General Eloquin's voice rang through the clearing. “Squires, the enemy pike stand ready to meet your charge, archers have outflanked and ambushed you. Death is but a spear shaft away. If you are to live, you must plunge through your enemy's forces under arrow fire. More than that, I expect each of you to deliver killing blows! Neal, sound the charge.”

Jess grimaced, dispelling her brooding thoughts with a determined shake of her head. She would deal with her mother's dreadful plans later.

"Jess, are you ready?"

She felt a fierce shiver of anticipation run straight through her and into Mercy, her piebald mare. Left hand holding reins and the light wooden shield that was her only divergence from the suits of steel, mail, and hardened rawhide worn by each of her fellow Squires of War, her right hand held her lance ready for the charge.

Jess caught the gaze of Neal, acting captain of their band, who gave her a crisp nod.

“Vanguard is yours, Jess. When the whistle blows, charge and ward. As always.” He grinned.

Jess grinned back. “Yes, Captain.” Heart racing, she gazed at the scores of mock pikemen before them, dozens of posts mounted with swine carcasses, wearing a mix of mail hauberks, rawhide boiled in water and glue, and gambesons of tough, quilted linen.

All in all, their mock opponents represented the types of armor most likely to be seen upon the battlefield, though few save knights would have access to shirts of mail or breastplates of steel.

“Jess.” But one word, all she needed to hear. Jess turned and gave her closest friend in all the world a grateful smile. Malek winked, and Jess pushed all regrets aside, focusing simply on the task at hand.

Her heart jolted as Eloquin blew sharply on his whistle. A click of her heels and Mercy was racing for the cluster of training dummies ahead, even as Jess caught sight of the two score spears mounted to coiled springs to best represent an infantryman's posture. They could be knocked aside by a shield in the hands of someone well-trained in the maneuver, though they would spring back for the next student, and even with their blunted tips they could crack the bones of men or mounts and send Squires toppling to the ground, risking serious injury.

Even as she took in the threat rapidly approaching, she heard the whistling twang of two score arrows raining down upon her and her fellow Squires.

“Jess!”

The slightest tinge of concern, but Neal need not worry, for the arrows fell short of the band of charging Squires, as if shot off course by the gentlest of winds.

It was then that Jess spotted none other than Knight Commander Hyve, leader of the Knight Aspirants and General Eloquin's counterpart, gazing down at their training session. Used to training alone with her fellow Squires, Jess accepted the witness, though she didn't particularly like it. What made her almost lose focus as she was but seconds away from the deadly forest of spears before her was Hyve's favored protege, and Jess could swear his gaze was fixated upon her even now.

Mord.

An Aspirant whose day wasn't complete without either mocking her or making the lewdest of comments. Jess had despised him from the first day they had met, and he had done nothing to mitigate the contempt she had for him. Yet despite his taunts and the extra hardships she had been forced to endure since their first fateful bout, she had eventually been offered a chance to study under General Eloquin himself. A prize more than worth all the grief her nemesis had put her through.

“Jess!” Malek's voice. The first twinges of panic.

Jess hissed, cursing herself for a fool, allowing herself to be so distracted, so her surge was stronger than the subtle gesture she had intended, and thus sure to draw the attention of her nemesis, letting him understand her strengths that much better, no doubt to one day use against her. The exact opposite of what she wanted.

“Jess!” But Neal's call was unnecessary.

With a crack, the fifteen foot long spear shafts were abruptly yanked back, many of them flying completely free of their springs or shattering, even as Jess tilted forward, her lance couched and ready, feet firmly planted in her stirrups, braced for impact.

Time seemed to slow in that curious way it sometimes did for her. After an endless moment, Jess felt her lance plunge into the armored meat carcass before her, bursting links of mail front and back with only a staggered moment of resistance, as armor that almost never broke in hand to hand melee gave way before the terrible fury of her charge.

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And still Jess did not let go until she felt the shock of her weapon plunging into the second rank of mock pikemen, but a split second before her lance plunged right up to the guard. Two men down with one lance, and no strain to her wrist.

Even as she allowed herself a single burst of elation, she was instantly swept back into the moment with the din and crash of her friends slamming into their own targets, Jess reflexively raising her shield as if to parry any potential assailant even as her right hand snatched mace free of saddle hook to pound down upon the helmets of pitted iron and cracked steel fastened to the carcasses they faced with controlled fury, as if she fought in deadly earnest.

