Sareen had insisted that she and Omid change into the appropriate gear during this training session. Not because the attire offered any extra protection, but because the Kirzallan did not want their best clothes damaged in the fighting. It was simple, consisting only of what felt like undyed cotton that lay directly at the midpoint between form fitting and loose. Not too tight to be restrictive, not too loose as to get caught on anything.

Which meant that Sareen’s razor sharp sword slicing through the left sleeve of Omid’s tunic was indeed far too close despite not drawing any blood.

“You’re on the defensive.” Sareen noted as she kept her sword at the ready while circling the human before going for a high strike. “You seem to favor that.”

Omid deflected the blow, noting that she was still not putting as much force into the strikes as he knew her to be capable of. “I was a scholar, not a swordsman. When the library would arrange an exchange of books and other research materials I would go with the transport-”

She feinted to the left before trying another test strike on Omid. After another narrowly timed deflection he caught his breath before continuing as Sareen kept circling. “Nothing but horribly misguided thieves thinking we held anything of monetary value, so not the most skilled of opponents. Perhaps if they could think of more than themselves they would have known the true value of what we carried.”

“It would seem you have long had vision. How did you deal with those who lacked such vision?” Sareen raised a brow before striking at Omid’s blade faster than he could possibly react as he put everything into simply blocking it.

Omid wanted to be surprised by the aggression on display here as she toyed with him, but he knew from recent and not so recent experience that this was at least one version of her having fun. The broad smile on her face confirmed that. He exhaled hard and caught his breath before continuing with his tale. “I was always honest about the fact that while we carried nothing worth their time, I would not be letting such knowledge vanish into the gutter to rot with trash who wouldn’t even know what it was really worth.”

Sareen struck a few more easily deflected test hits as she advanced on the young man having to remain light on his feet as even those test blows were getting stronger. She beamed as she spoke. “They never listened, did they?”

“Sometimes they would.” Omid shot glances around the courtyard for any kind of advantage, but found none as he realized he must be getting backed into the fountain. “Other times...I didn’t always use those exact words. The one time I did though…”

The Kirzallan stopped her advance and lowered her sword slightly, smile wide and teeth sharp as she insisted: “Tell me.”

The human’s eyes had been unfocused as he recalled and pursed his lips, he looked up to meet Sareen’s eyes. “We had unearthed a tablet containing a text of a dead civilization. The most complete of its kind. It was the final words of an all but forgotten people. They would have likely used it as a building block in a thrown together shack after they had cut me down.”

In less than a blink, the tip of Sareen’s blade was at Omid’s throat. As he swallowed he felt it close enough to shave with. The smiling woman pressed on, undeterred and locked eyes with him. “And when those without vision met a man who had vision to spare?”

Omid tapped the tip of his blade to her navel beneath the undyed fabric while keeping his eyes focused on hers. “I did what I had to and stopped them permanently, and now the epitaph of a long dead people is being studied instead of forgotten.”

Sareen smiled and nicked Omid’s neck just enough to draw blood as he recoiled and held his blade up defensively. The Kirzallan only smiled before bringing the tip of the blade to her lips to lick the tiny drop of blood from the metal. “You could have struck me, and yet you didn’t.”

The human put a finger to his wound, finding only the tiniest bit of blood before putting both hands back on his sword while keeping his eyes on Sareen. “I knew you weren’t going to kill me.”

“No, but you know I can put you back together.” She said with a gleaming smile. “You’re too focused on what you must do and not what you could do. Now, show me the man of vision and grand plans. He who dares, and has the will to back it up.”

Omid wanted to be surprised by any of this as he steadied his breathing. He wanted to be surprised by this side of her that was some nearly unfathomable mixture of threats, encouragement, and some form of passion he still wasn’t putting a name to.

No.

The young man corrected himself and thought, “let’s start with ‘desire’, and work from there”.

Sareen didn’t give him too much time to think before she was striking again from high, which Omid parried into a strike against her this time. She gave a tilt of her head and launched into another attack as Omid continued backing away yet angling himself away from the fountain every chance he got during a parry that was inevitably countered.

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“This isn’t training so much as it is sparring.” Omid said between strikes, starting to tire from the fight as Sareen was only growing more lively.

“And yet you are learning, still!” Another slash to the fabric on Omid’s chest without so much as grazing him, as he started to believe that there was no mistake in those strikes. “Some lessons would be lost if you were still limiting yourself. Now-”

Their blades clashed several more times as Omid managed one more parry that still wasn’t close enough to a hit. He blocked another strike at his throat, and she put more strength into it until he was at risk of another close shave as she leaned in. “

“-don’t hold back!”

