“I was born ready,” Saela scoffs, rolling her eyes at me.
“Everyone, watch this closely,” I say.
Saela and I take a few steps further back to make sure everyone can see us. I move behind her and then dart forward quickly, grabbing her and wrapping my long arms around her slim torso. Her arms are effectively pinned to her side. She hesitates for just a moment, but then she’s running through the moves that we’ve practiced at home over the last few days.
She goes slack in my hands, becoming deadweight against my chest. Saela slips downward and I have to adjust my grip to keep her trapped, which gives her valuable seconds to maneuver.
Then, she slams the heel of her boot into my toes—a little harder than she really needs to for the demonstration. My yowl of pain is very convincing.
As soon as she can tell that I’m distracted by the pain, she shoves her arms away from her sides, loosening my grip once more, and slips out and under the circle of my arms, pretending to run away from me as the kids cheer.
“That was great, Sae,” I say, and duck down to rub my toes through my boot. “Maybe even a little more impressive than it needed to be?”
Saela giggles.
“So, right. Did everyone see how she used her size against me?” Heads nod, most seeming to grasp the basic principles at play here. “Sometimes it can be helpful to be small. Your attacker might expect you to be weak, to not fight back. Or you can fake at being weak, too.”
“Like you do in the ring!” one of the younger teenage boys shouts eagerly.
I give him a mock-stern look. “Not that you’d know anything about that, right?”
More giggles start up among the children. The fighting rings aren’t any place for kids, but that doesn’t stop some of the rougher dads from bringing their sons along from what is, in my opinion, too early an age.
“Your turn!” I count them into groups of three, making sure they’re paired with different kids from last time around. I have them practice until the sun dips toward the horizon. If I hold them here much later, they’ll miss dinner at home, and none of them can afford to do that.
Afterwards, I sling an arm around Saela’s shoulders as we walk toward home together. She’s chattering about her day, something about a mouse that got into her math class. I have trouble focusing on her words, though, Igor’s idea still bouncing around in my head.
Could he be right? Could my fighting skills lead to more than just a nasty nighttime habit that leaves me bruised and bloody—might they be my ticket out of this run-down quarter?
Later that week,I race home from training to get the house ready for Lee’s visit. He started coming over every two weeks a few months back, when it seemed like Mother’s health wastaking a turn and I was no longer comfortable leaving Saela alone overnight.
Now, our biweekly dinner dates—with my family in attendance—are some of the few times we see each other outside of my fights.
Before I can make it back to the house, though, I spot Lee turning the corner of our row of houses, and I get a moment to just… stare at him.
He’s a few years older than me and taller, which I appreciate as a tall woman, and muscular in a lean way. Tonight, he’s out of his messenger’s uniform and wearing a blue button-down shirt under his coat that brings out the depth of his blue eyes. His face catches the torchlight from the sconce on the corner and I shamelessly admire the sharp cut of his jawline and cheekbones.
Lee spots me watching him and smirks, the twist of his full mouth setting my insides ablaze. He’s sohandsome.
“I brought that bread your mother liked last time,” he says by way of greeting, passing me the packet when he nears. It’s still warm.
“Thank you,” I say, touched by the small but thoughtful gesture. “I wanted to say, about my mother…”
Her visit to the medic this week was the roughest one yet. My description of how she’s been acting lately clearly troubled the medic; plus, my mother was pretty out of it for the entire visit, rambling and vacant. But there was nothing he could do—he said we’re already giving her the maximum dosage of her medicine.
And that I need to prepare myself for a future where she’s always like this.
Lee is looking at me patiently, waiting for me to go on.
“She’s just been pretty bad lately,” I finish feebly, not wanting to get into all the details about her latest delusions.
“I’m so sorry, Meryn.” Lee’s voice is soft. “I know how hard it is to see her that way.”
I wrap my arms around him, closing my eyes and resting my forehead on his shoulder, taking comfort from his solid warmth. He brings a hand up to brush my hair aside, his breath hot on my neck.
His teeth nip my skin lightly and I shudder and push closer, heat coiling in my belly.
“If you do that much longer, we will not make it to dinner,” I say, my voice rough.
