Chương 49: B2, Chapter 3: Training Day

I woke up early and ate a light breakfast, determined to stay ready and light on my feet. I grew up with propaganda about breakfast being the most important meal of the day. Even though I wasn't as convinced nowadays, the message stuck. Grabbing a few day-old pastries out of the larder, I crammed a muffin into my mouth and exited the Breakwater Inn, ready to hike to my destination. The morning sun was already warm, feeling like an early afternoon on most days.

As a port town, I wasn't used to describing the weather as warm almost ever. The streets were relatively empty at this hour, with a few people still heading to their stalls to set up shop for the day. I waved hello to a handful of faces I recognized—as well as a few that I didn't. A lot of the town knew who I was now, thanks to the spectacle I'd made of myself not a week prior.

Word travels fast when a random guy shows up in town, invents cocktails for the first time in the history of the world, and then stabs a pirate through the heart in front of a crowd. I was almost surprised that I didn't have a nickname yet. Or maybe I did have one and just didn't know it. Perhaps it was one of those nicknames people whispered behind your back. Like Dingus, or Flatbrain, or the Ugly One. A short walk brought me to a sinuous footpath through woods, crags, and a rocky decline.

I'd felt more confident when I'd gone bouldering in college. The whole time, I couldn't shake the nagging feeling that I was being watched, somehow. I kept checking over my shoulder. Nothing but forest revealed itself. There were two beaches near Seaport. One was long and curved, frequented by townsfolk when the weather was just right. And then there was my destination. It lay farther off the beaten path, separated from the main one by stony cliffs that cut through the surf. Here, fewer people might watch me flail.

Finally, carbed up and a few pastries lighter, I stepped down from the last boulder. My feet sank into the soft surface with each step, leaving fresh tracks. The sands were mixed white and dark, studded with small rocks and broken shells. It was the kind of place where you could go barefoot if you were brave, but you'd want to look out for anything that could cut the soles of your feet. Waves crashed in gently, making that wonderful hissing sound as they shuffled the sand around.

With each swish, a crackling crescent of bubbles popped and disappeared where the water receded. I raised my hand to shield my eyes from the glare of the sun, expecting to see a completely vacant beach where I could warm up and stretch unbothered. I'd reached that age where jumping straight into sport, minor athletics, or getting out of bed too fast was a risk. Moving my limbs around and getting a few dynamic stretches in first was a smart way to prevent otherwise certain injury.

But instead of an empty beach, I saw someone there waiting for me. Lady Talia was swinging her sword around in the air, fighting an invisible opponent. Even though she faced mostly away from me, I could tell that she looked serious. Abruptly, she stopped mid-swing, turning her head like an owl toward me. Her eyes narrowed, and she tipped her chin up in greeting. As I walked up, she cleared her throat.

"You're late."

"What? No, we said early morning. This is definitely early morning."

"I meant earlier."

"Should've been more specific," I grumbled. Then, "Wish I had an alarm clock."

"Why don't you get warmed up real quick? Jog around, get limber, do a bit of stretching. I know it sounds stupid, but we're here to prevent injury, not cause it." Well, at least we were on the same page about that. I only wished I didn't have to do it in front of her. Something about warming up under observation always made me feel awkward. Not as awkward as getting caught masturbating by your parents, but definitely more awkward than saying "you too" to a server after they tell you to enjoy your meal.

Lady Talia about-faced and went back to doing her thing. One moment, she was chiding me, and the next, she was playing with swords. I jogged, stretched, and did some side bends and easy stretches. Then, just to make sure it didn't look like I was half-assing things, I kept going. I pulled out all the stops from playing sports in high school. First, high knees and butt kickers. Then, rotating my arms to loosen up my rotator cuff.

I even tried a few Zumba moves I'd learned that one time I'd gone to a class before deciding it was way too hard for me. Finally, red-faced and sweaty, I moseyed back over to Lady Talia. I cleared my throat to get her attention. She gave me her usual appraising once-over and cleared her throat lightly.

"Interesting techniques. I'm sure that'll do." Without any more preamble, she motioned for me to follow her to where she'd laid out several swords on a leather mat on top of the sand. There were far more blades than I expected. I thought we'd narrowed things down to just a few in our last session, but apparently I was wrong.

"A lot of options," I murmured.

"We still have to see which works best for you. Last time, it became pretty clear that two-handers and really long blades aren't for you. Or anything heavy, for that matter." I flexed my arms, looking for definition. It wasn't like my triceps didn't pop. My dad bod was halfway to a not-bad bod, honestly.

"I may not have a shredded physique like you, but—""I'm not calling you weak."

