Sample Chapter from "The Black Directive": Teach Me

So, I've always had a problem with most of the books that I've read.

Fantasy being fantasy, the stereotypical character archetype falls inside the lines of "Hagor, the barbarian! Ultimate bad ass, and destroyer of all things evil!"

He may be able to wipe out an entire army with a sweep of his hammer, but how did Hagor become a bad ass? What did he do? How much did he practice? Who taught him the trade?

The following sample is a chapter that shows my main character, Maqui Tomisson, when she is about seventeen years old, learning the skills that will allow her to go off and hunt a whole bunch of wicked shit as she gets older...

Teach Me: Training With Shade

“Yes, Maqui!” Jed exclaimed in excitement as I finished the form. “That, it was fantastic, yes?”

He had us in the courtyard, and for the last few days had been drilling me on the intricacies of my new Shade.

“When you strike on the back swing,” he said as he stood before me, his eyes bright with excitement as he held a phantom spear in his hands, “you want to back step with your rear leg before the left blade thrust, yes?’

He pantomimed the movement, spinning gracefully before me with his invisible spear. From the beginning, Jed has trained me to fight in straight lines, using angles, but always to move forward. Now, though, he has me whipping Shade back and forth, almost like a quarter staff, and the spear moves like I was born with him in my hands.

“Again!” Jed barked, and at his strident cue I drilled the form.

-Right blade strike to the outside of the calf, followed with the left blade to the inside of the thigh. Deep swipe from the right at head level to take the eyes out. Back step with the rear leg, spin, and drive the left blade into the solar plexus for the finish-

Smooth and fast.

“Good, Maqui; good!” he said enthusiastically, clapping his palms together.

“Everything is one move, yes? Not strike, strike, strike,” he said, driving the edge of one hand into the palm of the other to illustrate his point. “One move, one flow, like water, yes? Now, again!”

I followed the command, Shade’s dual spearheads slicing through the air, just as smooth as before.

“Your technique,” Jed said as I finished the form, the spear head still hanging level in the air, “it is fantastic, yes? Woman, they are not stronger than men, so they must be better!”

Suddenly he paused and gave a gruff cough, fist to mouth, realizing that he had been giving me too much praise. He waved a stern finger at me in an effort to recover. “It could still be better, though, yes?”

“Tomis!” he bellowed jovially without pause, turning away from me, “Come! You and Maqui will train freeform!”

Quiet in the shadows of the evening sun, Maker rose from where he sat on the barrel, tapping out his pipe on the heel of his boot as he did so. The dottle fell to the earth and was quickly crushed beneath the heavy heel of his first step. Once again, the fact that he somehow manages to train in his heavy work boots is a testament to how strong he is.

For some unknown reason, I found myself filled with nerves. Maker and I have sparred countless times over the years. I’ve beaten him a handful of times, but normally he would manage to get the best of me due to his size and power. And don’t let anyone ever tell you differently; size matters. If they do, and you believe it, you’re both just foolish.

On the handful of occasions that I had managed to beat him it was because the fight had dragged on longer than usual and he had begun to tire. People don’t seem to realize this, but a lot of extra muscle means that you need a lot of extra air, and no matter how big your arms grow, your lungs stay the same size.

I took my place in the yard with Shade angled before me more like a quarter staff, this being the new first position that Jed had showed me. Maker took his time (at least it seemed to me), as he leaned Meegan against the fence post and grabbed his heavy leather sparring gear. He squeezed his bulk into it, his head popping through the center like a turtle coming out of its’ shell. Once the leather straps were tied, he grabbed Meegan and took his place before me.

I was waiting for the call to begin, and my nerves and anxiety were building the entire while. The seconds crept by with exaggerated slowness, and after a few moments I finally broke my eyes away from Maker’s to glance impatiently over at Jed. It was with no lack of irritation that I saw that he was taking his time to light one of the thin cigars that he called “cirretes.” Unhurried, he shook the hand that held the striker, letting the flame extinguish, as he waived a languid hand in our direction before giving the call to…

“Begin.”

