He stepped closer and circled her. Once, unhurried, the same way he'd assessed the path on their ride from the falls, accounting for all the variables.
She tracked him without moving her feet.
He came around behind her.
His hands came over hers from the outside, adjusting her grip. Not roughly, not tentatively, simply with the directness of correcting something that needed correcting.
His fingers repositioned hers on the hilt, pressed her palm flatter, moved her thumb.
"Firm," he said, close behind her ear. "Nae stiff. Feel the balance."
He was close enough that the warmth of him reached through her sleeve where his hands covered hers.
She focused on the grip. "I feel the difference."
"Good."
He shifted to her side, crouched slightly, pressed one hand to her hip. Brief, precise, guiding her feet apart into a wider base. "That's where yer balance lives. Lower than ye think."
She swung.
He blocked it without apparent effort, the crack of wood sharp between them. "Too slow."
"Too confident," she said, swinging again with more intention.
He stepped inside the arc of the second strike and caught her wrist. He turned it so her blade angled down between them.
She pulled against the grip. He held it without strain.
They stood closer than she'd intended.
Close enough that she was acutely aware of his size in a way she hadn't been before. Not threatening, not imposing, just present, a wall of warmth and controlled stillness that she was somehow inside of rather than at a proper distance from.
"Strength isnae force," he said quietly. "It's timin'. Ye were lookin' at me. I was lookin' at the moment before ye moved."
"How do ye ken the moment before?"
"Practice." His thumb pressed briefly along the inside of her wrist where he held it, adjusting the angle of her hand on the hilt.
The touch was technical and lasted approximately three seconds and sent a shiver up her arm that she had no way to account for.
"Again," he said, releasing her wrist.
She struck again, faster this time, and he didn't block it.
He guided it, barely touching her forearm, redirecting so the momentum carried her through the swing and forward.
She found herself nearly against him, sword arm extended, his chest a breath from her shoulder.
Neither of them stepped back.
The yard was entirely quiet.
She was aware of it at the edges, the absence of sound from the men who were very carefully not watching from the perimeter.
The center of her attention was him. The absolute stillness of him. The way he was looking at her with an expression she couldn't name but could feel the weight of.
A throat cleared.
