moonshadows

Waste of time. He snarls, one blade lashing out with crushing force towards the slighter form of his Champion, causing her to retreat a step. Useless worm. A second strike; she retreats again, unable to meet the full force of his blow. I know he’s hiding something. Blow by blow, step by step, he chases her around the gym while his anger slowly erodes the control he holds over his vision until suddenly, her lilac presence vanishes from his rage-blinded sight and he forces his temper back under control. The blank wall facing him is a puzzle until her soft voice calls his name from behind him. Of course. With nowhere else to go, she slipped into the Twisting Nether. Clever, his young Champion. With an irritated sigh, he banishes his weapons and gestures her to the corner where the stripped wire waits. She gives him a curious look, but obeys and he paces impatiently while she drinks. When she makes a motion to resume their sparring session, he angrily counters it with a sharp gesture.

“No,” he snaps. “That will only feed the anger.” Taloned hands clench and unclench as if they could wring the truth from the delegate’s neck. When she holds her silence, he realizes he has been braced for her reaction – and that he did, in fact, speak out loud. The instinct to feel humiliation from having exposed his weakness is trampled by the fear of losing control next week, when this frail freedom will be denied him.

She calmly moves close enough that, should he choose, he can pull her into an embrace. “What should I do instead?” she asks, her tone diffident but her expression challenging him to protest. He considers it – he’s still angry enough that a good argument is tempting indeed, and how dare this slip of a girl challenge him? – but she looks fearlessly at him and says, “I am your Champion. Tell me how I can serve you.”

I can’t do any of that if you don’t let me, his memory of her says. She meant that, he realizes. Despite her youth, she was serious about serving him – and she can be trusted to not take advantage of any opening his weakness offers.

“What did you detect from the head delegate?” he demands, a corner of his seething rage satisfied by the way she straightens to attention.

“When he said he would need to let the chancellor know of your arrival so that the necessary arrangements could be made, there was an echo,” she says, “but I couldn’t hear what he was hiding.”

When she does not continue, he pounces on her hesitation. “You couldn’t hear what he was hiding, but…?”

His Champion takes a deep breath. “…but I could probably find it if you gave me permission to actually enter his mind.”

The implications – and potential complications – flood him and absently, he pulls her against him while he sorts them out. She can enter another’s mind and seek out knowledge, but she has not done so because he commands her. Would she be detected if she did enter the head delegate’s mind? Is this ability of hers a weapon he can command her to use with impunity, or something best held in reserve? She did not enter the delegate’s mind because he had not given her an order to do so, but he did order her to do what needed to be done with regards to him. Has she been going into his mind? Do the blades she mentioned protect him at all times, or only when his anger flares? What about when he’s relaxed? Too many questions, not enough information.

“Take your hour now,” he growls threateningly. “Tonight, I will expect you to be in your rooms and we will discuss what you can do.”

“Yes, my Kal’shan,” she says, unbothered by the implied threat.

Rather than release her immediately, he holds her tighter as though physically clinging to the memory of her silent assurance: I know. I don’t care. You’re my Kal’shan. He cannot afford to doubt her, to allow her to be hurt by his wrath. Regardless of his fears, he must trust his Champion to be exactly what she seems to be until such time as he is in no danger of succumbing to madness.

The fact that she’s nestled endearingly against him, even knowing what he could do to her, doesn’t hurt.

She watches him stride angrily towards the door, waits until it closes behind him before moving her wings slowly in the motion he’d shown her yesterday. The memory of his hand makes her blush. Resolutely, she picks up her glaives and moves back into the center of the large, empty room, determined to make the most of her hour.

Although their conversation on Week’s Dawn had detoured swiftly into the turbulent waters of death and resurrection, he had made a point of letting her know that he knew at least some of what she was capable of. Then, in a baffling display of calm, he’d announced that their bonding session would be in the afternoon of Week’s Dusk. Surely, he had to have suspected something, but if he had, wouldn’t he have reacted somehow? Was this another trap? As much as it terrifies her to contemplate being caught with her mental fingers in his metaphoric cookie jar, she knows she will still take every opportunity to keep doing what needs to be done to keep his mind working as best it can. She doubts this is what he had in mind when he gave her that command, and has no illusions that such an excuse would cause him to spare her life if he ever finds out. The thought of his trust in her being so utterly shattered, of not being able to serve him, makes tears prick at her eyes and she forces herself to concentrate on the motion of the blades.

I won’t let that happen.

No, she’ll go slow and careful, not making any new repairs for a while. Cleaning the toxic emotions out of his memories will be more than enough to occupy her for months. At least he seemed to be taking her seriously now. She’d be content to have him think of her as a child forever as long as he still let her do things for him.

At the end of her hour she puts the blades away and awkwardly flaps her wings the way he showed her. Even weak as she is and going slow, she can feel the power in the stroke. A few more repetitions to get used to the movement, and she puts her illusions back on and heads out. She’s almost all the way to the door before it hits her: she won’t be able to practice next week. He won’t be able to-

No wonder he’s so worked up.

Deep in thought, she walks back to her rooms, completely ignoring the guard left behind to escort her.