Maker attacked immediately with the overhand right that he’s so fond of, his hand held at middle haft of Meegan’s shaft. The attack isn’t meant to cut or pierce; it’s a blunt, powerful attack with the sole purpose of connecting with one of the hammer heads just below the spears’ head. He’d used it frequently enough that I wasn’t caught by surprise.

With my old spear, the response had been a parry that allowed me to retreat to a safe distance. But now, with this Shade…

The hammer head was descending towards my left temple, but I didn’t back up as I normally would have. Instead, I leaned back and used my lead left blade to parry from the outside, catching Meegan just below the cross piece. I shifted my hips, my feet, and rather than retreat from the blow I threw my weight behind Maker’s strike, driving the point into the ground where I had been standing.

My left leg was forward, and similar to what Jed and I had just been drilling, I drug my right leg through the dirt, spin stepping around as I twisted. The head holding Meegan in the dirt pulled away as I whipped around, and Maker stumbled, off balance. I continued my spin, pulling Shade with me, and Maker and I stood only inches apart, back to back, with my spear tip poised just above his unguarded neck.

“Stop.” Jed barked, as if I wouldn’t have done so anyway. I took a step back, somewhat surprised. Two counts? I thought to myself. I’ve never beaten him that fast.

Like I said, the times that I’d managed to beat him came after a long exchange, once he’d begun to tire. Besting him that quickly could be nothing but a fluke. Maker looked just as surprised as I did as he straightened, bushy eyebrows furrowed, holding Meegan once more before him into first position.

“I slipped,” he muttered darkly, and if I didn’t know any better I would have said he sounded a bit petulant. Questioningly, I looked at Jed for instruction. Ass that he is, he continued to lean against the fence post, although he seemed to be watching with a speculative eye as he exhaled the fog of his cirrete. “Once again, yes?”

Watching each other in a wary fashion, Maker and I squared up once more, and it seemed like he was just as surprised as I was. Can’t be, I told myself. Just my imagination. The cirrete held between his fingers, Jed leaned forward, watching closely.

“Begin.”

There was no immediate attack, this time. We circled each other in the dust of the courtyard, feinting our strikes, wary in a way that neither of us had ever been before. I was still learning how to use Shade, and Maker was just realizing that he had to learn how to guard against my drastically different style of fighting.

He threw a short, mid-level thrust. I parried, responding with a light, eye level slash. Maker drew Meegan’s haft up, smoothly blocking my strike as I countered with a two count combination aimed at his head and leg. Maker retracted, pulling Meegan across his body in a cross guard as he blocked them both. I was starting to hope that he would tire soon, because even his blocks caused my arms to ring.

With no warning, Maker reached out, using his suddenly free hand to slap my lead blade to the side. He’d never done anything like this before, and I was slightly off balance as he charged me with a shoulder rush. Once again, my normal response would have been to retreat, but this time there simply wasn’t enough space or opportunity to do so. I don’t know why I did what I did next, but it flowed like I had done it a thousand times.

I let the slap from Maker’s hand push my lead blade to the side as he barreled in, but rather than let myself stay off balance, I redirected the momentum to loop towards the ground. As he planted his lead foot I hooked the flat of the spearhead behind his heel. A quick heave and twist, and both of his feet left the ground as he stumbled. He landed flat on his back with a thump, grunting explosively as the air whooshed from his lungs.

“Stop,” Jed commanded as I stood above Maker, Shade’s point poised above his torso. The adrenaline had begun to kick in, and my chest had begun to heave despite the fact that I wasn’t tired. I backed away, panting lightly, as Maker worked his way back to his feet. He was grumbling something that I couldn’t hear, and made a great show of dusting himself off to hide that he was breathing heavily.

Jed had left the fence, standing straight up as the cirrete continued to waft an acrid smoke up from between his fingers. The speculation in his eyes had sharpened, and there was now something predatory in the way that he was watching us. He was silent for a moment, and then slowly, deliberately, said, “And once more, yes?”

