Dies the Fire

"Stumps you mentioned. We're not short of them, and pie plates we could probably manage too," Havel said.

Then he drew his first shot. The bow's draw-weight was eighty pounds, but with the pulleys he only had to exert that much effort at the middle of the draw. It fell away to less than forty when his right hand was back by the angle of his jaw, and he brought the sighting pin down on the middle of the man-figure's chest…

Whffft!

There was something rather satisfying about it; particularly this time, since he'd come near the target, at least.

Someday I'll actually hit it.

"You're releasing a bit rough," Signe said. "Remember to just let the string fall off the balls of your fingers-"

They worked at it for half an hour; when he stopped he worked his arms and shoulders ruefully. "This must use muscles I don't usually put much weight on," he said.

"You're making progress," Signe replied. "Any more today and you'd get shaky."

He nodded. "After a certain point you lose more than you gain," he agreed.

"And you don't mind learning from a girl; I like that."

A corner of Havel's mouth quirked up. "I'm not an eighteen-year-old boy," he said.

Their eyes went to the flatbed. Eric was standing with an air of martyred patience, holding something on the anvil with a pair of pincers while Hutton hit it two-handed with a sledgehammer; Ken Larsson observed, a measuring compass and a piece of paper in his hand.

The ting… tang… chink! sound echoed back from the steep slopes, fading out across'the white noise of the brawling river.

"And I'm not an idiot either, if there's a difference," Havel went on.

This time Signe laughed out loud, probably for the first time in a few days.

"Knives?" he said briskly.

She nodded eagerly. They walked over towards the tree where the mule deer was hanging.

They'd wrapped it in sacking, but there weren't many flies this early in the year. He went to the tie-off on the tree trunk and lowered the carcass from bear-avoidance distance from the ground until the gutted torso was at a convenient height.

Signe watched, a little puzzled, but eagerly caught one of the wooden knives he'd whittled. She fell into the stance he'd showed her, right leg slightly advanced, left hand open and that forearm at an angle across her chest. The knife she held a bit out and low, point angled up and her thumb on the back of the blade.

Havel took an identical stance. "Now, what are we both doing wrong?" he said.

She shook her head, wincing a bit as she bit her lip in puzzlement; it was still swollen and sore.

"We're about to fight a knife duel," he said. "Which means that one of us is going to die and the other's going to get cut up real bad, get killed too or crippled or at least spend months recovering. Yeah, I'm going to teach you how to do that kind of a knife fight, eventually, but it's a last resort unless the other guy's truly clueless. I was real glad not to have to go mano a mano back there."

He switched the grip on his knife, holding it with the thumb on the pommel and the blade sticking out of his fist, the cutting edge outward.

"First let me show you something. Grab my knife wrist and hold me off."

She tucked the wooden blade into her belt and intercepted his slow backhand stab towards her throat. He pushed, using his weight and the strength of his arm and shoulders; Signe stumbled backward, struck the trunk of the tree and grimaced as the point came inexorably towards her throat. Suddenly her knee flashed up, but he'd been expecting that; he caught it on his thigh and pressed the wooden knife still closer.

"Halt!" he said, stepping back; he was breathing deeply, she panting. "OK, you're what… five-eight? Hundred and forty-five?"

"Five-eight and a half," she said. "One-forty-four, but I think I've lost some since the Change."

"Probably," he said. "Right, so you're a big girl, tall as most men, and as heavy as some; which means you've got plenty of reach, and there's no reason you can't get real fast-you've got good coordination and reflexes already, from sports."

"But?" she said.

He nodded. "But most men, even ones a bit shorter or lighter, are going to have stronger grips, and more muscle on their arms and shoulders. Speed matters, reach matters, skill and attitude matter a lot, but raw strength does too in any sort of close combat, especially hand-to-hand."

"So what do I do?" she said tightly.

"Don't arm wrestle 'em and don't get into pushing matches. Your brother has reach and weight on me; he's nearly as strong as I am and he'll be stronger when he's a couple of years older. I could still whup his ass one-on-one-in fact, I did. Take the same grip on your knife as I did and come at me; give it everything you've got."

She did-and stabbed a lot faster than he had, as well. He let her wrist smack into his right hand, and squeezed tightly enough to lock them together. Then he let her shove him back; she was strong for her size, especially in the legs.

As they neared the tree, he snapped his torso around and push-pulled on the hand that held the wooden knife, body-checking her as her own momentum drove her towards him. Then he bunched his knuckles into a ridge and punched her-lightly-right under the short ribs while she staggered off-balance.

"Oooff!" she said; but she made a recovery, coming up to guard position again.

"See, what I did there was redirect you instead of pushing back. That takes strength, but not as much as the other guy's. You just have to be strong enough. See the point?"

"Yes," she said slowly, nodding. "I think I do, Mike. You mean a woman needs a different fighting style?"

"Right; a woman, or a smaller man. I'll have Will do up some weights for you-and Lua

He went over to the hanging deer carcass. "I used to use a pig carcass for this, back on my folks' place when I was a kid. They're better, because they're more like a man in size and where the organs are, but this'll do. Doesn't matter if we mess it up, since it's going into the stewpot. Go round the other side and hold on-hold it steady-put your shoulder to it."

He drew his puukko and took a deep breath. Then he attacked, stabbing in a blur of motion, the carcass jerking to the force of the impacts. The steel made a wet smacking sound as it clove the dead flesh, ten strikes in half as many seconds.

When he stopped, Signe's face had gone white again, shocked by the speed and power of the blows she felt thudding through the body of the deer. She swallowed and pressed her hands together for a moment before straightening up.

Havel nodded approval. "That's how you win a knife fight; you don't let it get started. Take him by surprise, from the back, or just get all over him before he can get set and kill the fucker before he realizes he's dying. OK, get your knife out and I'll hold the carcass."

He did, switching positions, although he gripped it at arm's length as she drew the bandit's long blade.

"We'll start slow. You've got to get real precise control on where the point and edge go, and get used to the feel of it hitting meat, and feel why it's a bad idea to turn it on a bone. He who hesitates is bossed, remember."

Excellent focus, he thought, twenty minutes later.

She was streaming sweat, and there were shreds of deer-flesh on her knife-hand and spattered across other bits of her, but she was boring in without flinching, eyes narrowed and seeing nothing else.