Steel

But Blane took the bait, because he was arrogant. Jill read him right.

“Untie her.”

One of the thugs drew a knife and sliced through the rope that bound her. She hissed when he nicked a piece of her skin; he didn’t seem to notice.

They let her go. She backed away, trying to find a clear space, and drew her rapier. She spared a quick moment to wipe away blood from the heel of her left hand, where the knife had caught her.

Edmund Blane unfastened his belt, removing from his hip the broken sword that he wouldn’t let out of his sight. Another of his men—they were all servants, interchangeable—was on hand to take the broken rapier and hand him another one. A whole, functional rapier with a worn grip and a sharp, gleaming blade. He held it up to his face, pointed outward, so he could gaze down the length of it, as if he didn’t already know it was perfect. From the edge of her vision she watched the man who held the broken sword; he stood a little ways off but didn’t leave the clearing, keeping the treasured rapier where Blane could see it.

The camp had fallen quiet. The men who had been working set aside their tools and gathered closer, to watch their captain fight the scrawny girl who’d appeared in their camp.

Jill was in something of a panic—she hadn’t thought this through, she knew nothing about how Blane fought, it was dark, hard to see by wavering firelight, the ground was rocky, all of it about the worst conditions for a fight she could imagine. But at least she recognized that she was panicking. She might be able to at least stave it off before Blane ran her through—

No, he wasn’t going to run her through; she wasn’t going to let him. She breathed slowly, filling her lungs, set her body in a correct position, held her sword in a proper en garde. Habit and ritual steadied her. She shook out her legs, gave a little bounce to loosen her muscles, and looked toward Blane.

He watched her going through the motions, point of his rapier resting on the earth, opposite hand on his hip. His lips curled in a half smile.

She saluted him, bringing her sword straight up and flicking it away. He raised an eyebrow, and didn’t salute her back.

For the first five heartbeats, neither of them moved. The tips of their rapiers barely crossed, which meant they were too far apart for either of them to make a real attack. This was just to size each other up. She made a beat—quickly tapping her blade against his. He didn’t respond, merely letting his blade give to the pressure, then bringing it back on line. She tried again; this time, he disengaged, scooping his sword out of the way. She quickly responded by starting a parry—but he was only testing her, and he didn’t take the opening. He didn’t attack.

She couldn’t believe how her heart was racing. She knew better than this; she didn’t get nervous and sloppy before fights. He wasn’t even doing anything to scare her—she was doing it all on her own. If she stayed scared, if she didn’t do anything but stand here deciding what to do next, he’d pounce and she’d be dead.

Here and now, that wasn’t just a figure of speech. The edge of his blade was sharp, and ended in a gleaming point.

He beat her blade, she beat back, and the fight was on. Attacking and counterattacking, he tested her. He was careful, calculating, his movements simple and precise. Textbook, which she wasn’t sure she’d expected from someone who by all accounts was a hardened villain. Maybe she’d expected the sweeping, flailing attacks of a movie swashbuckler. But Edmund Blane had had training, and he practiced. He drew her responses, and she fell into the expected pattern, as if they were drilling. She was dancing to the tune he played.

She stumbled back, out of his reach, to break out of the pattern and reassess. She circled, aware of Blane’s followers around the torch-lit clearing where they fought. They could strike at any moment as well.

So she brought the fight to him, lunging in a feint, countering the parry she expected. He matched her, with a bare smile and a gleam in his eyes. Good fencing wasn’t just hitting; it was a conversation, move and countermove, anticipating three or more movements along until each exchange was comprised of a dozen moves or more, steel on steel ringing out. The familiar fire lit in her veins, flowed through her limbs, and her muscles found their rhythm. This was a good fight. She just wished the swords weren’t real. Her mind felt electric, otherworldly—she’d rather be watching this from the outside.

After two or three complex exchanges, she decided she could hold her own against him—for a time. If she played a purely defensive game, concentrated on blocking, didn’t take risks. But if she did that, she’d never stop him. He’d wear her out, eventually she would make a mistake, and he would finish her.

She had to get out of this. So she turned and ran.

No one ran after her, probably because they were shocked. Even Blane stood and stared. Jill planned—however much she planned any of this—to just keep running, to plunge into the forest and escape. But the man charged with holding Blane’s broken rapier stood in her path. If she stopped, if she lost her momentum, Blane would have her thrown over the cliff—nothing would change. This wasn’t a feint; she was committed. She kept going, arms bent, still holding her rapier, charging forward.

The man in front of her flinched. And maybe that brief show of fear inspired Jill. She felt a surge, the flicker of a smile on her lips—she recognized the feeling, that moment when she saw an

opening, recognizing an opponent’s weakness. The broken sword was Edmund Blane’s weakness.

She ran into the pirate, shouldering him out of the way, and grabbed the sword out of his hands. The sword caught; she felt it drag through flesh. The man screamed as a wound opened on his hand where the blade cut, and he stumbled away from her. She kept running, never slowing, keeping her eyes where she wanted to go—the shadows in the forest beyond.

Other pirates were running now, moving to intercept her and capture her. Blane might even have been yelling. Jill had her task and didn’t waver; all she had to do was run. So she did, a sword in each hand, and let the shadows of the forest devour her.

The noise she made—the breaking of branches, the crashing of foliage—sounded immense to her ears. She’d never be able to hide or escape, because the whole forest knew she was here. She only had one chance at this. The voices shouting after her seemed close, echoing all around her—surely surrounding her. But the pirates didn’t catch her.

When she traveled this path previously, she felt she’d been walking in circles. Now the way seemed clear. It was as if she’d walked in a fog before, but now the fog had lifted. Whatever Blane had done to keep wanderers from finding his camp was gone. Or maybe—she was the one who held his sword now. Maybe it was the sword.

And now it was Jill’s, and maybe it really could help her get home.

Whatever had happened to the metaphysical fog that made her lose her way when she passed through here last time, she still had to contend with the forest itself, its tangle of vegetation, crawling vines, and jutting branches. She couldn’t pick her way and choose her path; she just ran and shoved her way past obstacles, letting them claw and scratch at her. The wounds stung, a sheen of sweat covered her, and her whole body felt sticky. It was too hot to breathe. She expected that at any moment she’d hear a musket fire, and that Blane would be standing behind her, shooting her dead. She ran as if she could outrun the sound of gunfire.

“Hey! Oy there!” The shout came from off to her left; the speaker was hidden in shadow and foliage. Jill automatically veered away.

“Get her! She’s here!” another voice said, this one right in front of her, and she realized too late that she’d fallen for a trick, and the voices meant to steer her where they could best capture her. It probably didn’t matter where she ran now.

She kept on, shoving her way past shrubs and branches that seemed intent on catching her and holding her.