"You say, that, but—""Drew. You're average. Ish. And look, I don't use heavy two-handers either. They're impractical anyway. No reason to practice brute strength techniques if you're not part ogre." She knelt down and picked up something short and flat that looked suspiciously like an overly ambitious dagger.

"Falcata. Probably easy to practice with." It looked approachable, sure. But was it what I wanted? No. I wanted a bat'leth. Yet I knew that would be wildly impractical. Not even trained actors could make the things look useful. Meh. The blade didn't matter, really. I just wanted to surprise Lady Talia with any the merest hint of competence. I looked at some of the other options she'd brought. Even if I went with the falcata, it wouldn't hurt to get an idea of what else she had in mind for me.

Besides, if I recognized a few, it might allow me to show off what little knowledge I had. I pointed at one that was long and spindly with a wickedly sharp tip.

"That's a rapier, right?"

"Yes. Good eye. Probably a bit advanced for you. Are you familiar with them?" I recited what I could from memory.

"Light weapon. Finesse-based. Favorite of bards until recently, and usually requires some level of mastery." Then I took a step further than I probably should have.

"Does more damage than a short sword."

"It does? That's news to me."

"I mean, it's piercing damage instead of slashing damage, right? And it… um… it's a d8 instead of d6, if I remember correctly." A few beats passed between us. A gust picked up sand and exfoliated my cheeks.

"And why did you mention bards?"

"Uh."

"You're strange sometimes."

"In a good way, I hope."

"Sure." She cleared her throat, fixing me with a teacherly gaze.

"Rapiers are great for dueling and showing off swordsmanship. Not so great for hacking someone's hand off. It's true that it takes more skill, so we'll avoid it for now. Still, I thought you might want to try it out."

"Do you think I might show skill?"

"No." That stung.

"But sometimes the best way to understand how to fight against something is to use it yourself. Besides, while you're learning, there's no reason not to expose yourself to a lot of things before you specialize too much." That sounded reasonable enough to me. Yet she'd taken some of the wind out of my sails. Enough that when I identified a cutlass, I didn't want to try showing off again. Slashing damage. Favored by pirates. Used to have a bigger critical strike range. Definitely wouldn't impress.

Shrugging, I accepted the proffered falcata. She took a few steps back and nodded, giving me the silent go-ahead to try a few practice swings. Unlike last time, I didn't put my whole body into it. There was no need to show off by trying to slice the atoms in the air apart. This was still a warm-up, as far as I was concerned. If you come across this story on Amazon, it's taken without permission from the author. Report it. Whoosh. Despite its small size, the blade felt heavy in my hand.

It would take decent control to wield it, and I was careful not to get overconfident. Whoosh. I felt fluid. Smooth. At one with the blade. Like maybe I could get the hang of this after all.

"Am I doing it right?" She smirked.

"Doing what right? Swinging wildly and without any skill?"

"Yeah, something like that," I grumbled.

"You're doing great, actually. I'm just teasing you. You may not know what you're doing, but you're not making all that many mistakes, all things considered."

"Oh yeah? You can tell all that just from a few practice swings?"

"I've been training since I could lift a wooden practice sword.

"Bet it took you a while to do this! It wasn't confidence that made me say it. No, that was just classic, old-fashioned shit talking. I tried an advanced move, tilting off-balance to show off maneuverability. I faked out in one direction and then swung in another, following it with a big overhead cleave. She laughed skeptically.

"Okay, you weren't doing bad until just then."

"What makes you say that?" I stopped and put my hands on my hips.

"Did you just try to fake somebody out? Like, make an imaginary opponent think you were attacking in one direction, but then suddenly attack another?"

"Yeah?"

"Don't do that. That's stupid." My face burned, and even though it was already hot and sunny out, I knew it wasn't from UV radiation. Nope. That was just regular old embarrassment right there. A wave crashed to shore, punctuating the silence. I almost wished a seagull would fly overhead and splatter one on her shoulder, just to even the playing field.

"Okay, but why is it stupid?"

"Do you know what the point of a sword fight is?"

"Is this a trick question?"

"You're trying to kill someone." She picked up a blade of her own, twirling it lightly in an expert hand.

"Or at the very least, maim them. You need to eliminate the threat, not fake them out. Do you see where I'm going with this?"

"Um, I think so?" Admittedly, all I could do was guess, but I thought my best guess was pretty good. I wasn't an idiot.

"The goal is to stab someone, not trick them."

"Precisely." She smiled at me approvingly, and a small rush of pride welled up in my chest. It wasn't enough to undo my shame from before, but it was a start.

"That fake-out you did serves no purpose other than to waste your own energy and provide an opening for a counterattack." I nodded, starting to understand. Yet I still had a question.

