A Katarina Vacation Arc
It took a week after her face finally healed again to get Katarina to agree to once more spar with her cousin.
"Isn't that… kind of big?" Katarina said, looking at the big hunk of wood with a handle Matthew was carrying.
"Ah, it's… well, I need to practice my greatsword skills," Mashu said as she held a huge wooden greatsword. Technically it was an ultra greatsword, but the sword itself was called a greatsword, so….
Katarina gave it a long, long look. "No," she said. "No, I can already tell how this is going to go. You swing it at me, I step on it and hit you in the face again. We're not doing it a third time!"
Matthew pouted. "What's it going to take for you to agree to spar with me."
Matthew faced her cousin wearing an onion-like helmet, her old heater shield and a wooden sword.
Katarina nodded. "There, we know you don't get you face ruined when we sparred like that."
"I should really work on my other skills too…"
"It's this or nothing!"
"Sigh… fine…"
Well, maybe it was a good idea to go back to the very basics.
A few days later, the Adeth home received an early morning visitor.
"Sir Galad?" Leona said, greeting the knight with a surprised smile. "How unexpected! Oh, is something the matter? It's very unusual for you to call on us before breakfast."
"I apologize for the inconvenience, Marchioness Romani," Sir Galad said, "But I decided to take the initiative and speak to young Matthew instead of waiting for her to come over to visit me again. She's doing morning drills, I believe?"
"Oh no, she's sparring with her cousin Katarina and losing badly," Leona said brightly. "You can practically hear her pride screaming and wondering if she wasted her time training to be a knight."
"Ah… " Sir Galad said. "Much is explained then. She's been visiting me for spars and 'refreshers'. I wondered if she'd suffered a defeat in a duel, but… wait, you mean Lady Katarina, the Third Prince's fiancée?"
"For now," Leona said with cheerful ominous foreshadowing. "I really shouldn't be so amused by my eldest's suffering, so I've been avoiding their sparring, and just watching the aftermath over breakfast. Why don't you go over to see them while I have a place set for you at breakfast. After all, you're already intruding, might as well go all the way. They're at Matthew's usual practice area."
"My apologies and thanks, Lady Romani," the one-handed knight said.
Matthew swung upward in a perfectly executed Weapon Art meant to break a foe's guard from below and leave them open for a more conventional strike, but Katarina merely backstepped, then darted forward with an overhead blow that struck Matthew's helmet with another dull ring. Matthew's heater shield swung wildly in an attempt to parry a subsequent hit, but there wasn't one. Katarina had taken her one blow and stepped back, her sword one more in a low guard. Matthew had tried to tell her a low guard left you open to attack, but Katarina refused to change, insisting that this was it was obvious she didn't want a fight. Given Matthew still hadn't managed to get a hit on her with anything that wasn't a greatshield, she hadn't pressed the issue.
Katarina also didn't take advantage of the opening the missed parry made, and Matthew settled back behind her heater shield, sword ready for an opening…
"Falling into bad habits, I see," a familiar voice said, and Matthew jerked, turning to find her old knight-master. "Two bad habits. You shouldn't take your eyes off your opponent, Dame Matthew. I know I taught you better than that."
"Katarina never attacks," Matthew said, and Katarina nodded enthusiastic agreement.
"It is still a bad habit to get into," Sir Galad said. "In a true duel, your cousin would take advantage of an opening."
"No I won't", Katarina said. "I really won't. It's dangerous! That's how you get stabbed!"
Matthew waved one hand as if to say 'see?'. "What brings you here so early, Sir Galad?" she said.
"I admit, after how you've come to visit me for several days straight recently, I grew curious as to what has been fueling your frustration," Sir Galad said. "Could it be that Lord Stone's stories of your skill are less exaggerated than usual?"
"Oh, I'm sure he was being nice," Katarina said. "I mean, he only saw me once, and that was during the finale scene of the Student Council's play during the School Festival."
"Still, you must have some skill, or Lord Stone would not have seen fit to speak of it," Sir Galad said. "May I spar with you, Lady Katarina? Only a brief crossing of swords, to gain your measure?"
