by K. J. Nessly
“By one mass training day?” Tyler asked doubtfully.
David shook his head. “Not one, but seven. We’re taking the week off to train.”
Elizabeth frowned. “Are you sure the Council will approve? They frown on families taking such a long absence from the people.”
“I’ve already written my intent to them and they have responded favorably,” David assured her. He didn’t feel it would be wise to admit to her that he would have done it with or without their permission.
“So what’s up first?”
“We spar. Everyone get your training weapons.”
A little while later, David led the way to the sparring ground and watched as his teammates formed a circle around him. Daniel, Luke, and Natalie set up the training weapons trestle and each Guardian set down their weapons until they each held their sword and a pair of daggers. He motioned Kathryn to join him in the center. She did, looking slightly apprehensive.
Jenna must have been feeling similarly because she asked, “Kathryn, are you sure you’re strong enough for a full week of training?”
“You did clear me for a full return to duties.”
“For light duties,” Jenna clarified.
“Training is light. Besides, it’s David I’m worried about. I don’t want to break him.”
David sent her a mock glare. “Thank you for your concern. Okay. Kathryn, you and I have never fought each other. We’re going to today.” He turned and looked at the rest of his family. “Matt,” he singled out their cook who couldn’t quite keep still. “Who haven’t you fought yet?”
Matt looked around. “I’ve trained with most everybody here,” he finally admitted.
David felt some surprise when the rest of the group voiced the same opinion. “So are Kathryn and I the only pair who haven’t sparred?”
“Go get the dessert, Matt,” Luke laughed. “This should be good.”
Kathryn pointed her sword at him. “You’re next.”
“Excuse me while I start running now.”
David rolled his eyes. What have I gotten myself into? “Well pair up with someone you haven’t sparred with…or who you don’t usually spar with. I want everyone to do the same. I want you to fight three times and then find someone else until you’ve fought everyone.”
After the initial confusion of finding someone they hadn’t sparred with in a while and finding someone who wasn’t already paired up with someone else, the Dragons were ready.
David held his sword at the ready and was surprised when Kathryn dropped her sword and grabbed her knives.
Matt chuckled from behind him. “I hope you enjoy eating grass.”
Ignoring his friend, David lunged forward and prepared for a vicious cut across the abdomen.
Suddenly, Kathryn was beside him, close enough to touch, and his blade was swiping empty air. The impact of her practice weapon hitting his Cirin armor knocked the breath from his lungs. An instant later her hilt slammed into his hand, which opened reflexively, and his sword dropped from his hand. A powerful backhand swing caught him once in the chest and he dropped like a stone.
“How did you do that?” He asked between gulps of air, he still hadn’t regained his breath from her initial strike.
“Practice.” She held out her hand and helped him up.
This time, he attacked more cautiously…a tactic which didn’t end up doing him any good. She blocked his side thrust with ease and spun out of range. He strode forward with a devastating downward strike—
She parried upward, bringing one of her knives up and around her head, and smoothly began a strike at his ear. As he moved to block, her other knife whipped down and caught him across the thigh, distracting him enough to get her ear strike in. A sudden jerk of her foot around his ankle and he was sitting on the grass again.
He rubbed his stinging ear, grateful that she had at least slowed down the momentum of her weapon at the last second to a sharp tap instead of a killing blow. He could no longer doubt Matt’s earlier words.
Kathryn was good.
Really good.
Her hand appeared in his line of vision and he gracefully accepted.
This time he would wait for her to strike first. She didn’t disappoint him. She lunged at him, a powerful downward strike which he evaded. He aimed a side strike at her that she easily parried. Then she reached over his hilt to cover his hand with her own and yanked towards her, David stumbled forward, and felt his sword forced from his grasp as she twisted to the right, leaving him an arm lock.
“I surrender!”
She released him immediately and he retrieved his sword. “Where did you learn to fight like that?” He asked in disbelief. The ease and swiftness with which she had disarmed him was frightening, even for a Guardian.
“Same place you did, at school.”
Before David could continue his line of questioning, Tyler came up and claimed Kathryn for his next partner.
Putting his questions aside, David focused on his new partner, Daniel. His technique was subtler than Kathryn's but no less devastating, just in a different way. Carefully David mapped out his plan. Daniel was nowhere near as powerful as David when it came to brute strength, but he had an agile-ness to his fighting style that reminded David of a wolf.
Suddenly, Daniel smiled.
"What?" David asked cautiously.
His opponent shook his head. "Nothing. Are you ready?"
In answer, David lunged at him, but to his surprise, Daniel was already moving and deftly avoided his strike, landing one of his own. Astonished, David studied Daniel carefully. The younger man had moved as fast as Kathryn had...and with the same effectiveness and ease. Suspicious David ran through all of his memories of watching Daniel fight. Before he could even go through half of them, Daniel attacked with a high strike aimed at David's temple. David blocked but Daniel used the momentum from the collision to bounce his blade off of David's and whip it around for a strike at his midsection.
