THE LAST KEEPER

No one usually trained in the broken shadow, and Sagiri moved inside it alone. He did not want to mingle with anyone after Team 25’s display during lunch. The stone pillars rose like broken trees, thick and uneven, their shadows overlapping and swallowing distance. It was dark, dimly lit as always, and he could not sense any presence. He whirled the spear around and got into the starting position. He had not been able to master the spear properly, and that is why he had picked the lightest one with a blade on one side. It stood taller than him since spears were meant for keeping space between you and the enemy.

Weight settled into his palms, and he breathed before he moved. He could start with a spear dance, which he was sure to taste on. It was the basis of mastering the sword before he moved to attacking and defending.

He advanced, slow at first, feet rolling heel to toe. The spear stayed close to his body, shaft angled low, the point almost touching the uneven ground.

He struck. A sharp thrust snapped forward, clean and precise, stopping a breath short of a pillar. He withdrew instantly, pivoted, and slid sideways into darkness. Another strike followed from a new angle. Then another. No wasted motion. He used the pillars as opponents. He circled one, let it break his outline, then burst out with a sweeping cut aimed at the legs. He dropped, rolled, came up behind another column, breath steady, muscles burning. The spear always tired him, and it seemed that it had not changed. It not only required the hands and the core to thrust, but the whole body to be in sync. He was convinced it was the hardest weapon to use. He had not yet received any basic training in the bow and arrow and sword, but he was convinced they could not be harder than controlling the long rod and blade.

Sagiri increased speed. Trying to become one with the weapon, but he was beginning to realize he had given more attention to blades and had forgotten to train with the spear. He had even given more attention to hand-to-hand combat.

Thrust. Withdraw. Step. Spin. The spear whistled through the air, kissed stone, and stopped just before impact. He imagined hands grabbing for him, blades flashing. He slipped between them, spear butt smashing into imagined ribs, pointing snapping up toward his throat.

His perception stretched by the moment. He moved before thought, reacting to spaces, to absence. Sweat slid down his spine. His arms shook. His grip tightened. He forced another sequence. Then another. His breath came harder now, echoing faintly between stones.

Still, he moved. One last drive forward. A full extension thrust. His shoulder screamed. His strength faltered. But he spun on his knee on a full spin before stabbing, bringing the combination to an end. Only then did Sagiri stop. He planted the spear and leaned on it, head bowed, chest heaving. The shadows closed back in around him. With it, only one realization came. He had not mastered the spear.

”You are thinking too much. That was the most terrible form I have ever seen.” Suddenly, a voice joined, and Miss Lakiya walked into the shadow colonnade. ”I did not know anyone came here to train besides me,” she said. She was bearing a sword longer than her own. She was tall herself, and her navy blue instructor coat flew behind her. The spear was a specialty of her tribe and most tribes of the west, and if sagiri could guess, she was a beast in the art.

sagiri bowed slightly and took a step forward.

”It is heavy,” sagiri said, wondering why one could pick such a cumbersome weapon to use in battle.

”That is the secret. If one stabs you with a blade, you might make it, but if they stab you with a spear, you won’t. It’s heavier, so it’s more lethal, and one good stab to the heart, you’re dead. It’s hard to miss at least one vital organ with this,” she explained as if the spear was her best friend and had never failed her. ”It is also best for hunting, especially against a big beast. Blades are lighter, but they sometimes can not scratch some beasts,” she explained, and sagiri could not help but agree. He could not help but think of the gravescale, how helpless they had been against it with only daggers. It seems he needed to master it if he wanted to be able to cause damage to bigger beasts.

sagiri nodded.

”I will tell you a secret. If you want to get used to its weight, you need to make it a point to walk with it everywhere. After the exam, you will be allowed to carry weapons of choice around so that you get used to the weight. I advise you to carry a spear because it is the heaviest and it will make all the other weapons feel lighter.” Miss Lakiya explained with one of her smiles that it could only mean she was thinking of something not specifically good.

