Chapter 13 The Mean Man

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"Vagrant, you are amazing, marvelous, wonderful, fabulous, delightful....."

Elena gritted her teeth and returned to the stance Figueredo called 'position'.

"... unimaginable fool," the tutor finished, punctuating each word with a light tap of his wand on the palm of his hand. For a change, his palm, just like the stern teacher next to the blackboard. The impression was reinforced by the fact that the master was indeed standing next to a large blackboard, which was covered with thin and carefully fitted slate tiles. The dark, glossy surface was chalked out - the direction of the main attacks according to Elena's height.

"You've been taking lessons from me for more than a year," Figueredo said boredly. "That money could buy you a good dowry and help you marry a decent man. You've been wasting it, tossing my time around like sand in the wind."

Draftsman sighed and whipped his apprentice on the shoulder with an exclamation:

"Position! Keep your back straight!"

Elena stretched even more. Her spine rattled like a taut string, or, to use a familiar reality, like the bowstring of a block crossbow. Her lower back ached. It was so tired from Badas's asshole surgery the day before yesterday, and it had continued unabated. The prison had started a big investigation with a group interrogation in several ways, the equivalent of a face-to-face session, and the apprentices had overdone it again. And now, with every movement, it was as if a copper nail from the shipwrights' arsenal had been hammered into her sacrum. The unpleasant word "sciatica" persisted under the skull cap, which Grandfather had suffered from impressively and for many years.

"One more time, you fool," Figueredo squeaked like an angry cricket. "First."

This time, the stick or, rather, a long and thick rod, whipped across her thigh. Elena bit her lip and didn't make a sound.

"Walk without stepping. The foot is carried forward, and then the force of the fall pulls it in and puts it there. I said this a year ago, six months ago, a month ago, but you don't listen to me. Let the earth itself attract and move your feet. Don't put in unnecessary force. You're gonna need it. Second."

A new stroke burned the other leg symmetrically. Elena held back this time, too. Figueredo stepped behind her, his brittle voice almost in her ear.

"You're lifting your toes, even though that's what I've managed to put in your empty head. But I'll say it again."

Draftsman was a little sideways and pinched the tips of the toes of her left foot with the rod.

"The foot doesn't roll. Not! Rolling!"

Elena waited for another blow, and it came, now on the shin, very painful, so that the woman did not hold back a sob through her teeth.

Figueredo stood beside her, side by side, demonstrating for what must have been the thousandth time.

"The foot walks forward, the muscles are not tense, the thigh swings like a pendulum, without tension. The toe is raised so you don't trip if a stone, a thrown blade, or a corpse falls under your foot. And if it's an enemy's foot, you step on it, and you can unbalance him."

Draftsman slammed his foot in an old felt slipper against the stone floor a few times.

"And no roll! The foot comes down all at once, like the jaw of a snare. The ground attracts the foot, and the foot clings to the ground with the whole sole, from top to bottom. With the right step, you can fight even on ice. Otherwise, you're bound to slip. Especially if you have a sword in your hand, which is pulling your body."

Draftsman sighed heavily again and shook his head, his tail of gray hair swinging behind his back.

"Vandera, you're as strong as an ordinary peasant. But weaker than any real fighter. It's harder to parry because a good punch with a strong arm will sweep away your defenses. It's harder to chop and slash through clothing than chainmail or armor. Only impeccable skill and skillful movement will equalize the odds, and you have one wrong one for six correct steps. That's good enough for a soldier. And for a woman, too. But in a fight with a brether or a good fencer, every seventh or eighth step opens you up to a blow. Maybe I taught you the art of the sword too soon."

Draftsman walked around and stood opposite her, one hand behind his back, like Napoleon's, the other twitching with a stick like a wasp's sting. Figueredo put the instrument to his student's forehead in a deliberately slow gesture and spoke gravely as if hammering wisdom into Elena's head:

"Right now, in this vast world, someone is frantically exercising to kill you. You don't know this person. He doesn't know you. But your destinies are linked. They lead to an inevitable meeting. The enemy does for your ten repetitions eleven of his own. He learns the right step. He corrects mistakes by painstaking teaching. And all this to finish you off. Think of it hourly, minute by minute."

I know who wants to kill me, Elena thought and remained silent.

A new sigh, full of deep disappointment.

"Again. All over again on the spot."

