Years of thousands of shuffling feet had worn away any memory of grass here in the sparring grounds. Carnhain’s light boots, not his heavy cavalry boots, didn’t even leave prints on the packed earth despite the rain from yesterday night. Other than the boots, he wore only looser black breeches- “looser” being the operative word as they were being compared against his generally scandalously tight breeches.

 

Carnhain smirked as his pupil walked up. Kiarma Speren was taller, probably stronger and quite honestly more masculine which cut an ironic contrast to the pretty-boy cavalryman. They knew each other from the episode in Caemlyn and despite the events there still found it amusing when she had been forced into a dress.

 

“Good morning Kiarma, you look beautiful this morning.” he grinned at her glare. “I see you brought your sword. Good. Drop it. First things first: footwork.” Besides the broadsword at his belt, today he also wore a whip despite knowing little of how to use the thing in battle. But neither would be of use immediately- unless he intended to chop off one of her limbs which he doubted would please Mehrin.

 

“Now, you know the basic steps: advance- a step forward with your leading foot and trailing behind with your left, retreat- same thing backwards, crossover- please don’t trip yourself, disengage- if you skin your knuckles it’s your fault.

 

“I’m going to strike out at you and without your sword you must avoid being hit using only the basic movements for now. I’ll start out slow.” That was all the warning she got before he brought a dulled broadsword down towards her head.

Kiarma was eager to train. She had awoken early in her excitment, not even caring that she was to be trained by that pretty-boy Carnhain. That man was insufferably rude, to be sure, but there was no denying he had much he could teach her. So long as he kept his mouth shut about that dress wearing episode, she wouldn't attempt to punch his face in.

 

 

“Good morning Kiarma, you look beautiful this morning.”Kiarma silenced her greeting before it could come out of her lips, replacing it instead with a glare. Insolent buffoon. It was not that she resented being called beautiful so much, she had heard it enough, she just hated that men seemed to think that was all she was - an empty head and a pretty face. And Carnhain knew full well her opinions on the manner, hence the rude glare.

 

"Argh!" Kiarma just managed to duck under the sword, earning a glancing blow to her shoulder for her efforts. She growled at Carnhain. So much for warning her. Still he was true to his word, each swing was rather slow, giving Kiarma ample time to step away from the swing of the blade, the first hit to the shoulder the only one she sustained. Until he decided to up the speed without warning. Kiarma grunted in pain and rubbed her arm, though she refused to give Carnhain the satisfaction of complaint. No doubt he assumed she was a weak little female, like most of the other men did. Ha! She would see him cry long before she admitted defeat.

 

Licking her lip, Kiarma watched Carnhain carefully as the blade swung at her again. Deftly she retreated, the sword slashing at the air in front of her. A quick crossover avoided the next blow, a retreat once more...and a wicked idea came to her mind. The next time Carnhain lunged with his sword, Kiarma sidestepped, before lunging forward and rapping the blonde man playfully on the head with her knuckles. "I believe I am a better dancer than you, pretty-boy. Care to teach me to fight?" Her stance was arrogant and her grin impish as she tossed her braid back over her shoulder.

 

 

Kiarma

Carnhain barked a laugh. “You wish to take up dancing, Kiarma? Hmm… I didn’t think you were one to give up the sword so easily after only two hits! Well, well, you liked that dress more than you were letting on eh?” She was glaring positively murderously at him which only made his smile the harder. “Oh, so you do want to learn to fight? I suppose we’ll step up the difficulty then.”

 

Dropping the lathe, he replaced it with the bullwhip he had brought, smiling all the while. “Now let’s see how you fare against a more difficult weapon. Don’t retrain yourself to the “classical” steps and feel free too attempt to show off.” he dared her.

 

ooc: this is short, but I can’t write anything more for this part until your next post. Go ahead and write up a bunch of fancy moves that Kiarma uses but if she tries anything too fancy, Carnhain’ll just hit her butt with the whip.