Read Darkthunder's Way for Free Online

too. “Have I told you as much?”
    “No, but you have souls; you can have kids and be injured. Even die, if you do it right.”
    “Which proves nothing except how limited are your kind’s notions of life and death. But that is not the matter of this meeting.”
    David bit his lip and frowned. There was no use putting it off any longer. “Okay, so what do you want with me?”
    In reply, Nuada reached to his golden belt, unhooked two plain, cross-hilted swords, and held one out in either hand. Fionchadd claimed one immediately; and at his nod David reluctantly took the other.
    “I sense misgivings,” the Faery said, as David backed away. “Yet you yourself once agreed that it would be worth your while to learn something of weapons-work.”
    “I wasn’t expecting it quite so soon, though,” David replied, relieved to discover that Silverhand’s mysterious summons held no more ominous portent. “I kinda thought we were talking in abstracts.”
    “Ah, but it is never wise to expect anything of the Sidhe,” Oisin said, chuckling. “They pride themselves on being unpredictable.”
    “Yeah, tell me about it, man.”
    “But you should consider yourself honored,” Fionchadd teased. “You are to have the best master in all of Tir-Nan-Og; for who better to instruct in weapons-work than the Warlord of the High King himself?”
    “And to observe than Oisin,” Nuada added.
    “But he’s blind!” David protested before he could stop himself.
    “So much the better,” Nuada said calmly, “for eyes can be deceived. But Oisin can tell how blows fly, where they land, and with how much effort; all from the pitch of parting air and the sound and rate of your breathing.”
    “Uh, speaking of blows,” David interrupted, surveying his scantily-clad body, “shouldn’t we be wearing, like, armor , or something? I’ve got some back in the boat Morwyn gave me.”
    Nuada shook his head, though his eyes glittered briefly. “Armor is only as good as the body it protects. For a master, there is no need. Besides, there is a special quality to these weapons.”
    David raised a dubious eyebrow.
    “When they bite flesh they do no damage.”
    “Well that’s just great ,” he muttered, with heavy sarcasm.
    “That does not mean there will be no pain,” Nuada went on obliviously. “For pain is a necessary thing for a man to learn. But the blows will do no lasting harm.”
    David glared at him askance. “How much pain?”
    “Enough that you will avoid it, enough that you will remember.”
    “But Finno’ll chop me to ribbons!”
    “Of course he will. Yet he too has things to learn.”
    “And we’d best be at it,” Fionchadd said, laughing, grabbing David by the arm. “Otherwise this cowardly human will surely talk away his lesson.”
    “There is always time in Faerie,” Oisin noted, “though sometimes less than others.”
    “I don’t know about this,” David grumbled, as Fionchadd led him to the center of the stone circle. He felt rather like a sacrifice about to be made at some Druidic rite, and found himself wondering who had built this enclosure.
    “You are not required to be good,” Nuada told him, when they had taken their places. “And truly you will never be as accomplished as the least of the Sidhe; but you might find a basic competency very useful.”
    “Yeah, sure,” as he faced Fionchadd.
    “The first thing you have to learn is how to stand,” Nuada told him. “And since you will not be using shields, you must stand to present as little target as possible. Observe how Fionchadd does it.”
    David did, or attempted to. The Faery boy faced him side-on, left leg leading, the sword in his right hand and poised horizontally above his shoulders so that blows might be delivered with the full force of the body behind them. That much, at least, David thought he could manage, so he copied the pose.
    Nuada frowned and strode forward, made minute adjustments on David’s posture, then frowned once more.