A Time of Blood (Of Blood and Bone #2) - John Gwynne Page 0,129
some of the other giants, Alcyon included, were joining most of the people in the field and gathering into a central square, forming loose columns. She saw Byrne standing at its head, the cut on her cheek from her duel a thin scabbed line. A dark-skinned woman stood beside her. As Riv watched, Byrne and the other woman drew their swords, Byrne holding hers two-handed over her head, just as she had begun the duel yesterday.
“Stooping falcon,” Byrne cried, and like a wave breaking, those gathered before her drew their blades and raised them in a mirror image of Byrne. Something about the sight of it stirred Riv’s blood.
“What are they doing?” Riv asked.
“The sword dance,” Balur said, hefting a wooden war-hammer.
Byrne called out something else, and over a thousand blades flashed in the morning sun.
“I like it,” Riv said, feeling a grin split her face.
“It’s a Jehar tradition,” Balur said. “Gar taught it to Corban, so it’s fitting that it starts each day at Dun Seren.”
“Does it work?” Riv asked, wondering if it would aid her swordcraft, or whether it just appeared to be impressive. She recognized variations of movements she’d learned during her training, but they had never been linked like this, forms and positions held until muscles burned. She could see sweat steaming as it dripped from noses, muscles quivering.
“Gar was one of the few that gave me more bruises than I gave him,” Balur said. “Though I only knew him a few years.” He paused, his craggy face softening a moment, lost in some distant memory. “Yes, lass, I’d wager the sword dance works.”
“Why aren’t you doing it, then?” she asked him.
“Because I’m an old man set in my ways. I was two thousand years old when I first saw the sword dance. And, besides, this is my weapon.” He hefted his wooden war-hammer. “It’s not made for their forms, but it still gets the job done. Speaking of which,” he said, “choose your weapon.” He walked out into the sparring ground, turned and waited for her, tapping the shaft of his hammer in his fist.
Riv ran a hand across the wooden weapons in the racks, eventually settling on two short-swords that most resembled her White-Wing blade. She was used to fighting with sword and shield, but she knew she needed to adapt.
She grinned approaching Balur, spinning the blades in lazy circles. Her wings twitched in excited anticipation.
I am sparring with Balur One-Eye. Not all is bad with the world.
And then she was surging at him.
The rest became a blur for Riv, a glorious release of tension as she wove in and out of Balur’s strikes and swings, hammer- head, butt and shaft all used as weapons by the wily giant.
Two thousand years! Two thousand years of weapons skill and learning. It’s no wonder he’s hard to kill.
And he was. As big a target as the giant was, as slow as she thought he would be, Riv struggled to touch her blades to any part of him. And she was not just using her feet, her wings lifted her from the ground over sweeps of his war-hammer, pulsing to give her speed as she drove at his chest, swirling her around and over Balur. Their blades clashed a thousand times, Riv deflecting Balur’s strikes and sweeps, never taking the brunt of his blows, knowing that would shatter her bones, instead nudging, pushing, deflecting his attacks, attempting to push Balur off balance. Try as she might, she could not get close to him. A score of times the tips of her blades grazed his leather and fur jerkin, but no closer.
Her only consolation was that he couldn’t touch his hammer to her, either, and to Riv’s thinking, that was one of her greatest achievements.
They parted, both panting, chests heaving, sweat streaming from them, steaming in the cold air.
Riv became aware of a crowd around them, and the sound of cheering. Amongst those watching was Kol, both his eyes swollen and bruised purple. His Ben-Elim were about him.
Balur smiled at her.
“You’ve learned to use them quickly enough,” the giant said, nodding at her wings.
She beamed in return. It felt good to be treated as normal. As a warrior who just happened to have wings. She was more grateful to Balur for that than he would ever know.
A warrior stepped out of the crowd, the red-haired man she had seen earlier.
“Now you’ve warmed up, One-Eye, are you ready for a lesson or two?”