"Isn't feinting a part of dueling?"

"Oh yeah. That." She came a little closer and kept her sword tip pointed away. It reminded me of when I'd gone to the shooting range a couple of times. They took gun safety seriously. Everyone made sure not to point the gun anywhere but downrange. And nobody touched the trigger unless they were ready to fire. Reading her cue, I made sure my sword pointed downward as well. She stepped a little closer, more comfortable.

"It's dangerous, but I think it'd be easier to show you than to just tell you. I really should've brought training swords for this, but fortunately, I'm pretty sure we can both just… be careful." Well, that sounded dangerous. I wasn't sure what I was in for, but it had the ring of a bad idea. Not that I'd ever let that stop me before.

"I'm going to show you something. We're going to do a bit of training with real weapons here. Slowly, and in as controlled a fashion as possible for safety. But make no mistake: these blades are real and they're sharp, so don't fuck around." I saluted.

"Playing with live ammunition. Got it."

"What do you mean? Live ammunition?"

"Never mind." You'd think I'd have figured it out by now.

"I'm ready. What do I do?"

"Attack me. Do that thing you did before. Slow motion. Try to fake me out." She raised her sword, pointing it almost directly at me but angled up slightly to the side and across her body. It looked like a dangerous position. I wasn't sure where on her I could safely hit—not that I wanted to actually hit her—but I had to start somewhere. That's how these kinds of lessons worked, right? Taking a deep breath and preparing to get my ass kicked, I tried to remember what I'd done before.

Some kind of fake to the side, followed by an attack down the middle, I was pretty sure. My feet dug in, toes gripping the sand. The muscles in my core flexed, giving me ultimate control. In slow motion, I feigned right, wide of her body. Her sword thrust forward at the same speed. It stopped an inch short of my tunic, right below my sternum. The tip didn't even quiver in her hand. It held fast and still, even while I struggled to rein in my slow-motion momentum.

"You see? That's what happens when you try to throw a fake," she said.

"If you don't present a credible threat, then I don't need to respond to it. All I have to do is stab you through the chest while you wave your sword off to the side."

"Okay, but what about feinting?"

"Feints and fakes are two different things. They're similar, so I can see how you'd get confused. Let's try again, but this time, instead of throwing your first attack wide, aim it toward my body." She stepped back and got into the same stance. I followed suit. Once we'd reset, I again evaluated where she was weak. It looked like I could get her shoulder if she was slow. At the speed of molasses, I swung my blade toward her shoulder. Nimbly, she moved her sword up to parry, then said, "Halt!" I stopped.

"Good. You went straight for me. It forced me to respond."

"Thanks?"

"Now that I've responded to an actual threat, you could potentially change your attack. Since I had to defend against your real attack, my sword no longer in a guard position. See?" I reassessed her stance and realized that, indeed, she was now wide open in the front. All that bodily real estate her sword had been guarding was suddenly exposed. And, though I was looking at it tactically… I'll admit that I wasn't exactly looking tactfully.

She wasn't as voluptuous as Wynnie, but despite hardened muscle, she still had soft curves. The free drape of her training clothes provided occasional glimpses of creamy side boob, and her skin glistened with perspiration. Whether she noticed, I couldn't tell. She appeared keenly focused still on my fighting form. My arm was still raised, paused midair on its arc towards her blade.

"I see. Your whole center and side are unprotected now.

"Good. You're getting it. So, changing the angle of your swing now to avoid my parry? That would be a feint."

"Okay. She sighed.

"Try it. Slowly. In slow motion, I tried to bring my sword around, dropping my shoulder exaggeratedly and preparing to swing up and under her deflection instead. Her eyes smiled, even if it didn't reach her mouth. She gave me a quick nod, noting that I'd caught on. She shifted her foot and rotated her hips, turning my dead-on strike into a glancing blow. Then, her blade parried again, deflecting wide. Her form was incredible. She wasted no movement. Every effort was deliberate.

After my blade went wide, she stopped us once more.

"So, did you get that?"

"Yeah, I think I did," I said, feeling no small amount of pride as I realized it was true.

"A fake is a useless maneuver. A feint is a genuine attack that morphs into another after the opponent responds. I think I'm getting the hang of this." She laughed softly this time, letting the sharp smile reach her lips. Oof. It was a rare sight from her, but a welcome one. She could disarm me with that, no swordplay needed. For a split second, I just took in her natural beauty, illuminated perfectly by the rising sun and framed by the backdrop of crashing ocean waves.

Again, she seemed not to notice, still focused on training.

