“Good work, guys. I’ll see you here same time tomorrow.” Anandur pulled his shirt on, turned the lights off, and stepped out of the classroom.

Except for Kri’s, the doors to all the other rooms were open, with sweaty people spilling out into the corridor and heading for the locker room.

That was why Anandur never used one.

What was the point? His house was a short walk away, and he could shower and change in his own bathroom, thank you very much.

He waited outside Brundar’s classroom until everyone but his brother was gone. “Are you in a hurry to get home?”

“Always. Why?”

“Kri is training Wonder, I thought you would like to see her moves.”

“Indeed.” Brundar lifted his long, heavy gym bag off the floor and slung the strap over his shoulder. Unlike other people’s bags, Brundar’s didn’t hold a change of clothes or shoes. By the rattling noise, he had more than one sword in there, and probably several knives.

Anandur glanced at the walls, looking for the evidence of Brundar’s knife throwing. “Where are the holes?”

“I got a memo from Onegus demanding that I use targets for practice and stop damaging the walls.”

A very reasonable explanation, except there were no targets in the room either. “Don’t tell me you used your trainees for that.”

One corner of his brother’s lips lifted in a ghost of a smile. “The thought crossed my mind, but no.” Brundar transferred the bag to his other shoulder and reached inside the exterior pocket to pull out his phone. “Interesting.”

“What is?”

“Did you read the text from the chief?”

“Damn. I left my phone in the classroom. What is it about?”

“Go get your phone. We’ll talk about it later.”

“I’ll meet you in Kri’s classroom.” Anandur turned around and jogged back.

Fortunately, his phone was still where he’d left it, and no one had taken it to the lost and found.

“Sweet,” he murmured as he read the text from Onegus. Apparently, Magnus had been busy.

Tucking the phone into his pants pocket, Anandur jogged to Kri’s.

Wonder turned to look at him as soon as he entered the classroom and smiled.

“Eyes on me, Wonder,” Kri said. “Allowing yourself to get distracted in a fight is bad. No matter what goes on around you, you don’t take your eyes off your opponent.

“Got it.”

“Okay.” Kri turned to Brundar and him. “Don’t be quiet. I want to teach Wonder to ignore distractions.”

“Yes, ma'am.” Anandur gave her a two-finger salute.

“Let’s try this move one more time.” Kri assumed a fighting stance and Wonder mirrored it.

“So what do you think?” Anandur asked.

“There is nothing to think about. I want a piece of the action.”

Did Brundar want to train Wonder?

Nah, he must've misunderstood. “Are we talking about Wonder’s training?”

Brundar cast him a sidelong glance. “I meant the raid.”

Now that made much more sense. “Onegus didn’t say anything about a raid, but it’s safe to assume there’s going to be one.”

Brundar’s smile looked evil as he leaned against the wall and crossed his arms over his chest. “I’m looking forward to kicking some Doomer ass.”

“Same here.” Anandur leaned against the wall next to his brother. “The dog idea opens new possibilities. I’m not sure how we can utilize them, though. I’m pretty sure they can be trained to sniff out immortals. The problem is where to start. This time, Magnus had a lead, so he knew where to start looking.”

“True. Maybe Turner can come up with something. If anyone can, it’s him.”

Anandur turned his attention back to Wonder. She was doing great, and it seemed that she’d learned how to tune out the background noise because she hadn’t faltered again.

She was a natural, strong and fast, but her moves didn’t seem to be the product of professional training. It was street fighting at best.

“Someone must’ve trained her,” Brundar said.

“I’m not sure. She is powerful and quick and has good instincts, but other than a few basic moves I didn’t see her performing any of the known sequences.”

Brundar shrugged. “Nevertheless, she is not a complete novice. She has those basic moves down.”

“Which proves once again that it’s all in the attitude. Wonder believed she could, so she did what needed to be done. No hesitation.”

The primary tenet of combat training was to drill attack moves into fighters until they became automatic, second nature. When shit was going down, overthinking the next move was not an option. It took a lot of grueling training to achieve that level of mastery, but it seemed Wonder was one of the rare individuals who had it naturally. All she had to do was learn the moves, and they became part of her flight or fight instinctive arsenal.

Next to him, Brundar sighed wistfully. “I wish she would reconsider applying for the force. I’ve never had the pleasure of working with a natural. I could make her magnificent.”

“She already is.”