A/N: Here goes the next chapter! Thanks for all the positive reviews of the previous ones, never had the opportunity to tell you, I really like them, and I'm taking them into consideration, rewriting some chapters for you. :)

Chapter eight: Training

When Tristan's horse reached the trail of the caravan, the Knight stopped his mare and turned around on his saddle, handing Leera the tunic she had left to rot on the frozen ground.

She locked her fierce gaze on his, refusing to cover her body again.

But his eyes told otherwise. "No." And she understood everything he meant by it. Not now. In time. I know who you are, and I am not afraid.

Slowly, as if to mean she still wasn't happy about it, Leera outstretched a hand and took the piece of cotton, passing it over her head. Only her hands were bare now. And it didn't seem to bother Tristan, even though her tattoos seemed to scream at the sky.

As they both reached the point where half the caravan had stopped in woods for the night, Leera jumped off the horse and came to sit by Lucan, who had awoken during her absence.

Two brown eyes locked on hers, widening through the fever.

"Leera?"

The young woman smiled softly and stroked her cousin's hair. It stroke her at that moment that her own severed hair would be a hell for his young eyes. It had been so long.

But two small and underfed limbs soon wrapped themselves around her neck and, bringing her close, Lucan hugged Leera.

"I thought you were dead, little one." Allowing her fears to show, Leera kept her eyes dry, but still shook inside. She kept the young boy against her heart for long minutes. "I thought I had lost you."

Lucan pulled back and looked into his cousin's eyes, his glassy but no tears showing behind his eyelids. "I thought you had forgotten about me."

She chuckled and shook her head vigorously. "Never. I would never have forgotten you. I searched for you and your father for long weeks until the tracks disappeared. I grieved. Both of you."

The young one before her seemed to understand she had been pained, and nodded calmly.

Lucan was only half-Woad, by his mother. His father, a Briton, had had to raise him alone after his wife died in childbirth. Leera had been the closest to a sister he had ever had, even though she only visited them rarely.

But half of his blood knew her nature. And a Woad's nature was not to weep.

"I am glad you found me." And with a last hug, Lucan laid back onto his furry covers, and closed his young eyes.

Leera looked up and met Dagonet's kind gaze, which was watching the little thing try to sleep. She found it appropriate, that Lucan would have found a father figure in the giant. He was the Knight she would trust with her life, no matter what.

"Dagonet?" The giant's eyes met hers. She placed the back of her hand on her chest and bowed a little. "Thank you."

He bowed in response, and Leera got up, peacefully walking towards the tent where Guinevere was getting bathed by the landlady, Fulcinia.

Merlin's daughter wasn't in the mood to talk, and neither was she, so she soon escaped the place after a quick wash, taking her bow and quiver and settling in a far set of woods, alone enough to permit her to practise.

After her third arrow touched the centre of the aim, Leera turned around. She had been aware Tristan had been there all along, but only acknowledged his presence at that moment.

The Knight looked at her aim. Taking another bite at the apple he was eating, he settled his sword down against a tree, and chose two branches long enough to pass as blades.

Handing one to Leera, he calmly waited for her to take it.

It took some time before the young woman understood what this sparring implied. Trusting someone enough to lower her defences and learn from another being. She was too proud for that.

But she remembered her fight with the Saxons, and knew her weaknesses.

She took the branch and waited for Tristan to do something.

The first blow came without her notice, and she caught it right above the shoulder, sending her down on her knees. The second one was meant to be a lethal blow, had it been a real sword, as it landed on her neck.

Looking up, she saw that Tristan, still in his calm stature, was waiting for her to get up.

Loosing her already thin patience, Leera lifted her arms and took the tunic off, feeling freer to move around without that piece of cloth to restrain her.

She took the imaginary hilt with both hands and bended her knees a little, in a posture that was very Woadish.

Tristan shook his head and approached her, putting his own weapon on the ground for a few moments.

His hand found its way down Leera's back, straightening it. His foot pushed her knees back straight, and he made her straighten her normal posture. Two callous hand ran freely on her arms, and the "sword" stopped at her right, ready to whirl deadly towards an enemy's throat.

When he was done, and when all of Leera's body was shivering, Tristan took his branch back and waited for her to attack.

Basing her blow on her strength, she made it whirl towards the Knight's chest, but was taken when he just stepped aside and used her own speed to send her flying to the ground, his branch pushed on the back on her neck.

Leera growled and rolled back on her feet, facing the silent Knight again, making their fictive weapons shock against each other, without her ever having the upper hand. Tristan just stood there and waited for her blows, sometimes sending her into a lethal position.

Only once did Leera understand that her emotions were only dragging her to her death.

Her last attempt at "killing" Tristan was the best of all. Without her mind or heart interfering, the Woad managed to fake a turn and blow the branch onto Tristan's leg, then sending it upwards onto his waist, touching him to the point where he would have had to kneel under a real sword.

Their gazes locked. Dark orbs against green ones.

Leera released a breath she had been holding, and she calmed herself.

Tristan threw his branch aside and nodded.

Leaving her alone in the woods.

When she was certain to be alone, Leera fell on her back, the softness of the leaves against her skin.

She chuckled to the night.