Power Awakens

Eddick checked over his shoulder, in the murky twilight he could see three more men following him, less than an hour behind him they picked their way along remnants of his trail. The Sun was casually dropping to the horizon, casting a hazy red shadow across the floor of the valley. The temperature was dropping, but Eddick didn’t feel it. Even from this distance, Eddick could see the three Warriors hunting for him, all three of them moving with a cat like grace, dark and predatory, they where obvious killers.

It had drained Eddick to kill the first of the Quad and he knew it was going to get much harder before the day was out. The leader hung back four paces from the two Morr-Praktise Warriors. He somehow managed to watch the ground and the surrounding shrub at the same time, piercing the increasing gloom with the practiced alertness of a hawk looking for his next kill. Eddick knew he didn’t have much time to get to high ground, he needed to fight the Morr-Praktise in terrain of his choosing otherwise he was finished.

As Eddick forced himself up the remaining hillock he realised he was near to exhaustion. Taking out the first Morr-Praktise had cost him more than he realised. Dusk descended, the air cooled further and the Warriors closed on Eddick’s trail. They quickly found his tracks in the dark grey sandy dust, there had been no time for Eddick to mask his trek up the hillock.

As the first two warriors advanced up the gulley, they had no need to conserve energy, which showed in their eagerness to attack their prey, this was their first mistake. The last was to assume that a quick decisive attack would rapidly overcome their target. The Morr-Praktise attacked him without any thought for their own lives, they were swift and deadly, and showed a confidence for their own abilities which bordered on arrogance. As the fight commenced Eddick slowly realised that they had not intended to kill him. They were merely there to wear him down, deplete his already low energy levels to exhaust and weaken him. These men were sacrificial lambs to be thrown away with a total disregard for human life. This callousness in his Enemies was frightening to behold, to throw away the life of two young Warriors merely to weaken an opponent was an anathema to Eddick, who always believed that life should be cherished. These thoughts flickered through his head in the instant it took to engage the first of the Warriors.

When Eddick reached the crest of the hillock, a few moments before the Morrs had found his trail, he breathed a huge sigh of relief. In the deepening gloom he had managed to discern the outline of an old Nedite Fort, just beyond the sight of the pursuing Morrs. The outside walls had caved in and nature had come back to reclaim the once bustling hill fort, but at least it would force the Morrs to attack him one at a time, as the collapsing walls had caused a man made gulley to be formed.

In the gulley Eddick waited in the semi-darkness, the damp seeping into his clothes. He slowed his breathing to conserve his energy and waited tensely for his pursuers. Soon enough the Morrs would track him and attempt to kill him. As he waited he once again tried to determine what a Morr Quad was doing tracking a lone Dublain Warrior across the Plains of Rajah. The Morrs were over a thousand leagues from their homeland, it just didn’t make sense.

In the gloomy quiet, Eddick slowly let his senses adjust to his surroundings. As his training had drilled into him over countless years, he reached out with his talent and projected his senses around the hill fort and further on into the twilight. As he attuned to his environment, he began to feel the dense cold of the surrounding block work, the moisture of the moss on the rocks felt as though it was brushing against his skin, in the distance he could feel the impact on the air of the thrumming wings of a local hummingbird. As Eddick immersed himself he was totally attuned to the nature around him, the air, the earth, he was One with his sword, it now felt like an extension of his arms, linked into his nervous system as completely as his other limbs. He was ready.

As the moments passed Eddick analysed his chances of survival. In his currently weakened state he thought that he could take the two Morr-Praktise, however, three may be too much even for him. He needed time to replenish his natural energy levels, before he could handle a number of simultaneous warriors. His natural talent, years of martial training and experience, would not be sufficient if the Morrs attacked him as one. His only hope lay in the narrowing of the gulley, which would force the warriors to come at him one at a time.

Time seemed to compress, moments into seconds, seconds into minutes.

The Morrs attacked without care. They seemed to understand his strategy to force them into a one on one combat but this didn’t slow them in their headlong rush through the collapsed rubble. A fleeting thought of suicide berserkers went through Eddick’s mind as he met the first frenzied sweep of a sword thrust.

Suddenly the feeling of time shifted again as Eddick unleashed himself into the first of his counter-attacks. Eddick had used his time in the gulley to full advantage, he was one with his surroundings, feeling connected to all the living things in the gulley and acutely aware of the position of every stone, rock and pebble. His attacker was forced back from the ferocity of Eddick’s counter-attacks, stumbling on a rock as he moved back and slightly left of Eddick. The minute shift in defensive stance was the opening Eddick needed. As swiftly as it began the first encounter was over. Eddick’s Sword exited the nape of the Morrs neck in a spray of blood and flesh as it moved back to the Asemi position, the classic first stance of all Sword work.

Normally Asemi was used by apprentices learning Sword for the first time, used by a Profent level Swordsman or a Sword Master, Asemi was designed to kill an opponent from the ready position with minimal movement and use of energy.

