by P. M. Biswas
Tam was getting goose bumps. Damn this eerie forest and its fickleness! “How do you find your way around this puzzle map?”
“It is only a puzzle if you cannot read it.”
“I can’t. I can’t, that’s why—don’t go wandering off and leave me to get lost, would you?”
“Even if you were lost, you would be found.” Loren pointed up at the canopy. “The birds could guide you, for example.”
“No, the birds could pluck out my eyes. You could guide me. Just stay by my side, got it?”
“What a sentimental declaration,” Loren said wryly. “Truly the words of a loving wife.”
Tam shoved Loren. She’d meant to do it lightly, but given how reed-thin Loren was and how burly Tam was, she ended up propelling Loren several steps into the glade.
Loren stumbled to an ungraceful halt and frowned back at her. “What was that for?”
“For breaking your promise. You said you’d rather cut out your tongue than call me wife.” Tam held her hand out, palm up. “Hand it over, then.”
“Hand what over?”
“Your tongue.”
“You’re so gruesome.”
Tam jeered. “Better than being a timid li’l rabbit-prince who’s too afraid to be himself.”
“I’m taller than you are!”
“So you agree with all my other assessments of you? That you’re timid, rabbity, and afraid to be yourself?”
Before Loren could defend himself, there was a whinny from across the glade and Tam saw Maple step out from behind a towering bush bursting with yellow flowers. Flowers that Maple was apparently ingesting, because a few stray petals clung to her chewing mouth.
“Hey!” Tam rebuked her. “Can you eat that? What if it poisons you, you silly horse?”
“She is far wiser than you, you silly human,” Loren said. “She is only grazing on sleep-flowers. The most they’ll do is make her drowsy.”
Maple did have blissfully glazed-over eyes.
“Great.” Tam sulked. “I have a sedated horse and a fake husband. My life is now complete.” Tam went up to Maple and patted her down, checking for any injuries.
“She is unharmed,” Loren said. “I made sure of it. No predators were permitted to enter this area while Maple was in it, and I laid a perimeter charm to prevent her from leaving.”
“Oh. Thanks.” Tam hated thanking Loren. She wished Loren would quit doing things she had to thank him for. “I was worried she’d have been devoured by some giant piranha on four legs.”
“Piranhas don’t have legs. And they can’t survive out of water.”
“Here, they might. Anything’s possible in the Wanderwood.” Tam spotted her armor and her spear lying where she had left them, undisturbed. “My stuff hasn’t disappeared! Brilliant.” Then it dawned on Tam that this might be against Eras’s policy. “But aren’t we humans supposed to be unarmed? Can you even give my spear back to me?”
“I won’t let you take it out of the clearing,” Loren said self-consciously.
“Still, this is awfully suspicious….” Tam smacked her fist against her palm. “I’ve got it! You’re trying to sabotage the negotiations! By tempting me into arming myself!”
Loren huffed in exasperation. “Are you physiologically incapable of accepting someone’s goodwill?”
“Why would you bear goodwill toward me? After I’ve sassed you so much?” Tam squinted at Loren distrustfully. “Is the bond messing with your mind, or what?”
“Or what,” Loren muttered, looking like he was regretting this spontaneous excursion.
“If you’re not sabotaging the alliance, why else would you be giving me back my weapon?”
“I’d hardly call a spear that tiny a weapon.”
“Oh. Oh, it’s on.” Tam immediately hoisted her spear, relishing the weight of a weapon in her hand after all that tedious diplomacy. “Prepare yourself, princeling. We’re going to spar.”
“And you’re accusing me of sabotage? I’m not the one insisting we fight in the middle of peace talks! Put that useless spear down.”
“You just called it useless! You insulted its honor!”
Loren goggled. “Spears have honor?”
“Now I must champion its just cause!”
“What cause is that?”
Tam twirled her spear in a cocky display of skill. “Defeating you so soundly that you’ll never be able to meet my eyes again.”
Loren scoffed. “How will you defeat me? I’m armed with a bow and arrows and you have a spear. A spear will do naught against a barrage of arrows.”
