by Kody Boye
Katarina struck him upside the head hard enough to knock him to the ground.
What?
At first, he couldn’t understand what had just happened or how he ended up in the dirt. Head spinning, eyes out of focus, ears ringing like his head had just been placed inside a bell struck with an iron hammer—he allowed his vision to clear and the sound to die down before tilting his head back just in time to see a man step into view.
“We were sparring,” Katarina said, allowing her arms to fall slack at a side.
“What woman thinks she can wield a sword?”
“I do.”
“You do?” the man laughed. “Who do you think you are?”
“My wife,” Nova said, accepting Katarina’s hand as she reached down to pull him up. “Back off, buddy.”
“Back off yourself,” the man replied. “I’m the weapon master and what I say goes.”
“What you say goes?” Katarina asked. “Who the hell do you think you are?”
“Don’t talk back to me, bitch.”
“Hey!” Nova cried, throwing his sword and shield on the ground before stepping forward. “Nobody calls my wife a bitch.”
“I do.”
“I oughta kick your motherfucking ass you pathetic little pussy.”
“He’s not worth it,” Katarina said, casting her own armaments aside and stepping out of the sparring ring. “Come on, Nova. Let’s go. We don’t have to deal with this.”
“I shouldn’t have to deal with this either!” the man called back as Nova and Katarina made their way from the training grounds. “If I see either of you back here again, I swear I’ll have you reported!”
Nova shook his head.
Though in his heart he knew such a thing would never go unpunished, especially under the king’s jurisdiction, he knew more than well that arguing with a nobody would do neither him nor his wife any good.
“You shouldn’t let this get to you,” Ketrak said, frantic to calm his raging daughter as she tore her way through the room and opened each and every drawer in sight.
“Yeah,” Nova sighed. “He’s just a dumbass, that’s all.”
“Just a dumbass?” Katarina asked, throwing her hands in the air when Nova tried to approach. “No, Nova, Father! This is absolutely ridiculous.”
“I’m not saying it isn’t, but—“
A knock came at the door.
Shit.
Could the new weapons master have reported them so quickly after they had left the premises?
In a short, spontaneous moment of anxiety, grief and nerves, Nova balled his fists at his sides, tightened them until his knuckles popped, then stepped toward the locked door.
“Should I open it?” he asked.
“I don’t see why not,” Ketrak replied.
Katarina had nothing to add.
A short moment after he realized neither member of his family would say any more, Nova set his hand on the doorknob and took a deep breath.
All right, he thought. One… two…
He opened the door.
No one stood outside.
“What the,” he began.
“Uh,” a voice said. “Hello?”
Nova turned his head down to find Carmen standing at his feet, hands in the air and a frown on her face.
“I hope I’m not interrupting anything,” the Dwarf continued, lowering her hands before steadying her posture when she began to sway as though in tune to the ocean, “but I was passing by and heard some arguing going on, so I thought I’d check on it.”
“We weren’t fighting,” Nova said. “At least, not about anything that’s happened between the three of us.”
“Care to let me in?”
Nova stepped aside and ushered the Dwarf in with a simple nod of the head.
“So,” Carmen said, turning her head completely around to face Nova as he closed and locked the door. “What’s going on?”
“It appears as though the castle’s new weapon master has a thing against women wielding swords.”
“What?” Carmen frowned.
“He called my wife a bitch.”
“A bitch?” Carmen growled, reaching down for the mace at her side, which she drew without any hesitation whatsoever. “Nobody calls my friends that! Let me at ‘im! I’ll bash the fucker’s balls in!”
“I’m not so sure about that part,” Ketrak chuckled, reaching down to press his weight onto the Dwarf’s shoulders. “No need to get so riled up there, little lady.”
“I’m not a little lady, sir. For your information, my name is Carmen Delarosa, Drake Slayer of Ehknac, and I care not what men think when it comes to the mistreatment and the abuse of women.”
“Neither do I,” Katarina replied, crouching down beside the Dwarf and testing the weight of the mace in her hand. “Though if you think about it, there’d be no use in bashing his balls in.”
“Why?” Carmen frowned.
“Because he’d still have his dick.”
Nova could hardly contain the burst of laughter that sounded from his throat, which immediately drew two intense, if somewhat-dirty looks.
Keep yourself together, he thought, smiling, then nodding as Katarina clasped a hand around Carmen’s shoulder and pushed herself to her feet.
Their anger was not without purpose, not summoned without need or initiated without being compelled. To them, their entire livelihoods had been insulted all because what they wanted to do—because they, in their minds, considered themselves strong, much stronger than other women who might simply refuse or be afraid to learn how to defend themselves when there seemed to be other men about.
“That’s not true,” he whispered, shaking his head as Katarina stormed across the room to stand at the broad expanse of windows on the northern wall.
Women were not naturally weak creatures. They needed no rescuing, no pampering, no protection or anything that could limit them to the space of four walls and sometimes three. That in itself was a philosophy that had been bestowed upon them by men who believed they had not the strength to wield a sword, to don a shield or to ride a horse like a man when, in reality, they could do all those things, and more, if only they set their minds to it and were allowed to do said things without restrain or oppression.
