Acre by J. K. Swift

Author:J. K. Swift [Swift, J. K.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction
Publisher: UE Publishing Co.
Published: 2016-05-25T07:00:00+00:00

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CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Early morning was the best time for martial training, as the sun had not yet risen over the city and the stone walls of the Hospitaller compound still held in the coolness of the night before. Foulques had joined a motley group of brother sergeants for their exercises after morning service. Many of the ordained Black Knights avoided practicing with their brown-robed brethren. The most common excuse was they lacked the classical training of the noble-born knights and if you sparred with them too often you would pick up poor habits. Foulques, on the other hand, relished his sessions with the sergeants. He saw it as a chance to pit his years of training against an assortment of unorthodox, and often unpredictable, fighting styles.

The sergeants were a rough lot. Many of them had been professional soldiers before their calling, others had fled into the Order from a life of crime. The Hospitallers did not judge a man’s past life if he was willing to take the vows, but discipline was harsh, and any man that did not fulfill his new duties would take his turn bound to the whipping post in the square, or worse, the gallows. Although, the latter was infrequent, as it was a better use of resources to simply post the troublemaker to a hostile area that saw frequent clashes with the enemy and let God be the ultimate judge. In return for pledging their lives to the Order, new brothers and sisters were granted absolution for their past sins, a fresh start for their soul. That was the great attraction for most. For others, a safe place to sleep and two good meals a day, which frequently included meat, was enough.

Foulques knew most of the sergeants well, and they him. A few of the older sergeants had been sparring with Foulques for almost twenty years. His Uncle Guillaume had entrusted much of his upbringing to these men. Foulques did not know whether that was because he saw value in it, or simply because he was too busy to raise his brother’s orphan on his own.

Foulques held a shield in one hand and his double-edged, hand-and-a-half blade in the other. It was light enough to be wielded in one hand, yet the hilt was of a length that one could get a second hand on the pommel to deliver devastating two-armed attacks if needed. A gift from his uncle on the day Foulques was knighted, the sword had been in the Villaret family for eighty years, yet it still gleamed like it was fresh from the master swordsmith’s final polish.

The sergeant he faced, an Englishman named Roderic, stood across from him similarly armed, except he used a practice sword rather than risk his own weapon. Perhaps Foulques should have been using a practice blade as well, but he preferred to train with the weapon he would use in the field. And his sword was so well crafted that, other than the odd nick to whetstone out, Foulques was not worried about damaging it.

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