The tension grew charged between them. It was crushing. Even when Kedar left the cave with some grumbling she was certain didn’t form coherent words, it remained inside. An entire other presence they had shaped with their past and the unfinished task that sat between them.
There were no more excuses. The blizzard had finally let up. She was as strong as she was ever going to be here in this wintery desolation. Though cold lingered deep in her bones, she was certain the only cure for it at this point was a steamy hot bath and a year drifting as close to a sun as she could possibly get.
When he came back, his muscles were bunched together, his posture stiff. Vessa hadn’t told him yet, but he knew.
She’d been stretching out her legs near the fire, but stood up, letting the blanket fall around her. “Well, then…” The sudden need to be done with it all weighed against her. “I have a job to get back to.” Vessa picked up her raze sword, extended the blade.
Kedar made no move for a weapon of his own. He merely stared at her, his hands open.
She gestured at him impatiently. “You’re the one who wanted this. Unless you’ve had a change of hearts?”
Snarling at the accusation, he bristled. What had been reluctance sitting in his muscles turned to lethal energy before her eyes.
Vessa inclined her head in acknowledgement. He was a worthy opponent, at least. And wasn’t that what every Seken wanted in the end? There were only two great deaths to a Seken: to die in a lover’s arms or to die by the hand of a worthy opponent. Her people were not much different than the Xaal in that respect.
Kedar cracked his neck and rolled his shoulders back to settle into his full height. It never mattered how many times they sparred, she always had to force herself to be more focused with him. He was truly unrivaled. No one in his clan had ever come close to his ability. How they hadn’t demanded he challenge the qon and lead was beyond her.
She didn’t have to hold back when she fought him. He could handle all her intensity and give it back to her in kind. And he didn’t hold back, either. Xaal would see it as disrespectful to do so, and he’d treated her like an equal from the moment they first crossed blades.
But whereas she’d spent the last seven years fighting off pirates or battling in arenas between running jobs across the universe, he’d only had one focus—finding and killing her.
There was a very real possibility that she would die this day. She wasn’t certain if it was acceptance or years’ worth of bitter resentment that made her numb to the idea.
They’d been fated for this moment from the very start.
Kedar unsheathed his plasma dirk.
Worlds collided. He was at once the male she’d met in secret in the forest of her home, the one who had betrayed her, and this altogether different one before her. She’d fought him once before, but this Kedar was truly committed to destroying her for the sake of his honor.
“Let’s get it done,” Vessa said, ignoring whatever emotion was stuck in her throat in favor of the cold descent of battle focus.
He didn’t power his weapon. A respectable thing to do since she wasn’t also wielding a plasma dirk. Their blades were equal.
But weretheystill?
The cavern seemed at once too small for them and too large. He was mere paces from her but in the moments before she struck, it felt like an unbridgeable chasm. Her sword connected with his plasma dirk, and the impact sent tremors up her arms.
At once, they fell back and circled each other. Testing. Feeling each other out. It had been too long since they’d sparred for them to truly know each other’s fighting style. Though one would always have a signature, a style by which they fought, it could be adjusted, calibrated. Adapted. As impatient as she was, she wouldn’t rush the process. With each move he made, she learned. And remembered.
When at last the coiled energy between them expanded, becoming a thing that demanded payment in blood and sweat, she struck truly.
His free fist flew toward her side as she closed in. To avoid the hit, she had to bail mid swing. A strike this early to the ribs could be fatal. As she twirled around, bringing her blade down in a diagonal slash, he switched his blade to his other hand and attempted to punch her again.
Fuck.
His reach was longer than hers. He knew she would have to get much closer than he did. That was how it’d always been. The length of her raze sword only compensated for so much. She had learned to take hits strategically from him after all.
Speed was her greatest advantage. Being able to strike and movebeforebeing caught—or moving in a way that mitigated the impact of the strike—was how she’d always won her fights with him. But it seemed that was something he’d been training for over the years. Every time she found the perfect opening and darted in, he moved in such a way that she was blocked.
Vessa schemed, looking for weaknesses she could take advantage of. Except, after minutes of noncritical fighting, shewas starting to realize exactly what he had become. He hadn’t just trained hard for seven years. He’d honed himself into a weapon that was specific to her and the way she fought. For every advantage she once had, he’d learned how to turn it against her.
Vessa felt his energy shift only a second before he was on her. All her focus had to go toward defending herself. Each strike was hard, so hard that a fleeting sadness went through her. It really would be shit to die on this shitty planet.
“I should have killed you,” she growled as she was forced back. “Instead, I gave you mercy when you gave none to my people.”
“You should have, Vessa. And don’t act like you did me a blood-damned favor.”
She was too close to the cavern wall. Twisting away from him at the last second, before his dirk would have cut off her head, she changed places with him.Now.She struck, feinting only to bring her blade up. Unable to block her fully, he turned, sending the sharp edge grazing across his chest and side instead. It sliced through his light armor. Drew blood.
