“Watch,” Thorn said. “Tell me what you see.”
“With them down at that end of the strip, about all I can see is Sorenson’s back.”
“Can you see Jamal’s face?”
“Through the mask, sure.”
“Watch his eyes.”
Jamal’s defense had stiffened. Sorenson was pressing, pressing, but Jamal resisted, halfway over the end line.
Back and forth the blades. Attack, parry, riposte, parry, remise, parry, press.
Inside himself, Thorn went still. This was the hardest part of coaching. For that matter, it was the hardest part of spectating, being reduced to an observer. It had been a very long time since he had fenced competitively, but every time he watched a bout a part of him longed to be out there.
“Here it comes,” he whispered.
Jamal had overparried Sorenson’s last attack, leaving his own blade a little higher than he should have. Sorenson reacted immediately, stepping forward and starting a compound attack that began with Jamal’s right wrist, feinted to the outside of his right elbow, then circled over his arm to come in toward his shoulder. As Jamal worked to close out that line, Sorenson’s point dropped suddenly, streaking toward Jamal’s front toe.
Beside him, Thorn heard Marissa gasp.
He smiled.
On the strip, Sorenson had dropped into a crouch, trying to buy an extra moment or two before Jamal’s counter could hit his mask. So the feint toward Jamal’s toe hadn’t been a feint after all. Sorenson was trying to score a touch, or to drive Jamal off the end of the strip.
But Jamal wasn’t reacting as anyone had expected. As soon as Sorenson’s point started its dip—later, Thorn even heard some of the audience say it looked like he started moving a bare instant before Sorenson’s attack, which made Thorn smile—Jamal had leaped, but he hadn’t gone backward. He had jumped up, tucking his right foot under him and dropping his own point directly on top of Sorenson’s mask.
Touché.
And match point.
The director called halt and awarded the touch, but it was all a formality. Jamal had won.
“How’d he do that, Tommy?” Marissa asked.
Thorn smiled again. “Tell me what you saw.”
“His eyes, you mean? Well, it’s hard to see through that mesh, but they looked different. Unfocused, I guess, but more so than usual, if you know what I mean.”
Thorn nodded. “What else?”
She paused, thinking, then said, “The oddest thing was his face. I mean, I’ve seen Jamal fence a few times, and it always seems that he’s grinning, or gritting his teeth, or biting his lip, or something, you know? But this time, there at the end of the bout, it was like his face lost all expression.” She looked at him. “Why, Tommy? Does that mean something?”
Thorn smiled. “It means he’s getting there.”
They went over to join the small crowd gathered around Jamal.
“Great bout, Jamal,” Thorn said, shaking his hand.
Jamal grinned. “Thanks,” he said.
“Yeah, amazing.” Marissa shook his hand, too.
They started walking away, away from the others and toward where Jamal had his gear.
“Tell me, though,” Marissa said when they had gained some space. “What happened with that last touch? It looked almost as though you knew what he was going to do before he did it, but that can’t be right, can it? Tommy always says—”
“Anticipation will get you killed,” Jamal finished, grinning again. Then his smile faded. “Honestly, Marissa, I don’t really know what happened. I could feel him pressing, and I knew he was setting me up for something, and of course I knew I was out of room, and then, I don’t know. It’s like I found myself three feet up in the air, my point coming down on his mask, without really knowing how I got there.” He shrugged, looking slightly embarrassed, and darted a glance at Thorn.
Thorn nodded. “It’s like your counter just happened.”
Jamal’s eyes grew bigger. He nodded. “Exactly,” he said. “Like it wasn’t me doing it.”
“Excellent,” Thorn said. “And congratulations.”
They were already calling people over for the medal ceremony. “Go get ’em,” Thorn said.
Jamal grinned again and darted off.
“Tommy?” Marissa said. There was an edge to her voice, a tell-me-now-or-you’ll-be-sorry note.
Thorn chuckled. “It’s called ‘no-mind,’ and it’s not a Western thing at all. But it’s a very good thing. Being one with the moment, so that the blade itself seems to react, not the fencer, and the parries and attacks throw themselves. It extends further, to where the touch happens before the move, and the bout is over before it begins, but I think we’ll save that conversation for another time.”
She looked at him, frowning. “Why?”
He grinned. “ ’Cuz I want to see Jamal get his medal.”
The Great Desert Waste
North Africa
One of the things Lewis had learned about men over the years was that the surest way to catch them was to use multiple baits. Some men liked to be thought physically attractive; some preferred to be admired for their minds, or personalities, or their senses of humor. Some wanted you to be impressed with their ability to make money—or to wield power. A man who might laugh out loud if you called him a “hunk” or a “stud” might also preen like a peacock if you flattered his intelligence or his compassion.
With a man like Jay, you wanted to hit him on at least two fronts. The first and most important bait, Lewis figured, was to be a fan of smokin’ Jay, the computer whiz. That was easy enough to do—he was good, as good as any, and better than most, so it didn’t take much acting on her part to admire his moves and knowledge.
But computer geeks tended to be insecure about things on the physical plane, and letting it be known that he was attractive on a male-female basis was the second prong of the attack. She knew he was a normal heterosexual man—he had a wife and child—and she was making it apparent that she would like to roll around with him and break furniture, doing some things he probably wouldn’t be able to do at home with the baby sleeping in the next room.
He had to be at least curious and flattered.
Given her choice, she would be running a custom-made-to-attract-Jay-Gridley scenario, full of subconscious prods to get Jay’s hormones stirred so she could take advantage of them, like that club in WWII Chicago. But Jay had been fairly adamant that she join his VR creation this time, which meant that he was nervous about hers, which was good. Keeping him off balance was where she wanted to be.
She smiled as she walked along behind Jay. He had them walking in a classic desert, dressed in Bedouin-style white robes and sandals, with high-tech snake sticks, moving along a trail passing tall sand dunes dotted with bits of scraggly grasses. She had a cowl over her head and a scarf over most of her face. In fact, save for her eyes and forehead and hands, she was completely covered, and that was worth another smile.
Her staff was not the crook’d wood of a sheepherder, though, but aluminum or titanium, expandable, with a wrist loop and a spongy, padded grip. The bottom end was sharp and pointed, with a round concave metal disk “basket” a few inches up, to offer more support in snow or, in this case, sand. There was a button under a flip-up cap on the staff’s butt, and if you pressed it and grounded the tip, it would charge the basket with enough low-amp voltage to send a serpent on his slithery way if it was anywhere close to the critter. If that didn’t work, you could stab the crawler with the point itself, or just bash him with the staff like a club.