Luck in the Shadows

Seregil. Knowing the method of his would-be detractors, he'd taken care to make them suitably ambiguous. Ghemella had taken all three.
    Smiling darkly, Seregil headed back to the jeweler's shop to begin his patient vigil.

24 Watermead
    Alec slid his blade away from Beka's and jumped back, leaving her off balance. For the first time in half an hour, he managed to get past her defense and score a touch.
    "That's right! Hold her, hold her!" Micum cried. "Now pull back the way I showed you. Just right. Again now!"
    It had been snowing heavily since early morning, so they'd cleared the hall for a practice area. Alec had made good progress over the last three days and neither he nor Micum wanted to chance losing ground.
    Kari had been patient about it all, merely insisting that the tables be moved to protect the tapestries. She and Elsbet had then retired to the kitchen for the morning, but Illia remained perched beside her father, cheering gleefully every time Alec bested her sister. It hadn't happened often so far.
    Beka rubbed her side with a rueful grin. "You're improving, all right. I think Seregil will be pleased."
    Her face was flushed under its freckles and her eyes sparkled with the same gleam Alec had seen in Micum's and Seregil's during mock battles.
    She looked older with her hair braided back, and the close-fitting jerkin showed the gentle swell of her breasts more than the shapeless tunics she usually wore.
    As she raised her sword again, he found himself so distracted by the deadly grace with which she moved that her sudden overhand swing took him completely off guard and cost him a new bruise on his shoulder.
    "Damn, I did it again!" Grimacing, he assumed a more wary stance.
    "Concentration," Micum advised. "Watch your opponent, look wide, see everything. A flick of the eye, a change in balance, the way she holds her mouth, anything that can tell you what she's thinking of doing next. And don't tense up; it makes you slow."
    Trying to keep all this in mind, Alec worked backward, drawing Beka, making her follow him.
    The bound wire grip of the hilt felt warm and familiar against his palm as he executed a respectable attack of his own. Catching her blade in the curve of one quillon, he twisted hard and almost succeeded in disarming her.
    "Hooray for Alec!" Illia crowed, clapping her hands in delight as her champion pressed his advantage.
    Beka knew that trick, however, and quickly taught him one of her own. Hooking his ankle with her foot, she pulled one leg out from under him. Alec fell heavily backward as his sword spun away across the flagstones.
    Beka pinned him none too gently with a foot on his chest and rested the tip of her blade lightly against his throat. "Cry mercy!"
    "Mercy!" Alec dropped his hands in submission.
    When she released him, however, he grasped her other ankle and brought her tumbling down beside him. Leaping astride her, he pulled the black dagger from his boot and rested the flat of it against her throat.
    "Cry mercy yourself," he gloated.
    "You cheated!" sputtered Beka.
    "So did you."
    "Seregil will be pleased!" Micum groaned, shaking his head.
    "It sounds like someone's slinging anvils around out here!"
    Kari laughed, striding in with an armload of trenchers. "The pack of you go find somewhere else to make your racket. I've got a meal to get on."
    Servant and laborers quickly filled the hall for the midday meal. Stamping snow from their feet, they pulled out the tables and soon everyone was seated over a hot meal.
    Micum spent most of the meal planning a new saw pit with the reeve. It did not escape his notice, however, that Alec and Beka had their heads together in some discussion of their own. Judging by the evident disinterest of Elsbet, who sat on Alec's other side, the subject probably revolved around swordplay or archer's tack.
    Kari leaned close, following her husband's eye. "You don't suppose she's falling in love, do you?" she whispered.
    "With a commission to the Queen's Horse in her pocket?" Micum chuckled. "Our Beka's too hardheaded for that."
    "Still—he's a good lad."
    "Don't give up hope," Micum teased.
    "He's too wild for Elsbet's taste, but Illia would have him in a minute. She says so at least twice a day."
    Kari gave her husband a good-natured nudge in the ribs. "Get on with you! The last thing I need in this family is another man with wandering feet. And if Seregil's taken this boy up, you can bet your head he's got them."
    Micum hugged her close. "You'd be