Kim had been very cold to him when he’d arrived at the Swan. She was still angry about yielding her authority to Charlie.
“Where’s What’s-Her-Face?” she’d sneered when he had come in the door for his training session with Saskia.
“You mean Charlie?”
“Who else would I mean? Or do you have another girl I don’t know about?” At that, Kim had spun away and left him speechless.
As for Charlie, she had declined when he’d asked her to come along to the Swan.
“I have a few errands to run before the Gathering. Besides, I don’t think Kim is all that thrilled with me at the moment. I’ll see you later tonight, non?”
Her absence annoyed him, which was strange because he’d found her incredibly annoying when she’d first shown up. Now he was mildly shocked to find that her presence was reassuring. She always had good advice. She was right about one thing, though: Kim was not fond of her at all.
Finbar was hard at work polishing the wooden tables. He pretended not to watch, but Brendan could see the old man stealing glimpses of him as he rubbed oil into the worn, gleaming surfaces.
Finbar had become a fixture at the Swan ever since he’d led Brendan to the amulet he’d stolen from Brendan as an infant. Though the old Exile had caused him a lot of trouble, Brendan had spoken up for him, taking his part in a bid to be reinstated in the Faerie Fellowship. Brendan knew what being an outsider felt like, so he sympathized with the white-haired, haggard man with the haunted blue eyes.
Still, the way those eyes followed him whenever he came to the Swan disturbed him. He saw a hunger there, a plea for help. Brendan had done all he could to plead Finbar’s case to Ariel. He imagined what it would be like to be an Exile himself, always knowing that another world existed and never being able to see it. He felt a sharp sadness for the old man wiping the table so doggedly.
“Hey, Finbar,” Brendan said with a little wave. Finbar raised his sad blue eyes from the table he was polishing. “You okay today?”
“Right as rain, young Prince. Right as rain.” The answer didn’t match the emptiness in Finbar’s eyes. “You just keep yer mind on yerself. I’m just fine.”
Brendan smiled and looked around the room. The rest of the audience was made up of a few early-evening patrons. Monday was a slow day at the Swan. That was why Saskia had the time to spar with Brendan. Leonard, usually the doorman and bouncer, was keeping an eye on the bar for his love, Saskia. They made a formidable couple: she a Warp Warrior and he a shape-shifter. Brendan had never seen the big man transform into a lion, and he wasn’t sure he wanted to. Leonard grinned at Brendan, his golden teeth glittering against his dark skin. “Don’t let her scare you, Brendan. She ain’t such a hard one, deep down.” Saskia bared her teeth at her man in a feral grin and growled deep in her throat. Leonard’s booming laugh rolled out across the bar like thunder.
“Ready, Brendan?” Saskia asked.
“I guess… ” He barely got the words out before she blurred across the circle on the attack. Brendan dove out of the way, brushing against the invisible barrier of the fighting circle. The barrier flared with a purplish light, and his shoulder stung where he’d brushed against it.
The fighting circle itself was amazing, though Brendan was too busy getting his butt handed to him to really marvel at it. Prior to their sparring match, as she had done before every session, Saskia had cleared the floor of furniture and drawn a circle on the seamless wooden floor with what appeared to be a piece of purple chalk. Satisfied with her work, she tucked the chalk in her trouser pocket. They were confined within the circle.
Saskia closed her eyes and took a deep breath, held it, and let it out. Brendan had seen many Faeries perform similar rituals to focus their minds before employing their powers. He envied her concentration. No matter how hard he tried, he could never seem to block out the world around him and see what he wanted with his mind’s eye. Saskia then clapped loudly once at each of the four points of the compass, north, south, east, and west. Suddenly, a shimmering cylinder of energy sprang up from the chalk line, reaching from the floor to the ceiling high above. The energy shimmered and then faded.
“That’s so cool,” Brendan had said the first time she’d created a fighting circle. He’d reached out to touch where he thought the barrier was. His fingertips brushed a flexible, elastic, yet impenetrable surface. Instantly, his hand sang with pain and went numb. A flare of purple light accompanied the agony. “Ow! MAN!”
“The circle is a holy shape, sacred to our people,” Saskia had explained. “It is simple. It is perfect. It is eternal. Within this circle, I will attempt to teach you how to defend yourself. The circle will contain you. You may not leave until I permit you to leave.”
“What if I have to go to the bathroom?” Brendan had quipped on that afternoon, weeks ago.
Saskia didn’t laugh. She flexed her fingers, stretched her neck until it cracked loudly, and then began to mercilessly thrash Brendan. When she’d finally let him out of the circle by scratching away a section of the chalk, Brendan was barely able to limp to the Faerie Terminal. He’d spent two hours in a hot bath at home before going to bed.
Now he was about to take a beating again. He watched Saskia crack her knuckles and his heart sank. He’d never so much as laid a finger on her in ten sessions. She was just too fast and far too experienced for him.
“The circle is in place,” Saskia said. “The pain is a distraction. Avoid the barrier. Defend yourself!” The sparring match commenced.
Another hour of punishment followed. Though he was aching from a hundred carefully aimed blows, Brendan believed he was beginning to follow Saskia’s movements a little better. She came at him from every angle. Her movements were so fast that her limbs were mere blurs.
Brendan was having less trouble staying in warp mode. He found he could connect with something inside him, like a current of energy running under the surface of his skin. He realized that apart from being a pain in the butt last night and keeping him from getting a good night’s sleep, Charlie had perhaps helped him see what he had to do.
In the meantime, Brendan had been scorched, whacked, slapped, and tripped more times than he could count while never landing a solid blow on his opponent. Saskia looked as fresh as ever. Her skin was flushed and slick with sweat, but otherwise she seemed unaffected. Now she was stalking him around the circle in an effort to lay yet another beating on him.
Brendan was exhausted. He was bruised. He was more than a little sick of being a punching bag. He tried to imagine himself moving faster, warping more efficiently, but he couldn’t concentrate. He was in too much pain. He couldn’t turn off the part of his mind that shrilled in his ears that he wasn’t able to beat Saskia and shouldn’t try.
Then he remembered what Charlie had said as they sat on the dome under the stars, watching the Dawn Flyers. Sing a song inside your head. Brendan thought about that. It sounds crazy. I’ll probably just get my head knocked off, but at least there’ll be musical accompaniment.
He decided to sing a song that his father loved. One of Brendan’s earliest memories was of his dad rocking him to sleep and singing the song as he drifted off. It was a Scottish folk song, and probably the only song he knew all the words to. As Saskia crouched for a new attack, Brendan struggled to remember the lyrics.
In his head he sang,
Oh, you’ll take the high road and I’ll take the low road
And I’ll be in Scotland before you
But me and my true love will never meet again
On the bonnie, bonnie banks of Loch Lomond.
He’d been thinking so hard about the words that he almost failed to see Saskia’s attack coming. He ducked under a roundhouse kick and stepped aside. Even so, she managed to clip him on the shoulder. His arm went numb to the fingers. Still, he’d dodged the worst of the blow. Saskia’s yellow eyes registered the slightest surprise before narrowing.