"Well…" Katarina said hesitantly. "All right. But just a short one, breakfast is going to start soon."
"I would not dream of delaying you," Sir Galad said. "Dame Matthew, may I borrow your weapon."
Matthew handed him her practice sword, then took off her helmet. "Here," she said, offering the onion-shaped helm to him. "You'll need this."
"Oh, I' sure there's no need for that, Dame Matthew," Sir Galad said, flourishing the wooden sword in his only hand to get a feel for it.
Something like smug glee glinted in Matthew's eyes. "Fine. But remember, I offered."
Katarina gave him a strange bow, unlike the many bows used among the covenants. "I'll be in your care," she said, then settled into a low guard.
Sir Galad mentally disapproved. A low guard was basically one big opening. Still, he refrained from pointing this out and embarrassing the lady. "Very well then," he said as Matthew stepped back. "Shall we begin? Dame Matthew, if you would be so kind as to give the signal."
Matthew nodded, that glint still in her eyes, and gave the signal to begin. "You are being invaded," she said, an age-old phrase in the ancient tongue so ritualized they'd lost its literal meaning in the modern day.
Sir Galad instantly moved in for an aggressive attack…
The family was sitting down for breakfast when the doors to the dining room slammed open.
"UNCLE SALOMAN! HELP!" Katarina cried, while behind her Matthew was helping guide Sir Galad, whose nose was swollen and bleeding. "I RUINED SIR GALAD'S FACE! I DIDN'T MEAN TO! WAH!"
"I told you to wear the helmet," Matthew said.
"So you did," Sir Galad acknowledged. "Now stop being so smug about it, please."
"Can't help it, it's nice to not be the one bleeding from the nose this time."
"Dear, please make that Light Magic healing tool you keep saying you'll make one of these days," Uncle Saloman said with a sigh as he got up.
"Introduce me to a Light Magic wielder and I will!"
After reassuring Katarina that his injury wasn't her fault, as he HAD been offered a helmet but he'd turned it down, Sir Galad apologized for ruining breakfast with his disfigurement and excused himself. Matthew offered to escort him to the door, and Aunt Sheryl insisted he bring home a basket of breakfast food he could eat on the way back.
"All right," Sir Galad said once it was just him and Matthew in the hallways, walking towards the front door. "Tomorrow, come see me after lunch, I should have a training regime planned out by then."
Matthew blinked. "Sir?"
"None of that, Dame Matthew. You were knighted, you're no longer my squire, we're equals now. And apparently equally in need of honing our skills once more," Sir Galad said determinedly. "I've been defeated before and learned from it. That's not going to change now."
"Ah!" Matthew said. "Um, you don't have to…"
"No, I don't," Sir Galad agreed. "But if I'm going to be training to not be utterly humiliated by someone with a solid defense, it helps to have a partner, and you want train for the same thing, right?"
Matthew nodded. Then she sighed. "Am I a terrible person for wanting to beat my cousin just because she beat me?"
"Don't think of it as beating her," Sir Galad said. "Think of it as rising to her level. You're not pulling her down, you're raising yourself up."
Matthew blink, and a her face brightened, a genuine smile coming to her face as her pride as a knight finally saw an honorable path in front of her. "Ah, I see! Thank you Sir Galad. I see I still have a lot to learn about being a knight."
"We both do. Right now, let's learn how to overcome a solid parry defense that doesn't use a shield," Sir Galad said.
"Don't bother with spears," Matthew advised. "I'll demonstrate later, but spears just makes it easier for her to parry us."
"Hex it. I suppose that means halberds and lances are out too," Sir Galad mused. "How about maces and clubs?
"She has very good poise," Matthew said. "And if she can't parry, then she backsteps and ripostes. It's basic, but it works."
"Yes, that's why they're the basics," Sir Galad said. "I wonder who she squired under?"
Matthew blinked. "Huh, I didn't ask. I probably should." Katarina had never mentioned training to be a knight herself, but why else would a lady be so skilled with the sword?
"Please do. It would be good to know whether that is the result of skilled training or natural talent," Sir Galad said.
