Sterling moved like a dancer through the field of argent fire, the silver flames licking harmlessly at his skin. His opponent—the aeromancer with the crackling lightning blade—darted and weaved, desperately seeking an opening that didn't exist. He'd learned a new trick, as had Sterling: the amulet on the knight's son's neck, bronze set with amber, had made him demonstrably immune to his own flames, while the lightning swordsman had used gusts of wind to make short rushes and facilitate quick getaways.

  The problem with using wind to enhance your speed, Dalliance thought distantly from his seat, was that wind fed fire. Every gust the mage used to propel himself made the inferno burn brighter, spread the fire, and cut off his escape routes. Just like it had versus Dalliance himself, last time.

  Sterling waited, patient as a stone in a furnace, batting away futile swipes or warding away approach with his fire, until his opponent's movements grew sluggish, erratic. Heat exhaustion was setting in.

  His opponent made one final desperate lunge, lightning sword leading, and Sterling sidestepped casually, his blade sweeping out in a vicious clothesline that caught his opponent across the chest. The wards flared brilliant white, absorbing what would have been a lethal impact. The mage flew backward, hit the clear floorboards in what had previously been a field of flames, and didn't get up.

  Sterling strode off the arena, not even breathing hard.

  "Dalliance, you're next!" Missus Tempest's voice rang across the training ground. "Who wants to be Dalliance's opponent today?"

  Effluvia raised her hand cheerfully.

  Dalliance groaned. They'd been sparring for months now, and he was tired. He'd been hoping for someone else. Anyone else.

  "Now, someone who didn't raise their hand," she continued, her eyes scanning the assembled students with predatory focus. "Gallant."

  This time it was Gallant's turn to groan.

  "And for the random encounter—" his teacher's voice took on an amused undertone, "—Flounce."

  The arena went quiet. "Alright," Flounce said, timidly. She'd never been even a little confident-looking. It made it worse.

  The fury of the storm stalked across the arena floor before him.

  Coruscating purple and pink streamers of charge quested around Effluvia like tendrils testing the floor. Her clothing billowed, the ends of her loose sleeves ballooning outward. Her hair whipped around in the charge and stood straight out, stirred by the eddies of her magic.

  Dalliance felt the familiar rising prickle of his hairs. Without naming it, she loosed her lightning.

  She'd been getting better at that—hiding her incantations. Not that it mattered before [Prediction].

  His sword leapt out of its sheath with a speed Dalliance would usually have taken great pride in, the product of weeks of sword drills, and even as her lightning lashed out, Dalliance threw the sharpened chunk of metal to the side.

  The stutter-step strobe of the flash—

  He squeezed his eyes closed—

  Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

  Playing in a sequence of still images, he saw his sword still flying at three feet from him, then couldn't see it at all at five. The flat crack of her spell, followed by the metallic ringing of his sword striking the floor well behind him, and the skidding sound of it clattering to a halt, rang behind him.

  Of course, she wasn't done.

  Dalliance juked to the side, rolling on his shoulder even as he brought [Redirect] to bear—it wasn't the only protection he had, anymore, but was still probably the best. Oddly, no matter how he focused on it, he still couldn't twist the spell to hit her. Not that he'd really wanted to, sparring. Nor could he keep track of the hundreds of options the skill gave him in the instant of casting. 'Not at me' seemed to suffice, as the voltaic energies unleashed their hysterical fury on the floor yards from his form.

  His ears still whined with the aftershock, and felt stuffed full of wool. It made him feel removed from the action, a little.

  Over the last few weeks, Dalliance had been sparring mostly outside, and mostly with swords, just because of the inherent danger of lethal magic without the security of the ward. He'd learned a lot about how to use [Blur], or [Breath of Fog]—functionally identical to his sleep spell, Ronan had suggested, and in a practice match we don't have to waste time waiting for someone to wake up afterward.

  But sometimes the best ways were old ways.

  Dalliance called out the chant for [Locomotion] all in a rush, syllables nearly blurring into one another, and made a jerking gesture, and hurled Effluvia at the ceiling even as his fingers transitioned into the gesture for [Cancel].

  Perhaps she had forgotten, but it didn't matter. She threw her body forward at the waist, tumbling, and at the apex of her ascent, vanished in a flash of violent light. Rose-tinted tendrils of lightning quested downward, streaking past him in branching veins of light.

  Behind him, the air crackled, and he threw himself forward, twisting.

  She'd reappeared inverted, momentum carrying her feet upward, straight for the back of his head, but he'd seen that coming.

  [Locomotion], recast, retrieved his fallen sword to his hand just in time to block the flailing sideways cut of Effluvia's own duelist's blade, apparently purchased specifically for their practice sessions and still shiny and new.

  The shield spell she'd procured him wrapped itself around the blade, and when he tackled her the shock pulled her hand free of the grip, leaving it hanging in mid-air, behind him.

  Her hand darted to her leg, drawing a wand from its holster, then, without pausing, she whirled it in a vicious arc to club him in the face. His back-step, to maintain measure, gave her the opportunity to cast another bolt of lightning, this one avoided by the simple expedient of hopping over it, though the splinters from the blast peppered the back of his shirt and pants, and the air stank of ozone.

  The shield spell expired, her blade clattering to the floor, and she dove for it.

  "[Slumbering Breath]," Dalliance cast, filling the area with faintly glowing vapor. He had the satisfaction of seeing her frustration before she darted into the cloud, emerging from the other side blade in hand, sprinting after him.

  It wasn't an instant effect, he'd found.

  She stabbed, and he deflected, trying for a riposte. As usual, the spirit was willing but the wrist just wasn't fast enough—Ronan was despairing of his zero-Might pupil, but there was only so much a 13-year-old arm was willing to tolerate. Effluvia vanished into sparks and light, and Dalliance ducked the slash that would have crowned his head from behind.

  She was getting a little slower.

  He stabbed backwards, below his own left arm, and felt the point score a hit, but shallow, then stepped back with his left to spin, rising blade deflecting her response even as he kicked her in the shin with his right.

  They were really going all-out, he realized. Perhaps it would be worthwhile to reveal another of his little tactics.

  [Gust].

  Effluvia had just enough time to look shocked before the wind spell pulled her hair across her face, blocking her vision for a fleeting second, all that was required for Dalliance's blade to reach her throat, where it stopped, and all was still.

  "Not fair," growled Effluvia as the ward cycled, purging them both of magic and restoring the arena. "A lady's hair is off limits."

  "Pin it up, then."

  "Quite right," said Missus Tempest. "Men wear shorter beards, not to mention hair, for this same reason. Visibility, hand-holds—though I needn't, I trust, stress that hair pulling is beneath us all and will not be attempted in my class?"

  Dalliance walked to his side of the arena, sheathing his sword. Effluvia was getting better. They both were.