Joe didn’t have them emitting, but he did have them orbiting his body, prepared for use whenever he needed it. He stirred, and Kilniara stirred as well, lifting up and kissing him. He breathed in her kiss, enjoying it then decided the others could wait for a few more moments and pulled her in for a passionate kiss that she joined exuberantly. The make out session lasted for a time that Joe wasn’t able to measure, lost in the moment too much, but he did end it firmly and the two stood to head out of the room.
“I’ll check the hallway.”
“No need,” she smiled, if a bit bashfully.
Joe shook his head and kissed her back, “Thank you, but this will reflect more on you than me. I want to be careful for you. We don’t do anything, but if they see you coming out of the room, they will believe that you are, no matter what we say. Please, let’s be careful, OK?”
Kilniara fell silent at that, looking away and Joe stopped.
“What’s wrong?”
She stared up at him, the limpid pools of tears already threatening on her bottom eyelids, “You are ashamed…?”
Joe chuckled, “No. Not of you, but I know… older cult… traditional cultures. It’s really bad for women. It costs me nothing to keep you safe, so why wouldn’t I do it?”
She stared at him, tears receding slightly but still frowned, “Why are you so insistent on this?”
Joe paused, pursing his lips, “Let’s talk about it at breakfast with Gwenvair and her mother. I think I’m missing something. Maybe you can explain things to me.”
Kilniara’s eye’s widened, “You would talk about this with others?”
“Of course? It will help me understand your culture and people.”
Her sour mood instantly evaporated and she smiled brightly, “There’s no need.”
Joe froze, confusion setting in quite quickly, “OK. Now it’s my turn to be confused. What’s going on?”
Kilniara giggled and walked out of the door, “It’s nothing. See you at breakfast.”
Joe’s frozen stance broke as he jerked towards the door but found the hallway empty and mostly silent, the susurrus of conversation or rustling clothes nonexistent as no one seemed to be awake or meaningfully interacting. Joe stepped back and closed the door silently behind him before turning to the wash basin to prepare for the day. He cleaned quickly, only spending a bit of time to wash his face before heading out of his room. OK. What… is going on? I’m … that was … that was weird, right?
Joe cleaned decently well and stepped into the dining area. The room proved pretty much empty, only Kilniara sitting at the table. Joe looked around.
“Where is everyone?”
“They’ll be here soon. Zilnek and Garnedell are outside practicing your cultivation techniques… your katas. Gwenvair is with them, excited to learn and practice with them as well. Her mother is watching, but that is all.”
“Everyone is outside practicing the katas?”
Kilniara nodded, “After what Garnedell did yesterday, everyone is fascinated with your cultivation, Joe. People want to…”
Joe interrupted, “Really?”
Kilniara smiled beatifically, “Yes, really.”
Joe grimaced, smiling with pride at spreading his art across the stars but a bit embarrassed as well, “Hmm…”
Kilniara cocked an eyebrow while tilting her head to the side. She said nothing but stared at Joe. Joe’s grimace turned to a grin after a bit. Joe waited for more but she said nothing else and Joe took the hint and moved on.
“Well, then… let’s head out to see them?”
Her nod was soft but obvious and he smiled in return. So… right answer, I guess?
He stood and she went with him. She slipped her hand in his and he found himself being subtly led by her. He pulled her in and bumped her shoulder and she smiled up at him, bumping him back. When she pulled back, he pulled her in a second time, but with firm deliberateness and stole a kiss from her. She froze, enjoyed the kiss for a few seconds, then pulled away in embarrassment. Joe let her go with a soft chuckle and she stared up at him, shivering and turning her face away in weakly controlled embarrassment.
She turned away from him and led him to the front door and when they stepped out into a gloomy morning, Joe looked up in surprise to see a dark sky heavy with incredibly black clouds. Rain? Huh… first… wait… have I ever seen it rain here? Does it rain? And why… Joe’s thoughts on rain quickly evaporated when he realized the dark clouds above were heavy smoke from burning fires all around the city, heavy trails of smoke trailing up into the sky from outside the city walls.
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“A lot of smoke…” Joe semi-asked.
Kilniara nodded, “This Tide’s Burning will likely be prolonged.”
Joe paused at that, “The bodies?”
Kilniara, this time, seemed a bit surprised and replied uncertainly, “Yes?”
Joe nodded, “Makes sense. Takes a lot of time to bury all those bodies.”
“Bury?”
Joe glanced over then, “Yes? We bury our dead.”
Her confusion flickered across her face and Joe continued, “We take the bodies and dig a deep hole and cover them with dirt.”
“Your people do this?”
“Yes.”
“And it works?”
Joe paused at that. Did they understand abo… nah… probably still don’t have an understanding of microbial diseases… but its not hard to connect rotting corpses with disease and poor health…
“Yes. It works well.
“Huh… seems like a lot of work.”
“For something like this, we might likely burn the corpses as well, especially if there are too many of them.”
