Chapter 6 #3
William stilled. She was wicked with her staff and had held her own in a fight against a lone man who underestimated her, but to fight like a Highland warrior?
With a shield and sword as a Viking shieldmaiden?
He might tease her about it and be impressed by her skills, but that didn’t mean he liked it or necessarily wanted her to continue.
“Fight?” William asked as his brow furrowed. “While ye have uncanny skills for a lass, ye have no need to fight. As my wife, that duty now falls to me.”
“Aye, William. And I’ll gladly allow that. But as we agreed, unless I must protect ye, or when we canna be together, I must have skills that will aid me here. Ye may have noticed trouble has a way of finding me.”
William held her shoulders but pulled back slightly to look into her vibrant, dark green eyes. She wasn’t accepting no for an answer – he saw it on her face. “Trouble finds ye? Or ye find trouble?”
Her lips pursed in a rosebud moue of discontent, and he wanted to kiss those lips and drop this entire conversation.
“Does it matter who does the finding?” she asked as she dropped her gaze and bit her bottom lip.
Och, lass. The move was distracting! “My da always said I needed to know how to defend myself. But I’m from a time when people didn’t walk around with swords and spears.
My staff and kicks will only do so much.
William nodded slowly, hating to agree with her. “Your da was right. Ye should no’ need to defend yourself, but that does no’ mean ye’ll no’ find yourself in such a position. No’ all men are honorable, as we have seen.”
He shifted his gaze towards the tents and exhaled hard as he considered his next words. He wouldn’t be able to stop her from defending herself or him if the occasion arose.
Mayhap ‘twould be more prudent if she were better prepared. God knew his life would be destroyed if anything happened to her. Why not give her the upper hand to ensure that never happened? Mayhap have her continue training with her staff. But to learn sword fighting? That took years to master.
And I dinna want her fighting sword-carrying warriors anyhow …
“Stick to your fighting style,” William finally advised, turning his gaze back to her.
“’Tis second nature to ye, and ye are skilled with the pole.
Unless ye want to start training two hours a day, every day with the sword, ye should avoid using them.
Strength can be everything in a sword fight.
Steel is heavier than wood, and that means strength is also speed when it comes to attacking and blocking with a heavy blade.
Speed and skill can overtake strength alone, but as I said, ye would need to practice more than we have time for. Years.”
William pointed to the two boys fighting. The older, bigger brother had the advantage over his little brother, with the bigger brother stepping forward with every swing and shoving his smaller brother back with his might and longer reach.
Ailith studied them for a few moments, then flicked her mantle of wavy hair over her shoulder and faced him again.
“Fine,’ she replied. “No swords. Then what else should I do?”
“Stick to your pole,” William repeated himself as he brushed his knuckle over her tender jaw.
“Ye’ve proven that ye can use it well enough against a sword.
Lean into ye strengths, mo ruaidh. Remember these three words: distance, speed, and surprise.
You’re a lass, and that means every man will dismiss and underestimate ye as merely a lass.
Use that, your brain, the skills ye already have, and your pole to survive. ”
She jutted her chin out at him. Her insolence was as sexy as it was irritating.
“What’s the point of that game ye and Eoghan just played?” Ailith asked, peering at him as if it were a real question and not one she already knew the answer to.
His jaw worked. “’Tis to teach us to fight with other weapons, other than the sword. A warrior might not have a sword in his time of need, and ‘tis a benefit to know how to use other items as weapons.”
Ailith stared him down until he caught her meaning.
She might not have a pole in her time of need.
Especially as a lass, she wasn’t walking around with a fighting staff everywhere she went.
In the woods with the Morays, she had to fight with her bare hands until the fool dropped his sword, then she carried it with no knowledge of how to use it.
Evidently, if she was truly from a future time, they didn’t use swords enough for her to be familiar with the length of steel.
She'd been lucky so far, poles, banners, and branches were easy enough to find, but what if she couldn’t find one when she needed one most?
The idea of her fighting alone clenched his stomach.
The added prospect that she might have to fend off a man unarmed–‘twas enough to drive him to the brink of madness – mad enough to agree to her request.