Moving to the right, David brought his own sword down in a sweeping block, moving their swords over their heads and to the left. Daniel brought up his elbow in a strike at David's nose. David ducked and, balancing on one leg, struck out at one of Daniel's legs. Amazingly, Daniel moved aside and brought his elbow down on David's shoulder. David let the elbow hit and then used the added momentum to roll out of Daniel's reach. Deciding that finesse was not going to win him this battle, David abandoned all subtlety and attacked with all of his energy.
Impressively, Daniel managed to block all of his moves and David disengaged, moving back a few feet. "How did you get this good?" He panted. "You didn't fight like this before."
Daniel grinned at him. "You make it easy."
I make it easy? David pondered his words. As if lightning had struck him, Daniel's words suddenly made sense. "You're reading my mind." It wasn't a question.
Daniel's grin widened. "I really remind you of a wolf?"
David shook his head in disbelief. "Alright, you’ve made your point. So teach me, how do I fight a mind reader?"
Daniel paused a moment, finally he said, "By emptying your mind."
David frowned. "How?"
For a minute that actually seemed to stump Daniel. "I don't know," he finally admitted. "Ask Kathryn, I can't glean anything from her mind when I fight her."
"Of course you can't," David muttered. Seeing that Tyler was waiting, David released Daniel as his partner and sought out Amy.
From the moment they began to spar he could see Kathryn's influence over her fighting. Like Kathryn, Amy fought with a single minded determination that David found disconcerting. Kathryn must have drilled Amy in speed and reflex drills because she was faster than he had expected. However, unlike Kathryn, Amy fought with a fiery ferocity that was exactly opposite of Kathryn's icy intensity. Amy came at him like a whirlwind, her sword flashing whereas Kathryn came at him like a predator who had cut off all avenues of escape. He wasn't sure which technique scared him more.
After
two more radians of continuous sparing, David finally called a halt.
"Finally!" Matt groaned as he sank to the ground and rubbed his sore forearms. "I thought you'd have us sparring all day."
Natalie laughed. "Come on, Matt. It isn't that bad!"
He glared at her. "This from the girl who's started using her knives rather than her sword."
Natalie shrugged. "They're lighter and faster," she said with a wicked gleam in her eye.
David looked at Kathryn. "You're a bad influence, you know that right?"
Before she could answer, Matt spoke up mournfully. "Has anyone seen Lacey? I haven't been able to find her for the last two days.”
One by one all of the Dragons voiced negative answers. "Where is she?" Matt groaned. "I'm worried sick!"
Destiny swooped down and landed on the grass beside him.
Matt eyed her apprehensively. "You wouldn't."
Destiny stared back at him.
Matt's expression became sorrowful. "You couldn't!"
Destiny opened her beak and belched.
"She did!" Natalie chirped cheerfully.
"Kathryn, I'm going to kill your bird."
"Before the feathers start flying," Jenna spoke up. "You might want to eat lunch first."
The redhead eyed Destiny with malicious intent. "You're right," he agreed. "She's easier to catch when she's full." He led the group back to the house and together, he and Cass, served lunch, which consisted of cold sandwiches, fruit, and cold water. Matt picked up and tilted a large stein. As he took a long swallow of his drink, Matt became aware that there was something big moving in his mouth.
Gagging, he threw his cup and spewed liquid all over the table, drawing shrieks from several of the girls and sounds of disgust from Luke and Daniel. But he ignored them for in the middle of the table, covered in water and his saliva, sat Lacey. His family erupted into laughter.
"If only you could see your face right now!" Luke laughed.
"B...but, how?" Matt asked flabbergasted.
"Gotcha!" Natalie crowed from several seats down.
Epilogue
Two Months Later
Generations of planning, destroyed. He hoped that whatever grave had been dug for the idiot Tanner had been shallow and ravaged by wild animals.
Lord Tanner should never have been recruited into the Brotherhood of Fire. His dying words to the Guardians when they had rescued Lady Kathryn had alerted the Guardians to the presence of his previously invisible society. And on top of all that the idiot had let another of the swords fall into their hands, letting the Guardians know that they weren’t the only ones with unstoppable weapons.
He hoped Lord Tanner burned forever in some fiery pit with no mercy.
Events that weren’t supposed to happen for years, events that had been planned for almost a score of years, refined countless times and worked out to the minutest detail, he had been forced to reevaluate and reorganize. His spy on the Guardian Council had kept him abreast of the developments of their investigation into his organization, including the ruling that had ordered all inquiries into the matter over. However, his spy had warned him that there were certain parties within the Council who didn’t agree with the ruling and were quietly continuing the investigation. He needed them distracted.
He hated the Guardians with every fiber of his being. They had taken everything from him and given him nothing in return. His life was nothing to him, the Brotherhood was everything. The Guardians needed to be destroyed and this was the first step.
Crawling slowly he made his way to the top of the ridge. When he reached the trees he stood slowly, blending in with the forest. This was the first execution he had scheduled for today. Tonight there would be one more. He waited patiently.
There! His target was walking with his wife through the royal gardens, no doubt celebrating something. The Queen always liked to celebrate something.
