Azure Mist's Arc

Chapter 3 of 7

Dawn came gray over the clearing. Azure faced the biting plant again. Jade watched from the cabin porch, arms crossed, saying nothing. Azure gripped both silver swords and studied the towering stems. Six jaws swayed above her. Tendrils coiled near the roots, waiting. She had touched the trunk once. She meant to do it clean this time. She rushed in low. A jaw snapped and missed. She spun right and cut. But the plant leaned right too, matching her. She spun left. A second jaw was already there. Azure kept moving the way she always moved, quick and small and close. The plant learned each step before she finished it. A tendril hooked her waist and yanked. She crashed against a stalk. Two more tendrils wrapped her arms and pinned her swords wide. A jaw lowered toward her face, teeth dripping. She kicked, twisted, screamed. The tendrils only squeezed tighter. One coiled around her top and ripped it half away as she thrashed. Her blades slipped from her hands and fell in the dirt. "Jade!" Azure shouted. Green light flashed across the clearing. Jade landed inside the tendrils, both swords already cutting. She sliced the vine at Azure's waist, then the two at her arms. Azure dropped free and grabbed her own blades from the ground. Jade stood back to back with her now, breathing steady. "You fought it the same way twice," Jade said. "It counts on that." "I tried something new every time," Azure said. "No. You changed the swing. Not the timing." Jade tapped her own chest. "Small and fast. Always small and fast. It knows your rhythm now." Azure looked at the plant. Every jaw tracked her, ready. She saw it then. Speed was the pattern. Not the move. She let her arms drop. She walked in slow. The plant hesitated, waiting for the burst that always came. A jaw struck early, guessing. Azure stepped aside without hurrying and let it pass. She stopped. She started again, slower still. The tendrils twitched, unsure where to grab. Then she broke. She dove full speed, faster than any step before it, under a jaw that lunged where she should have been. Her palm hit the trunk hard. She held it there. The jaws froze above her. The tendrils sank down and went still. Azure stood with her hand on the bark, chest heaving. Jade sheathed her green swords and almost smiled. "You slowed down to speed up," Jade said. "Good. That's one style. You have nine left." Azure pulled her torn top closed with one hand and picked up both silver blades with the other. Her one trick had died in the city. Her second habit had almost fed her to a plant. But she understood now what Jade meant to teach her. Not a move. A way to keep an enemy guessing. "Then show me the next one," Azure said.