The Killing Moon (Dreamblood #1)(9)

Could the urge to grind his opponents’ faces into the sand truly be a blessing? Nijiri grinned. He would meditate upon it later.

Sentinel Mekhi glanced at Sentinel Andat, his kohled eyes narrowing in amusement. “I think perhaps Acolyte Nijiri wants peace, pathbrother.”

“Hmm,” said Andat. He was grinning as well, turning his fighting stick in the fingers of one hand with careless expertise. “I think perhaps Acolyte Nijiri wants pain. I suppose there’s a kind of peace in that.”

“Share it with me, Brothers,” Nijiri breathed, crouching low and ready. With that, they came at him.

He did not wait for their sticks. No one could deflect, or endure, blows from four armed Sentinels. Instead he dropped low, presenting a smaller target and slipping beneath the zone of their fastest response. They were fast enough with their feet, though, and he only just dodged Sentinel Harakha’s sweeping kick by rolling over it. This, thankfully, put him outside the Sentinels’ circle and forced them to turn. That gave him a precious half-breath in which to formulate a strategy.

Harakha. As the youngest of the four, he had yet to develop a Sentinel’s proper serenity. He was dangerous; any Sentinel who survived his apprenticeship was dangerous. But Nijiri had observed Harakha in sparring matches several times, and noted that whenever his blows were deflected, he tended to flail for an instant before recovering, as if shocked by his failure.

So Nijiri swept at Harakha’s ankles with first one leg and then the other, rolling on his forearms to execute the sweeps again and again, forcing Harakha to dance back. The other Sentinels quickly altered their formation to avoid Nijiri’s whirling legs and to keep from tripping over each other—just as Nijiri had hoped. Then, when Harakha grew justifiably annoyed and angled a stabbing strike at Nijiri’s head, Nijiri closed his legs and rolled—toward Harakha. This brought him under Harakha’s stick; the tip struck the ground beyond Nijiri and lodged, just for an instant, in the sand. At this Nijiri kicked up, aiming for Harakha’s hand. He did not score, for Harakha realized what he was doing at the last instant and jerked back, retaliating with a furious kick that Nijiri bore with a grunt as he rolled away. A small pain-price to pay, for he had achieved his goal: Harakha stumbled back a step more, overcompensating in typical fashion for the fact that he’d almost lost his weapon. This forced the other three Sentinels to move more, gracelessly, to avoid their clumsy younger brother.

Distraction was a Gatherer’s beloved friend. Rolling to his hands and toes, Nijiri darted forward and slapped his hand against Mekhi’s calf. It was hard to find the soul from a limb, and harder for Nijiri to cool his thoughts enough for narcomancy, but perhaps—

Mekhi stumbled and fell to the ground, groaning. He was only groggy, but from an awake, aware man whose blood was fired for battle, Nijiri could expect nothing better. When Mekhi went down, however, Harakha hissed and nearly tripped over Mekhi’s stick. Nijiri rose behind him like a shadow, and too late Harakha realized the danger. By that point Nijiri had touched two fingers to the nape of his neck, sending dreambile coursing along his spine like cold water to numb everything it touched. Harakha was unconscious even as his body whipped around. He kept spinning until he hit the ground, hard enough that he would no doubt curse Nijiri for his bruises when he woke.

Delighted, Nijiri rounded on Mekhi, who was trying to stumble away until his sleep-mazed mind could clear. Forking his fingers and humming the song of his jungissa, Nijiri lunged after him—

—Only to halt, statue-still, as the tip of a stick came to hover before his face. Another stick, light as the touch of a lover, came to rest on the small of his back.

It was only a sparring match, he reminded himself in an effort to summon calm. (It did not come.) Only a test… but he had seen Sentinels impale men using sheer strength and angles to make their blunt sticks sharp as glass-tipped spears. And Andat liked to leave flesh wounds whenever he felt Nijiri had not fought to his fullest effort, as an encouragement to greater diligence.

“Good,” said Andat, who held the stick to his face. That meant the one behind him was Sentinel Inefer. He had bested two, but been caught by the two most experienced. Had that been enough to pass the test? I should have left Mekhi; he was no threat. Should have gotten one of the others first, should have—

“Very good,” Andat amended, and with relief Nijiri realized the man was truly pleased. “Two of us, with you unarmed and all of us ready? I would have been satisfied if you’d gotten one.”

“It would’ve been Harakha, regardless,” said Inefer behind Nijiri, sounding disgusted. “Blundering, peaceless fool.”

“We’ll drill him until he learns better,” Andat said easily, and in spite of himself Nijiri grimaced in sympathy.

Nijiri felt Inefer’s stick leave his back. “Other matters take precedence for now,” Andat said, looking up at the balcony that overhung the sparring circle. Nijiri followed Andat’s gaze and tensed in fresh dread, for there, gazing down at them with a wry expression, stood the Superior of the Hetawa. Beside the Superior stood two men in sleeveless, hooded robes of loose off-white linen. He could see nothing of their faces, and the angle was wrong to glimpse their shoulder tattoos, but he knew their builds well enough to guess which was which—and which, since a third man should have been among them, was missing.

Suppressing a frown, Nijiri got to his feet so that he could raise his hands in proper salute toward his brethren.