Their weapons clacked a staccato rhythm as they moved with the tempo of their contest. Akar was technical, fluid, perfect, like all of the Jehar; Coralen was movement and fury, but she was without her wolven claws, using just a practice sword. Akar broke through her guard with a feint and lunge and punched his blade against the flesh a fraction below her ribcage.

You just killed me.

That made her mad and she grabbed his blade, dragged herself up it and sawed her own weapon against Akar’s throat.

‘What was that?’ he asked as he stepped away.

‘You killed me, but not instantly. I was practising taking my enemy to the bridge of swords with me.’

He smiled at that and nodded his respect, then touched his hand to his throat, fingertips coming away bloody. Even though her blade was made of wood she’d managed to draw blood.

‘I am not your enemy,’ Akar said.

‘What?’

‘I am not your enemy,’ he repeated, ‘and I do not wish to die whilst training on the weapons court.’

‘Sorry,’ she muttered.

She’d been first on the weapons court this morning, expecting to see Corban, fully intending to give him as many bruises as was physically possible during a morning’s training. When he had not turned up it made her angrier, her only option to take it as a personal insult.

He is avoiding me.

Akar had been the first unfortunate man who had asked her if she wished to spar with him.

This is not working. I need to see Corban and tell him what I think of him. What I think of a man who gets kissed by a woman and then avoids that woman for a ten-night. And especially when that woman is me. Me, who’s punched and kicked and bitten a score of men that tried to kiss me, and now . . .

She screamed internally.

Coralen strode from the court, slamming her practice blade into a wicker barrel as she left. She strode through the wide streets of the fortress, heading for the great hall, her eyes scanning for Storm as she went. If Corban was not in there she would try his chamber.

She reached the great hall and walked through the open gates. This chamber still managed to fill her with a sense of awe. It was just so huge, the branches snaking across the roof high above. She stood on the steps that led down onto the main floor and took it all in. She thought of Dath and Kulla at last night’s festivities and smiled, then remembered them kissing, which reminded her of something else, and she scowled.

She saw Meical sitting on a bench at one of the tables, alone and with his head bowed.

It’s the first time I’ve seen him still. He is usually doing something every moment of the waking day. Maybe he’s seen Corban.