Too unsettled to rest now, and since I was already in the
barracks courtyard, I decided a light workout might do me
the most good. Burn off some nervous energy and maybe
loosen up my back muscles.

With the afternoon waning, most of the troops had cleared
the practice yard. Finding an open corner, I stood
quietly for a moment, centering myself and asking Danu’s
blessing for a clear mind and a bright blade.

Drawing my sword, I held it upright before me, hilt down
and point up. This moment always gave me a measure of
peace, the gathering pause before the flow of motion.
Danu’s spirit filled me and I moved into the first and
simplest of her sword forms.

Most children begin with her first form, Midnight. I’d
learned it younger than most, at five, clonking myself
regularly with the wooden practice blade. Salena had just
given birth to Andi, and Uorsin had been raging through
Ordnung in the hours since.

I’d heard his bellowing summons long before he burst into
the nursery. Though I remembered little else about that
time—other than feeling bereft, summarily dismissed from
my mother’s attention—that memory blazed bright in my
mind. My father, who already frightened me more than a
little, standing like a giant amid the miniature toys of
the nursery, his red-gold hair bright and blue eyes
blazing.

“Curtsy for the High King,” my nurse prompted, poking me
with a shaking hand, but I’d stood frozen, clutching the
doll my mother had just given me, so I would have a baby
to play with, too.

“What is this?” Uorsin yanked the doll out of my hands
and threw it across the room. With contempt, he took in
the little table and tiny teacups I’d set out for my doll
and me to share and dashed a big hand through them,
sending china shards flying. “You are my heir, Ursula,
whether I like it or not—and here you are fussing about
with dolls and fripperies.”

Even then I knew better than to let him see me cry.
Mother told me to save the tears, tuck them away, and
take them out later. They were for me, not for him. She
did the same.

“Come with me, Daughter. It’s high time you learned
something useful, if you’re to be a credit to the throne.
Do you know how many people died so you can sit here in
your pretty rooms playing with pretty things?”

“No, my King.”

“Thousands. Tens of thousands. Are you worthy of their
sacrifice? Of my sacrifice?”

“No?”

“No. But you can be. Your mother has a new daughter now
and has cast you aside. I’m all you have. Understand?”

I did understand. Then and in the days since. He took me
down to the practice yard and started teaching me how to
hold a blade. When I tripped over my dress, he ridiculed
me. When I fell, he made me get up on my own. My dolls
and dresses were packed away, replaced with practice
daggers and wooden swords, pants and shirts better suited
for drilling.

While Uorsin continued to oversee my progress, another
instructor took over my daily training. A priestess of
Danu, Kaedrin taught me the twelve sword forms, starting
with the Midnight form. My father’s brute-force
techniques would never serve me well, she said. Kaedrin
showed me how to use the strength of my lower body, the
speed and flexibility of my lighter physique.

The twelfth form—the most complicated and demanding—
finishes at Noon pose, one that took me two full years to
master. It’s one of Danu’s tests that she demands the
most strenuous postures and intricate maneuvers of the
blade after you’ve already executed eleven other forms
and your muscles are weeping from exhaustion.

I held Noon pose, up on the toes of one foot, the other
leg poised in front of me to protect and deflect with a
snap kick, my sword high above and behind, ready to slice
into Snake Strike, my other hand palm out, steady. Danu’s
salute.

My back sang with the strain, but I refused to drop
before the count of twelve, as Kaedrin would have
expected of me. As I lowered body and blade, my gaze
snagged on the intent stare of the Dasnarian captain. He
showed no sign of overt aggression, but I moved my sword
and self into a defensive posture, ready. A slight smile
twitched at his grim mouth. He raised his short blade—a
wide, bevel-edged hunting knife—and held the flat against
his forehead.

Then he strode away, leaving me wondering. Challenge or
salute—or both?