Disconcerted, my thoughts were flying through my mind. Normally I couldn’t beat Maker twice in a fortnight, but now I had bested him twice in a single session. As he took his place in across from me, a sudden jarring thought occurred to me. Could he be letting me win? Trying to build my confidence?

Suddenly I was angry, almost violently so. I didn’t ask for this, I thought to myself, my silent voice dripping acid drops of bitter resentment. I do it because you wanted me to. I’ve worked just as hard, been just as dedicated as you.

It had never really bothered me if I won or lost in our sessions, but I’d be damned if I didn’t earn every victory and bruise. Maker wanted to play with me? That’s fine; I’d bring the fight to him.

I set myself facing him, and I could feel my face forming into hard lines as I waited for Jed’s call. Watching closely, Jed took a long drag from his cirrete, and as he exhaled flicked the butt absently off to the side. “Begin.”

Without a warning, without a whisper, I felt it happen, smooth and painless. My vision sharpened, and my hair felt like it had been doused in flame as the darkness rolled over me. A dim surprise flashed somewhere in the back of my mind but I ignored it. I stayed focused on Maker, and with my vision suddenly so acute I could see every crease and line on his aging face. As it had the other day, time seemed to slow to a drag, keeping pace with the heavy thud of my heartbeat.

Thump, my heart pounded against the inside of my ribs.

Go, I silently told myself.

Shade blurred forward in a whirling figure eight pattern, hammering at Maker with heavy overhand blows. Caught on his heels, his eyes widened as he fumbled with Meegan, slowly trying to pull her over his head to block my attack.

Too slow, I thought coldly. Just as his arms had begun to move to the defensive position I reversed direction, using the same pattern, but coming up at his mid-section, beneath his guard. My first strike fell short, not quite reaching him, but then, scritch, scritch, scritch, and Shade’s heads had dragged three long scratches through the toughened leather of his sparring gear, just above the navel. With the rear head I slashed hard and fast from the right side, and a tally mark appeared, bisecting all three.

Maker seemed to be moving through quicksand, and his body was only barely beginning to fall back from my onslaught. In the briefest of moments I assumed he was mocking me, and my anger flared. Holding Shade low in one hand, I dropped my hips closer to the ground, lowering my center of gravity, and shot in on one knee towards his legs. The thick of his left thigh was against my collar bone, but instead of grabbing the back of his heel with my free hand to drag him to the ground, I thrust the upper part of my arm up high into the apex where his legs connected. The explosive grunt I heard told me that my bicep had found its’ mark.

I tensed my body and exploded upright, lifting Maker (all two hundred and thirty pounds of him) three feet into the air before dumping him unceremoniously on his head in the gravel.

“Stop! Stop, Stop!” I held Shade angled at my hip for what would have been a killing blow as Jed’s frantic call pierced my ears. I wrenched my eyes towards where he stood only a few feet from the fence, and the panicked expression on his face caused me to draw up short. Out of the furthest corner of my eye I saw the butt of his cirrete, which he had flicked so long ago, finish its’ downward descent and bounce lightly in the dirt.

Thump.

Time seemed to slow back down, and I could almost physically feel it dragging across my skin as I came back to myself. In control of my senses once more, I was suddenly flooded with shame and bewilderment at what I had just done. Panicked, I threw Shade to the ground, rushing to check on Maker, to help him up.

Instead of taking my outstretched hands, Maker lifted up one of his meaty arms and grabbed me by the shoulder. Sitting up with a grunt, he used it to lever himself to his feet, and the full weight of his body almost caused my knees to buckle. He pulled me tight beneath the crook of his arm and leaned on me heavily.

Words can’t describe the level of shame that I felt in that moment. I hadn’t meant to hurt him; never him. My carelessness could have killed him. He leaned against me, wheezing, the sound rattling deep in his lungs. Oh, no, I broke his rib, I lamented to myself as tears began to prick at the corners of my eyes. I’m so sorry, it’ll never happen again, I prom-

His grip tightened about my shoulders, and the wheezing took on a different tone. It thickened, coming forward in great booming, gasping, breaths.

