I charge forward, dive at my spear only to get kicked hard in the stomach. I roll and grab at it through the pain, but suddenly Tara has me. Sole arm twisted behind my back. “I will break your finger.” The pressure of her grip increases to a near unbearable level. Her face is close to mine. I feel her breath.
I meet her blue eyes. She is beautiful. Fierce and passionate in the orange, flickering bonfire’s light. It’s not that I’ve never noticed. But for whatever reason, it strikes me now. Reallyregisters. “Then break it.”
She does.
My mind doesn’t process it properly for a second, and then I bellow my pain. My finger bent at an unnatural angle. She’s released her grip on me, standing back as I fall to my knees.
“Concede.”
My arm is shaking. It doesn’t matter. It is six weeks back to Caer Áras. Broken bones will heal.
I grit my teeth, and pull the digit back into place with a roar. Crawl over to my spear and pick it up. Try not to cry out as my finger refuses to join the rest of them in wrapping around its haft. I know what I want. I could spend the rest of my life chasing the ghosts of my past. The mysteries of what has happened to me. But I have a real life, here. Now. With these people.
I am not going to let go of that.
“No.”
And something changes.
It slithers through my body. A sense of connection to my spear, of being completely in tune with it for the first time. I calm. Everything becomes clear, and bright, and sharp.
The pain fades.
Get up.
It’s a sense rather than words. An echoing, heartbeat impression of what I need to do. I obey.
Straighten. Set feet.
I do it.
She is coming. Overhead strike.
The realisation is in my head before I recognise what Tara is doing. Tara’s spear comes down in an arc and my own twirls in my hand. Light, almost moving on its own, my broken finger an irrelevance. Not an extension of my body. Part of me. Truly part of me.
I meet her blow one-handed, and my spear does not waver, and I do not feel the shock of the impact shiver as I should.
Good.
I look up into her eyes, and see her disbelief.
Take advantage.
I flick her haft away, unfurl the spear from my defensive stance, and strike.
It all seems so easy, now. So simple. Having one arm is no real disadvantage. The weapon does what I command it to. Light enough to move where I want it, when I want it. Strong enough to absorb any attack without effort. The impressions in my head flicker, and I heed them. Tara backs away.
She snarls, and her eyes bleed to black. I know her. I know why. She is afraid, now. Afraid that here, on this very last stage, she will falter.
And then the fight truly begins.
Our movements are an impossible dance. Too quick and graceful for any normal warrior, no matter how many years of training they have had.Left sweep counter. My skills alone, advanced though they have, would never have been enough to hold her off for more than a few seconds without the impressions in my head. But they are there, and I do.Duck push step back. She is faster than me by a fraction, but I survive for five seconds. Ten. Twenty.Block left block right block low. She attacks and attacks and attacks. Doesn’t stop. Flows on from one strike to the next to the next without ever pausing for breath. I cannot say whatthe others around us are doing or thinking. Our spears are a blur. There is only the fight.
Then her haft finds my wrist. Barely more than a brush but it is enough to throw my next movement off a hair. She sees it, somehow. Changes her stance and reacts with inhuman speed.
The air rushes from my lungs and I am tumbling, the force of the impact blasting me backward. I turn the fall into a roll, skidding on my knees along the grass and preparing myself to spring back again.
She will listen now.
