or…”
“Focus is manifold,” Kessligh replied, in far more fluent and commanding Saalsi. “You separate the inseparable. All is one. I have only ever taught you one thing. Draw it into your centre. Find the symmetry. You'll find that each new thing I teach is not truly new, only a variation of that one thing which you already know.”
Sasha frowned as she finished her straps. Gave a yank of hard leather upon the cold, wet shirt beneath. Confusion aside, Saalsi described the svaalverd far better than Lenay ever could…or Torovan, for that matter. A word could be one thing, or it could be another, with a subtle shift of contextual grammar…just as a svaalverd stroke could be many things, either offensive or defensive, depending on the slightest slide of a foot, or the angle of a wrist to the hilt and blade. Saalsi forced her to think, to consider every word. Sometimes she thought that was also Kessligh's intention.
They began with a series of high offensive combinations, Kessligh attacking with rare speed and fury. Sasha defended each with a rapid retreat and flashing stanch, occasionally feinting or misdirecting to a sidestep for the offensive counter…yet rarely, today, did her counterattacks find success. Always Kessligh's strokes found the limits of her high arm extension, straining her shoulders as her arms struggled to hold their form above her head. Once, she simply lost the grip with a hard impact, the stanch snapping back to clip her skull as she ducked. Another blow caught her a glancing strike on the forearm as she hissed in pain and clutched at the bruise. The next time an attack came from that quarter, she was ready with a hard slash and counter…yet Kessligh's own reverse caught her hard across the middle with a lightning thud! upon the banda that drove breath from her lungs.
“You overcompensate,” he told her in hard, calm Saalsi. Wind whipped the untidy hair about his brow, as wild as the rugged lines of his face. “You know that's your weakness. You overcompensate and leave your opposing quarter unguarded. A good fighter or a lucky fighter may find that opening and split you. If you were less lazy on the arm strength, you'd be better.”
Sasha breathed hard, regaining her composure as she leaned upon her stanch. “If I build too much shoulder strength,” she said through gritted teeth, “I get stiff. Stiffness is the surest way to limit my extension…”
“Bhareth'tei, not bhareth'as,” Kessligh said. “You're implying the theoretical, this is practical.” Sasha rolled her eyes in exasperation. “Combat is the place where the unlikely becomes probable,” he continued. “You do not think your weakness great, yet I exploit it even now. Few soldiers ever see the stroke that kills them. Once more.”
The resulting session gave her a whole new set of bruises and the very nasty suspicion that Kessligh had been going easy on her, even during her better bouts against him in the past. Certainly he'd warned her of the need to improve her high extension for a long time, but she could not recall him having exploited it so ruthlessly before. And she'd thought she'd been approaching his standard. It was time, it seemed, to think again. Like on so many things, of late.
Finally her late swing barely intercepted a slashing cut that collected her arm and cracked the left side of her head. She stumbled to one knee, clutching a hand over her ear, as her head rang like the inside of a great temple bell. Kessligh, crouching opposite, held her shoulder to be sure of her balance. When she did not fall, he stared into her eyes, drawing her attention.
“Sasha. Sasha, are you well? Focus on me.” She tried, though it hurt. She brought the hand away from her ear and looked at it. There was blood on her fingers, though not much. A small cut. Kessligh's perfunctory glance proved as much. “Slow and sloppy, that's what happens when your shoulders get tired so quickly. Watch my fingertip.”
She focused on it, as he moved it closer, then further back, then side to side. Her bruise throbbed in a familiar, straight line where the stanch had struck. High defence was difficult to practise without helms. Sometimes, they'd used them…but svaalverd fighters rarely wore such restrictive armour in combat. Mostly, they were careful and knew each other's capabilities well enough to avoid injury. Mostly.
“Stand up.” She did, and found her balance was good. In fact, there was little, if any, dizziness. It