She then nodded at that, seemingly satisfied and then snuggled back into his side, falling silent as they walked through the front garden lawn together. The two headed out the front gate then and she subtly guided him with soft squeezes or tugs on his hand. It ended up not being necessary as they wound up at the same place where Garnedell had his duel the night before, although Joe really did appreciate the soft guidance she’d offered. Garnedell and Zilnek were practicing there, mostly practicing their forms, but also acting the forms out against one another in very poor combat. They still didn’t react very well with one another, poorly enacting their forms. Around them, Gwenvair and her mother watched while several other clan members watched carefully. Joe found their avid attention rather humorous given how poorly the two were fighting each other. Joe came to the circle, settling in beside Gwenvair under the guidance of Kilniara’s.
Joe settled in to watch for a bit. Garnedell, with more experience, proved a bit better at intercepting Zilnek’s strikes while also throwing out his own attacks intermittently. Zilnek replied with enthusiasm, but lacked the skill to go with the enthusiasm. Still, he never gave up and used the few kata’s he knew as best he could.
After watching for a few moments, Joe stepped forward and began correcting Garnedell’s incorrect forms while offering Zilnek a few hints on how several of the forms he knew could be used. Soon, the boys were listening to him, so instead of allowing a freeform spar, Joe would call out a kata to one of the boys, then advise the defender the best kata they knew to defend against it. It took a bit, but as the three began learning their timings and to trust one another, they began to see how what they had learned actually functioned in a real fight. Both boys became incredibly excited when they saw the results and began carrying out the forms. Joe found himself bemused at their excitement but went along with it. A bit early for sparring, but… they aren’t doing too bad, and in a world with magical healing… maybe it’s ok?
Behind him, Kilniara hopped excitedly and called out to him, “Can we try, Joe?”
“We?” Joe asked, glancing behind him to see Kilniara and Gwenvair holding hands and staring at him with expectant excitement. Joe laughed and waved them into the field, setting up an area for the two of them.
“Gwenvair only knows a couple katas… pretty poorly. We can only do those, OK Kilnaira? I don’t want you to hurt her.”
Kilniara immediately agreed with excitement, uncaring of the limited options she had because of Gwenvair’s much lesser training, “OK! OK! What should we do?!”
Joe quickly set up the two boys to repeat a specific strike and defense, the alternate being attacker and defender. He then turned to the two girls and repeated the process, although he had to keep to the narrower set of movements that Gwenvair knew. Once both were practicing well, he took the time to walk between both couples, offering advice, corrections, and pauses for reflection as he taught them. When he’d given both several sessions, he then shifted them to another simple movement set that interacted well with one another then repeated the process. The effort took little physical energy, but Joe found himself quite invested mentally and the hour session that followed drained him pretty quickly. The other four proved just as exhausted but when Joe called for a break, they all immediately rejected it, finding quite a bit of renewed enthusiasm for Joe’s training.
Joe laughed and shook his head, “No. No! We aren’t going to keep going like this. That is how you injure yourself. Let’s head in and have breakfast before we head on with the day. Don’t worry, we’ll do this every day. We already do! You know.”
Kilniara was happy enough to end it despite her obvious joy in learning. Garnedell and Gwenvair proved as reluctant as Zilnek, who actually complained that Joe was ending their punishing efforts.
“But, we are actually learning to fight!”
Joe smiled with some mockery, “You were learning to fight before!”
Zilnek looked up at him and grumped, “But… I didn’t… I thought you were teaching us some strange dancing!”
Joe barked in laughter, “Actually, learning to dance can be quite powerful to learning how to fight well as well, but no… what you are learning are the forms of some of the simpler martial arts amongst my people.”
Toulnaria, the Matriarch, actually interjected at that point, “This… simpler form is what you have taught Garnedell? What he used yesterday?”
Joe nodded, “The beginner forms, yes.”
She paused at that, “The beginner forms?”
Joe nodded, “Well, I guess not really. Those are just some standard defense moves for using sticks or staves. There are significant number of forms to be learned, some hundred or so for each martial art. Some martial arts have many more than that, as they also train how to use weapons. But, for this martial art, it is only how to use hand to hand combat, for the most part so I had to just offer some very basic staff movements.”
The Matriarch responded with a cautious deliberateness, “So Garnedell’s staff combat yesterday was… basic.”
Joe nodded, “Hmm. Yes. Staves are some of the most common or basic weapons taught by most martial arts, so I taught him a couple forms he could use while using his staff. They aren’t part of the forms I’m teaching them now... well… I guess I am teaching them, but they aren’t part of the art I’m teaching them now. The staff forms are simple combat forms that really aren’t related to any martial art, just distilled knowledge of what I’ve learned. When they’ve learned unarmed combat, I’ll start adding in the weapons combat as well. It will be awhile before they can really use weapons well, but we can start.”
The Matriarch fell silent at that as they walked back towards the house. With the return to the house, Joe felt his autonomic response send out a monster sense and frowned before sighing. The Matriarch looked up at him concerned, but Zilnek, obviously wanting to speak, quickly interjected, “We’ll do this every day?”
<Chapter 86 Continued>