Litany of Winter

Severin turned with Rafael instead of reaching. Their wooden blades knocked together near the guards, separated, then met again when Rafael tried to come across his forearm. Severin caught the second cut and kept his feet under him.

Rafael changed direction.

Severin nearly followed too far. He checked the front foot before his weight went with it and brought the rear foot under him. Rafael’s point still touched his shoulder.

”Reset,” Neumann said.

Severin stepped back to the chalk.

Rafael lowered his sword. ”Better.”

Severin rubbed his shoulder. ”Still fucking lost.”

Neumann clapped once before they could start again. ”Swords on the stack. Against the wall.”

The nine obeyed. Severin put his sword with the others and flexed his sore fingers.

Someone had come into the hall.

The man stood beside the far doors near Neumann, tall enough to make the trainer look smaller and broad through the shoulders and chest. His black Order coat was buttoned to the throat, with gloves covering both hands. A wool balaclava hid his head and face except for the eyes.

One eye followed Neumann. The other was pale and fixed.

Severin looked at the balaclava again.

Martin had noticed it too. ”What the hell’s that about?”

The man looked at Martin. Martin stopped smiling.

Neumann said, ”Initiates, meet Pilgrim Aldric Mourne. The Divider, as his cohort likes to call him.”

”He’s here at my request because some of you are getting a little too confident with those wooden swords.”

Bennett folded his arms. ”Sir, did any of us actually think that?”

”No. But Keller probably will if you give him enough time.”

Martin looked offended. ”Not me. I already know how bad I am.”

Neumann glanced at him. ”Mourne doesn’t discuss why his face is covered, and neither will any of you.”

Aldric looked away from Martin and toward the chalk marks in the center of the hall.

Neumann crossed to the sword stack, took one from the top and tossed it toward Aldric, who caught it in one gloved hand.

”Montoro.”

Rafael looked from Neumann to Aldric.

”Take yours.”

Rafael pulled a sword from the stack and stepped onto the chalk.

The others moved farther along the wall while Neumann cleared the center of the hall. Aldric took one of the chalk marks. Rafael was not small, but Aldric stood several inches taller and was much broader through the shoulders and chest. The wooden sword looked small in his hand.

Neumann looked at Rafael. ”Try everything you can to hit him. Don’t worry, he won’t use his mark.”

Rafael settled into stance.

Aldric kept his sword low, one foot slightly behind the other.

Neumann pointed between them. ”Go.”

Rafael moved first.

His opening cut was the same short, controlled attack that had caught Severin earlier. Aldric shifted his front foot barely an inch, and Rafael’s blade passed in front of his coat.

Aldric’s sword rose, and the wood cracked once.

The point snapped aside, and Aldric’s wooden blade stopped against the side of Rafael’s neck.

Rafael stepped back. Along the wall, even Martin kept quiet.

”Reset,” Neumann said.

They stepped apart, and Rafael came in faster the second time, feinting high before changing line toward Aldric’s ribs.

Aldric gave him the space, and for a moment Severin thought Rafael had him.

Then Aldric’s back foot moved. He turned just enough to clear the strike, brought his sword down across Rafael’s blade near the guard and drove it toward the floor.

Rafael recovered before the blade touched stone, but Aldric was already inside his reach, the wooden point resting against his chest.

”Reset.”

Rafael stepped back and reset his grip.

Severin watched Aldric’s feet.

His feet barely moved. One short shift had cleared Rafael’s strike, and another had put him inside his reach. He never had to fight for his balance afterward.

Neumann glanced toward the wall. ”Hale. Your turn.”

Severin looked at him. ”No chance. This guy’s a fucking monster.”

”Shut up and take a sword.”

Rafael handed Severin the sword as he stepped back toward the wall.

Severin stepped onto the chalk and faced Aldric, whose seeing eye settled on him through the balaclava.

He raised the sword.

”Same rule,” Neumann said. ”Do whatever you can. Just touch him.”

Severin looked back at Aldric. ”Bloody hell...”

Martin snorted from the wall.

Neumann pointed at Severin without looking away from Aldric. ”Another word and that’s twenty more.”

Severin decided twenty was enough and kept quiet.

”Go.”

Severin kept the first step short, but Aldric did not give ground.

Their blades met. Aldric turned Severin’s sword a few inches off course, barely using any force, and the opening was gone.

Severin kept his balance, changed direction and tried again, but Aldric’s sword was already there.

A quick pullback kept him from overreaching before he shifted outside and attacked from the other side.

