Authors note: Song at the top is what I kind of imagine Nicky's theme to be. Hope you guys enjoy the new chapter. If any of you end up commenting I would greatly appreciate it. I'm extremely new to Wattpad haha. Pfft, I decided to put Nicky's hair in a pony tail in the pic at the top cause I thought it looked pretty cute like that. Lmao, what do you mean this isn't how Emery and Nicky's first meeting went down? 

I hadn't slept all night. That night in the baths kept replaying to me over and over again. Following my punch to Emery's face he had simply stood there for a moment before he just well... left without so much as a word. I had been left alone knowing what I had done. What had he done after he left last night? Had he told Orla...had he told everyone? Would I come into the hall only to find the royal army waiting to take me to the execution block?

In the morning as we made our way to breakfast Gani came up to me, a concerned look on his face.

"Hey you okay?" I blinked, startled by the sound of his voice.

"Uh...yeah? Why do you ask?"

Gani shrugged but the worry was still obvious in his expression.

"You seemed a little off when you came back last night and well...you were tossing and turning all night." I tried to shrug it off, act like it was nothing...Gani would know soon enough what I had done and what I was if what I was anticipating was waiting for me.

"Don't concern yourself with it." I said forcing a laugh. "I just was worried thinking about all the training we have ahead of us." That seemed to make Gani relax a little and he gave me a quick nod. As we finally entered I took a deep breath and shut my eyes...I didn't want to see. I didn't want to see an army, I didn't want them to drag me away as Orla and Emery watched grinning. I felt a sudden tap on my shoulder and I tensed. Oh God this was it...Oh God... OhGodohGodohGod-

"Nicky man...you okay?" The voice was Gerner's. I opened my eyes to the normal bustle of the banquet hall. Everything was normal. Then again...maybe they were just waiting to get me alone. I cautiously trailed behind the others hoping they would block me from he who would not be named. Suddenly I heard Munny's voice.

"Woah! Emery! What happened to you?" Shiiiiiiit. I cautiously glanced over to see him. Emery as usual was surrounded by his usual entourage of 4 or 5 boys and he turned to face Munny now as if just listening to the younger boy's voice was an annoyance. I could see now that there was a bandaged on the bridge of his sharp nose. Every muscle in my body tensed again as I waited for him to speak, feeling my stomach twist in worry.

"I fell."

His answer took me by surprise and it took quite a bit of effort to not visibly react to it. I could hear the confusion in Munny's voice as well.

"You...fell?"

"Yes, or should I say it yet again to get it through that little block head of yours. I am actually quite clumsy surprisingly. I tripped on my way back to my room last night." I swallowed hard. It couldn't be. Why would Emery be covering for me? It made no sense. Something was wrong, there had to be a catch. He had turned back to his posse by now still soaking up the attention they were giving him and wasn't even looking at me, he was acting as if he had never even seen me before in his life. I didn't know if it was too early to be relieved. Maybe he had never been punched before and didn't want it going around that someone had kicked his ass, then he would have lost all his new found popularity. I had no idea what point Gani had been trying to make about him being uncomfortable with everyone paying attention to him, it seemed to me that this guy lived for it. My team at last moved away from Emery's table finding our own and started breakfast. Not long after it was time for training. Every colored group was all together this time, unlike the day before, and we were met by Orla before it officially began. She greeted us now, wearing a tight dress of dark green, her hair still braided around her head. For some reason she carried a large scroll under one arm.We went silent as she cleared her throat to speak.