Maker was laughing.

Not just a chuckle, but a full blown belly laugh, the type that I’ve only seen from him a few times. As the first tear slipped over the lid of my eye to drip down my cheek I gave a half-hearted smile, utterly confused by what was happening but relieved to hear him laughing. Tucked beneath his arm as I was, I could only look up at him as he laughed himself out.

“I told you!” he bellowed, still grinning widely as he pointed a finger at Jed. “You didn’t believe me, but I told you that it could be done!”

If I’d been confused before, I was doubly so now, although for different reasons. What was he talking about? I glanced back and forth between Maker and Jed, but couldn’t garner an ounce of insight. Maker should be angry, but he’s jubilant. Jed had seemed panicked mere moments ago, but he now stood with his arms crossed, a dark scowl painted across his face.

“You weren’t letting me win?” I asked uncertainly as I looked up at Maker, and I wasn’t the least bit embarrassed that my voice pitched high at the end. His features contorted in surprised disbelief.

“Let you win?” he roared back, apparently not realizing that my ear was only a foot away from his mouth. “Gods, no! What kind of man would I be if I let you win anything? What would that teach you?”

I was stunned, and I’m sure that it showed on my face. If Maker hadn’t let me win, then that meant I had taken him three for three. The first could have been luck. The second I had had to work for (a little). The third…I didn’t really know what the third was.

 I had been having little moments like that the majority of my life, but this time had been different. Every other time that the darkness had come out it had overtaken me. When I would go black, I was swept away beneath (hurt, break, kill, scream) the rage. I never knew what happened; I just woke up to the aftermath of my actions.

This time, though, I had stayed aware. Angry, but aware, and it had almost felt like it had been (aiding, unleashing, blooming, unlocking) working with me. Every sense I had, every nerve, had felt triggered and unified. I was considering all of this as Maker continued to hold me to his side, still chuckling lightly. I looked up at him once more, and something about my expression must have struck him as funny because he burst out into another gale of laughter.

“You will stop this, now!” Jed’s voice rang across the courtyard as he stalked towards us. His face was as dark as Maker’s anvil, and to put it simply, he didn’t look happy. “You will take your places! First position, now!”

Maker’s laughter cut off abruptly, and we glanced at each other, both of us caught off guard. It had been a long time since Jed had been this formal with us, but there was no denying his “request.” We separated, Maker walking over to pick up Meegan as I gathered up Shade. We took our places, side by side, as Jed continued to glare at us furiously.

Our trainer stood before us, his eyes dripping heat, with the fingers of his hands steepled together in front of his mouth. He turned his eyes from us, glancing at the ground as he gathered his thoughts, and when he looked back his eyes were as calm as his words.

“This training that we do,” he said softly, but with a quiet intensity, “it is about control, yes?”

He walked over to Maker, who, despite the thrashing that I had dealt him, held Meegan before him in a firm hand. Giving a slight, tight lipped smile that never reached his eyes, Jed gently clasped the palms of both hands about Maker’s wrist. They stared at each other for a brief moment, and then Jed twitched. I don’t know what else to call it. With no show of effort whatsoever, Jed rolled his grip down towards his knees, and Maker was suddenly doing a cartwheel without the aid of his hands. He landed heavily, face first on the ground, his lead hand still holding tight to Meegan from where it remained gently held between Jed’s palms.

“It does not matter how strong you are, yes?” Jed asked to no one in particular as he released the larger man’s wrist. Leaning over, he grasped Maker by the elbow and helped him stand back up as the blacksmith spit dirt from his mouth. Ignoring the sudden assault, Maker looked astonished as Jed cordially dusted some of the dust from his shoulders. Giving the blacksmith a final gentle pat on the cheek, Jed turned to face me.

“And,” he said in a low voice, standing in front of me with his hands clasped behind his back, “it does not matter how fast you are.”

Faster than a snake strike, his arm lashed out in a blur. Before I could even begin to respond, I felt a sharp, stinging thud as he flicked the tip of a finger across the very point of my nose. I flinched at the impact, and fresh tears rose into my eyes.

