? 

In deep thought I enter the sparring area. The smell of sweat and the sound of fists on punching bags pulls me out of my thoughts. I find Madeline in a corner practising round kicks. 

“Morning Liberty,” she pants after completing a series of ten repetitions, “How’d you sleep?” 

“Good morning to you too! I slept great honestly. I expected to be more sore than I am honestly,” I return her greeting. 

“Your face is almost fully healed. Your wolf is powerful. Mine will need another day before I’m good as new.”

“Shall we alternate the round kicks and help each other?” I suggest.

“Sure, we have enough time to practise both sides. Do you want to start? I already got a series in,” she answers as she moves from the mat. 

I stand on the mat and look in the mirror. I close my eyes and think back to the pointers Gamma Heath gave last week. I take a deep breath and start my first series of ten kicks with my right leg. Without a break or waiting on Madeline her feedback I switch to my left leg. 

“Well done, Liberty,” Madeline smiles.

“There has to be some feedback," I grin back. 

“Sure there is!” She laughs. When she’s done I step off the mat and she steps back on it. 

I focus on Madeline’s execution of the round kicks. Not only to give her feedback but also to watch and learn. 

“It’s hard to give you feedback,” I start, “Partially because your technique is really good and also because it feels slightly stupid for me to tell you how to do something when you’re so much more proficient than me. But I have a few minor things.”  

I’m in the middle of explaining to Madeline how I think she can improve  when a voice I don’t immediately recognise interrupts me. 

“Well, if that isn’t the worst fighter of the pack correcting someone… How interesting…” the voice drawls.  

I spin round to face whoever is talking in such a patronising way.  

“Good morning Danny, got out of the wrong side of the bed?” I quip back.

Danny has a crush on Verity, she however is not interested in him. She likes the attention he gives her and that she can send him for errands but other than that she just merely tolerates him. 

Danny doesn’t care for me or Madeline so he’s probably pestering us because of yesterday’s spar outcome. Sure enough Viera and Verity walk in and stand behind him. Both the twins are smirking.  

Danny will be eager to show Verity that he can handle me. Preferably he will verbally humiliate me or make fun of me. If that doesn’t have the desired effect he will start a fight. 

“Don’t think because you’ve trained for a week and you’re the Alpha’s daughter you can boss us around. Back down little girl you’re nothing.” He steps closer to me towering over me by several inches trying to get me to step backwards.

I straighten my back, “Oh Danny you poor little pup, trying to impress Verity by showing your bad boy side. News flash she’s not impressed with your brawn nor is she interested in you. Now leave me and Madeline practice in peace.”

He narrows his eyes, “You and Madeline are awfully chummy since she beat Verity and Viera for you yesterday. Dare to spar me?”

“Liberty, let it go. We’ll just go elsewhere. He’s not worth it,” Madeline tries to stop things from escalating.

I nod and start to walk away.  Suddenly Danny grabs my arm and pulls me towards him. 

“Don’t cry…” Danny hisses.

Before I can think it through I kick his shin. Hard, no holding back. He cries out and lets me go but I don’t get the chance to escape. Within seconds Danny is on top of me raining down punches. I avoid most of them and manage to get him off me. 

I kick him in his stomach, throwing him off balance but he doesn’t fall to the ground. He recovers and kicks back, I avoid his leg by ducking and try to sweep his other leg from beneath him. 

He lands a hard punch on my nose that immediately starts bleeding. My fist lands on his jaw, splitting his lip and dislodging a tooth. 

“ENOUGH! Both of you idiots STOP!” the booming voice of Gamma Heath blares through the gym using his aura forcing me and Danny to stop. Both bleeding we scowl at each other. Danny growls at me. To my content I see that I’ve not only split his lip but also managed to hit his eye which is now swollen shut. 

 /Well done us,/ Naveah proudly quips, ignoring our broken nose and split eyebrow. 

“Does either of you care to explain what happened?" Gamma Heath barks out.

“Liberty was provoking Danny” Viera starts shifting the blame to me.

“Zip it, Viera” Heath silences her.

“Well? Has either of you morons got to say anything in defence?” Gamma Heath barks out looking at both me and Danny. 

I shake my head looking down at the ground feeling ashamed that I let Danny provoke me. 

“Apparantly you’ve both got too much energy so instead of participating in today's training you are going to run 10k, do 100 sit ups, 100 push ups, 100 squats and 100 burpees. IN THAT ORDER. Now MOVE!” Gamma Heath decides. 

 “But Gamma it was Liberty who instigated and started the fight,” I hear Danny try. 

Instead of defending myself or listening to whatever bullcrap Danny blurts out I go to the slackmill to start my 10k run. Within a few minutes Danny joins me, setting up the slackmill next to me.

“Danny! Take the slackmill on the other end of the row! Stay as far away from her as you can!” Gamma Heath shouts.

I ignore Danny and focus entirely on getting through the punishments. When I'm finally finished my body is broken and I lie on my back tyring to gather enough strentgh to get up and go to the changing rooms.

“You got off easy this time. Next time I’ll make sure you won’t get back up,” Danny hisses as he passes me on his way to the chanigng room. The threat sends shovers down my spine. As I lay panting and gathering courage to get up and go home.  

I watch him walk out and notice that Heath is following Danny with his gaze, eyes narrowed. Heath looks at me, “Keep your head on your shoulders next time. Now go home and take a bath. Tomorrow is another day, another training session.” He doesn’t sound unfriendly. Maybe I impressed him by not giving up. 

 /We have to ask Cooper if he has more of the magic ointment or pay a visit to Olwyn ourselves,/ I groan to Naveah, who just grins back at me in return. 

/Coulda, woulda, shoulda have trained more before,/ she rubs our past laziness in my face yet again.

/Can’t change the past working hard in the present./