Elena stepped into the center of the Circle of Death and gripped the hilt of her training sword, a heavy stick with a cross instead of a hilt and a lead pommel on the end of the hilt. She wanted to cry, as she had in the first weeks of her apprenticeship, to see how effortlessly and effortlessly her mentor handled everything. Draftsman was seriously ill, a relentless sickness gnawing at the old man from the inside day after day. Figueredo could not walk a hundred steps without respite, could not bend over, and had to squat, keeping his body upright. Elena was healthier, younger, stronger, and faster. And still, next to the sick fencer, she felt like a cow on the ice, trying to compete with a figure skater. There was a ruthless, radical refinement in every movement of Draftsman, a school where mistakes were punished by the strictest examiner named Death. This school, the precise knowledge of what to do and how to do it at every moment replaced both health and youth.

The student performed the parade and froze in anticipation of the command.

"Pendulum!" ordered Figueredo.

Elena stretched her arm forward and began a combination that had become tiresome over hundreds, thousands of repetitions. The "point" froze, glued to an invisible point, the weapon arm going left and right, practicing symmetrical defenses against side blows. Thirty movements, then a change of hand. And again, and again, and again, until the hand loses sensation and the forearm broken a year ago seems like lead. And then keep going.

"The Horseshoe!"

Now the point was actively working, the wooden sword drawing an inverted horseshoe.

"Elbow still!" shouted Draftsman. "The arm acts from the shoulder, and the torso rotates, increasing the opposition! Otherwise, the heavier blade will strike your own."

Her lower back ached even more. However, it was much harder on her soul.

The year of apprenticeship became for Elena a time of permanent humiliation. And it could not be said the fencer tried to hurt her in any way. After the mentor and the apprentice had concluded the present contract, it was as if Draftsman had been replaced. The mentor was strict, businesslike, and professional. He took to teaching and taught her every minute of their almost daily lessons. Elena waited for the inevitable washing of the training room, taking out the night potty, and other "non-statutory" things that, judging by the mass culture, were inevitable for an apprentice in the dojo. None of this was required by Figueredo. Elena came, put on her training pants and shirt, and then all communication was devoted only to the High Art.

"A High Diagonal!"

The sword chopped from top to bottom, striking downward, in an almost fully extended arm, ending the motion at the foot of the "hind leg". And immediately went in the opposite direction, imitating a false blade strike from bottom to top.

Yes, as a mentor, the fencer was above reproach. Except for the fact that, with very few exceptions, every lesson left Elena with several new bruises. Worse was another thing. Figueredo didn't believe in his pupil and didn't think it necessary to hide it. He just didn't. "Vandera" could try or not try, trample on the place in impotent attempts, or demonstrate impressive successes, but the mentor still sincerely despised her as a person out of place, who bangs his forehead in the closed gate instead of doing something more worthy and useful. And this quiet, unconcerned disdain hurt more than a stick, the third in a year of apprenticeship. It hurt like a real blade. Especially when combined with the growing realization that, yes, Draftsman was right, she would never be a brilliant swordsman. Only a solid average.

"Left-handed eight!"

Month after month Elena tried her best. It seemed to her sooner or later the fencer would at least appreciate her persistence. In vain. It took many weeks for the student to finally understand - Figueredo would never recognize her as a fighter. It simply wasn't in his picture of the universe. Now, the woman held on to nothing but her ego. And the memory of the killer's red eyes on the ship. Draftsman was wrong about one thing - Elena knew too well who would one day come for her. And now, thanks to the science of Art, she understood even better how deep the gulf between them was. So, despite all the frustration, almost every day Elena knocked on the damned door of the hated mentor. And she was learning, little by little, tiny steps, hard, with frustrating failures and setbacks - but she was moving forward.

"Chopping from behind the head, fifty strikes each to the right and left."

When, despite the autumn chill in the unheated house, the student's shirt was soaked almost through, Draftsman finally deigned to return to the movements. Elena walked along the exhausting rays of the damned star, performing learned and exhausting sequences of blows. She practiced the simplest combinations "parry - counterstrike", on which the whole fencing art of "urban combat" was based. The air in the hall seemed to thicken, soaked through with the sour smell of sweat and disturbed dust. Figueredo's eyes bulged with what seemed to be toad eyes as he beat the rhythm of the stick on his palm and his student's hands. Not hard enough to take away her mobility but enough to memorize the direct link between error and pain at the level of reflexes.

"Enough," Figueredo finally relented, and Elena froze, leaning on the stick.