Don’t judge me; it really stung.

I wiped the water from my eyes with a gritty finger, tentatively touching the numb tip of my nose as Jed moved back to stand before us.

“Hear me, now, both of you,” He said in a voice so soft each of us had to strain our ears to listen, his fingers tented before his lips once more.

“Strength. Speed. They are nothing if you cannot control them. A horse, it is both strong and fast, yes? You may go for a ride, but if you cannot control the animal, it will control you.” Pause. “It will break you.”

            He watched us both equally, but why did I feel like he was speaking to me?

“It is only once you have tamed the horse,” Jed continued solemnly, “broken it to your will, that you may use it. Once you have done this thing, you will be better than you were before, yes?”

            Jed looked away from us both, his eyes gazing out past the horizon at some distant thought that only he knew. Abruptly, he clapped his hands together with a sharp crack. “Enough for today,” he said in voice that more closely resembled what we had come to know. “I have things that I must consider.”

            He shot one more glance at me from the corner of his eye before turning to walk silently back to the house, leaving Maker and me alone. I peeked over at him from beneath my lashes, the shame from earlier coming back in a dull wave.

            “I’m sorry for, you know,” I began, my voice faltering, “earlier; hurting you.”

            Maker pursed his lips and spit, a thin stream of saliva spurting through his lips to spatter on the ground.

 “Save it, girl,” he said in his customary grumble. “The only things you hurt were my pride and my balls.” He reached down, unabashedly giving a tug at the breeches over his groin, and shaking a leg out at the same time.

He looked over at me with a hard frown, all traces of his earlier jubilance washed away as his brows furrowed. “You ain’t even said ‘thank you’ yet for the work I put into that spear.”

Hard as the words may have seemed, they were the thing that told me that he and I were okay. If he’d been polite, if he’d been silent, if his eyes had started to shine…I would have known that there was a true problem. But I was used to tough words from a tough man, and could see beyond them to what he was really trying to say to me. He started to walk away, and I fell into step beside him.

“You’re not mad at me?” I asked hesitantly, lifting my head as we walked back to the house side by side. Maker guffawed, a loud burst of laughter that sounded like splintering wood.

“’Course not,” he said bluntly, a slightly bemused expression on his face. “Why would I be mad at you? Hell, I’d be mad, at myself, if that thing hadn’t worked the way that I’d hoped it would.” He finally looked at me, and his expression was severe. “You have any idea how hard it was to find the right balance for those scrawny arms of yours?”

Maker knew that I was self-conscious about my arms, how bulky they were for a girl, and the jab was his way of telling me that everything was all right. Of a sudden, his face split in a fierce grin as he reached out and grabbed me by the scruff of the neck, pulling me close for just a moment before releasing me.

“Maq, you did me proud today. What you did…” he broke off, searching for the right words. Failing to find them, he recovered quickly. “Let’s just say that I’ve been waiting for you to do that for a long time,” he sighed. “You’re going to be strong, just like your mother.”

My steps floundered, and my feet came to a halt. Maker had never mentioned any knowledge of my mother. Had never mentioned her at all, in fact. I froze, looking at him in stunned surprise.

Did he know her? If so, how did he know her? Why had he never mentioned it? Had he known my father, too?

My steps had come to a halt, and Maker’s had done the same. His expression was dark, shadowed, and it was one of the few times in my life that I couldn’t get a read on him. He wasn’t looking at me, his gaze remaining firmly locked onto the porch door as he started to walk again. Something about his posture told me that he’d said something he hadn’t meant to. Maybe something he’d never meant to.

I found that I suddenly had a thousand questions hanging from the tip of my tongue. Just as I was about to voice them, however, Jed peeked from the inside of the doorway that stood open on the porch.

“Tomis!” he bellowed, “Hurry up, you great, hairy ass! Dinner, it is your turn this evening, yes? I crave nourishment; sustenance! Feed me, you great buffoon, and it had better not be peppered turkey with bacon again!”