It would be naught but practice. Plain and easy as a game of Twelve Shells, and no more to it.
Fie knew a lie when she heard one. Even one she aimed at herself.
Tavin unsheathed his swords but set them in the grass near his feet, much to Fie’s relief. Instead he passed her an empty scabbard, then used the remaining scabbard to draw two marks in the dirt, dim by firelight. “Keep your feet on those. Now look at me.” She did. “Keep looking at me.” He circled to her right side, so her chin near lined up to her shoulder. “Hold up your, er, sword. Elbow loose. There. If you remember anything, let it be this.”
“Standing like a dolt?” Fie asked. Everything about it felt unnatural and foolish. The Vultures couldn’t possibly be watching, or she’d have heard their laughter.
“I know it doesn’t feel right.” A shade of Tavin’s normal grin flashed as he turned square to her and tapped one of his shoulders. “Here, try to hit me.” She took an awkward step forward and jabbed the scabbard into his shoulder easy enough, then retreated to her footmarks.
Tavin shifted, mirroring the stance he’d set her into: scabbard held out between them, the rest of him angled to the side. He tapped the same shoulder. “Again.”
She tried, but he all but brushed the strike aside. Now she saw: even if she got past his own weapon, she had to travel within his arm’s reach and then hit a shoulder still tilted askew from her.
“That’s why,” he said. “If anything will keep you alive, it’s this: be as small a target as you can. And always keep your weapon between you and your foe.” His mouth twisted. “All things considered, that will probably come naturally to you.”
She gave him a dark look. “Aye, and I bet hitting you will, too.”
“I wouldn’t be surprised.” The grin that followed flashed more than a shade of his usual humor. “Short swords don’t have much range, but you have the element of surprise. Your best shot will be knocking a hit off course and using that opening to go for their hands, eyes, anything you can. Try to hit me, slowly.” She did. He brushed her strike off again, but then in a blink, he was closer, his scabbard tapping her forearm.
Fie narrowed her eyes. “What just happened?”
Tavin shifted back. “Watch. Block.” He pushed her scabbard away slow, firelight slipping along the lines of his scarred wrist. “Step in.” He stepped into the void. “Strike.” His scabbard completed an arc it had begun in the block, landing at her forearm again. “Now you—”
She moved before he finished. He automatically sprang out of her range, then sighed. “I knew I should have put off teaching you how to hit me.”
“You said to use the element of surprise.”
“Yes, on people who are trying to kill you!” He gave an exasperated laugh, a little too loud, then glanced to the prince.
Jasimir was listing sideways, chin propped on a palm. A snore betrayed him.
Relief flickered through Tavin’s expression.
Fie lowered her scabbard. “Why are you dragging it out?”
“I’m not,” he said, setting himself back into the sword stance. “I am fully prepared for you to hit me. Have at it.”
She scowled. Block. “You know what I mean.” Her scabbard pushed his aside. Her voice lowered. “You’re not going back to the palace.” Step in. “And he thinks you are.” Strike. She went for the throat. “You’ll die for him, but you won’t tell him the truth?”
Tavin’s face was unreadable; he did not move away. “What does it matter to you?”
“It’s a pain in my ass,” she hissed. Yet another half-lie. “And yours. He keeps harping on the Hawks because he needs to believe you’re all squeaky-clean and selfless, married to your duty.”
“What does that have to do with me?”
Fie stepped back. “What’s your duty to the prince?”
“To keep him alive.” Tavin nodded slowly. “To … to die for him.”
“Aye.” Fie shrugged. “So he needs to believe you’ll do it, and he’ll keep up that nonsense the whole way to the Marovar, just to prove it. Unless you tell him the truth.”
“It’s not that easy.” Tavin stepped back. “Again.”
Annoyance made her hasty. Block. “Twelve hells it isn’t.”
Step in. “It’s not about me,” Tavin said, “it’s the king.” Strike. “Again.”
“What’s the king to do with it?” Fie returned to her footmarks.
“King Surimir has a … a shine for Hawks.” Tavin frowned. By dark, Fie could pretend she hadn’t polished away his scars. “He’s the sort of king who travels with half an army just to remind people he commands their blades. He wants people to think he’s dangerous. To treat him like he is.”
Fie remembered the first time she’d held Phoenix fire. She hadn’t wanted to burn the world down; she’d wanted the world to know she could.
“He’s a Phoenix witch,” she mumbled. “He’s a king. Isn’t that enough?”
Tavin shook his head. “Again.” Block. “He married Queen Jasindra mostly to add her to his armory. I was given to Jas so he could start his own Hawk collection.” Step in. “But Surimir wants an imitator, not a son. Jas has no interest in throwing himself parades or yanking half the Splendid Castes into his bed. The queen raised him to be a good ruler. I was raised to be a good Hawk. You can guess which of us the king thinks is useful.”
Strike.
She knew what he meant, yet she couldn’t help another jab. “And how does you tumbling all those palace waifs help the prince, then?”
Fie hid her delight when he actually slipped. Then she tripped on her own snare: he righted himself, all fluster and fumble, and Fie discovered she found that disturbingly close to charming. Damn him. Of course he’d find a way to make stumbling about attractive.
“It—it would have been cruel to ask for more,” he said, blunt. “To try to make anything last.” She lowered her scabbard, feeling as though she’d waded into waters deeper than she’d thought. “I’m a bastard, an heir to nothing. For ten years, I’ve been told my only purpose is to keep Jas alive. That the best thing I can do is die for him. Of course I met people I wanted, but how could I ask them to stay mine when I couldn’t truly be theirs?”
Any sneer or jest had long withered on Fie’s tongue. “You’re still going to disappear once we’re out of this. What are you going to tell him then?”
“The truth. Fie, I promised I’d do everything I can to help you. I brought this on your family. I owe you a debt. And my life will be my own to give, as long as you would have it.” He raised his scabbard, and something frighteningly near hope rose in his voice. “Again.”
Fie tried to order her whirlwind thoughts and couldn’t even see where to start. Tavin’s arm moved through the dark.
He truly meant to vanish.
Block.
He meant to help her. To do everything he could. But she’d thought—
Step in.
She’d told herself he only had a tourist’s interest in her. That he found her at best a useful ally to woo, at worst the makings of a lurid boast to scandalize the other Hawks.