Kellin pointed to a bench along the far wall. By the time they reached it, Taymar’s thread of control was stretched to the breaking point. She clenched her fists and sucked in long, slow breaths, trying not to be too obvious as Kellin sat and stretched out his leg so the still-fuming medic could examine his knee. She poked and twisted it with no apparent regard for his pain, and even though he remained motionless, everyone present knew it had to be excruciating. Taymar could have appreciated the woman more if she hadn’t been a medic.
The man with the bag standing over her shoulder was apparently tired of waiting for her to acknowledge his presence, and pulled a palm-size disc from his bag. It wasn’t so different from the hovering ball they had sent to scan her on Daryus. A triangle of blue light shot from its center as he raised his palm toward her face. She slapped his hand away before the light could touch her. “I’m not hurt.”
“Yes, you are,” the man said, trying again. “This won’t hurt. It will just tell me if anything’s broken.”
“I’m fine,” Taymar said, scooting back. She didn’t have far to go. The wall was behind her, and Kellin was between her and the door. “It’s just a little blood.”
“Listen,” the medic said, clearly irritated. “You have been kicked, or punched, or who knows what in your head. That can be very serious. Just let me do my job, and if nothing’s broken or critical, you can go.”
Taymar glanced around the room. Several people had paused their workout to see how this was going to play out. She decided she didn’t want to be their entertainment anymore and turned back to the medic. “Fine. Scan me. But don’t touch me.”
He threw up his hands in a gesture of frustration, but clicked the scanner on without comment. The light flashed from red to blue, and once again he raised his palm to scan her head. Cool blue light bathed her face, and she had to close her eyes as he crossed his hand in front of her. Something beeped, and when she opened her eyes he was staring at the screen of a small reader board in his other palm. “I need to wash off the blood and use a nanoscreen on your eye.”
“If you touch me, I will break your arm,” Taymar said, unclenching her fist in case she had to act on her words.
The medic slid his reader in his pouch and faced her. The smell of his anger filled the space between them. Taymar shifted to prepare for his attack, but Kellin placed his massive hand on the man’s chest, effectively ending the potential confrontation.
“Ensign,” Kellin said after the man had taken several steps back. “Is it serious?”
The man glared at Taymar one last time and then turned to Kellin. “It will be. She needs to be treated. But nothing is broken.”
Kellin nodded. “Then you are through here.”
He started to argue, but with a look from Kellin he clenched his jaw, snapped his bag closed, and strode from the room, radiating hostility.
“To answer that question about your own injury, yes,” the woman said, sliding her scanner back in the pouch. “You have extensive tissue damage and you need to go to the medical bay. Now, sir, I’m not going to fight with you about whether or not you’re going to go there, because I know you will. Like her eye, in a few hours, your knees will be unbendable due to the swelling. Since you can’t work with knees that won’t bend, you will either go to the medical bay or explain to Captain McCauffer why you weren’t wearing protective gear. That could get awkward, considering you are one of the people on this ship who’s supposed to enforce rules like those.” With her prognosis made, she stood to leave.
Kellin shot her an intimidating glare, but she was unimpressed. “You have made your point,” he announced. “Am I free to go?”
Slowly, the medic gathered the rest of her equipment, and after surveying his hairy gray body one more time purely for the sake of annoying him, she popped a coy affirmative and sauntered away.
Kellin turned to Taymar. “What you did was not smart.”
Taymar didn’t respond. She knew he was right, but he didn’t understand where she had come from and she didn’t owe him an excuse. Instead, she pulled the torn sleeve of her shirt back into place and looked out across the room. “Do you know how to sword fight?”
“Yes. Would you like to learn?”
“You’ll teach me?” she said, barely able to hide her excitement.
“I will teach you.” He smiled his odd half snarl. “Come with me.”
Kellin led her to a small room where a man sat behind a short counter. The instant he saw Kellin, the man climbed to his feet and smiled, giving Taymar’s blackening eye a curious glance. “Afternoon, Lieutenant Sacondore. Do you want your dathin?”