"Now, don't get cocky. Understanding the difference between a fake and a feint is pretty basic stuff. It's the kind of thing you'd learn on your first day of training," she reminded me.

"Today's my second day.

"That means we're going at half the speed we should be.

"Well, that's a hell of a lot more than any of my friends know, that's for sure," I replied. Honestly, I was still impressed that after so many years of playing nerdy role-playing games, I was actually living one. My girlfriend was an ice sorceress, a dragonkin was teaching me to sword fight, and my newest employee was a succubus scoundrel. Meanwhile, my friends back on Earth probably still thought a feint required a deception roll. A bit of sadness tugged at my heart as I remembered them. Yes, I missed them.

Yet I also just wanted to reassure them. They all knew I was trying to turn my life around when I died in front of them from a fireball to the face. Before that fateful night, I'd shared some of my goals with them. I wanted to cut down on drinking; find a career that didn't keep me up so late or make it so hard to socialize normally; stop pursuing short flings and find someone to care about. If only I could let them know I was doing all right. Maybe I was still stuck behind a bar, but at least now it was my bar.

And if they knew I was in a committed relationship instead of some weird, drunken situationship that started on a dating app? Well, if they knew all that, they'd be happy for me. If any of them said something like "he's in a better place now" at my funeral, I might have them to thank. Lady Talia flipped a lock of hair behind her ear. Her foot tapped against the sand.

"So, now that I'm learning some basics, what do I learn next?" She shook her head, staring down at my feet.

"Probably the thing you should've learned first. Your stance." I looked down at my feet as well, suddenly self-conscious. They were planted a little more than shoulder-width apart, grounding me in the sand. I felt strong, like I could block the brunt of a blow with my sword if I needed to, or that any swing I made would have power behind it. A strong breeze blew off the bay, whipping my clothes around me. I stood stock-still, unmoved, a pillar of power and force.

"You look sturdy," she observed. I flashed a grin.

"I feel sturdy."

"I regret to inform you, then, that that's stupid too."

"What? Why?"

"Have you seen how fast swords move in a sword fight? Real fast. It doesn't take much strength to break skin or slip between cracks in armor," she explained.

"You might think sturdy helps you attack harder and stronger, but you don't need that. You'll never need to take the brunt of a blow, for example." I cursed silently under my breath. And she heard me think that? Did dragonkin have mind powers?

"You know another word for sturdy? Slow."

"But what about balance?" I countered.

"What about it? Tell me who has better balance, why don't you. Someone with a broad stance who never moves, or someone who can walk a tightrope heel to toe without falling?" I let out a laborious sigh. Everything she said made sense, but I hated it. Sword fighting was supposed to be badass. It was supposed to be cool, filled with powerful swings and arcing blows. I'd always thought blade work was a gorgeous, balletic expression of mastery, like kung fu or taekwondo. Apparently, it was closer to Muay Thai.

Or a good old-fashioned back-alley stabbing. Up close, sweaty, fast, and brutal.

"Okay, so what am I learning today, then?" She rubbed her chin thoughtfully, eyeing me up and down. A few seconds longer than was necessary, it seemed. I wasn't exactly wearing gray sweatpants, but the effect was similar, and Lady Talia wasn't nearly as cold-blooded as one might expect for a lizard girl. After another beat, she came to her conclusion.

"We're going to work on your stance. Strength training, balance training, and a few basic attacks with a sword."

"What about guard stances? Or how to parry?"

"Your best bet in a fight as a beginner is to make a single good attack. Just one. The longer the fight goes, the higher the chance you'll die."

"You don't think I should learn it at all?"

"Let's just make sure you finish the job before you need to use any other skills," she said. The rest of the morning, she ran me through a grueling workout routine. If I thought Zumba was difficult, I hadn't seen anything yet. After only a few minutes in, my quads were already torched, and I felt a growing twinge in both calves. My shoulders ached from swinging the sword, and my forearm felt like it had caught fire, not used to the way the weight sat in my grip.

But we didn't stop when I started to feel uncomfortable. Apparently, Lady Talia considered all that part of my warm-up still. The two of us practiced for another half hour or so, until my pride finally left my body through my mouth in the form of begging. I would've gotten on my knees if my legs could handle getting up again. Mercifully, she agreed to call it for the day. And just in time, too. A few townsfolk were making their way down the path toward the beach. I didn't want any more witnesses than Lady Talia.

I wanted our private training sessions to stay private. Although as I hoisted myself up the long, winding path back to Seaport, I still had the sneaking suspicion that we hadn't been alone. Underneath the scuffed tracks of the beachgoers who'd recently arrived, the dirt look almost methodically, if hastily brushed, as though someone have covered their footsteps with a pine bough.