AelKennyr Rhiano
The drow attacks, and with a fierce joy, Nimros spreads his feet apart, as he has seen his teacher do, and raises the practice sword, his long, tapering fingers curling around the scarred hilt. His green eyes narrow and he stills his body, waiting, watching, and assessing the way the drow moves as he rushes forward. Watching not the blade nor feet of the warrior, but the eyes and the set of the shoulders. There! He thinks to himself, and with a loud cry, he spins his body about at the right time, and feels the press of the wind as the drow steps past him, unchecked. With the grace and fluidity of motion bequeathed to his race, Nimros delivers a hard blow against the back of the drow and dances back, out of reach. Too easy, he thinks, and he is right for the drow swings his blade low, and had Nimros been slower, the tendons on the back of his legs would have been cleanly severed.
His lips curl in a snarl, and he is rewarded with a flash of grudging respect in the drow’s eyes. “Dos inbal screus,” he says. He then feints and launches another attack.
The speed with which he bears down upon the elf is well known to Nimros now. But something has changed in the drow’s manner. Now the practices are in earnest. Now, should he fail to repel a blow, he will be seriously injured, even die. The threat of dying is not only frightening to the Teleri elf: it is physically arousing. He is seduced by the prospect of his own blood being spilled upon the practice sands, and the smell of blood from a wound on his teacher tightens things lower in the body and makes him lick his lips.
“You have learned,” the drow has just told him.
“Dos ph' kiel,” answers Nimros. “You are slow.” He meets the attack, turns aside the drow’s blade and with a well-aimed elbow, smashes the nose of the dark skinned teacher. Hot blood spatters him, and the grunt of pain from the drow brings a laugh from Nimros.
“Ol zhah draeval dos xun j'nesstren xund,” taunts the Teleri, deftly avoiding a fist and dropping to the floor, sticking out a leg and sweeping it under the drow’s feet to bring him down. “It is time you do women’s work,” he has told him.
The drow grunts as he hits the floor, but quickly he grabs Nimros’ foot and twists it. Pain shoots up Nimros’ leg and he screams in rage. Savagely, he uses the wooden sword as a club and beats at the drow until his foot is released. Only then does the elf spot the drow’s sword, not in his ham fisted hand, but on the ground where it landed when the drow fell. He has disarmed his teacher.
Slowly the grim faced, scarred warrior sits up, a hand going to the blood which is still gushing from his nose. He wipes at it with the back of the hand, looking from it to the elf a few feet away, rubbing at his swelling foot. He nods in the direction of the blade lying on the ground. “Ol zhah dossta. Dos inbal nezmuth ol. Nin dos orn kl'ae skikudis,” he says.
Nimros’ eyes widen. He does not understand all the words, but enough to know that his performance today has won him the right to use steel at the lessons. No more the wooden sword. He nods and points to himself, “Nimros.”
The drow grunts and then repeats, “Nimros. Dos malar saph ilythiiri dalhar. Drill dos orn screa.” Slowly, eyes locked upon the elf, the drow rises.
Nimros struggles to stand. He tries to put weight upon the foot, and bites his lip at the searing pain. He looks over to see the drow quietly staring at him. Drawing in a breath, he walks over to where the sword lay, refusing to limp or favor the injured foot. He bends over to retrieve the steel, never once turning his attention away from his teacher, snags the hilt and stands back up. “Thank you, “he murmurs in the common language.
The drow snorts. “No thanks,” he rasps. “You earn blade. I kill you if you cannot learn to keep blade.” Then the drow gives a feral smile. “And your bones I will break, suck the marrow.”
Nimros barks out laughter. Surviving and winning the sword a heady experience, his body taut. At this moment, he wanted to come back, find her naked and waiting for him, and surrender himself to the pleasures of flesh. But first he must walk back to the chamber, unaided. For he has come to learn that his teacher makes no idle threat. “I will learn to keep blade,” he tells the drow, “And I will learn the taste of drow marrow.” This earns him the laughter of the drow.
But as Nimros walks back to his room, the pain of the foot sharp and relenting, he wonders at how the marrow would taste upon his tongue.
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