“No,” Kellin said. “Today I need two nisami swords.”
“Yes, sir,” said the young man just before disappearing into a room behind him.
“Why does everybody call you sir?” Taymar asked while they waited.
“Because I outrank them.”
That didn’t exactly help, but before she could ask again, the swords arrived and nothing else mattered.
Kellin held out one of the swords. She had never handled a sword before. They were forbidden to Arleles on Drani. To be fair, she had tried to make a few, but they came out as warped blobs. This one was perfect. The sword was slightly curved, with a long brown hilt made of the same material as the sheath. It was slightly longer than Taymar’s arm and, including the sheath, almost as thick.
She started to pull the blade out, but Kellin placed his hand on hers. “No,” he said. “All weapons must be properly stored when not in a sparring chamber. We do have to keep some of the rules.”
Taymar nodded and turned to find a room. They didn’t have to wait long. The occupants barely cleared the door before Taymar pushed past them. Sliding the sword from its casing, she turned the blade in the air so the light could dance off of its shiny surface and drank in the beauty of the weapon. When she looked up, Kellin was watching her, his approval obvious.
A little embarrassed, she resheathed the blade and went to put on the white suit she had seen the others wear.
“You won’t need that,” he said. “We will not spar today. There are things you must learn first.”
Taymar wasn’t even disappointed. She had never in her life touched a sword, and if they did nothing but wave it through the air, she was thrilled to do it. She tossed the suit aside and faced her teacher.
“First, you must learn that the blade and the sheath are one. As you learn to handle the blade, so must you learn to handle the sheath. The sword must never be pried or jerked from its cover. There is a specific way each sword enters and exits its sheath, and you must find it. Eventually, you will be able to resheath your sword without looking. Now, draw your blade and resheath it until you can feel the path it must take.” Kellin demonstrated with his own sword.
Oblivious to the world around her, Taymar did as instructed. The first few times, as the blade moved in and out of its brown casing, it jerked and dragged. But Taymar kept trying, until finally she discovered the trick. There was a point about halfway in the sheath where she had to compensate for the arc of the blade by twisting downward. Kellin nodded when Taymar repeatedly sheathed and unsheathed her blade in smooth, fluid motions.
Next, Kellin drew his sword, and with hairsplitting accuracy sliced it through the air, stopping so close to Taymar’s neck she could almost feel the tickle of its razor-sharp edge. He had struck so quickly that Taymar didn’t even have time to move. Whatever his intention had been, he only succeeded in furthering her addiction.
“It is not as easy as it looks,” he informed her casually. “And if you take aim at my neck, we will conclude this lesson.”
Taymar grinned and turned away to practice. Again and again, she swung the weapon. Every three or four swings, Kellin would slip in and correct her body position, or move her arms, but Taymar never balked—even when he stepped behind her and placed his arms over hers. His nearness didn’t matter. Only the sword mattered.
They worked on form and stance an
d finally moved to sets. Taymar mirrored Kellin as he walked through a set of blocks and swings. Attacks and counters. Her arms were beginning to shake from the unfamiliar weight of the sword and exhaustion was making her footing clumsy, but Kellin wasn’t faring much better. His knee was visibly swollen and he wouldn’t put weight on it. She wasn’t at all surprised when he grabbed the sheath from the floor and slid his sword back in its case. And she wasn’t entirely unhappy about it either, until she turned to grab her own sheath and saw Nevvis watching from the door.
He stood leaning against the glass, arms crossed casually and that infuriating grin stamped on his face. Ranealla was there as well, her black hair in a braid that framed her white face like the night caressing the first moon.
Nevvis shifted to not block the door and spoke to Kellin for Taymar’s benefit. “I don’t know if giving her a sharino was such a good idea, Lieutenant,” he said, looking at Taymar as he spoke. “I mean, think of the kind of damage she will be able to do with that.”
Taymar whipped the sword through the air the way Kellin had shown her. It wobbled a little, but she still managed to bring it to a full stop mid-swing. “Come on in, mighty ki, and find out what I can do,” she said, meeting his golden stare.