“You call those ceremonial twigs arrows? I could snap them in two across my knee.”
“No, you could not. They only appear delicate. They’re made of enchanted ironwood and wouldn’t break even under the striking of a hammer.”
Now that was more like it. Tam jogged in place, eager to begin. “Good thing I’m built like a hammer, then.”
“Tam.” Loren massaged his temples, as if staving off the onset of a truly horrendous headache. “I didn’t save your life for you to waste it on a pointless sparring session.”
“Only you would call sparring pointless. Guess what, Your Highness, you won’t survive the battle if you don’t survive the spar. Sparring is how I ensure I stay alive. Given that a war’s coming, it’s how you should ensure you stay alive too.”
“So this spar’s for my benefit, is it? Is that what you’re claiming now?”
“Anything to get you in the mood.” Tam grinned unrepentantly. “C’mon, Loren. Bring it.”
“Your language is highly inappropriate, and—and how would you even spar with me? We have contrasting weapons.”
“That’s what makes it interesting.”
“It won’t be that interesting when I shoot arrow after arrow at you and you fail to deflect them with your spear. I have no intention of turning you into a pincushion, especially when it might interfere with the alliance my father is currently establishing.”
Tam pictured it—arrows flying at her and Tam without a shield, forced to rely only on her spear to safeguard her. If she could manage it, it would refine her hand-eye coordination to an almost unachievable height. Even if she couldn’t manage it and had to resort to her presently discarded shield, this spar would still vastly improve her performance. “Nice. Very nice.”
Loren regarded Tam with alarm. “Nice? What’s nice?”
“That’s an excellent idea.”
“What’s an excellent idea?”
“You shooting at me. It’ll give me unmatched defensive practice. Target practice in reverse, if you will. Because I’ll be the target.” Tam spread her feet in the stance Maryada had taught her. “Hit me.”
Loren stared at her. “Where is it?”
“Where’s what?”
“Your armor, you suicidal creature. Why haven’t you put it on? My arrows are tipped with elven steel, capable of cutting through the trunk of an oak. No matter how strong you are, you are still far less substantial than an oak.”
“You care about me dying? Aw.”
“I cared about you dying even when you were an utter stranger. It is the way of our folk, gracious as we are.”
“Yes,” Tam drawled sarcastically. “I can feel your graciousness radiating from you like light from the sun.”
“Why, thank you.”
Tam spat on the soil. “It wasn’t a compliment. Hit me, cowardly elf-boy, or go running back to your father if you’re so afraid of drawing a little blood.”
Loren’s eyes narrowed. He reached back to pull an arrow from his quiver, not even taking his eyes off Tam to do so. Mayhap he wasn’t as inexpert as Tam had estimated he was. “Has anyone ever told you that you’re impossible?”
“Everyone. Constantly.”
“That, I can believe.” Loren slotted his arrow. “Do go crying back to your father if I draw ‘a little blood.’”
“That’s even more impossible than I am,” Tam said, “since my father’s dead.”
>
Loren paled. “I—” He looked appalled at himself. “I’m sorr—”
“Stop apologizing and shoot. I am no swooning damsel overwhelmed by a fact as simple as death. I am a warrior.”
Loren was staring at her again. “Unfathomable,” he said quietly, as if seeing in Tam a being so opposite to him that she was beyond his comprehension.
“Besides, even if you do hit me, all you have to do is plug me into your Pool of Healing and patch me back up. Why’re you so scared of wounding me?”
“Because it’ll still hurt you, you oblivious—” Loren’s words seemed to strangle him, he was so frustrated.
“And it’ll hurt you. That’s what you’re actually afraid of, isn’t it? That when I feel pain, so will you.” Tam bared her teeth. “Or is it because you’re an archer? Is that why you’re cringing? Because you’re too gutless to descend from the trees and fight me face-to-face on even ground?”
“Did you forget that I saved your life?” Loren retaliated. “Do you not owe me respect?”
“Aye, I owe you respect. It doesn’t mean I have to like you.” Tam jabbed her spear in Loren’s direction. “I owe you a degree of respect for saving me, elfling, because that is my debt to bear. But you are no friend of mine. Nor will you ever be.”
