I tilted my head, puzzled, but I answered him before I’d really thought about whether I should. “California,” I said. “For about ten days. Then Paris and the Riviera with Jolie.”
He didn’t answer, but I saw his jaw tick again, right before he nodded absently. He shifted his weight on his feet, then looked up, once more with an empty expression on his face. I saw his eyes on my body, but not quite in focus.
He motioned me forward with his fingers.
“All right.” He quirked an eyebrow. “Let’s see something.”
“Magic?” I was stalling. “Physical?”
“Either. Both. Do whatever feels natural.” His lips twitched, once. “Only don’t leave your mind open while you decide, or your opponent will read it off you. Experienced fighters always use the seeing arts. Pretend you see me as an immediate threat to your life. Pretend you’ve only got a second to make a decision on how best to get away from me.”
I gave a low snort, but it came out more like a choking sound.
“Fantastic,” I said.
“Come on, Shadow,” he said, clearly growing impatient when I still hadn’t done anything. “I spar with Alec, too. Greythorne would have pulverized you by now.”
He was right. Alaric would have.
Alaric always managed to make it seem funny, though. Welaughedwhile we sparred. So why did this feel so deadly serious? I felt for my sun primal, foregoing the monocerus, if only to save that tiny increment of time. My adrenaline already had me nearly shaking, sure I was about to get flung into a wall at the speed of your average bullet.
I took a breath.
“Andham kartum.”
I murmured the cast near-silently, sliding my hands intoshunya mudraas I pointed the spell at his eyes. Speaking casts under my breath was another thing I’d learned from Alaric, especially with longer casts, which tended to include anything in Sanskrit. Alaric spoke his too softly for me to hear, and without moving his mouth enough for me to see it, either.
With Bones, I didn’t wait to see if the blinding spell took. I ran at him, throwing a right cross he easily slid back and away from, while barely moving his upper body. I kicked down and at an angle with my right heel, aiming it at the side of his knee.
He slid easily out of the way of that, too.
He moved so fast, yet so minimally, I scarcely understood how I’d missed him.
So much for the blinding spell. I hadn’t even seen him block it.
My foot landed hard on the mat, and I twisted into a back-fist with my left hand, following the weight and momentum of my body. It was one of the tricks I’d learned in the self-defense classes at my Overworlder school, not to mention online videos and anything else I could find once I got stuck in that boarding school in Winchester.
Unfortunately, I was flat on my face on the mat, sucking in the smell of cotton and sweat, before I’d completed the turn.
He hadn’t thrown me hard.
I wasn’t even entirely sure he’d used his hand.
The whole thing had lasted maybe four seconds.
“Interesting,” he said, his voice maddeningly casual.
I glanced up, and was shocked to realize his eyes were completely white. Ihadhit him with the blinding spell, so either it got past his defenses, or he’d let me do it. It just hadn’t made a single bit of difference. Bones slid a hand in front of his face, murmured a counter-curse, and his irises shimmered back to gold.
“But how did you––” I began.
“Blinding spells won’t do much to a trained fighter,” he explained. “They might lose their physical vision temporarily, but if they’re any good at all, they can still see with their primal. It’s fine to try it on someone you’re reasonably confident is a shit caster, but not for any fight where you don’t know your opponent’s abilities.”
When I just lay there, sucking air, his voice grew impatient.
“Get up,” he said. “Try again, Shadow.”
I pulled myself shakily to my feet.
