Flashback Glaive Day

[Lashander]

17th Day of Spring 512 The petching thing was heavy. Heavier than he'd expected anyway. Granted, the glaive towered over the boy, well, almost-man, with its long haft and the curved blade atop, but he had two hands to grip it, and it shouldn't have been this hard. Maybe that was why everyone else pranced about with swords. But Lash had actually sat down with grizzled old Beren, his designated mentor in all things martial, and talked about this. There was a reason professionals across the world carried their blades - no matter whether for stabbing, slashing or chopping- attached to long poles. Beyond being less cluttery when fighting in a tight formation, it gave them range. The ability to cut someone down at double the distance of a swordsman was nothing to laugh at. Lashander had liked that argument. Like most normal people, he enjoyed being alive. Like most normal people, he didn't care one bit about something as intangible as honor. Beren, an easygoing southerner with bronzed skin and unruly blonde hair, had paraded a few options before the boy next. Different spears, the trident -he could always use that one for fishing if the going went tough, his mentor argued- as well as all sorts of halberds. But it was the glaive that had spoken to Lashander. It has a sutble elegance the others lacked he felt. The curvature of its blade also offered some added versatility at the price of a little power. He'd live with that. He was still swinging a metal blade on a pole taller than him. It would take armor to walk away from that no matter what. "Thinking you should have picked a petching sword instead?" Lash's instructor sneered across the courtyard. He could afford that tone of voice. He wasn't a slave but an old family retainer. Beren had been entrusted with the safety of family caravans as well as the household and was by all means beyond reproach unless he accidentally hurt the kid before him. Not that Lashander minded. The boy wasn't exactly an authoritarian in any sense of that word. Of course slaves existed to be ordered around, but even that he did in a rather lax manner. Lashander would have thought he'd find it hard to follow the man's instructions due to that disregard but frankly, his curiosity had outweighed his desire for freedom to do as he pleased here. He wanted to learn, and if he wanted to learn -that much he understood- he had to acquiesce to his teacher's wishes. Didn't mean he had to take his shyke lying down. "No thank you, Beren. I really wanted a weapon with a looong shaft I could stick up your petching arse one of these days." Beren shook his head in amusement before replying. "Shame your parents aren't around. They'd be so proud of you. Now, back into position! Right hand a third from the blade, left hand a third from the bottom, glaive held out at an angle in front of you. Left foot forward!" It had only been a few bells that Beren had had him feinting at the air, but that much Lash could do. The pose actually felt quite natural. The annoying thing was the fact that he was about to cross the courtyard they were stood on another time, feinting at the air. Especially since stopping the weapon before its inertia jerked Lash around wasn't exactly an easy thing. And his arms were getting tired. "Alright now, kid. Right foot forward, downward slash! Go! Left foot forward, backhand slash! Go!" And so on.

[Lashander]

The good thing was that after another bell of slashing his way across the courtyard like this, Lash couldn't feel any pain in his arms anymore. The bad thing was that after another bell of slashing his way across the courtyard, he couldn't feel his petching arms anymore. After the latest feint, a downward swing, Lashander simply lacked the strength to resist the weapon's heft. The glaive's blade struck a terracotta tile, cracked it, bounced back and leapt from Lash's grip. All he could do was look on as it clattered to the floor. Beren laughed, the old shyke. He petching laughed at having run the boy ragged. "About time!" He was still laughing as he padded over to his charge. "I thought I'd be missing out on dinner tonight with the way you kept going." Lash looked at his instructor with what he thought was a hard look. Unfortunately he was a spoiled kid and not the sort of grown man he'd have needed to be to pull this off. "It's good!" Beren assured him soothingly. "I've known grown men who threw down their shyke after a bell. You at least have some passion for this in you, even if your petching head isn't in it!" The boy's eyes narrowed even further which onl served to make him look constipated and caused the old guard to laugh out again. "Look." Beren began once he'd calmed himself again. He picked up the glaive and took position, just like Lash had. "Here's what you do:" Lashander watched his instructor take a step forward, clench his grip around the weapon's shaft as if he wanted to strangle it and jerk it down and up with stiff arms. It did make the muscles on the soldier's arms bulge but even the kid admitted that this didn't quite look what he imagined a proper sweep of the glaive to look like. "You cramp up around the haft and you're only using your arms to move it. In reality, if there's something heavy you wanted to move, you'd put your whole body into it, right?" Lash nodded his agreement. "Why aren't you with the weapon then?" Beren asked and answered his own question before the boy could even think about it. "Because I haven't shown you. I've just told you what to do and left you to interpret my words as you saw fit." Lash opened his mouth but again the veteran was already ahead of him. "Why? Several reasons." "One. Your arms will burn tonight and tomorrow and maybe the day after as well. You will remember this. You will remember how it feels to do it wrong and not go back to that. I'm sure you've touched a flame at some point in your life and burned yourself and from that day on you knew not to play with fire. Well I just done burned you boy. Or rather, you did it to yourself... I just didn't stop you." Lashander's hands balled into fists but before he could even consider taking a swing at the much bigger man, the sheer numbness in his arms told him he'd have trouble dropping his pants next time he went to the pot. He didn't even want to think about getting them up again. A punch was out of the question. "Two." Beren continued. "Two, there's no point in going anywhere with this before I know you're up for it. Which I now know you are. I'd ruffle your hair with pride but you look like you'd try to bite me..." He took a pause for a chuckle. "As far as raw recruits go you did better than expected." That little compliment did do well enough of a job to soothe the boy's annoyance. It even made him think just a little. He did like new things didn't he? He didn't like failing, nobody did, did they? But it was new and it was actually fun to run himself ragged... though hearing that it has been for naught had been less fun. Ah well. The truth would come out when this wasn't new anymore. "Finally, quite simply, it's easier to see where your problems lie now than refine you as much as I can and then find you're holding your weapon like you're afraid it'll run off. The glaive isn't your slave. It's not your boss either but you got that down. It's not even your friend for the record. It's quite simply an extension of your body. Or at least it should be. Now... watch me and I'll show you what that should look like."