Stepping forward, then behind his wife, Nova wrapped his arms around Katarina’s waist and set his chin on the top of her head, which seemed to fall purposely there when he secured himself behind her.
“Hon,” he whispered.
“What is it?” she asked.
“If we have to do it in here,” he said, tightening his hold around her body, “then I’ll teach you how to use a sword, whether the guards like it or not.”
“And I’ll help!” Carmen said. “A woman has to know how to defend herself, especially in this day and age.”
“I would appreciate that,” Katarina said, reaching down to set her hand over Nova’s, “more than anything else in the world.”
Early the next morning, after rising before the crack of dawn and borrowing two of the sparring swords from the training grounds, Nova and Ketrak pushed all the unnecessary furniture to the sides of the room to create a feasible sparring ring. The light from the midmorning sun piercing through the broad windows and reflecting off every object within the room created an atmosphere which Nova couldn’t help but feel as compelling, which served perfectly for what he and his wife were about to do in the close, unguarded quarters they had lived in during the past few weeks.
Standing in the center of the room with their practice swords drawn, poised and at the ready, Nova and Katarina began to edge toward one another, eyes intent yet completely focused on the situation. At their sides, Carmen and Ketrak watched with intense fascination, leaning forward, whispering to one another, even pointing and commenting on certain things that eventually led Nova’s gaze to falter from his wife.
Get a hold of yourself, he thought, snapping his eyes to the armed woman currently making her way toward him. Look at what happene
d last time.
Who could forget that Katarina had clocked him upside the head, knocking him to the ground almost instantly?
Using that pain to not only compel him, but to allow the realization that his wife, though untrained, could be a very dangerous enemy, Nova thrust his foot forward, then threw a jab in Katarina’s direction, which she quickly dodged and returned with a swipe of their own.
“Get ‘im Katarina!” Carmen cried.
Ketrak whooped in response.
“No love for me?” Nova asked, ducking as his wife threw another shot in his direction. “Come on! That’s no fair.”
“Those be fighting words,” the Dwarf replied. “Come on, Katarina! Fight dirty.”
Dirty?
His wife thrust her foot forward directly toward his ankle.
Nova jumped.
He lost his balance.
Sailing toward the floor more quickly than he could have imagined, he collided with the floor with enough force to drive his breath from his lungs. Regardless of his most obvious distress, however, Katarina came forward, bearing her sword down with both hands on its hilt and directly toward his chest.
He rolled.
The sword collided with the ground.
He picked his practice blade up just in time to deflect a second sweeping blow.
“Cuh-Come uh-on,” he managed, raising his sword just in time to meet Katarina’s. “I cah-can’t… buh…breathe.”
“You snooze you lose,” Carmen said.
Katarina laughed and threw herself back, just enough to where Nova could recover his breath.
She’s better than I thought she was.
He’d never known his wife to be a woman quick on her feet. Sure—she’d demonstrated that she could run at a fairly decent pace, given the long walks and escapades they’d taken around Bohren during their youth, but not once had he imagined her capable of using a sword, or using it well for that matter. Seeing this brutal, honest integrity and strength was enough to make his heart swell with pride, for Katarina merely wasn’t that lonely mayor’s daughter from the town of Bohren, but someone capable of being a true warrior and a fierce opponent.
“Ready?” Katarina asked.
“Ready,” Nova said.
They threw themselves at one another and began to throw and deflect blows as though exotic dancers moving to the sway of some invisible tune. A throw here, a jump there, a sword rising, then falling and a fist flying to knock the weapon out of the other’s hand—in a flurry of activity, it seemed his wife would never tire, nor reveal a weakness he could use to his advantage. That idea sent chills down his spine and tendrils of anxiety within his chest, making him even more nervous about what he was doing and whether or not he would accidentally strike her.
I can’t hit a woman, he thought. That’s wrong.
Either way, he would either have to hit her or be hit himself.
Raising his sword, he blocked a blow Katarina threw at him, then held her sword steady against his, pressing his weight into the hilt of the blade as hard as he could while his wife stood stoic with the same intense ferocity.
“You’re good,” Nova chuckled.
“So are you,” Katarina replied.
Nova pushed.
Katarina faltered.
The tail end of the sword went flying through the air and Katarina went down, directly on her back like he had no more than a few moments beforehand.
“So,” Nova said, stepping forward, trailing his sword down so it would hover directly over Katarina’s heart. “What do you say about this, dear wife?”
“What do you say to this, husband?”
A weight sounded at his torso.
Nova looked down to find the tip of the wooden sword pressed against his abdomen.
“You’re dead,” Katarina said.
Carmen burst into a series of giggles, then fell off her chair and onto the floor, where she proceeded to roll with laughter as Ketrak, too, began to chuckle at the sight before them.
“Wasn’t sure if we were going to do that,” Nova mumbled.
“You snooze you lose,” Katarina smiled.
Carmen howled with laughter.
“Nova,” Katarina said, raising her head to look him in the eyes in the faint light of the setting sun.
