managed to block a blow that might have decapitated her, felt the slap of blade to blade scream up her arm.
“I need to—”
“Block!” He snarled it at her. “If you can do nothing else, block.”
But her sword slid weakly down his, and he killed her again.
Standing hard against her, not winded in the least while her breath whistled, he gripped her wrist.
“Hold the damn sword, you’ve muscle enough. And use your feet, for fuck’s sake, and your head before you lose it. I mean to kill you, that’s all you need to know. I want your death.” He slapped her sword with his, again and again. “Fight to take mine.”
He drove her back, back until she had to use both hands to hold the sword. “Strike out!”
She swung, and his block had the sword spinning out of her sweaty hands. Her legs wobbled, and he finished her off with a shove.
“You’re not training but badgering and bullying.” Incensed, Morena stomped over to retrieve Breen’s sword. “It’s no fair fight, and you know it.”
He rounded on Morena so they stood—both armed and toe to toe. And both spewing temper.
“There’s no fair fight in battle, and you know it. Do you want her alive or dead? For dead she’ll be if this is the best she has. For she’s useless with a sword and nearly as bad with her fists.”
He wrenched the sword from Morena, tossed it down beside Breen. “Pick it up, get on your feet, and try again.”
“I’m not useless.”
“Prove it then, if you’ve the belly for it. Take up the sword. Fight, or die.”
She hurt, everywhere, but that was nothing compared to the rage that flooded into her.
She was not useless.
“Die then,” he said, and strode toward her, sword poised for the killing blow.
She threw her hand out, threw the rage with it. And the rage had heat, a burning that seared through her, boiled out of her.
It shot him into the air and back a solid ten feet before he struck the paddock fence, snapping wood as the force sent him tumbling through.
For a moment, Morena froze, eyes wide. “Stop. Stop now, Breen,” she said before she raced to Keegan.
He sat up, waved her off. And looked over at Breen with a kind of dark satisfaction. “Well then, somebody’s waking up at last.”
Breen pressed her shaking hand to the ground. It vibrated still inside her, that shocking spurt of power.
“I didn’t mean . . .”
“You should.” Keegan got to his feet. “You should mean whatever it takes to send the enemy down rather than yourself.”
“Your nose is bleeding.”
Carelessly he swiped a hand under it. “As it has before, will again. Pick up the sword, get up.”
“She’s shaken yet, Keegan. Gods, so am I. Let her be.”
“It’s still in her. I can see it.” Crouching by Breen, he gripped her chin. “Just as you feel it. You’ll use it. We’ll work to focus it, to channel it, to control it, so it comes and goes at your will.”
His eyes—so intense—glowed into Breen’s. And in them she saw pleasure and approval.
“This is what you wanted,” she realized.
“Aye, it’s what’s needed. Morena, go hold Harken off, as he’s racing out of the stables as if they were on fire. And have him do the same with Aisling and Mahon. Tell them all we’re fine here.
“On your feet.” He gripped Breen’s arm, pulled her up. “As now true training begins.”
Appalled, at him, herself, at everything, she tried to shake him off. “You did that on purpose, goaded me, slapped at me.”
“And it took far too long for results. You’re a slow burn, Breen Siobhan, but you’ve hellfire when it finally lights. Now we’ll use it.”
“I don’t want . . .” Not true, she realized as he simply stood, the iron grip on her arm, and waited. However terrifying, she did want whatever had exploded in her, out of her. Because it had been glorious, too.
“I didn’t do it on purpose. I didn’t control it, and I could’ve done worse than a nosebleed.”
“All true enough, and so I’ll help you. I’ll help you,” he repeated, and for the first time his words didn’t bite or sting. “I’ve some in me, as I’m of the Wise, but I’ve no god’s blood, so you’ve more. Your father had the same, and when my own died, he took up my training, and he stood for me as a father would.”
Pausing, he looked around, the fields, the paddocks, the house of sturdy stone. “This farm is yours