"As you all know the process here is extremely rigorous, that's why last night nine of the boys who did not meet up to our expectations were sent home." There was a whisper of shock that quickly spread through the boys. Nine had been sent home already the first day? "Quite, QUITE!" Orla snapped immediately causing the room to go silent once more. "There are 40 of you now and we want to make sure you all stay up to the task. Remember your goal is to be in the top five. That is why...starting today we will have..." she unrolled the large scroll now. "The rankings. These are your scores from the evaluation yesterday. Every day your new scores will be added and a new ranking will be put up. Here are the 40. The last 9 that did not make the cut were removed and trust me....this will not be a new occurrence. The scroll was nailed up and almost immediately boys were swarming around it to see where they landed. I finally pushed my way to the front of the crowd to see where my name among others resided on the list. I was number 7. It wasn't an awful number but...I would still need to work hard to make it to the top five. Khalil was silent behind us. He was number 30. Not the worst number but...yeah...definitely not good. My eyes drifted to the top three. Munny was 3rd. I heard Gerner who was number 15 give him a little slap on the back in congratulations. Number two was a boy named Samuel Wallis...I vaguely remembered him. He had been the one who had informed us about Emery yesterday. Speaking of Emery...I looked at the top spot and there he was. He was already surrounded by an even larger crowd than usual.

"Congratulations!"

"You're amazing Emery."

"Woah Emery! You're such a good swordsman! Could you teach me." I did happen to hear his reply to that last comment.

"Sorry, you can't teach talent," he said it flashing a smile as he ran a hand through his short blonde curls. I wanted to kill him. He laughed at that. "I'm simply joking of course. I had to train extremely hard to obtain that level of expertise as well. I'm afraid it's not something someone could simply learn in four months. Not to brag or anything but...I clearly am the best swordsman here. What can I say? I guess it's just in my nature to be a God among men." This wrought him a round of applause from his posse. HOW HAD THAT GOTTEN APPLAUSE!?! All he had done was brag about himself?! People were latching onto every word he said and the arrogant prick was lapping it up. Gani couldn't have been more wrong about this guy.

And so...the first official day of training began. We were each paired with a hand to hand combat partner and I happened to get Samuel. He was good but...even though I might not have been first in other categories I was able to beat him at this. Down and dirty combat and killing was my nature. It was what I had been trained my whole life to do. First to defend myself and later as a way to provide for my sister and I. I was able to pin him down after about 15 minutes of brawling despite his obvious size advantage. I saw Orla watching me once I had done it. I slowly let him free and Samuel rubbed his shoulder as he stood up breathing heavily.

"Damn Nicky, haha that hurt."

"Again." It was Orla. She stood there still watching us.

"Just a minute, can't we catch our breath before we go back to-"

"I said again."

We trained for hours straight like this. We fought, someone surrendered, we did it again switching partners every hour. The next part of the day brought...quite a bit of worry to the boys. We were led into a room we had never been in before. It was large but broken up into multiple smaller sections by curtains.

"There will be less of this kind of training then the others but it is still a required part of the duties learned to be a Kingsmen none the less." Orla stated matter of fact way. There were whispers of confusion among the boys trying to understand just what was going on. Finally Orla put an end to it all. "As you know on the Kingsmen are meant to meet the prince's every desire. That includes the art of pleasing him in a physical matter as well." This caused the room to erupt into a frenzy of talking.

"What?"

"But....but I don't want to practice touching a man."
"Excuse me, ma'am, I believe the prince prefers women. Why should this be necessary?" that last prominent voice had been Emery's who had stepped forward still surrounded by his bath of groupies. Orla just looked him down.

"It doesn't matter what he 'prefers' it is what is required." She said it sternly, like a mother might scold a small child and I found myself having a sudden new twinge of respect for her. Hell yes, fuck you Emery. Orla continued. "You'll be paired up with someone from your team first and then a boy from another team. You each will go to a separate curtained off area. There you will find a small hour glass. When you flip it your minute will begin. You must pleasure your partner as much as you can in the minute. At the end of the minute the hour glass will be flipped again and the other partner will begin. Don't think you can try to just pretend to do it, if I find out you lied at any point in this training you will be kicked out immediately. At the end both you and your partner will fill out a paper to evaluate the other's performance on a 1-10 scale." She paused for a moment. "You may only touch the top half of their body, nothing below the torso." That brought a small wave of relief over the group still the tension in the room was obvious. Orla began making her way around the room assigning partners finally arriving in front of our group. Before she could pair us off Gerner and Munny stepped forward. Gerner cleared his throat, appearing slightly nervous.