As usual, the woman lost track of time - there was nothing in the hall to measure time, no hourglass or simple klepsydra. Even the ringing of the city bells faded into the thick walls of the house. The duration of each lesson Draftsman determined arbitrarily, guided by his considerations. Elena could determine the time only when it was over, going outside. It could be a few minutes (which, however, rarely happened) or two or three hours until the midnight watch, so it was necessary to return home at the darkest and most dangerous time of the night.

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"Defenses," Draftsman ordered curtly, selecting a training sword for himself. "How do you take a blade-to-blade strike?" He asked, weighing the same stick as Elena's in his hand as if he were holding it for the first time.

"At right angles, strictly, without cupping the blade," she replied without hesitation. Elena went into a defensive stance without command, placing her right hand behind her back. The draughtsman had trained her from the beginning as an overhand swordsman, both to make her opponents more uncomfortable and to compensate for the fracture that had stiffened the mobility of her main arm a bit.

"Explain."

"The blade of one blade and a line transverse to the blades of the other always form a right angle."

"Why?" Figueredo marked a feint to the right and, when the student turned the blade upright, pointed down, struck for real from the other side. Elena felt that she was losing her breath catastrophically. It seemed infernally hard to parry and speak at the same time.

"Because... otherwise the defense... weaker."

"Exactly. As you are now," Draftsman's next blow easily broke through Elena's defenses, so the student was hit in the forehead with the end of her blade. It wasn't severe, but it was painful and instructive.

"Farther! Faster!" shouted Figueredo.

Mechanically fending off her mentor's ever-accelerating attacks, Elena remembered a long-ago duel with Kai for three rounds on the first day. Or was it the second? At times, everything that happened in the far north seemed unreal, like a dream or an old man's memories of his youth.

Yes, the real fight was far from sport fencing, starting with the weight of the weapon and ending with the main problem - the inevitability of a retaliatory strike. For several months, Draftsman had been literally coaxing out of his student the reflex of an athlete - to jab first, not caring about defense. On the track, this brought a point, but in life, it regularly ended in a counterattack, even by a wounded opponent [1].

"Mediocre," Figueredo finally concluded. As usual, without much emotion, stating the obvious fact. "It's like I said, you'll fight off one soldier now. But no more. You're afraid of a blow. You're blinking. Not good."

Elena thought of objecting but held back. Extensive practice pointed to the futility of excuses and objections. She was also starting to get a headache and felt slightly nauseous. Practicing in the constant gloom was hard both technically and mentally. But Draftsman was relentless - a fighter rarely chooses a place to fight. He is forced to fight wherever fate takes him. If you're not ready for a fight in a dark street without streetlights, you're not ready for anything.

"Well, you'll have to look in the water," Draftsman promised cryptically. "Put the sword down. Time to breathe."

Elena shoved the wooden instrument into the rack and, without a command, went back to the center of the star. It was time for what her mentor called "scratching the skin with bones." In general, the methodology of Draftsman left many questions. On the one hand, Elena understood that the methods of rational cognition and scientific organization of the educational process here were still several centuries away. On the other... It was still strange. For example, Draftsman began to show Steps at once, but the correct breathing - after more than half a year. Then the master threw her an old chain mail (putting it on and lacing it up correctly turned out to be quite a quest) and gave her a little chase with the second stick. And clearly demonstrated that in a little bit of heavy armor, moreover, in the torn rhythm of battle, when movements do not coincide with inhalation and exhalation, the usual chest breathing does not work well, and abdominal breathing is not much better.

And the fencer began to teach Elena another way, quite strange, absolutely unnatural, but... at the same time working and effective. It was hard to describe in words. It could only be shown. The essence of the method was that the horse was harnessed behind the cart. That is, not breathing fed the movements, but on the contrary, each movement, especially of the shoulder girdle, acted like a pump. It massaged the lungs and stretched them like bellows for a new portion of air. The movements were really like brushing the bones from the inside. At the next stage, the pelvis and hips were also involved in the work. It was called simply and roughly - "ass breathing" [2].

According to her personal feelings, the whole cycle of breathing exercises took about fifteen minutes. It started with "wiggling" on the spot" and then turned into steps all over the star. From the outside, it looked like a crazy break-dancers dance or a fancy sports walk. In general, it helped, but Elena could not achieve consistency in the process, to feel it and make it an integral element of any fight. It made her angry and made her feel inferior again.

"That's it, we're done, pick up the wood," for a change Draftsman slammed his stick into the floor, resoundingly and sharply, in a way that made Elena flinch.

"You're still terrified of the blow."

