Read Online Without a Front by Fletcher DeLancey - Free Book Online Page A

ahead, grinning like a pre-Rite child at the sensation.
    It was a magical time. She walked and hiked and climbed and sometimes just sat, watching the waves on the beach or listening to the wind in the canyons. Alone and undisturbed, she gave herself permission to remember Ekatya and work through her heartache. It was time to let this one go. And somehow, what had been impossible in Blacksun was happening naturally here. She didn’t know whether it was the beauty of her surroundings, the constant physical activity, the privacy, or the fact that she no longer had that desperate need to get away, but the clouds were lifting out of her head. She felt as if she were waking up.
    After five days of blissful privacy, Tal decided she was ready for company again. Micah’s expression when he found her on his cabin porch, sword grip in hand, was worth the walk over.
    â€œYou want to spar?” he asked in disbelief. “I thought you’d forgotten how by now.”
    â€œYou hoped I’d forgotten, you mean.” Her high spirits were manifesting themselves in a cockiness that she couldn’t rein in. “Are you coming out, or do I go to the Guard cabin to find someone younger?”
    He narrowed his eyes. “You’d be wise to remember that age has advantages. I know every trick in the teachings.”
    â€œNot every trick. Don’t forget that you weren’t my only instructor.” She thumbed the control and smiled at the familiar shinng as the blade instantly expanded from the grip, the individual sections merging into a solid whole. Making a show of inspecting her blade, she angled it so that it reflected the bright morning sunlight into Micah’s eyes.
    â€œOh, my apologies,” she said sweetly when he winced and brought his hand up. “I assumed you’d know that old trick.”
    He growled at her and vanished into his cabin while she laughed quietly to herself. A moment later he reappeared, grip in hand.
    â€œLet’s see if you can back up that attitude with actual skill.”
    She gave him a wide grin. “It will be my pleasure.”
    They faced off in the sandy clearing just below his porch. It had been more than a moon since Tal had last sparred, but the feeling of excitement was always the same. As the child of both a scholar and a warrior, she had the choice to enter either caste, but in moments like these, balanced on the balls of her feet and facing the blade of an opponent, she knew she would never have survived as a scholar. She loved physical activity and the thrill of competition far too much to choose a caste where such activity was not a daily requirement. As it was, the demands of her title already took her too far from the level of action she preferred. Sometimes it was nice not to think or feel, and when she was fighting, she tapped into a part of her mind that was too narrowly focused for such distractions. When she was deep enough into it, even her empathic senses were dulled. In physical activity—and especially in fighting—she found a mental clarity that was unattainable in any other part of her life.
    Micah moved in first, testing her defenses in a flurry of thrusts and slashes that soon drove all thoughts from her head save the most basic: defend, attack, and win. There was no Lancer here and no Colonel of the Guard, only two fighters and two swords. A lifetime of training enabled her to dissociate mind from body, letting her muscles react instinctively while her mind worked several steps ahead, strategizing and seeking to create an opening that she could use against her opponent.
    In the end, she didn’t need to create it. Micah gave it to her with a lapse of judgment that she gleefully exploited, using the hard end of her grip to strike his wrist at a pressure point guaranteed to numb his fingers. His sword dropped to the ground, and she held the edge of hers at his throat.
    They stared at each other, chests heaving from the