The pine—and-sandalwood-scented changing room shifted his mood, as it was meant to, and focussed his attention on his body. Hobart stripped off his business clothes and dropped them into the hamper. His exercise clothes hung on racks . . . today, for his fencing lesson, he chose a skinsuit and the leather armor. His coach didn’t approve of leather, but he was in no mood to pamper his coach.
He glanced at himself in the mirror with satisfaction. Barrel chest, flat belly, well-muscled legs, erect posture, firm mouth. Not a slack, flabby fiber in him, mind or body. A man fit to lead.
In the exercise room itself, he warmed up with the standard sets, then stretched. As he was twisting himself into a pretzel, trying not to look at himself—he hated these stretches, which were at best undignified—the door opened and the Swordmaster came in. His own coach would not have dared; Hobart had made it clear that he needed no supervision in warm-up. But the Swordmasters were an old, proud breed, and he put up with their arrogance for the sake of their skill. Bunny had never taken up fencing, and had resolutely refused to have a Swordmaster at his estate even when most Families did. Well, and who had just died?
“Lord Conselline,” the Swordmaster said. “Your form needs improvement.”
“Instruct me,” Hobart said, proud of conquering a flash of anger.
The Swordmaster bent and twisted his own body into the stretch, and held it. “You are not keeping the knee straight,” he said, from under his arm. “And you are bending the spine too much in the thoracic span, and not enough in the lumbar.” He unwound, not red in the face or breathless. “Try again.”
Hobart twisted and tangled himself into the required knot. He knew what it was for, but he disliked it and knew he had been skimping on it for months. The Swordmaster’s hands steadied him, and then pushed and pulled . . . Hobart felt a pop in his spine, and the sudden ease of a cramp he had not realized he had.
“Like that,” the Swordmaster said. “You really should let Orris spot you in this for several months.”
“I’ll consider it,” Hobart said, untwisting carefully.
“Good. If you are ready . . .” The Swordmaster nodded toward the salle.
“Is it true,” Hobart asked, as they passed through the archway, “that all Swordmasters must have killed with the blade?”
“It is a tradition,” the Swordmaster said.
Hobart wanted to know what it felt like but could think of no polite way to ask. And which blade? The Swordmasters taught the use of all blades, had mastered all styles.
Orris held out practice masks, transparent reinforced ceram with touch-signalling circuitry embedded, and the warm-up blades. Hobart glanced at Orris, wondering what he’d told Master Iagin; he suspected Orris of reporting on more than his fencing skill. He did, after all, have to take the occasional call during a lesson, and Orris might have overheard scraps of conversation. But nothing important, he thought. Nothing that would interest a Swordmaster anyway.
Masked and gloved, with blade in hand, he faced Master Iagin on the strip. The salute—old-fashioned, formal, an utter waste of time, and yet it set the emotional tone for what followed. The initial touches . . . boring, when all Hobart wanted was to get this session out of the way so he could return to his plotting.
Master Iagin’s tip smacked into his faceshield, which flared red. For an instant he could not speak for anger, and then he grunted. “Touch.”
“Your mind wandered, Lord Conselline,” Master Iagin said. Behind the arc of gleaming protection, his expression was unreadable—quiet, a little stern, but neither anger nor apprehension.
“My apologies,” Hobart said. This was, after all, one of the reasons he had stayed with fencing, the need to concentrate utterly on what he was doing. But Orris usually gave him a few minutes to settle in. The man had never struck him so early in a session. Still . . . the Swordmaster was who he was, and probably thought fencing was the most important thing in the universe. In his, it may have been. Hobart collected these scattered thoughts, locked them away, and focussed on Master Iagin’s blade.
Just in time, for it flicked toward him again, and his parry was only just enough. He missed the riposte, but by the next parry was able to riposte . . . only to meet Master Iagin’s parry and a riposte so powerful it blew through his own and punched him lightly in the chest.
“Touch,” he said, this time more cheerfully. He was not expected to defeat a Swordmaster, only to show that he had been working.
He had indeed, and his next attack actually achieved a touch. His spirits soared. He had never made a touch on the Swordmaster from seven before. All that work with weights must have done it. Twenty touches—sixteen to the Swordmaster and four to him—then a break to stretch out again before taking up the heavier blades.
“Your right forearm is definitely stronger, Lord Conselline,” the Swordmaster said.
“Orris has me doing weight work.”
“Good. But I notice that your left arm is still substantially weaker—there should be no more than five percent difference in strength, unless someone has suffered an injury. Have you?”
Hobart scowled. “It’s stronger than last year.”
“Indeed it is. But the imbalance affects more than your off-hand fencing, milord. It also affects the set of your spine and your gait. You need to balance them, just as you balance work and play.”
Hobart’s scowl deepened; he could feel the tension in his neck. “I have no time for play, Swordmaster. Surely you have heard of the terrible crisis that faces us? Lord Thornbuckle was killed by terrorists—”
“Yes, of course,” Master Iagin said. “But that makes my point. You must be balanced to withstand such blows. It is the failure of balance in your society which makes it vulnerable—the undisciplined who stagger and fall when the blow falls.”
“I do not intend to stagger and fall,” Hobart said. He caught a glimpse of himself in the mirrors that lined the salle—flushed and truculent. Dangerous.
“Nor will you, milord, I’m sure. Your work here—the discipline needed to achieve the level you’ve achieved—sustains you, along with your native talents. But as each movement balances contraction of one muscle group with extension of another, so the steadfast must balance strain and relaxation.”
“I find relaxation in this,” Hobart said with a wave to include the entire exercise suite.
“That is good,” Master Iagin said. “You have a warrior’s heart, which finds ease in growing stronger.”
Praise, of a sort. He would take it. A warrior’s heart he knew he had, and he could feel himself growing stronger.
When the lesson ended, Hobart invited Master Iagin to dinner at the family table, but the Swordmaster declined. “With your permission, milord, I will walk in your gardens; I must take ship tomorrow, and I am not often able to stretch my legs in such beauty.”
“Of course.” He still did not understand Master Iagin’s fascination with the garden, but he anticipated that request. Discreet surveillance had revealed that the man did not tumble a maid behind the hedges or use any sort of communications device to contact a confederate. He always did what he asked permission to do—strolled along the pebbled garden paths, stopping now and then to sniff a flower. He pretended to fence with the topiary knight, and if one of the gardener’s cats appeared, he would pick it up and stroke it. At the far end of the garden, he always paused to watch the black-finned fish in the lily pond. Not what Hobart had expected of a Swordmaster, but they were known to have strange habits. Most of them, for some reason or other, liked gardens.
At dinner, Delphine asked if the Swordmaster were still there. Hobart gave her a look that shut her up instantly, but then he answered her. “He’s here, but he’s leaving tomorrow. Why?”