Still smiling, Nevvis looked over at Ranealla. “Whizzz!” he said. “And in only a matter of hours. Aren’t they just amazing.”
Ranealla shrugged. Taymar had no idea what they were talking about, but whatever it was, she wasn’t sure Ranealla approved. Of course, were it not for the klonide, she would have known what the woman was thinking.
Nevvis turned to Taymar. “Come on out, mighty tali, and let me see that big black thing on your face.”
Suddenly, Taymar remembered why Nevvis was there and her playfulness left her, but the depression didn’t take its place. Kellin had banished that. Instead, looking at Nevvis so casually poised against the door, her mind began to whirl.
He stood near the opening, one hand in his pocket, an easy shot. He wouldn’t be able to stop her from slicing him open. She wouldn’t get far, but with him out of the way maybe she had a chance. But why had he left himself so exposed? Especially considering the fact that she was holding a weapon Arleles were not even allowed to touch on Drani. Yet, there he stood, completely vulnerable—or was he?
Taymar stepped back and relaxed her grip on the hilt as she gave Nevvis a hostile stare. She saw not the indifferent man his body portrayed him to be, but instead a man who was testing her and was ready for whatever she had in mind.
The anxious expression on Ranealla’s face confirmed that Taymar had broadcast her thoughts, thanks to the klonide. She was visibly tense. Even Kellin, who had stopped just shy of the exit, seemed unsure of what she would do. So, resigned, Taymar picked up her sheath and smoothly inserted the sword.
“Thanks, it was great,” she told Kellin, handing it back to him and pulling her sleeve back onto her shoulder.
“Perhaps we can meet again tomorrow evening.”
Taymar nodded, and the two stepped out of the room. Kellin acknowledged Nevvis and Ranealla with a curt bob of his head and then limped away.
Hoping for the best, Taymar walked past Nevvis, mumbling that she was fine, and headed straight for the exit. Nevvis said nothing. He didn’t move, but his request came through clearly enough as a subtle pain crept over her body. She knew she couldn’t stop it, outrun it, or ignore it, so she paused a few steps from the door. Apparently that wasn’t good enough for Nevvis, because the pain continued to increase until she finally turned rigidly around. He simply motioned for her to come back to where she had started.
“That looks pretty bad,” Ranealla said, looking at Taymar’s swollen face.
“I’ve seen her with worse,” Nevvis said, pushing against the blackened eye.
Taymar jerked back more from the intrusion than the pain. “Leave it alone. It’s fine.”
Nevvis’s brow went up. “It’s fine, except that I can’t even touch it?”
Ranealla looked on in bewilderment. “You keep mentioning how you have seen her worse. I’m afraid to know in just what condition you have seen this girl. How much worse could it be?”
Nevvis snorted. “You’re right to be afraid. You should have seen her when I walked into the medical compound that first time. Believe me when I tell you, she has been much worse.” He pushed along Taymar’s cheekbone. “Why didn’t you let the medic take care of this? It would have never gotten this bad.”
Taymar shrugged and tried to pull away, but Nevvis grabbed the back of her head to stop her. “I’m fine,” she said again, shoving against his chest. “I just don’t want you poking at my face.”
“Stop,” Nevvis demanded. “I don’t think anything’s broken, but you need to see the doctor. Then, you need to change. You have a meeting with the captain.”
When Nevvis dropped his hand, Taymar backed away and pulled up her torn sleeve. “Why does he want to see me?”
Before Nevvis could answer, the wristband Ranealla wore chirped. She glanced at the message and turned to Nevvis. They didn’t speak, but whatever she sent him telepathically wasn’t good news. Nevvis frowned and looked back at Taymar as Ranealla rushed toward the exit. “Come on,” he said, placing a hand on the small of her back to guide her toward the door. “Let’s get you cleaned up. We need to talk.”