Elena said nothing, thinking if there was something, she wasn't afraid of its blows. She had already received hundreds of them, thanks to the efforts of Draftsman and his stick.

"When a blade comes at your face, you blink. Sometimes you look away a little bit and tilt your head back. It's bad. But it's fixable. Usually, you wear goggles or a mask made of rods to throw nasty things in your face. There's a better way."

Draftsman displayed a coin, an ordinary copper coin, polished to obliterate the coinage. A small circle of light metal in the long fingers of the craftsman.

"Listen, memorize, you'll do it on your own."

With a light flick of his fingers, Draftsman sent a coin to Elena. The latter caught it just as sparingly and easily.

"Take a pot or a bucket," the master instructed. "It doesn't matter, as long as your head fits through. Pour water. Warm water for starters. Put the coin in the bottom of the bucket."

He accompanied each phrase with appropriate gestures as if he had no hope for his apprentice's intelligence. Elena clutched the coin in her fingers and wondered. The coin seemed cool as if it were not even in the codpiece next to the body. It was as if Draftsman had no temperature of his own at all.

"Next, you should bend down and look at the coin. Eyes relaxed, eyes wide, like in battle. And then shove your face into the bucket!"

Figueredo clapped his hands together audibly, so much so that Elena flinched.

"Don't blink like that," the long, bony finger pointed precisely at the apprentice's right pupil, and the woman suppressed an instinctive urge to step back. For a moment it seemed as if the old man wanted to pull her eye out.

"The trick is simple - don't lose sight of the coin, not even for a moment! This is not dangerous to the eyes, but it will be unpleasant. It's a good time to learn to keep your eyes open, no matter what. When you can repeat it without a hitch, you should take the water colder and colder. The great masters practiced with a barrel of ice floating in it, but for you it is unnecessary."

"But..." Elena dared to object. "This way..."

Again hindered by language and conceptual barriers, how to quickly and understandably explain to a half-crazy fencer that breaking the protective instinct is not good? And Takeshi Kitano nearly went blind on the shoot of "Zatoichi" by getting too into the role of a blind man. And the student also felt a fit of terror after realizing she was realizing the meaning but forgetting the words. "Instinct", "shooting" - she knew what it meant, but to recall the native speech required straining her memory. And the Japanese actor in general bristled in her memory like a photograph, a half-erased image.

"But you could go blind like that!" She exclaimed at last. But the tutor understood perfectly well.

"You can't gain skill without sacrifice," Figueredo shrugged. "It's old wisdom, for any knowledge you pay with time, money, sweat, and blood. They can't be shuffled or replaced. You need weapons and knowledge. You have to pay money for it. Any skill only becomes native after thousands of repetitions, and that's time. Fatigue will gnaw at your dicks, turn your bones to water, and that's sweat. And finally, you'll never be a warrior if you don't know how the bruises hurt after a fight when the thrill disappears. If you haven't had your teeth cracked under someone else's fists or had your breath knocked out of your chest from hitting the ground. That's blood."

Figueredo squinted, looking at the dim lamp as if it shone like the midday sun.

"Also, mastery always comes with a commodity you don't need, but you have to take it. Blood vengeance for those you've killed, the attention of the powerful who want you to get your hands dirty in their place. The envy and spite of the less fortunate fighters."

Draftsman raised his hand sharply so that the stick stopped just a couple of centimeters from the tip of Elena's nose.

"That's what I'm talking about," the fencer said softly as the student recoiled, closing her eyes for a moment. "I don't care if you look at the coin or not. You want to become a warrior, not me. You've decided that the path of the killer is your path. It's up to you to decide if you're willing to buy another useful skill that will save your life one day. And whether you're willing to pay the full price."

Draftsman lowered his stick and turned away with the words:

"Lesson is over."

"And you?" The woman asked into her mentor's back.

"What?" asked Draftsman perplexedly, raising his head yet not turning around.

"Did you pay your price for the unwanted goods?" The apprentice said, amazed at her audacity.

Draftsman was silent, rotating the instrument of instruction in his fingers, all of which reminded Elena of the "science of pain" the master had taught her. The woman gripped the wooden sword more firmly and automatically assumed the desired position.

"Yes, in full," replied the fencer unexpectedly.

Figueredo walked along the wall, picked up a rag, and wiped away the chalk drawing with a few strokes.

"I had many students, but one stood out among them. It is a rare case when Pantocrator gives his child strength, intelligence, and flexibility in equal measure. And a desire to learn. A gemstone that need only be cut to glitter like the Dark Jeweler's greatest temptation."

