Thalia Thornbreak's Arc

Chapter 4 of 9

By dawn Thalia and Marcus had not gone far. She stood in the ruined hall and turned her jeweled sword over in her hands. The amethyst in the hilt caught the morning light. Her parents already knew she meant to fight. The written objection had reached them a day early. That meant they had a day to act. She pictured a guard on horseback riding to drag her home before she could earn a single deed. "They'll send someone," she said. "Soon. If I'm caught before I prove myself, I'm just a runaway." Marcus leaned against a cracked pillar, chewing a strip of dried meat. He did not look worried. "Then don't get caught," he said. "Or better, don't be worth catching easily." He nodded at her blade. "You hold that like a scepter, not a weapon. A hunter can see it. A soldier will too." The words stung because they were true. She had carried the sword for show. She raised it now and swung at the air. The motion was slow and wide. Marcus set down his food. "Give me an hour. If riders come, you'll want to answer them yourself, not hide behind me." He pulled a plain knife and stepped into the light beneath the wisteria trees that grew through the broken roof. Purple blossoms hung low over the stone. "Feet apart. Weight down. Stop reaching. Let them come to you." She copied him. He knocked her blade aside with the flat of his knife. She stumbled. He did it again. "Again," he said. Each time she caught herself faster. Her arm learned the weight. The graceful princess grip became a fighter's grip. Sweat ran down her back. Petals fell around their boots. Midmorning, hoofbeats sounded outside. Thalia froze. A single rider in her house colors reined up at the doorway. He was armored, older, sure of himself. "Princess," he called. "Your father sends me. You come home now. The others are a half day behind me." Thalia stepped into the doorway. She did not lower the sword. "You rode ahead of them?" "To spare you the shame of a crowd." He dismounted and reached for her arm. She moved the way Marcus had drilled. She turned her shoulder, slid past his grip, and set the point of her blade at his chest. Her feet held. Her hand did not shake. The rider went still. "Tell my father I will come to the coronation on my own feet," she said. "With something to show. Not dragged." He measured her, then the steadiness of the blade. He stepped back and mounted. "I'll tell him what I saw," he said, and rode off the way he came. Thalia lowered the sword. Her arm ached. But she had turned the first rider away, and bought herself the half day before the rest arrived. Now she had to use it.