Taking a deep breath he pulled an arrow from his quiver and notched it. Slowly he pulled the bowstring back and took aim—
That night, Selvin slowly picked his way along the narrow path. To his back, sharp stone ripped into his skin as he kept his body pressed tightly against the cliff wall. It was pain he was willing to endure considering the alternative. The path was barely half a meter wide and wound along the side of the sea cliff with an ancient shoreline high above. Below he could hear the sharp slapping of the waves as they hit the base of the cliff, but even more ominous he could hear the roaring crashes of the waves breaking over the multitude of rocks and sea stacks jutting up from beneath the tumultuous water. The pain in his back was a small price to pay to avoid being broken on the rocks below.
He felt his way along the cliff, darkness hid the path and neither of the moons were visible through the heavy cloud cover cloaking the landscape in blackness. Finally his searching fingers felt a hole in the cliff. Pulling himself inside, he breathed a sigh of relief. He hated the trip necessary to reach the Brotherhood’s gathering place.
More confident now that he wasn’t a heartbeat away from falling to his death, Selvin moved quickly through the tunnel his footfalls falling dully on the damp rock. During his initial visits he had broken his nose several times before he had learned when the tunnel changed directions. Now, he easily navigated the dark path until, after turning a corner, his eyes were blinded by the sudden appearance of torches along the walls.
He had never learned how their leader kept the light of the torches from spilling around the corner, but he had also learned not to ask insignificant questions. Shivers ran up his spine just thinking about it. He vowed he would never make the same mistake that Talbor made. The dolt couldn’t keep his mouth shut. Resisting the urge to cover his nose to block the stench of rotting sea life and dank mold, he hurried forward. To be late would be to forfeit his life.
Three more turns and a long hallway found him standing before an intricately carved wooden door. While the craftsmanship was breathtaking, the scenes depicted on the door would have unnerved even the most experienced of campaigners. There were images of men and women being tortured in various ways. Vines that had the heads of snakes curled around victims, their fangs a heartbeat away from the fatal bite. There were other images of creatures and tortures that Selvin had not recognized, but just looking at them made his skin crawl.
He opened the door and stepped into the room beyond. It was a circular room with blood red curtains hanging on the wall every four meters. In the center of the room a stone fire pit had been dug out. As near as Selvin knew, the fire that burned within the pit never went out. The flames licked out of the pit and reached upward several meters, illuminating the room.
Directly across from the door was a raised platform, upon which one lone throne stood. The stone the chair had been hewn from was as black as the tunnels had been, but it was covered in blood and fire jewels. Blood jewels, deep red with black veins running through them, were highly prized by the noble class, but fire jewels were forbidden to all but the king. At first glance, fire jewels appeared to be nothing more than a clear crystal, but when one looked closer, the observer would see a raging fire contained within the crystal. The flames ranged from red to white to blue. The black background of the chair enhanced the flames of the gems and made them normally visible, even from across the room.
But tonight he couldn’t see the gems, he couldn’t even see the chair. Instead, his attention was drawn to the three cloaked figures, standing on the dais, obscuring his view of the throne. He knew these men, they were the leaders of the Brotherhood. Their cloaks were black but were covered in flames that refused to burn through the cloth they covered. As he approached, Selvin could feel the heat from the fire pit on his back and the heat from the cloaks on his face.
Selvin knelt and touched his forehead to the cold, wet stone beneath his feet. “My Liege.”
“I am disappointed in you.”
Selvin winced. The cultured voice was carefully controlled, not allowing him to glimpse just how disappointe
d his master was.
He opted for the ignorant approach. “My Liege?”
The voiced hissed, “You have failed me.”
“Please, My Liege…” Selvin started to protest but cut off his protest when fire coursed through his body in waves.
“Your assignment was simple, destroy the Dragons and keep Lord Tanner under control,” The voice said harshly. “Instead the Dragons are stronger than ever and Lord Tanner’s actions have cost this Brotherhood dearly. And you have lost your sword…again.”
“I found it the first time,” Selvin protested weakly.
“I found it,” his master corrected. “And I gave it back to you without requiring blood payment.”
Selvin winced. To create the magical swords that could withstand the attack of a Guardian sword, the Brotherhood had resorted to old magic thought to have been lost for centuries. It required the new sword’s owner to sacrifice part of his body during the smelting process. It was the blood of the owner that gave the sword the red veins and only lived as long as the one who donated the blood. Once the owner died, the sword would dissolve into blood. Selvin had given the tip of his little finger and at his master’s reminder the phantom tip began to throb as it had the day it came off.
“I will not fail you again, master,” Selvin promised. He waited in silence for several long moments before his master uttered two slow words.
“I know.”
Two simple words. From a teacher to a student they could have been seen as words of encouragement, but from master to servant, they were deadly ominous.
Before Selvin could reply he heard the flap of heavy fabric and the room was suddenly filled with the strong scent of Gredenia flowers. A low growl sounded from behind him and he couldn’t help himself. Selvin turned to look.
His blood froze in his veins and all the strength fled from his body. “Wh—wha—what…?!”
“Do you like my new pet?” His master asked softly. “It has taken me years to find it. All but the Brotherhood believed it to be a myth, but we knew better.”