[Lashander]

And so Lash watched as Beren went through the motions. Though older, bulkier and armored on top of all that, it didn't take skill to see that the man moved much more fluid through his stances and feints than the boy had. Lashander recognized it as well, cocking his head curiously, watching as Beren shifted from step to step in synchronicity with the drag of the glaive. It's like he's guiding a living being around rather than using a dead tool. Or so was the boy's impression of what he saw. Had this been a lighter weapon it might even have looked dainty. Like this, it still looked elegant. Like a bird of prey darting into Lake Ravok to seize a fish in its claws. Beren paused, set the glaive down on its butt and looked over to the boy who remained curious and thoughtful. "You don't just step and slash." The instructor more or less repeated himself there. "Your whole body must move as one. Not all parts at a time, but each in their time and place. Sure, you can guide the glaive with just your arms, but you will only die in more pain than if you'd just given up. Hips, back, chest, shoulders, upper arms, lower arms, wrists... they each have their assigned role in every move you can make. You take the step forward..." The grizzled veteran raised the glaive once more, then slowly stepped forth on his left foot. "You take the step and thrust out your hip. The momentum carries into your back which turns your entire torso into the swing. Like so..." For the boy's beneit, Beren overemphasized the motions he'd described, but that was hardly a bad thing. Lash could see Beren's hip just forward, saw the tension in his torso as he turned it in synch with the hip... he even thought he could feel the tension in his teacher's muscles as if it were a palpable thing. "Chest and shoulders do the big movements, your wrist does the fine stuff, like turning the blade to smack someone over the head instead of killing them, or just aligning it to slip between armor plates instead of bouncing off." But that was the part Lash did have down, they both knew. But wait, wasn't there an entire arm missing in between shoulders and wrists? "What about..." the boy started to interject, but yet again the old man was ahead of him. "Right, your arms. If you fight the way I just showed you..." "...and really, in essence that is true for almost any weapon. A sword, an axe, a maul... even punches work that way. No good fighter throws a punch using just his arms, unless he's playing with his opponent anyway. Where was I?" Nodding both to himself and Beren, Lash was all ears. It did make sense what his tutor explained. More muscles involved in the motion would offer him more strength to manipulate the weapon and more power left over which would translate to more speed and a higher likelihood of actually hitting someone with a swing. Why hadn't he thought of that before when he was hacking air for hours? Obviously because he simply was a foreigner to the whole thing, but the question he'd asked himself had been a rhetorical one anyhow. It didn't matter anymore. "Ah right. So the arms. The arms are what kills people." Lash didn't get that and it must have been written across his face in big letters. Because Beren laughed, yet again, probably the hundredth time today, it felt. And Lash was still confused. Did Beren mean to repeat what he'd just said about dying in more pain? Or did he mean... ah petch it, he'd answer soon enough without the boy even asking, wouldn't he? Of course he would. "Stepping and turning into the swing gets you there. Hips to shoulders allow you to get the glaive where you need it. The arms allow you to bring home the full heft of the weapon. Think of it like this: The big muscles do the heavy lifting, the smaller muscles do the fine control. It's like placing furniture. First you lift it in place, then you shove it around until it's just right... You've never placed furniture before, have you?" Lash shook his head at the question, but, "I do get the picture, I think. In fact I think I get it better when you show me and just explain than try to find some ridiculous image. I am neither a child nor stupid." Beren might have disagreed with either of that statement. But instead of doing so, he just walked over to Lashander and handed the boy the glaive back. "Is that so? Well, then show me! Hip, back, chest and shoulders, then the arms." The old soldier was in good spirits. Lash wasn't, and a groan seeping from his mouth attested to that. But he wasn't about to give his teacher the satisfaction of giving up. And with him trying to bring his whole body into the attack now, well, how much worse could it get for his arms? "Come on! Left foot forward, high slash! Go!"

[Elias Caldera]

Behold, Your Just Reward!

Lashander

Experience and Lore :

Skills

• Rhetoric +1
• Glaive +3
• Endurance +1
• Observation +3
• Socialization +1

Lores

• Learning From The Pain
• Your Weapon: An Extension of Your Body
• Combat: All About Movement
• Combat: Targeting the Weak Spots
• Maneuvering Properly With a Glaive

Miscellaneous :

Injuries

• None

Loot and Expenses

• None

Comments :

Let me know if you think I missed any or would like any of those Lores re-worded. I know sometimes you can get some that don't quite sound as cool like you'd imagine they should've.

Don't Forget

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