A gap opened at Aldric’s chest.

Severin stepped into the opening, and the wooden blade touched him beneath the jaw.

He stopped with the blade beneath his jaw. Aldric had moved once.

Severin looked down at the sword against his throat, then back at Aldric’s seeing eye.

”Reset,” Neumann said.

Severin stepped away.

As Severin passed him, Aldric spoke for the first time. ”Too much movement.”

The words came muffled through the wool.

Severin turned his head. ”Bullshit. I only moved twice.”

Aldric handed the sword back to Rafael. ”Still too much.”

Then he walked toward Neumann.

Martin laughed quietly, and Severin considered throwing the sword at him.

Neumann took his sword instead. ”All right. Now for the part you’re actually here to see.”

Neither Martin nor Paul said anything.

Neumann dragged two trestles into the center. Bennett helped him lift a thick oak practice beam across them, old and scarred by blades.

Aldric stood eight strides away.

Neumann tapped the middle of the beam. ”Here.”

Aldric lifted one hand and made a slight movement at the wrist. Faint green light showed beneath the edge of his glove.

Severin watched the empty air between Aldric and the beam.

Nothing crossed the gap, but a dry click came from the oak.

A thin cut appeared through the middle of the beam. For a heartbeat the timber held, then one half dropped against the trestle and slid to the floor.

The hall stayed quiet as Severin looked from the severed wood to Aldric.

The only sound had come from the beam. Nothing had crossed the room.

Neumann kicked the fallen half aside. ”As you can see, distance doesn’t make you safe from the things we deal with. Take note. Whatever power you end up with could be just as destructive.”

Paul stared at the cut face of the timber. ”How far can he do that from?”

Neumann looked at Aldric, but Aldric said nothing.

”Far enough, apparently,” Neumann said.

He had Martin and Bennett bring out a narrow training frame from the equipment wall. Four cords hung from the crossbar at uneven intervals. A strip of canvas was tied behind them, with a wooden backing farther back.

Neumann pointed to the second cord. ”Cut the second cord and the canvas behind it. Leave the board.”

Aldric raised his hand again. The second cord dropped, and a slit opened through the canvas behind it almost at the same moment.

The wooden backing remained untouched.

Paul stepped closer before Neumann caught him by the back of his shirt.

”Stay where you are.”

”I just want to see the cut.”

”You can look when he’s done.”

Paul returned to the wall.

Neumann shifted the frame sideways and pointed to the first and fourth cords.

”Both. Nothing else.”

Aldric moved his hand twice, and the first and fourth cords dropped while the other two stayed in place.

Severin looked at the two cords still hanging. They were close enough together that a knife swung from Aldric’s position would have caught all four, but Aldric had chosen two.

Neumann turned toward the nine. ”Hale. Out here.”

Severin stayed where he was. ”Why me again?”

”Because I said so.”

Severin swore under his breath and walked into the hall.

Neumann put him beside the frame, then pulled a fresh strip of cloth tight between two posts just behind Severin’s right shoulder.

He looked back at it.

”Don’t get any stupid ideas.”

Severin faced forward again. ”I wasn’t planning to.”

Aldric stood across the hall, and the distance looked much longer with Severin standing in front of him.

Neumann stepped away. ”Same thing. Cut the cloth and nothing else.”

Aldric’s good eye fixed somewhere past Severin, who kept as still as he could.

His gloved hand moved, and something soft brushed the floor behind Severin.

Neumann said, ”Done.”

Severin turned to find the cloth hanging in two pieces from the posts, cut cleanly through the section that had been directly behind his shoulder.

His coat and the post beside him were untouched. Across the hall, Aldric had already lowered his hand.

Severin walked away from the frame without being told.

Martin leaned toward him when he reached the wall. ”You’re looking a little pale.”

Severin glanced at him. ”You think so?”

Neumann made the nine inspect the beam and the hanging cords after Aldric stepped away. The oak had no splintering around the cut. The canvas had been sliced just as cleanly.

Severin ran a thumb near the edge of the timber without touching it.

”Don’t put your fingers in there,” Anna said.

He moved his hand away.

Aldric was near the doors when Severin looked up. Neumann said something to him too quietly for the others to hear.

After a single nod, Mourne opened the door and left.

The swords came back out.

Severin took one from the stack and returned to the chalk. Across from him, Rafael rolled his shoulder and took his stance.

The severed cloth lay near the frame behind them.

Neumann walked past. ”Clean touch. Reset.”

Rafael raised his sword, and Severin set his feet, keeping the first step short.