Loren’s face went cold. It was as if clouds had shadowed the sun—even Loren’s luminous green eyes acquired a cooler, darker glitter. “Very well,” Loren said. The hesitation had left his voice. It was lower than Tam had ever heard it, rock-solid and deep, and it sent shivers up Tam’s spine.
Then, before Tam could even see Loren draw his bow, he’d shot an arrow at her. It whizzed past her ear.
“Yes,” Tam hissed in delight, because even though it was just a warning shot, it was swifter than Tam had envisioned. If Loren could draw his bow that quickly, this match would be a thrill.
Tam sprang into motion, launching herself into the air to strike down Loren’s next arrow, and his next. She leapt again, her booted foot rebounding off a nearby tree, dislodging chunks of bark. Tam knocked Loren’s fourth arrow away with such force that it veered off from its original path and struck the dirt with an audible thud, burying itself inches deep in the soil. Tam’s spear reverberated with the impact.
Not enough. Not nearly enough.
There were still five to six seconds between the whistling of each arrow. Loren had slowed the speed of his draw after that initial shot, likely because his anger was simmering down and his innate caution was taking its place.
That could not be borne.
“Is that all you’ve got, princeling?” Tam goaded him on. “Is that all your skinny arms can manage?”
Loren growled and redoubled his attacks. His next arrow came faster, and the ones after that faster still, merging into indistinct streaks as they zoomed toward Tam. Tam ducked and dodged, whirling as unpredictably as she could, making herself harder to track.
Loren turned to keep his aim on Tam as she bounded around the edges of the clearing, ricocheting from tree to tree, keeping herself above Loren’s line of sight as much as possible. His arrows lodged themselves into the trees Tam was using for leverage with a relentless thock thock thock, getting swifter and swifter, the seconds between each draw shrinking as Loren’s movements became more fluid and habitual.
It was all Tam had ever wanted from a spar. It was perfect.
All that bounding around was tiring Tam. Her lungs burned and her hamstrings ached, and each lunge was tougher than the last. Soon she would have to sacrifice the advantage her leaps gave her to simply maintain her stamina, even if it meant grounding herself and making herself more vulnerable to Loren. She was using more muscles than Loren was, and was using them harder and meaner than he was. She couldn’t outlast him.
But, by Astar, she could try.
Tam rolled as she hit the grass, balling herself up to shrink her size as a target. As she came back up, she ripped the grass up in handfuls, with clumps of soil clinging to its roots, and flung it at Loren’s face.
Loren cursed. If he wasn’t so preoccupied with getting dirt out of his eyes, he’d probably be blaming Tam for being a cheat. But this wasn’t cheating. This was fighting. Earnest fighting, merciless and pitiless and so, so good.
Loren’s distraction gave Tam ample opportunity to wage her own attack. She flew across the clearing, her heels kicking up dust, her spear aimed right at Loren’s heart. Loren saw her coming and cursed again, fumbling to get his arrow slotted in time, but Tam had already reached him. Only reversing her spear at the last moment spared Loren from being spitted on it like a wild boar. Its blunter end caught Loren in the ribs and Loren fell backward with an oof.
To his credit, Loren surged back onto his feet in a single smooth motion and resumed firing at Tam—just like that!—and Tam laughed in genuine joy as she fended off more of his arrows. She back-flipped away from Loren’s volley of shots and, when she landed, flowed into the steadiest posture of all—her legs braced far apart, her body closer to the earth and her arms akimbo, angling her spear across her torso to guard her most vital organs.
Now all Tam could do was hold the fort. All she could do was remain in this place and meet Loren head-on. Her limbs could no longer carry her from one tactically advantageous location to another. Tam would have to withstand his assaults from this disadvantaged position.
It was a waiting game. Who would tire first, Tam or Loren? Whose grip would slacken first? Well, obviously it wouldn’t be Loren, given that he hadn’t been leaping about like a particularly aggressive frog, but how long could Tam fend him off? That was the question.
Tam was positively itching for the answer.
