The Treason Blade (Battle for Alsaar Book 1) by Jenny Rebecca Keech Page A

side.
Traevyn fell backward. He rolled with the blow and was back on his feet and
balanced within seconds. Ishar smiled. He was good.
    Ishar
launched herself forward, her body angled to avoid a frontal blow as she
slashed inward with her left hand and held her right blade in a block position
that quickly turned into a downward thrust. The move required that Traevyn
respond to both attacks simultaneously. She wanted to test his reflexes.
Traevyn blocked the left blow and stopped the right downward thrust. He moved
quickly, sliding his right leg behind her right and shoving forward, driving
her backwards and down.
    Ishar felt
the loss of balance and realized that she was going backwards only a second
before she felt the shift of his weight coming down with her. Oh no, you will not, she thought,
falling backward and rolling immediately to gain a space between their bodies
and throw him off balance. She was ready for him as his weight fell on top of
her. Her feet caught his chest and with the rolling motion of her body, she
managed to throw him over and behind. She wasted no time. Her body’s recoil
from the throw brought her to her feet and she twirled and faced her opponent.
They both still carried their blades.
    Therein lay
the art. It was one thing to grapple. It was another to fight blade to blade.
The combining perfection was achieved when one could grapple and the blades
become a part of your appendage, an extension of your arm and hand. A part of you that could not be put away.
    Traevyn was
back on his feet. He settled back into a fighting stance, looked at her and
frowned. Ishar’s smile widened. Good. His moves turned wary with the sense that
an ending to this fight might not be as quick as he thought. They begin to
circle each other, guardedly, looking for a weakness to exploit. Ishar lost
track of time as first one, then the other sought to gain superiority in the
match. Traevyn was her opponent. He was everything at this moment. There was
nothing else. In battle, she would slide this focus back a fraction, but for
now, Traevyn filled her world.
    Ishar
recognized that time had passed by the fact that both she and Traevyn were
drenched in sweat and the daggers had grown dangerously slippery. A rational
part of her warned her that they should call off the match. Each had obviously
proved their ability to go toe to toe with the blades. But the ingraining of
her father’s training to never give up to a still advancing opponent prevented
that. She put her focus back on the fight and realized she had allowed her body
to tense. Ishar forced her shoulders to relax, then worked her way down the muscles of her body even as she continued to circle
Traevyn. She studied his movements for weakness.
    He lunged
inward, trying to use his body to overwhelm her and trap her blades at the same
time. It was a dangerous move. Traevyn had assumed she was exhausted, too
exhausted to react or stop him. The dangerous part was the four blades that
were now between their two bodies. The only way to truly prevent a cut was to
allow Traevyn to trap her. Ishar balked at the thought. She would rather risk a
cut than allow such a simple defeat. She reacted instinctively and brought a
knee up between their bodies even as she slid her elbow up and drove it up and
back. Traevyn’s head snapped back from the blow and Ishar felt one of his
blades skim across her armor right before hot pain sliced down her lower arm as
Traevyn was driven backward and to the ground.
    Ishar held
back the sudden urge to spin and finish him with a kick to the throat. It was a
good thing. She doubted he would have blocked. Traevyn lay on the ground,
still. For a second Ishar wondered if her blow had been stronger than intended.
Then she saw that he was staring at his blade that now dripped red with blood.
He glanced back at her and his eyes dropped to her arm. He was on his feet and
by her side the next second.
    “You little
fool,” he hissed. “You would rather risk a