After a final resounding crack of mace to helm, Jess pivoted back around, giving a sharp whistle to Neal while racing back to their starting position, taking deep breaths of air alive with the scents of pine and wildflowers as well as cured pork and iron. All in all, it was a beautiful day.

She forced battle trembling hands to carefully re-hook her mace even as she withdrew her estoc. A long tapered sword intended solely for thrusting, its triangular cross-section prevented effective cuts, but allowed it to be used much like a secondary lance after the first shattered in the initial charge.

Angled death, Jess thought, even as she pivoted Mercy around, the continuous rain of arrows still falling short of their band, Jess keeping an eye on the few stragglers, grimacing as the archers thought to target the Squires furthest from the main body, and for all that most of the arrows missed, one did not.

Jess couldn't help but glance Eloquin's way, and his icy blue eyes were cold.

Jess winced and shook away the lecture she knew was in store for her. For everyone knew their band had to be tight at all times. To straggle was to die, for reasons they all understood.

“On my mark, charge!” Jess cried out the moment everyone was back in formation, Neal nodding his accord, the entire band of Squires drawing free their estocs as they prepared to rush the mock pikemen once more. A full third of the spears had sprung back into place, those that had not been ripped free of their metal braces in the first pass.

“Blue Pincer!” Jess cried, once more losing herself and reveling in the moment. All of them stood high in their stirrups now, their bodies arched forward, arms bent slightly, a far different style of giving point than with lance. For even as the lance could be used but once, the estoc could be used to spear her enemy over and over.

There. But a second from her frantic charge was the dummy she chose, her estoc lining up at a slight angle from her body, and she braced for impact even as she felt the spring-loaded spears twist away from their band once more, Jess relaxing her arm the instant she felt the estoc bite into and punch through the mail shirt atop the swine carcass, expertly pivoting so that her wrist and shoulder suffered no strain as her arm was pulled back, the power of her mount spinning the carcass on its post around, her sword effortlessly extracting as Mercy raced past.

Her band of Squires had struck the left flank of pikemen even as Neil's half struck the right flank, all of them flowing around the cluster of stationary carcasses like a stream flowing around a rock in its center, maintaining the speed and maneuverability they needed to race away for another charge.

"Reform!" She shouted, Neal blowing a refrain of the command, and this time Jess hung back just a bit, making sure she was at the center of her band at all times. No lead-tipped arrows hit any of her fellows then.

Neal looked to her as they formed up once more. “How are you?”

Jess smiled into his hazel eyes. “Never better, Captain.”

He nodded once. "Excellent. Full on charge, now. We go from estoc to melee."

Jess nodded once even as she pivoted Mercy around, now leading the vanguard with a wild ululating yell, her fellow Squires to each side of her in a classic wedge.

And this time, as her sword plunged almost effortlessly into the torso of a pig carcass draped in boiled rawhide, Jess released the estoc's hilt and unsheathed her saber in one practiced motion, lashing out with fierce, practiced strokes designed not simply to hit with force, but to cut through the rawhide armaments before her with vicious slicing blows.

Perhaps the most common armor on the battlefield, only those who trained diligently in slicing through the hardened rawhide plates with specialized blades would draw blood. Training Jess had received in spades, fiercely devoted to mastering the techniques as she was all elements of swordplay. Her saber lashed out, scoring precise, killing cuts to the necks of her carcasses, Jess carefully aiming for those spots the rough armor did not protect, cleaving straight through cured flesh and bone, helmeted animal heads tumbling to the ground.

But knowing her mentor as she did, Jess made a point of whipping her blade through straps and plates of rawhide as well as at the armorless gaps, pulling the blade back toward her even as it cleaved through the armor, the blade biting all the deeper with the sawing nature of the slash as Jess drew it through her foe, even as muttered curses let her know that not all her friends had been as successful.

Several of her fellows forewent fancy saberwork in favor of flanged maces or war hammers that could whip down upon even armored skulls to stunning effect, no matter the other armaments worn. Which was fine, Jess thought. In the heat of battle, all that really mattered was what worked, survival and victory forgiving any number of sins of technique.

Their mentor blew his whistle, and at once Jess and her fellows wheeled away from their mock foes with final parting slashes and whipping strikes as would have been the case in actual melee, all racing in unison back to where Lords Eloquin and Hyve awaited.

And there Mord was, staring at her even now. The jubilation Jess always experienced after a good training round instantly dissipated as she caught sight of those cruel features flashing a cold smile her way.