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"Word around the academy is usually wrong."

"Not this time?"

He waited a beat, like he expected her to keep going, fill the silence the way most people did when a Master asked a question. She didn't. She let it sit there, chin level, waiting to see what he'd do with the gap she'd left.

"Funny thing is, I don't remember ever seeing you come through the academy," Dax said. "And I've had eyes on every training yard for six years."

Jade tilted her head, the motion small and unreadable, and offered nothing back.

Dax let it go the way he let most things go, without pushing for the rest of an answer nobody owed him.

"So," he said instead, dropping his bag onto the bench and pulling out a pair of practice blades. "I hear you're fast."

"Compared to what?"

"Compared to me."

"I don't know how fast you are."

He tossed her one of the practice blades. She caught it without looking, wrist turning at the last second to take the weight, and I felt something in my chest do a slow, stupid flip that had nothing to do with the knife.

"Corian," Dax said, still watching her test the blade's balance. "Mind if I borrow your yard and your Healer?"

"She's not property."

"Wasn't asking to buy her. Asking if she wants to spar."

Every head in the yard turned toward Jade at once, and I watched her catch it, watched her decide in real time whether that many eyes on her was something she could stand. A few weeks ago the answer would've been no before the question finished forming. She rolled her shoulder instead, settled her grip on the blade, and looked at Dax like she was deciding how much of an inconvenience he intended to be.

"Rules?"

"First disarm, first pin, or first person too injured to keep going. I'd prefer the first two."

"Ashter doesn't get involved." Corian added quickly, making me smile.

Dax glanced toward the stone where Ashter lay watching the whole exchange with open interest, ember eyes narrowed just slightly, unconvinced but not yet moving.

She stepped back into the open half of the yard, rolling one shoulder, then the other, and something in her stance changed entirely. Gone was the careful economy she used with a knife against a fixed target. This was different. Weight forward, knees loose.

Ashter rose off the stone the second she moved, but instead of following her into the open ground he padded past Dax without a glance and settled against my leg instead, shoving his head under my hand until I took the hint and started scratching behind the ridge along his skull.

Dax noticed her stance too. His grin didn't move, but something behind his eyes sharpened.

Movement in the garden wall told me we weren't alone anymore. Kellan's head appeared over the low stone divider first, then the rest of him, one hand still holding half a sandwich.

"Is that a spar?"

"Looks like one," Nykos said.

"Nobody invited us."

"Nobody needs to invite you. You climb the wall regardless."

Kellan didn't argue the point, mostly because he was already climbing it. Elira followed a moment later with considerably more grace, dropping down beside him and immediately claiming the best seat on our bench like she'd been assigned it years ago. Which, in a way, she had.

"Who's fighting?"

"Dax and Jade."