“Yeah?” he asked.
“Thanks.”
“For what?”
“Earlier. What you did.”
They sat at the end of the dock with their bare feet dangling in the air. Nestled together, his arm around her shoulders and her arm around his waist, they watched as the sky before them began to decline to darkness and as the little fish that wavered near the top of the water dove into their nests beneath the dock.
Are they us? Nova thought, trailing his eyes along the skirt of his vision, where he could see the creatures glowing beneath the breaking point in the waves. Are we them?
Knotted, like muscle on a grand man’s armed, and filled to the brim with tiny, luminescent eyes—they went to a place where only they could go and possibly slept there much like they, the humans, did each and every night. Likely, and forevermore, they would continue, persist, multiply, divide, but what of their culture and rights of passage? A thought occurred to him in the moments between watching the fish circle like some great, underwater vortex and the time Katarina leaned over and set her head against his shoulder, one so breathtaking that he could barely begin to imagine it. Did these things, these fish, have society? And if he could so easily relate to them and their pure, simple ways, did that not mean they had such a thing?
We still have a long ways to go, he sighed, easing his head atop his wife’s.
Sexism, racism, the overt hatred and misunderstanding of men like Domnin and Jerdai—all this and, it seemed, more, were issues pounded upon by men who claimed to be of freedom, of people who seemed to be more than content with the fact that their king was much kinder than what he could have been in spite of the war against Herald and the kingdom of Germa.
“You don’t have to thank me,” Nova said, drawing his mind from thoughts of things all the less bearing upon his life. “There’s no reason to.”
“Yes there is.”
“Why do you say that?”
“You heard what that man said to me,” she said, straightening her posture and looking out at the woodlands beyond the pond. “Almost all of them are like that. Not wanting to let us wield swords, saying we should stick to doing laundry and baking, telling us we have no purpose other than to get pregnant and have their children—it seems like all we’re asked to do is give, give, give. We’re never given anything in return—at least, most of the time—and while they might try to woo our affections with flowers or chocolate, it doesn’t mean the same to us as many would believe.”
“I can imagine.”
“But what you did, Nova… what you’re teaching me… this is something I’ll have for the rest of my life, or at least until the day I die.”
“You’re not going to die anytime soon.”
“I hope not,” Katarina said, shivering in the pale wind that sailed from the north and carried with it the smell of the ocean. She drew her shawl tightly around her and seemed to bite down to keep her teeth from chattering.
“Why do you say it like that?” he frowned.
“Because no one has any idea what the future holds.”
“Of course we don’t, but that shouldn’t mean we have to be afraid.”
“Does it, Nova, or does it mean that we have all the more reason to be afraid?”
All the more reason to be afraid? he thought, frowning, unable to resist the urge to wrap his arms around his wife and hold her as close as possible.
Men said that all should be in fear—that something, anything could be thrust upon them at any given moment. Be it the Gods, the government, or something even more fierce and brutal, there was always something to be afraid of, whether it was hiding in the dark or straight out in the open. That alone should have made him afraid for not on
ly himself, but his future, though why it didn’t Nova couldn’t be sure. Maybe it was because he had already lost too many things to care about anything more than his wife and even his father-in-law.
Do I even care about myself?
The thought stable and rooted within his head, Nova took a breath, expelled it, then looked out at the horizon.
Though nothing but darkness greeted him, he couldn’t help but think of better, happier things.
“Nova,” Katarina whispered, bowing her head into his chest.
“Yes?” he asked.
“I love you.”
“I love you too.”
Chapter 6
They seemed to swim over him like great snakes within the deepest of waters. Multi-colored and bearing the semblance of raccoons or other ring-colored creatures, these things skimmed the surface of the water in search of the dragonflies perched atop water lilies.
Where am I? Odin thought.
Unable to answer the thought not only because of his ignorance, but the fact that he could not think straight, he continued to watch the creatures swimming over the water’s great face and began to shiver as though chilled and unable to comprehend thought. First, it began, with snakes bonding together, molding as three, then four, then one as though Siamese twins did in rare instances of accidental childbirth, then they started to roll about as some fabled beasts are said to kill their pray. In this moment of isolation, and in this desperation of great fear, Odin tried to escape, thrashing into the deeper parts of the water only to find himself unable to swim. Pain clawed at his chest, reality tore at his heart and water burned into his eyes, creating scarlet tracks across the surface of his vision when he forced them shut and tried to draw one deep breath.
Water filled his lungs.
He began to drown, then sink.
As his body fell into the darkness, he encountered creatures that seemed to give off light the color of lightning, then acquainted himself with fish that bore mouths like wicked instruments of torture. Some of these creatures—fish, he could only assume, by the fact that they wore gills beneath what appeared to be mats of fur—2343 completely unlike anything he had ever seen: alien, even, in all definition and purpose. He’d once seen fish that produced their own light in the pond near Ornala, though small as they were and unintimidating in the least, but these things swimming about him snapped with each and every turn, eventually leaving way for featureless monstrosities so large they could have filled an entire castle.
