‘I know my way around a bow and a blade,’ she says. ‘Part and parcel of being a tracker. Though I don’t relish taking a life. My healing oaths are important; I try to honour them wherever possible.’ Tansy’s solemn as she speaks. I still can’t look at her corpse-skin without flinching, but there’s something stirring about her puckered brow, those grave eyes. I see why Leilani wants to believe in her.
She’d do well to beware frostfangs in sheep’s clothing.
‘We’re likely to face serious threats as we journey north, and I’d see all members of the Quaternity able to defend themselves should the need arise. To that end, I think it prudent to run through basic drills and defence strategies. We could all use the practice, especially as you’ve not had any formal weapons training.’ I turn now to Leilani.
She thrusts out her chin. ‘I know how to protect myself.’
‘A few evenings with your tutor learning to fling a throwing star is hardly up to the mark, Princess. The Highlanders are likely to make real trouble for us once we cross into the hills, and while the Sickening’s put paid to some of the worst mountain predators, frostfangs remain. Hoarclaws too, though the bears won’t attack unless provoked or starving. And the best defence against them is not to fight. Fall to ground instead. Play dead.’
I pass out weapons to the more experienced fighters. They pair off and begin sparring against each another: Blayze with Maris, Tansy with Delphine. The grate of metal meeting metal soon echoes off the vaulted ceiling.
I turn to Leilani. ‘Have you ever even wielded a blade?’
She glares at me.
I reach for one of the shortswords and press it into her hands. ‘I swore an oath to protect you. Kindly allow me to fulfil it. Now, widen your stance. Step forwards with your right foot. Keep the knee soft.’
Positioning myself behind her, I nudge her back foot so it sits at an angle, affording her greater stability, and adjust her grip, wrapping her lead thumb over the top of her index finger and lining up her hands so they sit neatly between pommel and cross-guard. Her slender f?ingers flex beneath mine as I lower the hilt to her hip. Her breath hitches and something splinters inside me. I’m whisked back to the fountain in the palace gardens, to that moment when I seized Leilani’s bloodied hand in mine. I’m suddenly aware the entire length of her body is pressed flush against me. Peak’s sake! I’m supposed to be keeping my distance.
Throat dry, I breathe in a lungful of violets, then step hastily back to instruct her from a safer position. ‘Transfer your weight. Back leg to lead leg. Thrust with the blade as you move. No, don’t bend your arms. Keep them straight for longer reach. Make sure you use the momentum in your body. It will lend more power to your elbow.’
Her eyes are sullen, her features pinched, but she follows my instructions and doesn’t mention her mother again. Once she’s mastered the basics, I demonstrate some defensive techniques – how to parry, how to block. She’s a quick study, meeting my blade, blow for blow. Scowling all the while. I lift my sword into a high guard, intending to teach her how to protect against a descending blow, but before I can lower my blade, there’s a terrible scraping sound. My sword is wrenched from my hands and falls clattering to the flagstones.
‘Sorry, Peacock, but that was painful.’ Blayze is at my elbow, twirling the longsword he’s just used to disarm me. ‘If you want her to learn to defend herself, she needs instruction from someone who knows what they’re doing.’
I roll my shoulders back. ‘I trained for ten sunrings at the Asteum. I’m more than capable of teaching the Princess to—’
He scoffs. ‘What you’ve learnt isn’t combat. Knocking people off horses with giant sticks, mincing around with blunt rapiers. It’s pissing around. Posturing. You’ve never seen a moment of real combat in your life. I doubt you’ve so much as spilt a drop of blood.’ He trails a finger down my doublet. ‘Gore doesn’t really go with silk, eh?’
I thwack his hand away. Rage blistering through me, I square up to the Clanschief, intending to challenge him to a duel to prove my skill. But Leilani interrupts me.
‘Blayze is right. We’re a team now, we should pool our skills to best support the group.’ She steps towards the Clanschief, holding my gaze all the while. Her fathomless lilac eyes boring into me, even as she simpers at the sand-rat, allows him to run his filthy hands down her arms, up her legs, positioning her like a marionette as he demonstrates how to execute an explosive series of rapid upward thrusts with the shortsword. There’s no elegance to his movements; they’re brutal, coarse. But effective. I have to give him that. Faced with frostfangs, this is the sort of frenzied attack that might stand a chance of routing them. Of piercing their hides, which are tough as permafrost. And Blayze isn’t even playing with a full deck thanks to his difficulties acclimating.
His hand is on the small of her back now. He lets it linger there, earning a glower from Maris. Leilani grins over at me. This is punishment for refusing to speak to the King.
I won’t stand for it.
‘Leilani, come here.’ I reach for her hand.
She tenses. Pulls away.
‘It isn’t seemly to behave like this,’ I hiss in her ear. ‘It isn’t honourable. It isn’t proper.’
Leilani looks me straight in the eye. ‘Proper? You’d talk to me of propriety? Of honour? After you swore me an oath and went back on it.’ She turns away. ‘It’s my own fault. I should have known better than to ever count on a bastard like you.’
A hush settles over the Armoury. The Clanschief’s lips curl. Damn. He heard. He knows. They all do. I hold myself still, channelling Hyperion. Face frozen as the Desolate Peaks.
Leilani’s fixing me again with those speaking eyes. They glitter now with all the fire of diamonds. The ire in her gaze shrivels me. I’m again that boy at her chamber door, chastened, holding my crumbling mooncake. My father’s maxim rings in my ears.A member of The Nine always keeps their word.
I draw myself straighter. ‘Fine, I’ll speak to the King. But you’ll owe me, Princess. A favour of my choosing.’
She nods, smiling through gritted teeth.
I quit the Armoury. Not bothering with farewells, I hurry beneath my father’s effigy, still unable to meet his stony gaze. But a plan is forming by the time I return to the palace to seek out Hyperion.
If propriety is so important to Leilani, then it’s propriety I’ll insist upon.
Another moonscycle, and Thawtide will be upon us. The perfect time for a celebration to send the Quaternity on its way. I’ll ensure it’s a night the Princess never forgets. There’s poetry here – payback for the crushed mooncake, for humiliating me before the Clanschief. Hyperion will support this – he promised to make her pay.
