Page 58 of A Liar's Twisted Tongue

I drop the spatha to my side, one of its edges poking into the floor. It’s a real pretty thing. The hilt between the two blades is silver—real silver—and there are blue stones engraved where the handle meets the blade. Which is pretty pointless, if you ask me. You’re using it to injure someone, not put on a show. But if Damien’s dagger could get a bottle of rena, I wonder what this could manage.

“Pick it up,” he groans and walks to me, readjusting my hands on the hilt until it actually feels comfortable in my hand. Then he pulls his sword from his waist. “Alright, sweetheart. Swing.”

I do as he asks, swinging again and again, but even droozed, he blocks my hits like they’re not worth his time. With my blade struggling against his, he flips his down, fast and precise, and my sword falls from my hands.

“What are you? Scared of hurting me?” He assesses me like I’m a book that’s so easily read. “Come on now.”

“Trust me,” I pick up my sword, “the last thing I’m scared of is hurting you.”

But am I? It was only a few days ago that I started a fire. That I felt the exact sensation I felt when I murdered two Folk. It was awful.

It was power.

Leiholan lazily taps his blade to my chest and keeps it there. “The weapon’s not a weapon. It’s an extension of you. Prove it.”

I knock his blade away with my own, and then I swing again. Yeah, maybe I’m scared of hurting someone, but I’m not scared of hurting him. A Nepenthe deserves it. I bring my sword back down on him, and I get another lovely speculation.

“You’re predictable.”

I don’t have time for his babbling. I swing, and he knocks my sword almost out of my hand, but I flip it around in time, raising the other end of my dual blade. Again, and our swords are locked in battle, each taunting the other with the threat of losing.

Leiholan, much to my annoyance, continues, “You always step with your left foot before you swing to the right, which is your most preferred move.” Then my sword is knocked from my hand and to the ground. He says, matter-of-factly, “It makes you predictable.”

Not all of us can slip off out of life with a bottle of vesi and a habit of annoying his students.

“And you step back before you swing. Every time. Predictable. But I still can’t seem to beat you.” I pick up my sword. “Predictability isn’t the problem.”

Leiholan laughs. “Okay, sweetheart. Let’s try again, and this time you tell me the problem.”

He must enjoy pushing my buttons.

I hate the Nepenthe.

Three fights and zero wins later, I try to leave but Leiholan stops me. “You have a better eye than I thought.”

“Guess you should scrap whatever else you thought. Or maybe not, seeing as I’m so predictable.”

“I was trying to give you a compliment.”

“Well, I didn’t ask for one.”

“My Gods, Desdemona. If you could be a nice person for just,” he raises his thumb and middle finger, holding them close, “a second of your time, you’d get a lot further than you think!”

“That’s rich,” I say, my voice deep with humor.

“I already know where you’re going with that, and I don’t want to hear it.” He shakes his head and crosses his arms. What? He’s really just… giving up?

“How would you know anything? Right, right! I’m sorry I forgot, I’m predictable.”

Leiholan just looks me in the eye, shaking his head slowly. “Because I know you, sweetheart, much to my distaste.” His voice is laced with the venom that he holds in his teeth. He scoffs. “I may be droozed most of the time, but all I do is help you, and all you do is bite me.”

I laugh bitterly. “Then why do you insist on helping me?” I start listing all of my less-than-pleasant qualities he’s bestowed upon me on my fingers. “I’m insufferable, distasteful, unlikeable, predictable. Is there anything else you want to add?” I shout.

He sucks in his cheeks and I can see the indentations of his fangs, reminding me of what he is, what he does. But his words sound the opposite of menacing when he speaks. “I’ve been where you are.”

I think of my mom, trapped and probably tortured. Then I have to stop myself from thinking. I look him in the eye and I say, “Doubtful” and am ready to leave when I remember that there was something I needed his help with. I watch him take a long pull from his bottle of vesi.

Is he right? I’m about to ask for his help, again. Did I not just bite him before?

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