"Time for what?"
"I suppose," Baj said, "for lessons again."
In a while, Nancy came back with two strong green stick-swords cut and whittled. One gently curved, the other straight.
"Good boy," Patience said. "You've done what I asked for her."
"Get up," Nancy said, staring at Baj through firelight. "Get up and fight." It was the first she'd spoken to him in a while.
Baj stood, and stepped aside for room.
"Poor light for fencing," Patience said, "- but all the better."
A distance from the fire, Errol, always interested in fighting, sat up to see.
"They're good at points," Richard said.
"At 'points', dear one," Patience said, "there is no good or bad, but only strike and not be stricken. I thought all old soldiers knew that."
The fire's glow was in Baj's eyes; he looked aside to spare his seeing, and Nancy tossed his stick-sword to him.
Baj expected an attack, but didn't get it. Instead, the girl watched and waited, cautious and cold as a stranger, so they stood with their whittled branches, still as ice-people carved for a funeral.
"Well," Patience said, "- fight, or fuck!" And to Richard, "See how coarse I've grown in exile? I would never have said such a thing on the Common."
"It's the company you keep," Richard said, and they laughed (soprano and bass) as Nancy – now looking furious – bounded at Baj as if to kill him.
He could have hit her once… then another time. But only gave room and backed away over high grass, shadowed by firelight and cooler light as the moon rose over the mountains.
When the girl paused, panting, eyes gold as Kingdom coins, Patience, at the fire, set her scimitar aside and stood. "Well, girl," she said, "you've learned something. But never lose calm when you fight!".
She walked over to Nancy, and took the stick-sword from her. "Stand away, now, and watch how it should be done… and done weak-handed at that."
And saying so – not quite finished talking – she was at Baj in an odd strutting striding attack, much like a fighting rooster's for posture… then sudden flurries of speed, in which her slung left arm seemed little impediment.
She came at him, white hair shining in moonlight, dark eyes shadowed darker, and struck short snapping blows at odd angles, and quickly – pecking, is what it seemed – delivered so unevenly in succession that they were difficult to parry. She had a… a style of striking then hooking his reposte away, using her branch-blade's scimitar curve.
It was very elegant, very determined attacking, and Baj found himself fencing as he'd fought only once before, when the Achieving King had come to the salle to teach him his lesson.
The fir branches whipped and thrust and whickered together in swift counters, and Baj felt the cool exhilaration of accomplished great effort – felt that for several moments back and forth across the moonlit grass, came close twice to hitting her, and was considering drawing a pretend left-hand dagger when Patience stepped a little strangely, kicked him in the right knee – and as he staggered, hacked him hard to the side of his neck. Then there was a delicate little motion, barely a thrust at all, that would have picked his left eye out if she'd wished, and her splintered branch had been sharp steel.
Lame, Baj still recovered and stood on guard, though he would have been a dead man. Beyond the fire's light, Errol clicked his tongue.
"Well, my Baj," Patience smiled, "you're almost as good as you thought you were. Though… a little too attentive to your greenwood sword. After all, it's only an instrument of your will. Your will directs it, not your wrist. And, of course, fighting includes kicks and other things."
Baj saluted her with his branch, standing a little awkwardly, since his knee hurt. "Thank you for the reminding lesson, Lady. And all the more, weak-handed."
Patience tossed her branch aside. "Oh, well-enough with something so light, fencing a few passes… But you are dangerously good, fighting straight-bladed – those nasty thrusts and lunges – and even better, I suppose, with your familiar steel in your hand." She reached across to nurse her left shoulder. "When you're less concerned with artful parries, Baj, and recall your fighting dagger and that moccasin-boots are useful kickers, you'll be an unlucky young man for almost anyone to cross. I don't doubt you'd have a fair chance of killing me, then."
"He did tell me those sorts of things," Nancy said. "He tried to teach me all of them."
"I'm sure he has," Patience said, "though was slow to remember a few himself, when he faced me… And poorly you've learned, Nancy. I've seen women cleaning fish with more skill than you show, girl, and much more sensible temper." She started toward the fire, then turned back. "What stands across from you when you fight, is life or death – and no person at all to be loved or hated. Learn that, or bite the dirt with your guts spilled out."
… Later, when Baj and Nancy both slept – Errol as usual curled against Baj's back – the moon had risen to its cloudy height, and a cold wind sighed from the north, mentioning distant thunder. Richard and Patience, wrapped in cloak and coat by the fire-pit's ashes, conversed quietly about Boston-town, which Richard had seen only once, years before – allowed the visit as aide to a colonel of the Guard. They recalled its gates, its many-streets and passageways… and the so-slow changes in its buildings, its cathedrals and courtyards, as the weight of their ice deformed them – to then be re-carved, rounded or angled, and new wall-blocks with altered key-blocks added, so each generation discovered a slightly different gleaming Boston, sculpted as their city.
They discussed that – and the Guard's Wolf-General, Sylvia, who'd once been Richard's commander, before his transfer and desertion… Then, tired of talking, they sat silent beneath a cloud-streaked jewelry of stars glittering the cold night across, and kept to their own thoughts until Patience said, "They're both still so young. Too young to suffer what must be done."
"Sad," Richard said, "- but true." A phrase legacy from Warm-times, and almost always appropriate.
CHAPTER 15
Dawn greeted with a rumbling crash and roar.
Baj sat up from his blanket's folds, was struck with the first of hard slanting rain, and drenched.
They all stood from coat, cloaks, or blankets, and trotted with their possibles and packs to the poor shelter of the evergreens, which whipped and bowed to the storm's wet winds, stroking them with soaking branches.
Errol, burrowing at Baj's side, was making shrill piping noises – shriller when lightning cracked past overhead, and another great door of thunder slammed shut.
Richard, fur-tufts sopped and drooping, ducked as lightning flared all a brilliant white – and thunder came smashing after it. Baj saw, in an echo of the eye, Nancy crouched wincing at her pack, teeth bared in fear as lightning came sizzling near, flashed down past the camp and cracked among the trees… He saw that, and as the glare faded, noticed Patience standing back, white hair plastered as the rain came down, watching him.
As though, in that moment, he'd seen his Second-mother looking through those black eyes, Baj, keeping Errol with him, went to the girl as wind came whistling… knelt beside and put his arm and a fold of cloak around her. She turned as if to bite him… but didn't, and the three of them huddled close.
The storm grew more savage, striking near them with bolts that blazed into the mountain, thunder peals that shook it. Then sweeps and sweeps of blowing rain… that as dawn lightened slightly to morning, could be seen marching as a shouting army in dark rank on rank across the mountains.
Nancy, fine red rooster-comb of hair soaked black, trembled at Baj's side. "Too loud," she said… The wind brought the white smell of water with it, and the smell of stone and grass from the mountain balds. Brought also an odd hint of burning – perhaps from fires the lightning set, too fierce for the rain to drown… The storm slowly eased to gusts and spattering dashes, the thunder gone trundling south, then eased again to puddled calm under cool and watery light. They all stood, shook water from drenched clothes, and Patience, stripping rain from her white hair, said, "Lord Winter wakes in the north, and clears his throat."