Loren took in Tam’s new stance with that same foreknowledge, his eyes lit with a hot, hungry spark so removed from his former coldness that it told her Loren was enjoying this as much as she was.
He met Tam’s gaze and shot without once looking away from her. And he kept shooting, stepping closer and closer. Tam spun her spear in circles so rapidly that all that could be seen before her was a blur. It was a shield of sorts, a shield formed not of any particular material but only of perpetual motion. Loren’s arrows bounced off it.
Until, gradually, they didn’t.
Tam’s increasingly fatigued biceps could not maintain the rate of rotation required to successfully ward off Loren’s arrows, and one got through, grazing Tam’s thigh. Tam barely registered it; she was too busy ensuring the subsequent arrow didn’t get through. But the arrow after that did, and this time it ripped through the sleeve of her shirt and tore a gash open on her left shoulder.
Loren cried out, dropping his bow, gripping his own shoulder as if certain he’d been hit. But his palm came away bloodless, and Tam, who had stopped spinning her spear because there was no point in parrying arrows that weren’t coming anymore, said, “It’s me. Loren, relax. It’s me, not you.”
Loren did the opposite of relax. He raced toward Tam and fell to his knees, his face stricken with horror, and it was only then that Tam noticed she was on her knees, too, that her legs had buckled in exhaustion and she had simply collapsed. Blood welled slowly and searingly out of her shoulder like acid, and sweat dripped from her forehead. Air sawed in and out of her throat like a blade of flame.
She felt glorious.
“How—” Loren reached for Tam’s shoulder but stopped before touching it. He was panting, frantic. “Why—why do you feel—like that?”
Tam smiled, aware that she must look half-mad. “Amazing, you mean?”
“You’re—you’re wounded, and yet you’re—”
“Loren. Breathe.” Tam sucked in some much-needed oxygen of her own. “I’m fine.”
“You’re bleeding!”
“Eh, not a lot. I could patch it up with a bandage. It’s barely a scratch.”
“Barely a—” Loren wiped the perspiration from his own brow. “But it hurts. You hurt. I need to heal you.”
“No, what you need to do is to let all this sink in.”
<
br /> “What, the fact that you talked me into shooting arrows at you?”
“No, the fact that you liked it. You liked sparring with me. Feel it. Let yourself feel it.” Tam reached out and grabbed Loren’s collar. “Stop lying to yourself, man. You lie to yourself about who you have to be, how you have to behave, and what is and is not acceptable for you to do in the eyes of your public. But now? Right now? Just be here. Feel the blood pounding in your veins. Feel the sweat cooling on your skin. Feel the animal that you are, primitive and vital. Have you ever felt more alive?”
“I….” Loren trailed off, his eyes wide. “I’ve… I’ve never done anything like this before.”
“What, you’ve never sparred? Can’t be.”
Loren shook his head. “Not… not like this. What I did wasn’t sparring so much as it was stationary target practice. If I did request a live target or volunteer to be one, my rank as prince discouraged others from taking me up on it, were I to be defeated and take offense, or were I to be injured and my father take offense. This is the first time I haven’t held back and my opponent hasn’t held back either. This is the first time I’ve….” Loren peered at his trembling hands. “Why am I shaking?”
Tam laughed again. She hadn’t laughed this much in a long time. She released Loren’s collar and rapped her knuckles against Loren’s chest, against his palpably pounding heart. “Feel that? The ferocity of your own life force? How you’re blazing with it?”
“Y-yes.” Loren’s skin was flushed, his eyes bright with wonder. “I do.”
“Then you’re no longer the prissy, priggish twit you were when we met, when you were disguising yourself with all those weird platitudes about hearts and homes and whatnot. Now you’re being yourself. That’s why you’re feeling so much. Because you’re letting yourself feel. You’re letting yourself be who you really are, instead of perpetually manufacturing a mask for people to see. You’re in the moment.” She clapped him on the back. “Enjoy it!”
“Enjoy….” Loren took Tam’s arm gingerly, elevating it to staunch the bleeding as he inspected Tam’s cut. “I still need to heal you.”