"Uh...Madame Orla? My friend Munny here and I were...well...we were a little concerned. See, Munny is only a kid y'know, he's only 13. His voice hasn't even dropped yet ma'am and I uh...I just don't think it's appropriate for him to be doing this." Orla looked the two over for a moment after he spoke as if she was actually considering his argument. Then she spoke again.

"Fine then, I can understand your concern. How about a compromise? Lord Vestari since you have so nobly stuck your neck out for your little friend here how about you two are paired together? I will not pair him with anyone else. This way we can assure he is touched by what you deem appropriate."

"I uh..." Gerner tried to speak clearly flabbergasted. "Uh I don't know if..."

"If that's what you ask for that's what you get." With that she had already moved on to me. "You." She was staring at me. "You'll be paired with..." she scanned the line pulling Gani forward. "This one. When you two are done you will practice with trainee number 19." Kahlil was next. Orla paired him with number 40 first and then he would go on to practice with Gani next. Once she was done assigning us she gave us a little nod to pick an area and begin. Gani and I chose the one closest to us. Each section was much like a tent set up. We couldn't see into any of the others and when we entered it was a small space. The floor was covered in fabric and pillows and the small hour glass rested on a table near the far left corner on top of a piece of paper a quill and ink that was there for us to rate each other's performance. Gani glanced over at me.

"I'm so sorry Nicky," he laughed nervously. "My, this is going to be quite awkward isn't it?" I forced a nod. "So uh..." Gani clearly just wanted to get this over with.

"So...should I go first or do you want to?" I found myself mumbling. Gani shrugged. "I'll do it. Please tell me if you feel uncomfortable in any way? Alright?" I nodded and Gani slowly reached over and turned the hourglass over. Gani kissed the way he smiled. The touch of his lips brushing over my neck was gentle and soft and I could feel my heart pounding in my chest as I felt his hands slowly brushing over my torso. His breath felt warm against my skin as he undid the buttons of my shirt one by one. He traced the line of my chest with his mouth as one might run their hand through a bath of hot water for the first time. I couldn't help but imagine how Gani must make love as this was going on. It must be pleasant, gentle and careful and slow. I hadn't even realized he had stopped until I looked up to meet his eyes.

"Time's up." He said with a small nod. "See, that wasn't so bad. A minute is hardly enough to even really do anything anyways. You'll do fine." And then it was my turn. I hardly realized my hand was shaking until I finally flipped over the hour glass. I felt like I had to match Gani. I was nervous doing this, clearly so. Where I grew up we didn't exactly 'make love' there was no foreplay like this. It was more or less simply shoving it in as soon as you could, finishing and then get back to work. Gani was Gani...I couldn't be rough with him like that. I slowly unlaced his jacket and pulled it off slowly before finally slipping his undershirt off his shoulders. I began to kiss him then, light pecks to those tanned shoulders dotted with freckles. I followed the line of his back and felt his skin beneath my mouth and fingers warm to the touch. Gani's body reminded me of a summer day. Warm and pleasant and comforting. Then the time was up. Gani was right, that had gone by quickly, we really had done almost next to nothing. My heart was still pounding in my chest, my pulse fluttering as I reached for my own jacket. Well it looked like it was on to the next partner. I glanced to Gani.

"Hey," I asked trying to keep my voice as normal as possible. "Do you know who number 19 is? They're my next partner." As I spoke I grabbed for the evaluation paper beginning to fill it out. Gani nodded at me as he laced up his own jacket.

"Oh yes. Number 19. That's hmm...let's see...oh! That's Emery."

My blood ran cold. Shit.