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Sklaw looked at them and snorted. “Before you likely-looking lads touch a blade, you’ll make one. Guardsman Smythesson will instruct you there, poor man. I leave them to you,” he told Coram, and walked out after the Duke.
Coram sighed, his face grim. “Well, lads—let’s be off to the forge.”
It was the beginning of a long, hard winter. After the practice swords were made to Coram’s satisfaction, Sklaw took over. He instructed them in the stances and passes that were such an important part of fencing. He taught them how to get a sword from its sheath quickly—a feat that looked much easier than it was. Always Sklaw hovered nearby, criticizing, growling, complaining. The boys learned to do everything while wearing their practice swords, because there was no telling where Sklaw would turn up. The only place it was safe to take the blade off was in one’s room, when one was bathing—and even then the door had to be locked. Alanna made sure her door was locked.
Sklaw singled her out for special treatment, perhaps because she was the smallest of the group. She did nothing right, or even better than last time. She was clumsy; she was lazy; she didn’t practice because where were her muscles? She was a midget; she had been dropped on her head at birth; she would never be a full-fledged knight, only a “Lord,” fit to do nothing but sit at home and write poetry. Alanna took the abuse and practiced doggedly, trying to deafen herself to the old villain’s talk.
“How d’you expect me to be confident if you’re bellowing at me all the time about how bad I am!” she yelled at him once.
Sklaw grinned without humor. “Well, laddie, if you’ve let an old buzzard like me hurt your confidence, you couldn’t have had much in the first place.”
Alanna bit her lip rather than answer him back, after that.
Spring came, and Duke Gareth returned to their class.
“We’re trying something new today, girls,” the Guard Captain growled as the Duke of Naxen took a seat. He tossed two sets of padded practice armor at Geoffrey and Douglass. “Meron. Veldine. Let’s see if you can use what you’ve learned on the move.”
The two boys put on the padding and assumed the “guard” position. “Begin!” Sklaw barked.
After a few moments Alanna closed her eyes. She had seen Duke Gareth fencing with Alex, who was the best swordsman among the squires. This was a mockery of that kind of fencing. Geoffrey would lurch forward and swing his sword at Douglass. Douglass would hurry to block the swing, stumble back, then lurch forward to try a swing at Geoffrey. After a while Duke Gareth called a halt. Between them, he and Sklaw went over the duel, showing each boy how he could place his feet better, how he could move quickly without stumbling, how he could improve his balance. Finally they were permitted to strip off their now sweat-soaked padding.
“Wellam. Trebond.” Sklaw shoved two fresh suits of padding at them. “If you can do as well, I’ll be much surprised.”
Alanna assumed the “guard” position, feeling her knees trembling. It was like taking any other kind of test, only ten times worse. A knight lived or died by his swordsmanship. Without a mastery of swordplay, she would be no knight, have no great adventures. Suddenly Sacherell, who was a friend and a sometimes companion, looked like a menacing ogre—a tall, bulky, menacing ogre.
“Begin!” Sklaw ordered. Alanna stumbled backward as she tried to avoid Sacherell’s lunge. Recovering her balance, she brought her sword up just in time to block Sacherell’s down-coming swing. She stumbled again and recovered only in time to block another swing—and another—and another. She stumbled and blocked, without making any swings of her own and without really getting her footing. The boy lunged forward suddenly, his sword point headed straight for Alanna’s throat. She tripped and fell over her own feet, dropping her sword. When she looked up, Sacherell was standing over her, his sword in the “kill” position at her throat. She closed her eyes as Sklaw let out a full-throated roar of laughter.
That night she lay awake, staring at the ceiling. Over and over she “fought” the duel with Sacherell in her mind. What had gone wrong?
She heard Coram moving around in his room, getting ready to take up the predawn watch. When he left the chambers, she went with him, a small, silent shadow. Wordlessly she accompanied him down to the kitchens, sitting beside him as he flirted with a sleepy scullery maid and ate his breakfast. Still silent, she followed him up to his post on the castle walls. Together they watched the sky over the Royal Forest go from gray to red-orange as dawn came.
At last Coram remarked, “Sleep at all?”
Alanna shook her head.
“I’ve seen worse.”
“You were there?”
“Aye.”
Alanna closed her eyes and shivered. The humiliation for Coram would have been terrible, and that made her own humiliation worse. It was bad enough to look like an idiot in front of her friends and Duke Gareth. But Coram was the man who had taught her how to use a dagger as a weapon, to shoot an arrow, to ride her pony. Coram had encouraged her all this way, had made himself a wall between her and the people who might have discovered who she really was. She had failed Coram, and he had seen it.
“I don’t understand it,” she whispered finally. “It—it was like—my body wouldn’t do anything I told it to. My mind was saying, ‘Do this! Do that! Do something!’ And my body just wasn’t connected. Sacherell—”
“Sacherell was well enough.” Coram yawned. “He’s a bit of a natural. Ye’re just not a natural with a sword, Master Alan. Some are born to it, like me. I never knew aught else, and I never wanted to. Now, some—some never learn the sword at all, and they don’t survive their first real fight. And then there’s some—”
“Yes?” Alanna asked, grasping at this straw. She was obviously not born to the sword, and she had no plans for dying in her first fight.
“Some learn the sword. They work all the extra minutes they have. They don’t let a piece of metal—or Aram Sklaw—beat them.”
Alanna stared at the forest and thought this over. “It’s possible to learn to be natural?”
“It’s just as possible as it is for a lass t’ learn t’ beat a lad, and the lad bigger and older than she is, and in a fair fight. Well—ye fought fair.”
It had taken weeks of training in secret to beat Ralon. The long hours, the bruises and her constant exhaustion were fresh in her mind. But it was worth it, Alanna thought. More than worth it.
She stretched, yawning widely. “Can I borrow your sword?”
Coram looked at the weapon hanging from his belt. “This? It’s bigger than ye are!”
“Exactly.”
Coram stared at her for a moment, then slowly unbuckled his belt. He handed the sword to Alanna, his face expressionless.
Alanna hefted the weapon in her hand. It was the largest, heaviest sword she had ever handled. It would be work to wield it with only one hand. “Thanks. I’ll return it later.”
She trotted off to find an empty practice room with plenty of mirrors. Coram was right. A sword could not beat her—and neither could Aram Sklaw.
6
WOMANHOOD
IT WAS THE FIFTH OF MAY. ALANNA AWOKE AT dawn, ready for another session with Coram’s big sword. She got out of bed—and gasped in horror to find her things and sheets smeared with blood. She washed herself in a panic and bundled the sheets down the privy. What was going on? She was bleeding, and she had to see a healer; but who? She couldn’t trust the palace healers. They were men and the bleeding came from a secret place between her legs. Hunting frantically, she found some bandage and used it to stop the red flow. Her hands shook. Her whole body was icy with fear. The servants would be coming to wake the pages soon. She had to do something in a hurry!
