Page 206 of Golden Queen
I turned and parried, then danced across the floor striking invisible foes in all directions.
Once or twice, I glanced up at the doorway or the windows, expecting to see someone there laughing at me.
Look at the princess, playing at fighting, I imagined them saying.
I had almost no real fighting experience outside of training with Arkadian and sparring with Io—and punching the occasional drunken lordling in the nose…or stabbing the random fae in the heart, I added with an inward chuckle.
The humor didn’t hide the dart of pride that went through me that I had managed to sink a blade into the heart of a warrior like him.
I instinctively knew I was good. I saw it in Io's face when he watched me. It had been a surprise in the beginning, but that had quickly turned into a look of admiration.
I felt like I’d earned some of that admiration. I had worked hard at it—for years. The gods knew how much time I’d spent in the Albiyn training yard with my sword in my hand trying to make myself stronger.
I had always believed if my body was stronger, I would someday be able to get myself out of the cage I lived in—perhaps earn the respect of my future husband so that I might just be taken seriously as a queen.
Sweat had begun to gather on my head, plastering my curls to my temples and sticking my shirt to my chest.
Wishing I had thought to bring some of the water from the pitcher beside our bed, I used one of the folded towels by the door to dry the sweat from my head.
I looked again to be sure I wasn't observed before I ran the towel under my shirt, drying the sweat running down my chest and between my breasts. I had skipped wearing underclothes since I had even fewer of those to spare.
When I finished drying myself, I pushed one of the burlap sword dummies out into the middle of the room and moved in position to strike it.
I lifted Sangui, and as I did so, the world around me narrowed to a knife point.
Time slowed to a crawl. My muscles contracted powerfully, lending me a strength that shuddered through me with wild fury. My lungs filled with so much air that my mind grew calmer, refreshed, and ready—vitalized.
My vision sharpened. I surveyed the swing and the arc, knowing with absolute certainty where it would land—what the result of the strike would be—the force, the speed. I adjusted it, choosing a better hold, a better arc, adding more power to the blow—all within the span of a single heartbeat.
And then I followed through as time resumed again. My blade sailed through the dummy like it was made of nothing but air.
I nearly cried out triumphantly as I saw the evidence of what I had done.
My body was already preparing for the next move as I swung Sangui up, around, and down. My senses became like clear water, flowing through me so that my body and mind were some extension of my blade, telling each other how to react. The sword struck again, slicing the dummy in half once more.
I struck over and over, feeling not a single strain of exertion or fatigue. Every blow landed perfectly.
The sword gave me the ability to move with inhuman precision and speed, to strike with furious power, and the stamina to keep moving long after my breath should have been lost to exhaustion.
I eventually stopped—not because I had to, but because I had destroyed the training dummy. It lay on the floor in a thousand bits of canvas, sawdust, and splintered wood.
"Holy fucking shit that was amazing," came a voice on my right.
Damn it!
I reluctantly turned in the direction of the unfamiliar voice.
"You must be Aelia," said another. The voices were so similar I wouldn’t have realized there were two of them if I hadn’t been looking at them.
I smiled, sketching a ridiculous little bow. "At your service," I said to a set of twins. They were identical tall, lithe fae men with dark-brown hair falling around their shoulders.
“Ash and Ever, I presume,” I said.
Io had mentioned them a few times. They were part of his Vanguard.
“Atyourservice,” they both said in unison, bowing.
They wore identical black leather armor—straps and braces running across their shoulders and down their arms and legs.
