Corrine vs Torvivor

Corinne raced at the lurker. Farfalee and Jasher both moved to stop her, but they did not react in time. Corinne held the tip of her sword level with the dark figure’s chest. “Enough!” she cried angrily. “You’ve done enough!”

The torivor lowered its arms and retreated before her, shuffling back as she stalked forward. The tip of her sword shifted left at the same time as the lurker attempted to dodge left, then back to the right an instant before it skipped to the right. She kept advancing. It kept retreating.

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“Get out,” Corinne said steadily. “Leave and do not return or I will slay you.”

Corinne stopped advancing and began to move her sword into a variety of defensive positions. The lurker would twitch and she would adjust. Jason found himself flinching with each tiny movement. She swiped at it, missed, and stepped back into a defensive stance. Her blade kept moving as if dueling an imagined foe, blocking invisible blows, occasionally poking forward in halfhearted thrusts. The lurker crowded toward her, knees bent, arms extended, feinting with its head and hands. She seemed to anticipate every feint, moving with the featureless creature instead of reacting to it.

Corinne shuffled back and lowered her sword to her side. The torivor flashed toward her at the same moment as she lunged, thrusting her blade forward. The lurker stopped just shy of the sharp tip. The torivor slapped at the flat of her blade, but she twisted it so the black palm tore open against the edge, bleeding light.

Corinne shifted the tip of her blade left, then right, keeping it pointed directly at the lurker as it sidestepped. The dark figure jumped up and back, sailing almost high enough to reach the rafters. Then it fell flat to the floor and blurred toward her legs. Corinne stabbed downward, the blade piercing the floorboards as well as the torivor. It disappeared with a blinding burst of light.

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“I could feel its mind,” she said. “Just like Father taught me. The concentration was tiring, but it could hide nothing. Even at the start I knew it would raise its arms and scare the horses right before it did. With it tracking us, I knew we’d never get away. Since it had no weapons, I decided to take a chance.”

Chapter 20