A pit formed in her gut at the thought of going to the medcom, but Nevvis wasn’t giving up and fighting him would just end in her looking like an idiot in front of the disturbing number of people who were watching them. So instead, she twisted away and reached the door well ahead of him.
They made the short journey to the medcom in silence, but even without her telepathy, she could tell something serious was happening. Nevvis’s frown remained fixed as he followed the dots along the wall; the few people they passed seemed a little too focused and hurried. It wasn’t until they reached the medcom door that Nevvis seemed to remember Taymar was there.
“Don’t beat up the doctor,” he said, swiping open the door.
“If that’s your expectation, we should leave now so you won’t be disappointed.”
Nevvis gave her a hard stare and pointed her through the door.
The pointy little doctor was busy typing a note into a reader board and didn’t both looking up as the door closed behind them. “You just missed Kellin,” he said, shoving the board into a slot on the wall. “That protective gear is there for a reason, you know.” When he finally turned around, he stared up at Taymar and drew in a long, dramatic breath. “Or maybe you don’t know. Ensign, get the blood washed off her face.” The doctor didn’t wait for a response. He just pointed to an available bed and walked into a small adjoining room.
Nevvis started toward the bed, but stopped when Taymar didn’t move. “I’ll stand,” she said, wiping at her nose. Dried blood flaked off onto the back of her hand. She had forgotten about the bloody nose. After wiping her hand on her pants, she tried to shove her shaking hands into her pocket. When she remembered she didn’t have any, she opted to pull the sleeve up onto her shoulder instead.
“There isn’t a standing station, Tay. Just come sit on this bench. We need to go, so don’t make this take longer than it has to.”
“Well then, let’s go,” she said, about to turn around when the doctor stepped back into the room, carrying a palm-size rolled up rubber mat and a scanner.
“Taymar,” Nevvis said, taking a step toward her. His tone held his typical warning, but also an urgency that she didn’t understand.
“Oh, don’t go dark,” she said, referring to the spots he didn’t have. “I’m going.”
She barely got herself seated on the bed before the one called Ensign started dabbing at her nose. After jerking away from his painful probing twice, she grabbed the small rag from him and did it herself.
“You will need to lie down,” the doctor said, pulling over a small tray on which to set his weird mat.
“Why?”
He looked up. His eyebrow
s tipped almost straight up as he scowled at her, and she would have laughed had the rest of the situation not been so serious. “Because I can’t reach you, for one, and because I need to use gravity to help hold this on your face. Does everything always have to be this difficult with you?”
Nevvis answered at the same time she did. “Yes!” He added, “Just lie down, Tay.”
She scooted her legs around and lay back on the table. The cold surface told her just how many tears she really did have in her shirt. Ensign circled over to the other side of the table to work on her nose again, but she kept her focus on the doctor, which wasn’t easy with her left eye swollen shut. He was peeling a thin see-through layer of who knew what off of the square mat. “What is that?” she asked.
“It’s a nano-sheet. Once this is on your skin, the microscopic probes will go in and dissolve the blood pooling under your skin and seal up any still opened capillaries. Then they will trick your body into absorbing the fluids it sent to protect your tissue. That will reduce the swelling and get rid of most of the bruising. It won’t hurt,” he said, holding up the nearly invisible layer of film. “I just need to lay this against your skin.”
Something pushed against her sore nose from the other side of the table, and Taymar reached over and snatched Ensign’s wrist before he could jerk away.
“Hey!” Nevvis yelled. “Let him go, now!”
Taymar glared at the pale-skinned man. “Touch me again, and I will break your arm.”
“Now, Tay!”
She released his arm and turned back to the doctor.
“Normally I would tell you to close your eye for this, but since it’s swollen closed, this shouldn’t be a problem,” the doctor explained as he leaned forward to drape the sheet over her black eye. “This is delicate, so don’t try yanking it off. Don’t touch it at all.”
The sheet felt cool against her skin as the doctor pushed and pulled it into position, his little fingers much gentler than Ensign’s.
Shield of Drani (World of Drani Book 1) Page 28