“Where’s Aspen?” He wasn’t going to participate in her training but he normally watched or checked in or something.

“Why?” Costrae said with a vaguely amused look on her face. Costrae rarely showed any emotion beyond vague amusement, annoyance, or fiendish delight, and even that was a bit disquieting. She couldn’t imagine what it would be like to see Costrae genuinely happy, though she wasn’t sure if costrae could show her emotions, or if she had any at all.

“It’s just,” Costrae tossed a slim blade at her and she caught it, being sure to grab the handle, “It's nothing, never mind.” Costrae gave a huff but Ana could tell if it was in amusement or annoyance or both. She stood in a fighting stance and motioned for Ana to do the same. When she was read she motioned for Costrae to begin and Costrae looked at her for a moment before fainting left and jabbing right. Ana moved to block the faint but had left her right side open and Costrae’s blade sliced through the air before wacking her in the side. The edges of the blade were dull so it was more like a thin metal rod but the blow still stung and she leapt back. She went on the offensive, lunging and jabbing but Costrae had blocked using her superior strength to shove Ana off balance for a second. Costrae dropped to a crouch preparing to kick a foot out and pull Ana’s legs back from under her but she spotted the move and danced away. Costrae jumped up slashing for her face but she waiting letting herself dodge at the last moment and get past Costrae’s guar quickly, spinning behind her and pointing the tip of the saber at the back of her neck, but Costrae was fast and they whirled, knocking her blade aside and pointing their own saber at her heart. Ana managed to hold onto her saber but she was off balance. She used it pretending to stumble back before dropping to a crouch pretending to swipe a leg out to knock Costrae off balance. Costrae danced to the side but Ana lunged up slashing at where her head had been. Costrae stepped swiftly behind her and in a flash Ana was on her back in the dirt, Costrae's foot on her stomach and both saber’s pointed at her chest. 

“You know I think I lasted longer than last time.” Costrae took their foot off her chest and Ana stood.

“You need to watch your opponent, look for their tells.”

“What do you mean?” She knew what she meant by watching an opponent for tells but she had been doing that. 

“You need to look, the slight bend of one knee, the angle of the wrist, a glance to the right or left.”

“What are your tells?” Costrae gave her a blank look before saying

“I don't have any.”

“Then how am I supposed to learn to look for them if my opponent doesn’t even have any.”

“I’ll imitate other people’s tells. We go again and this time watch more closely.'' They got into position and Ana watched closely as Costrae crossed her sword with Ana’s. They began, it was swift and brutal, Costrae started with an assault fainting right slashing left and Ana didn’t manage to block the blow as the saber whacked her face, a line across her cheekbone. She saw as Costrae danced and they started circling each other. Ana watched Costrae- there, she saw it, Costrae bent her knees and glanced left the moment before she lunged aiming for Ana side but Ana was ready duck past Costrae’s guard and spinning around her back managing to get in a blow to her arm as she tried to turn with Ana. Ana danced back, light on her feet and they circled again. It went on like that circling each other and pouncing before leaping away and doing it all over again. Ana watching carefully for the tell, the tick, the flick of the eyes, the blink, the twitch of the wrist. Sometimes Ana spotted it and sometimes she didn’t. 

Ana noticed Costrae leaning right before fainting left and swiping right and Ana dodged it, the moment feeling familiar. She slashed up as Costrae leaped away but, moving with her instead of retreating as she had before. She met Costrae’s return blow and gave as she sensed Costrae’s weight shifting more into the movement allowing her momentum to carry her forwards as Ana dropped down and kicked Costrae’s legs out from under her. For a moment Costrae was on the ground but Ana blinked and she had flipped, going from a crouch to rolling and coming up to Ana’s side and slashing at Ana’s head. Ana dodged at the last moment but the blow hit her hair tie and it snapped. Her hair cascaded down in an avalanche of blood and fire. She caught a flash of darkness at her side and on pure instinct she munged right and if the whoosh of air that brushed her left forearm she had just barely missed a lash of the sabre. She rolled to the side that she knew would get her closest to the edge of the pit and raised her hand,

“Stop, Stop, I need to tie my hair back!” She said, scrabbling for the extra strip of leather she kept in her pocket. She bent over and easily pulled her hair back tying it in a high tail. 

