The Dark Goddess

Chapter 16

‘This is way harder than I thought’ Ami thought to herself as she breathed hard and sweat trickled down her face, in fact she was actually sweating all over.

Now that she thought about it, she should have had a stronger meal for breakfast as soon as she saw weapons practice as her first course of the day.

She has made her own decision that very night before dinner and given the form back to Parker who in turn gave her a handbook for the course she chose and a timetable over a few months till the term is over.

She picked a course that would enable her to learn so much more about the world and the gods especially her heritage as well; History and Mythology.

The course included the study of other languages as well and she had been told by Parker that it was a really vast course, but she was ready for it.

Well she was ready until she saw that her morning first subject on the timetable was weapons practice, the only thing that got her going was the fact that she knew she really needed to be able to use weapons.

Getting to the amphitheater that morning after breakfast, she found out that Darren was part of the coaches along with a rugged looking aged man and a sleek but fierce looking lady.

Ami fell in line straight with Darren, she was kind of regretting that decision now because he hadn’t gone soft on her at all.

He was pushing her to go even beyond her limits, with a sword and shield in her hands and just a scythe in his (she had learned the name of the weapon he favored was a scythe and not a sickle as she originally thought, it did resemble a sickle though).

After teaching her how to hold and balance the sword and shield (which she got rather quickly), he then taught her how to attack and defend with both weapons.

Now they had been at it all morning, switching from attack to defense and vice versa, Darren was quite shocked on how fast she got the hang of it and soon she was making him work as well.

By the time they were finished though, she had totally covered the basics and was holding pretty well against his low level attacks and charging rightly into his defense as well.

Ami didn’t know who she got the skills from, but she hoped it wasn’t her father, she really wanted nothing to do with him and nothing to get from him.

Ami finished her session and by her watch she had a little over two hours before lunch after which she had French language basics and Aztec myths as the two learning subjects for the day.

She rushed over to her place to take a shower and get a change of clothes before heading to one of the Egyptian house to take Zara along with her to the French language basics class because they had it together and she promised Zeke she’d take her along.

Ami couldn’t figure out just why Zara was so timid, she looked beautiful and has a great body so Ami felt she should in fact feel anything but shy, but then Ami guessed that it must be her own personality then.

When Ami got to the house, she found out that Zara had been waiting for her outside, but then there were about three other girls hovering about her and immediately she saw that, she knew trouble was brewing.

She sped up and caught up to them and sure enough they were raining teases on poor shy Zara who only hugged herself as the words came at her.

Ami was furious but she kept her anger in check as she went straight to Zara, “Hey Zar, you ok?” she asked to which Zara only nodded and tried on a halfhearted smile “cmon let’s go have lunch before class” she said again intentionally ignoring the annoying girls.

The girls didn’t like that though, “Now who is this rude freak?” one of them asked.

“Oh cmon you should know it’s a friend of the other freak that don’t talk” another answered and they started laughing at that.

Ami had been willing to let it go initially but now she was really pissed, “If you three have nothing better to do with your pathetic lives than pick on others and call them names then I’m sorry but you’ve been leading absolutely useless lives” she retorted shocking all three girls dumb.

Ami started leading Zara away but then the girls recovered and all three rushed to block their path “where do you think you’re going, you rude, good for nothing freak” the first talker shrilled at them.

“You first years are so rude, you need to be taught a lesson not to be rude to your seniors” the third one said and balled her fists, hitting her other palm with it.

Zara tugged at Ami’s clothes and when she looked at her, she saw that while she wasn’t afraid of the girls, she was afraid of things going wrong and out of hand.

Ami as well remembered one of the rules Parker had told them was that they mustn’t use their powers against each other unless in a sanctioned activity.

While there is that clause though there isn’t any rule against good old fighting neither is there any about fighting seniors so she did a quick scan around them and found what she needed then she patted Zara to reassure her that it was going to be fine.

“Come at us if you think you’re worthy of the senior status you claim, as for me all I see are three sassy bullies, ugly ones at that” Ami said to the girls infuriating them so much that they rushed at her.

Ami was glad for two things, one; that they all aimed for her and two; that when she called on her powers it answered her at once and she used a forceful wind lasso to pull up the stick she had sighted earlier to her.

In her mind she converted the stick to a sword and did a technique Darren only showed her once because he said it was an advance session move and it was for multiple foes but Ami had already mastered it even without knowing.

She caught the stick and whipped the flat side (if it were a sword) on the three girls outstretched hands aimed to hit her.

The shock and pain of the hit was only just registering in the girls minds when Ami finished her technique by whirling into their midst and thwacking them at different strategic places even as she twirled around them.

By the time she was done, all three girls were on their knees clutching wherever was paining them the most at the moment.

Ami dropped her trusty stick sword and moved to meet Zara “See, just a bunch of harmless, sassy bullies” she said to her shy friend who was now able to give a convincing full hearted smile.

Ami was so glad that she was able to make Zara smile “come, before lunchtime is over” Ami said and they left the girls who were still furious and were swearing but now too scared to move close to the friends.

Ami had found out Zara was mute the very day she and Zeke stayed over at her place, it was also the day they all picked their course.

Zeke and Zara had a little fight using sign language about their courses, Zeke had wanted them to pick the same course so they’d be together and he could look after her but they both wanted different things and so Zara had told him that there was no need to force each other in on the other’s course.

She had picked Ami’s course though so Zeke got a bit calmer on the whole matter, that was until the timetable came in and they found out they weren’t offering some of the subjects at the same time.

Ami was quick to promise Zeke that she would take care Zara as much as their combined subjects allowed and for the subjects that clashed they would just have to trust Zara to be able to take care of herself, a point she had already proven for the morning subjects she had, Music history and Egyptian myth.

French language basics class went over smoothly, a little too smoothly for Ami which made her realize that it seemed she had this already programmed ability to absorb everything she learns really fast.

The Aztecs myths class on the other hand almost made her doubt herself though because she hardly grabbed anything while the class was on, she later figured it must be her brain that is shutting down by itself when she noticed how weary she had become most probably due to the rigorous morning training.

By the time the class was done, Ami was all sorts of tired, she wanted to go to her place and even have her dinner there, but then Miles and Darren found her and invited her to the Olympians bonfire night, Darren was also an invitee though and although Ami was tired she couldn’t say no to such request from her friends, her family in Haven.