”Now come at me with your spear. I will not use mine. Attack me, and I will dodge,” she said, already throwing her sword to the side as she hadn’t been talking of it as if it were a lover a few seconds before

sagiri had learned from Salka that he did not need to escape, and he did not need the attack command from Miss Lakiya before he sank. He kicked the bottom of his spear off the floor with his right foot and got into an attacking position. only for a moment before he twirled it and got into an attacking position.

He came in fast, spear driving straight for her centerline. Lakiya shifted barely a step, and the point slid past her ribs as if she had already known where it would land. Her foot tapped the stone once, and she was gone.

Sagiri turned and struck again. High. Low. A feint to the throat, a snap to the knee. The spear cut through shadow and air, fast enough to whistle. Lakiya flowed around it, spine bending, shoulders rolling, feet gliding between pillars. She never crossed her legs. Never broke the balance. She bent all the way back and caught the spear with her legs and pushed sagiri back a few feet. She was really in love with the spear.

Sagiri stuck the spear in the ground to stop the momentum before she jumped back. He pressed harder this time. These instructors were fast but not as fast as Salka, yet he couldn’t keep up. Sagiri chased her through the columns, using reach, angles, and speed. He cut off paths, drove her toward stone, and thrust where escape should have been.

Just when he thought he had her, she jumped and perched on the spine of the spear momentarily, before she somersaulted above his head, tapping him forward in the process and using his head as a pivot. She must have been made of rubber, depending on how fluid her movements were. She passed him so close he felt the air move. He did not dwell on the shock of her movements and instead allowed the archive to rewrite it. He spun, slashed, stepped in deep, and went for a stab.

She ducked under the shaft, palm tapped his wrist, and suddenly the spear was pointing at space while her knee hovered a breath from his thigh.

”Again,” she said.

His muscles burned. His breathing roughened. Still, he attacked. The spear was a ruthless weapon, and against a master of it, it was even more treacherous. It was as if she could predict his every move and dodged before he even executed. He kicked the spine of the spear off the ground and went for her again, but she dodged yet again. It was impressive how fast her defense was without a weapon.

Lakiya smiled then, quick and sharp, before she slipped inside his guard, twisted past the spear, and stopped with two fingers pressed to the hollow of his throat.

Sagiri froze.

”Good pressure,” she said quietly. ”Bad control. You and the spear are perfect strangers. You are not controlling it. It is controlling it,” she continued, going to pick up her swords.

”Watch and learn,” she said, getting into a sparring position, her knees wide apart and her butt so low it looked like she was sitting.

The air changed suddenly as she got fully immersed in her weapon. Her spear was held in her right hand at the centre, and the rest of it went below her arm to behind her back

She did not announce the start. She just breathed once sharply as if to be as calm as possible before she moved.

The first step cracked against the air as the pear wheeled around. She lifted the right leg so far up and attacked. The spear looked like it had come alive in her hands. spinning, snapping forward, and stabbing with so much vigor.

She advanced like she was listening to her weapon, and they were two halves of a whole. She thrust, swept as if to sweep someone off their feet, and lifted her left leg before reversing and spinning on her knee. The spear bit the air at throat height, dropped to the knees, rose again in a vicious spiral. Her footwork was relentless and short, driving steps that stole space and crushed retreat.

The dance was violent.

She twisted the shaft and let the butt strike hard, imagining ribs shattering, ankles crushed, wrists broken. Each motion carried intent and kill lines layered over one another, no wasted angle, no mercy. She spun it above her head so quickly and behind her back with one hand, then two, as if to add as much momentum as possible before she went airborne and landed the spear on the ground, shaking the ground with the force she used.

She spun once, low and fast, spear sweeping the ground, then snapped upright into a full extension thrust that would have pinned a heart to stone. She did not stop. The spear sang as she turned again, shoulders rolling, core locked, power driving from the ground up. Her breath stayed even. Her expression never changed.

When the dance ended, it ended suddenly. Silence rushed back into the arena. Miss Lakiya lowered the weapon and looked over her shoulder.

”That,” she said, ”is how you wield a sword. You don’t command it, you let it lead, but you give the command,” She said, and Sagiri could only understand what she was saying. He had not been able to look away from the beautiful violence. The spear did not look heavy in her hands, but a continuation of her will. And yet they both had been totally separate at the same time.