Omid wanted to be surprised by how this was all suspiciously familiar to last night. He wanted to be surprised by what she was encouraging and how she was teaching. He really wanted to be surprised by how much he was somehow enjoying this.

But more and more now, he wasn’t.

He drew her into a feint as he made to block, and as she went in for the strike he parried it into a blow against her wrist. The woman showed no pain as she withdrew her wrist and blocked Omid’s next strike in a blade lock. Both of them drew back with lowered blades as Sareen looked down to her wrist with that same grin as the tiny line of red vanished into nothing with a thought. Her gaze was on Omid’s blade now and the tiniest drops of blood still clinging to the blade before she turned her attention to Omid.

The human blinked, slowly turning his eyes to that bit of blood then back to the expectant Kirzallan before he sighed and wiped the blood from the blade with a careful finger. “The blade lick really isn’t my style.” He was mere seconds away from wiping it off on his sleeve when he saw her perplexed look shortly before he rolled his eyes and licked the blood off his finger in the same motion.

“There! Much better!” Sareen congratulated him as he shook his head still.

“I didn’t have much of a choice.” Omid asked as he was catching his breath after the incredibly one sided ‘duel’ that was only not worse due to the promise of no magic. This time.

The Kirzallan put a hand to his throat and hummed a soft tune as the nick from earlier vanished. Her hand lingered and traced up along his jawline as indigo eyes met his and a ravenous smile softened into another side of Sareen that the human was still adjusting to. “You always have a choice. Everyone does. And yet so many would claim otherwise. That the world would not let them have a say, or that the gods have taken it away. But there is always a choice. You are a man of vision, Omid. Don’t be the limit to your own vision.”

Omid remembered to breathe around the time that he wondered if she had ever been fooled, or if he was ever even attempting to fool anyone but himself. He was just trying to survive and do what he could, wasn’t he? Perhaps pride was coloring her hindsight to paint a more elegant and aware portrait of herself?

Sareen put a hand to his sword hand to lift it up with care. “Now, a lesson with the sword and then a lesson with sword and magic together.”

There was no rest for Omid over the course of those lessons. His only reprieve had come from Sareen cutting back the threat level despite teaching him some more advanced sword techniques, lamenting as she went that there was precious little time before the war party. Precious little time to teach him magic as well. And every time she would bring that up, an emotion almost resembling sadness crept into her eyes.

The aspiring mage had an idea of what it may be closest to, as she would in the next breath grow more exacting in her lessons only to follow with simple encouragement. He believed it to be a form of anger at the lack of time rather than him. Not truly sadness, for it didn’t fit her. Then again, he thought, what he knew as anger didn’t seem the best fit either. So much of her was familiar and yet still strange.

Even as they grew closer.

“Hmm, a trick for you.” She said with a tilt of her head while staring at the ground Omid stood on. “Shift the ground beneath their feet and even the best defensive stance will falter.”

Omid nodded, swiping his foot across the pale sand courtyard as he got a feel for it. “And if they attempt to counter that shifting ground with their own spell to put them on proper footing again?”

“Then they had to focus on that surprise, as you focus on striking them down.” She continued staring at the ground for a few seconds more before looking at Omid with full determination and focus. “The entity that is observing us...he may challenge you while you are back on Kir. Be watchful for him, and don’t take any challenge of any sort lightly.”

The apprentice mage’s mouth hung open as he straightened his back and looked around as though he expected to see someone watching. “What brought this on?”

“At the party, I will be there as well if he wishes to speak. And it is my palace.” She stared up at the tower that Omid recognized as her personal quarters. “Down there, if he decides to speak to you on your own there would be little stopping him before you retrieve our guest. No human, even a powerful mage, would be enough to give him pause.”

Omid pursed his lips, nodding as he wiped a bit of sweat from his brow. “What should I look for?”

“Look for what you can’t look for. A young man that you can’t seem to remember any physical features about even as you’re looking right at him.” Sareen sheathed her sword and made for the exit as Omid followed and listened. “If he challenges you, don’t back down. You would never win, but he would allow a draw. If he talks to you, don’t lie to him. Above all else, remember who you are before him.”

The suns were getting low in the sky after this eventful day, and Omid was feeling all that exhaustion catch up with him and join the newfound fear while sheathing his sword. “Thank you, Sareen.”

There was that tiniest look again from her, cast over her shoulder before turning back ahead as Omid continued speaking.

“Here’s hoping it never comes to that.” Though they both knew better.