Feck me, he thought.
“Aye,” he responded with a curt nod. “’Tis a fair point.”
“Thank ye,” Ailith said as she rose on her toes and kissed his tight lips again.
The kiss was not only for agreeing to help her, which she had been betting he wasn’t going to do, but also for being the kind of man who admitted when she was right.
A familiar rush coursed through her body at his acquiescence, one she knew from her Ju-Jitsu training. She could be back in her dojo, training again.
Only this time, she’d learn how to move around these freakin’ skirts.
William tipped his head as if evaluating her. “If it comes to a fight, the first thing ye’ll do is run. I'll no’ have my wife fighting if she could have run to safety.”
Och, he’d made that abundantly clear already. She nodded.
“Aye, William, I understand.”
“If running is no option, then stand your ground,” William continued. “Backing away can cause ye to trip on something you don’t see, like a rock or branch. Then ye’ll be dead for certain.”
Ailith already knew that – her sensei had taught her the importance of standing with her feet apart in a ready stance – but she just nodded her head in understanding, not wanting to interrupt William now that he had agreed to her request.
Her da hadn’t raised a fool, after all.
“Ye have a knife on ye?” William asked.
Other than a cutting knife for meals in the hall or in their chambers, she did not. Ailith shook her head.
His jaw shifted again. “If ye need to, ye can use anything around ye to fight,” William explained. “Ye saw what I did with the bucket, aye?”
“Aye,” Ailith answered.
“Throw dirt at your opponent’s eyes, pick up a rock, or swing a bucket,” William told her.. “Anything can be used as a weapon. Anything near your grasp. But let’s start with a knife since ‘tis small.”
He reached into his belt and drew his large Seox knife, then reached behind his back and pulled out another smaller knife – his smaller sgian-dubh – and handed it to her. Ailith palmed the antler handle.
“There are three main ways to hold the knife,” William explained, showing her with his own large Seox. “Blade up,” he said as he held the knife tight in his fist, finger and thumb wrapped around the handle.
Ailith copied his grip on her knife. Thankfully, the smaller knife fit well enough in her hand to mimic his movements.
“’Tis no’ a good method, unless ye're up close and jamming the knife in a man’s ribs and need a lot of power to shove the blade in deep.”
In a sudden movement, William stepped in close to her and thrust his knife, with the intent of stopping the blade mere inches from Ailith's side. Ailith jumped at the violent movement, shoving her wrist against his arm and lifting the knife up and away as she ducked. William’s knife made a swooshing sound as it went by, but never touched her.
With a quick flick of her wrist and a swipe of her arm, she lightly swept her knife across his belly. Her blade brushed against his tunic, dangerously close to his stomach, but she made sure not to cut the fabric or the skin underneath.
She knew she only got away with this move because he had not expected it.
The surprised look on his face quickly disappeared as he regained his composure.
Then he leaped forward with his knife springing out, followed by his hand and arm, and he allowed his body to follow, closing the distance on her.
Almost without thinking, her left hand shot out, colliding with his right wrist and knocking his hand and blade down and away.
Instead of jumping back, this time she stepped into him and spun in a tight circle as her elbow came up, her forearm parallel with the ground.
The snapping impact was louder and harder than she intended when the hard bone of her elbow impacted against the side of his head.
She gasped and yanked her arm back. The move had been so automatic, and she’d hurt William in the execution of it. Her heart thudded in a rapid staccato in her chest.
William staggered back three steps before he stopped himself and shook his head, regaining his balance. Shock and surprise didn’t leave his face so quickly this time as he stepped close to her again.
“That was . . . effective,” William said. His hand holding the knife rose in the air with two of his fingers extending to rub the spot she had struck. “Can you show me what you just did?”
Ailith repeated the movement but slower, sweeping her left hand in an arc, spinning outward and around, as her elbow came up in a mock attack. William’s eyes locked on her, following her every move, drinking in her form and frame.
When she was finished, his head made the slightest of nods as if to say he understood what she had just done. Then he followed her lead, turning with his elbow raised, mimicking her move as she watched him swivel in and brush his arm against her face.