“Your enemies won’t let you take a break to fix your hair.” Costrae said matter-a-factly walking over and slashing at Ana’s wrist. She’d dropped the saber on the ground a few feet to her left so she could put her hair up so she was left only to dodge the blow rolling right and popping up only to duck again as Costrae slashed for her throat. Ana saw Costrae’s knees tense preparing to lunge and she dealt a blow to the back of her knees, using the moment Costrae was off balance to race for the saber. Right before she reached it a leg swept out for her but she jumped landing in a crouch, grabbing the saber and rolling to stand up right. But when she stood to face Costrae there was no one there- then crack, the saber whipped the back of her shirt and she felt still healing wounds there burning and bleating out in pain. She let out a small sound before whirling and blocking Costrae as she attempted the next blow, meeting her sword and the immense force behind her strike. Their faces were inches apart and Ana was heaving breath but Costrae looked her square in the eyes as if to say focus.

She saw it a moment before the blow came, the shifting of Costrae’s weight to her right side as she stepped to the side letting Ana’s moment carry her forwards and off balance before hooking her foot around Ana’s ankle and yanking Ana. She fell, this time on her side before Costrae gave her a weak nudge with the toe of her boot and she rolled on to her side. She looked up to find Costrae hands on hips looking vaguely expectant, like a schoolmarm watching a child and expecting them to read the sentence on the board. 

“At least this time I saw it before it happened. That's progress.”

“The goal is to stop it so that it doesn’t happen at all, you're telling me you know how to do so but it's the putting it into practice that counts. You can know how to win a fight all you want but you’ll still lose if you can’t actually do it.”

“Fine, then let's go again.” So they did, and gradually Ana started to spot the small signs and tells that Costrae laid out for her.

“Stop, you look like a dehydrated jackrabbit.” Costrae’s tone was matter-of- fact. They had switched to hand to hand combat and Costrae hadn’t yet let her get a drink of water. She was exhausted and jumpy, and she had to admit her mind was getting a little fuzzy. 

“I’m only dehydrated because you won’t let me get water!” In fairness it wasn’t all dehydration, she was having a hard time focusing, she started at sudden changes but couldn’t spot what they were. She had energy but she couldn’t focus long enough to use it.

“You don’t need water, you need to do what I’m telling you to do.”

“You know you could just say try harder, right?”

“One, Don’t pretend that saying try harder will actually get you to try harder,” she might have asked if making list was a fae thing or if it was just Aine’s warriors but she had a feeling that wouldn’t go over well with Costrae, “And two, I’m not asking you to try, I’m asking you to do.”

“Whatever, now let's get back to it.” Ana stood but Costrae pushed her back down. “What the-”

“Get up.” Costrae had her foot on Ana’s chest

“I can’t your pushing me down-”

“I didn’t ask for excuses, I told you to do it, so do it.” Ana rolled her eyes but braced herself on her arms and pushed but Costrae pushed harder. She forced herself up and moved about an inch before Costrae pushed her back down. But Ana noticed when she did that Costrae’s knee was bent, if she could get in a blow to the back of her knee she’d have the time to get on her feet. 

Or she hoped she would. 

While keeping one arm braced against the ground she made a sharp jab with the other hitting the back of Costrae’s knee. Costrae, distracted, lost concentration for a moment, just long enough for Ana to get into a crouching position. 

Costrae responded by pushing her foot down on Ana’s shoulder. Costrae moved so that she was behind Ana now and she couldn’t see her. Now she was moving her foot, keeping the pressure as she dragged it down until she was pushing back and she was bent over the dirt. Her wound stung, sharp and cutting, she winced and Costrae doubled down. 

“I told you to get up, so get up,”

“You’re hurting me-” she started to wheeze but Costrae cut her off

“I’m hurting you because you showed me how.”

“That's not fair, you already knew about tha-”

“One, life isn’t fair,” what was it with these people and lists? “you get hurt and you go through it. The difference between trying and doing is that trying sees the challenge as optional, while doing accepts and enjoys that the challenge is the entire point of doing.” She thought for a moment about that, embracing that the difficulty was what made the difference. And with that simple switch in perception the world seemed so much simpler. “Second, I already told you that I knew about your injury because you showed me.” it didn’t matter when she’d seen it, it mattered that she knew, and she could and would use it against her. But she could do it.

Her forehead was almost on the ground now but she wasn’t going to give in. The pain was sharp and deep but she forced herself to push up against Costrae. Costrae stayed firm but Ana wasn’t going to give up. She pushed harder and harder, focusing her strength and energy as she pushed, the pain got worse and worse until she seemed to fall over some invisible edge.

Something clicked, or cracked, inside her and she was moving up pushing, Costrae’s strength giving way. And then she was straightening her knees standing up Costrae having been shoved off. She looked up then and she saw with crystal clarity Costrae standing from where she had landed after Ana had shoved her off, a small smirk on her face. 

“Now that you're actually going to do what I tell you to do, let's get back to sparring.”