Tarashana by Rachel Neumeier (little red riding hood ebook TXT) 📕

other taksu words. They are like tal, the word that means of the gods. Or the word for people, ila. Few other taksu words have that sound. Is there a different language Ugaro speak, or used to speak?”

That was an interesting question. I had no idea. I thought of other words and their sounds and said finally, “I think for that you should ask a poet, Suyet. There is a word for luck, donal, that is like that too, and a word for death, kala. A poet might know a tale that explains something about that.” Behind me, I could hear Tano struggling to explain some of what I had said. His darau was not good yet, but I noticed that he did not flinch when Geras corrected his choice of words or his manner of speaking.

We camped that evening by one of the shallow ponds left by the shiral. We were short a tent now, having lost one to the storm. The Lau, less comfortable sleeping beneath the sky, sorted this out as they saw fit. Not entirely to my surprise, Suyet went to Lalani’s tent, giving Aras more space in the bigger tent, with only Geras to share that one. I laid my blanket by the fire with everyone else.

“Is Suyet her husband?” Bara asked me. “I had not realized.”

I said, “Lau customs are not exactly like Ugaro customs.”

After a short silence, Rakasa said, “I am certain that Ugaro need not express any opinion regarding Lau customs, but now we are all curious, Ryo.”

By now we had traveled together long enough that I thought I could risk explaining, especially as Rakasa had declared so firmly that no one would express offense.

“Remarkable ... though of course I have no opinion,” Bara said, when I had explained dowries, and their importance, and talon wives, and how the failure of a dowry might bring a woman into an army in that way. “Or perhaps one opinion, if you will permit me to say so. When we come to your mother’s camp, perhaps Lalani should speak to your mother before she raises up her own tent.”

“No one could disagree with that opinion,” I agreed.

The night was calm, as generally happens after the shiral passes, and we delayed in that place long into the next morning to give the horses more time to rest and graze. As that would take some time, I took Tano away from the rest to spar, but I asked Geras to come too. Tano did not like that, though he did not say so. I pretended not to notice. I asked Geras to sit and watch, and then I made Tano spar with me. He did very badly, even worse than the other time, which I had expected. When I gave him an opening, he stepped back without even noticing he did it.

“Stop,” I said. He stopped in surprise, lowering his sword—another bad habit. I said nothing of that. I said, “Watch me,” and then went again through exactly the same moves I had just used in sparring, this time against no opponent at all, only the empty air. I gave the same opening I had before and stopped, and looked at Tano.

“Yes,” he said. He was embarrassed and ashamed and trying not to show that.

“Again,” I said. “Exactly the same. This time take that opening.”

This time he managed it. He was slow, but he stepped forward instead of back, and he took the opening I gave him.

“Again. Much harder.”

That time it was better. I said, “If your blade had been sharp, that blow would have cut me badly. Your sword might have turned against my ribs, so I might have killed you anyway. Lower would be better. Again.” This time I did not let him stop, but pressed him carefully. I gave him another opening, a different kind, and he stepped back again.

This time he knew what he had done. The color came up hot into his face and he threw down his sword.

“No,” I told him. “Pick it up. Anger is useful to a warrior, but that kind of temper will make a warrior careless and stupid.” My brother had told me that more than once before I had learned the lesson. He had had to beat me for that fault to make me listen to him.

I would not have to beat Tano. He listened to me better than I had listened to Garoyo. He was breathing hard from anger and shame, but he knelt and bowed to show he accepted the correction. Then he picked up his sword and stood up again, put on a polite, attentive expression and looked at me, waiting.

Geras cleared his throat. “Got an idea,” he said in darau. He picked up his own practice sword, still sheathed, and came to stand behind Tano. “Try it now,” he told me.

“So,” I acknowledged, and nodded to Tano to begin.

At first it was the same again. He was clumsy and slow, and when I gave him an opening he should take, he began to step back. Geras held out his sheathed sword and tapped him on the back, and he stumbled. I waited for him to recover. “Go forward,” Geras said to him in slow taksu. “Forward, not back. Close, not far.” To me he said, “Go on. He needs to learn better, right now, right this minute. He’ll do better as soon as he sees he can do better.”

Every time Tano started to step back when he should not, Geras rapped him lightly across the back with his sheathed sword. Twice Geras told me to stop and showed him something: a better way to stop me from getting through his guard to cut his forearm, and then again, a way to push my sword aside with the hilt of his in order to open the way for a knife. Tano