Shadow by K. J. Parker

Author:K. J. Parker
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Orbit
Published: 2009-11-05T05:00:00+00:00

Chapter Sixteen

Stand with your back straight. (Monach was asleep on a hard plank bed in the only inn in Prodo, a dismal little village two hours west of Laise Bohec; but in his dream he was twelve years old, and a novice in a practice hall at Deymeson.) Stand with your back straight—

‘. . . Your right foot slightly ahead of your left, your feet apart by the width of your shoulders.’ Father Tutor walked up and down the lines, looking for a misplaced foot to smack at with his foil. Late afternoon sunlight soaked through the thin vellum windowpanes, yellow and soft, and the whole world smelt of beeswax, sweat and wet plaster. ‘Now, draw your sword and hold it out in front of you, both hands on the hilt, as far as you can reach comfortably without stretching.’ A hedge of wooden foils sprouted from each row—

(Across so much space and time, Monach couldn’t recognise himself; they all look the same at that age, particularly in novice’s robes and temple haircuts. But he knew he was there, just as he always knew where his sword hilt was, or the extent of his circle.)

—and Father Tutor went back the way he’d just come, inspecting, adjusting the height of a foil-tip up or down, until he was satisfied that he’d achieved as much uniformity as was possible with a group of human beings.

‘Very good,’ he said. ‘Now, please listen very carefully, because I’m about to teach you the most important lesson you’ll ever learn.’ He waited for a heartbeat or so, just long enough to tantalise the class into paying attention. ‘Moving your feet as little as you can, turn round in a circle, keeping your eyes fixed at all times on the tip of your sword.’

Of course, it was something of a shambles. For one thing, he hadn’t specified clockwise or anticlockwise, and it was the first time they’d ever done the exercise . . . Inevitably, one or two novices collided in opposition, their foils meshing like the cogs of a gear-train. There was a certain amount of giggling, and the ludicrous sound of young, pattering feet on a polished wood floor.

‘That’ll do,’ Father Tutor called out, and at once the giggling stopped and the youth in the room evaporated like water sprinkled on the bed of a forge. ‘Lower your swords, stand down and listen carefully; this is very difficult, and if you get it wrong you will undoubtedly lose your first live fight and die. Now then.’ He took a deep breath and stuck his thumbs into his sash, an unconscious mannerism that he hated because he knew it made him look pompous and fat, but that he had no real control over. The class was staring at him; he felt apprehension and antagonism. That was good.

‘Think,’ he told him, ‘about the circle you’ve just drawn in the air.’ (Was that Father Tutor talking, or the Junior Tutor that Monach had grown into, eighteen years later,

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