The next Morr was immediately behind his fallen comrade and rushed to his death before he had moved half a pace past the crumpled body of his comrade. Eddick sighed at the disregard for life.

Eddick, in his state of oneness with the gulley, had positioned his boot beneath a loose stone and had already started to flick the stone through the air before the Morr had stepped over the dead Warrior. He caught the Morr Warrior on the small knuckle of his left hand with a firm but small thud. This produced a slight flinch in the Morrs defensive pose and the fight was finished. Eddick pulled his sword from the right eye socket as the Morr slid to the ground.

Again Eddick waited, perhaps this was to be his lucky day, if the last of the Warriors was as clumsy as the previous three then he might just survive this day.

Seconds passed as the last Morr slowly entered the gulley. Inwardly Eddick cursed, this was a Morr-Profent, at least the same level of skill in the sword and possibly as strong as Eddick. The well-defined muscles rippled under a dark cotton shirt, toned but relaxed, the Morr moved with feline grace, well balanced and tightly sprung for the kill. In addition to this, the Morr was fresh, and had not depleted his energy levels over the last few minutes; this gave him a big advantage over Eddick.

The Morr slowly advanced, letting his senses feel the surrounding gulley. Eddick gave him grudging respect, this one had learned. Moving slowly, he looked like a stalking leopard cat readying itself for the next kill, each step carefully placed and balanced; ready to deal out death within the space of a single heartbeat. Eddick moved back half a pace, wary of this new opponent.

Suddenly and as fast as a striking cobra, Eddick thrust his sword at the solar plexus of the Morr simultaneously dropping to one knee to move under the decapitating head stroke that he knew would follow. Eddick’s strike was surprisingly blocked by a furious downward cut. It felt like a blacksmiths hammer hitting his sword just above the hand guard, with the shock ripping up his arm.

Eddick’s sword was knocked from his hand and he reflexively moved into a backwards roll to throw himself out of the way of the Morrs killing sweep. Even so the Morrs sword managed to rip a shallow furrow down the right side of Eddick’s back. Pain welled in his back, elbow and wrist, which Eddick swiftly suppressed.

The Morr advanced, this time without the previous wariness, his confidence clearly showing by the almost negligible smile on his scarred face. In his heightened awareness Eddick saw the deepness of the six scars on the Morrs face as he came forward for the kill, usually a Morr warrior was given three scars on each cheek on attainment of manhood. These were usually light scars the warriors inflicted on themselves as part of the rite of passage, that this Morrs scars ran so deep was unusual, although Eddick had no explanation as to why.

The Morr-Profent obviously thought that Eddick was finished and as he advanced with a sneer on what he thought was an assured kill. Eddick dropped into a Shuto Geri stance and relaxed all his muscles whilst breathing deeply, slowing his movements and his heart, calming himself. One of the peculiarities of Eddick’s family, the Clan Vardis, was that they showed a consistent trait of developing more than one talent when they reached testing for Manhood. Eddick was a Profent Level Swordsman, itself unusual, but he was also a Profent Level Akkad, a deadly hand-to-hand martial art. To Eddick’s relief, the Morr didn’t recognise Eddick’s stance. Attacking a skilled Akkad with a sword was always approached with an increased level of caution, and a very different attack strategy was needed to counter the deadly effect of the Akkad hand strikes.

The contempt of the Morr race seemed to blind him to danger as he advanced, He swung his blade at Eddick in a classic Atuso stroke, a very powerful diagonal stroke which can cleave clean through the body of an opponent. Moving with the heightened speed of a cornered Muskrat, Eddick stepped inside the sword stroke twisting his body sharply to the right as his left hand came down to grip the wrist of the Morr. Following the direction of the stroke and using the momentum of the Morr, Eddick suddenly reversed direction in a short circle around his left hip. A sharp crisp crack echoed through the dusty damp air, as the wrist of the Morr was savagely snapped. Continuing the single movement in a flowing arc, Eddick pulled the sword from the limp wrist of the Morr and sliced the middle of the blade across the Morrs throat.

Eddick slumped exhausted to the mossy floor. As his sat there, he once again puzzled over why four Morrs had tracked him down and attempted to butcher him. He was a simple man with no enemy’s that he knew of. He owned a small construction company and was a part time captain in the Dublain Guards. But there was no current war or blood feuds that Eddick was aware of. Why then was he a target, it didn‘t make sense.

Eddick was on a journey to see his older brother Petrek and to witness the Naming Day of Petrek’s son when the Morrs had attacked. He was hoping to spend two weeks relaxing with his brother and family before the Naming Day, as he hadn’t seen them for over two years. He didn’t know why he had been attacked but one thing Eddick did know was that he needed to find out that reason. With this in mind, Eddick settled down, made himself comfortable wrapped in his cloak and promptly fell asleep.