Jumping ahead a few years, and more words, because you can't rush moments like this.
500 words - do they call this a quintuple-drabble? They should.
Lesson
The sharp iron bounces harmlessly from the butt-end of a log for the fifth time, and she growls in frustration. Three years on a farm and proficiency at this task still eludes her. At his derisive snort she straightens, stiff, and glares in his direction. She hadn't known he was there.
"You're going to chop your own foot off," he predicts, and she glowers at him, shifting the maul in her hands as though considering alternative uses for it.
"I'm not the one who went out fishing this morning without checking to see if there was enough firewood for the day," she hisses at him petulantly, "so maybe certain people should keep their advice to themselves, or else try to be useful for once."
He flushes, grins sheepish, and is at her side in a few long strides. "Here, give me that."
"No." She pushes away his outstretched hand, irritated with him for never taking her anger seriously; with herself, for how his smile disarms her. "Don't do it for me. Just show me how to do it right."
"Fine." He demonstrates. "Stand with your feet apart more. Now, spread your hands further out on the handle. When you swing, let the weight do the work, not your arms."
She is all awkward limbs and unfamiliar movement; metal bites mere splinters into the log. She filters an angry screech through her teeth.
"No, no, no." He's not quite successful at biting back laughter, but before she can blast him with the brunt of her outrage he's stepped around her, gripped the maul handle from behind. She's pinned in the space between his arms, her back firm against his chest and Llyr, when did he get that much taller than she? "Look, like this," and he covers her hands with his, shakes them loose of their abruptly convulsive grip on the handle, and slides them into the proper position.
"Now," he orders, into her ear, "keep your eye on where you want to strike, and swing it this way." His arms bend and straighten and his body sways like a sapling, taking her along with him; iron cuts through air; wood slides through hands; a rippling crack; stillness. She barely sees the log fall away in two halves. She's too busy remembering to breathe.
It's difficult, because he hasn't yet let go.
"Think you can do it now?" There's a note of teasing in his voice, but if she turns her head to see his expression…she mutters "yes", thickly, though it's a lie because she has no idea what just happened.
"Are you sure?" His breath tickles her ear. "I can show you again."
She throws him off, shoves the maul into his hands, and ignores how cold her back feels without him. "No. You can finish."
His eyes laugh green as he protests, "I thought you wanted to-"
"Never mind." She turns; storms back to the cottage.
Because he'd never let her forget it if he saw her smiling.