Draftsman put down his stick and rubbed the base of his hands as if he wanted to disperse the congealed blood through his veins.

"He was a fine fighter, and his fame eclipsed the best of the best, even Plague and Reaper, and they were the greatest Brethers of their generation. At that time, Vensan worked less and less often and grew weary of killing. And Ranjan left the City altogether."

Draftsman stood half-turned toward Elena, the yellow glare of the lamp on his face. For the first time in many months, Figueredo seemed... more human, perhaps. It was as if a long-ago memory had stirred a little of the dark misanthropy that had gripped the old master's soul.

"The light of greatness reflected on me as well, for I made him invincible. Knights, brethren, assassins, aristocrats... they were honored to pay me in gold just to have the great Figueredo look at them and give advice. And my mentorship."

Draftsman grinned bitterly.

"I forgot what "expensive" meant because the purses of the VIPs were bottomless, and even Primators considered it an honor to take a couple of lessons from me. And I didn't notice that my best student was poisoned by envy. Fame is a sharp spire, hard for a few to fit on. To everyone, my apprentice was the First Blade of the City, but also, everyone knew that I had made him one. Our names stood side by side, and he wanted to be the first. And the only one. So one day, he came to me with a naked saber..."

"And then?" asked Elena quietly.

"And then there was nothing good," Draftsman snapped, immediately locking himself into an armor of angry discontent. "Get out of here, you useless and useless creature. You've had enough stories about great men. It's a wasted effort."

Elena walked away, or rather, staggered on straight legs to a corner where her things were stacked on a narrow bench behind a screen of reed leaves. The fracture, seemingly irrevocably and well healed, was giving back a dull ache in her ligaments. Maybe that's why she was stuck learning to use both hands at once. Or maybe...

Her mind was blank and dull, and she dismissed the speculation and just silently changed into dry clothes, wondering if she'd have time to throw the training "uniform" to the laundresses. Draftsman's sense of smell seemed to be completely impaired, but it would be disgusting to exercise in a soaked, stubby shirt. In some places, the unbleached linen was a little whitened, reminding her that her mentor's stick had left not only bruises but quite bloody abrasions as well.

Figueredo coughed unpleasantly, painfully, wetly. Then, he took a long time trying to catch his breath. Elena changed her clothes, pulled on her boots, harting her toe on one of the wooden nails in the sole to top off a "successful" day.

"Take the glove," he said as Elena slung the bag on her shoulder. "And the sword."

"What?"

"Fool, take the combat glove," Draftsman repeated angrily. "And the sword. It's in the hallway, by the door. There was a fool here, just like you. He wanted to challenge you to a fight, saying that a woman with a blade is bullshit and an affront to tradition. He said he'd be back tomorrow."

The day had come. Elena knew it had to happen someday. Brethers regularly fought each other not for money but for glory and on the principle of "if I am the tenth and defeated the first, then I am stronger than the other eight, and now everyone will know about it!". Students also fought abundantly for themselves, out of fun, and for the honor of the school and the mentor. Elena had been spared this cup for a long, long time. Partly because a woman with a weapon was not taken seriously. They think it insulting to cross swords with her. Partly because Figueredo had once been famous, but that time was long gone, and to the current Brethers, Draftsman was just an old man out of his mind who taught something to a barmaid in men's pants for lack of normal students. She was simply ignored, seeing no honor or entertainment in the duel. And now, it seemed, someone had noticed. Probably a young and impudent one who could use such prey.

The woman stood for a moment, feeling the despair rising in her soul like a trashy scale. She wanted to ask the master many questions, like why the hell was he tiring her with long training instead of giving her a break before the fight? Or...

No, it's no use. It's the Draftsman. As Charley-Mongayard had honestly warned her - a nasty, mean man, rude and arrogant. He hates people and wants them to know it.

What's the use of appealing to the conscience of a man who has none? Draftsman is Draftsman. And if he says someone can challenge someone to a fight, then that's the way it is. And, most likely, the mentor hired or instigated the fighter himself. This was practiced by fencers who wanted to test a student or just get rid of him.

Without another word, Elena pulled two gloves from her equipment chest, more like layered mittens with padded rollers. She tucked them behind her belt. She found a sword in a simple wooden scabbard sheathed in glued cord. It was uncomfortable to do everything by the light of a single candle.

"Draftsman, damn you," Elena whispered and, adjusting her bag on her shoulder, pulled back the rattling deadbolt.

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