"Get up, we're trying that again!" Teresa yelled at me as I lay on the ground.
She had knocked the wind out of me with a hard knee to the stomach. I spit out the blood that had collected in my mouth and stood back up.
"I need a break, we've been doing this every day for weeks," I said. My knees trembled as I spoke.
"If you want a rest all you have to do is prove to me that you are ready for one," she said and readied her sword for an attack.
"I wouldn't mind doing that if you weren't absolutely insane!" I said as I just managed to dodge her lunging attack.
We had been training every day since those guys and that spirit confronted us outside the tavern. She said that the sudden boost in her intensity wasn't because of that but I didn't believe her. She began swinging her sword as powerfully as she could. I jumped backwards to avoid an overhead slash. If I tried to block it, I'm sure it would've cleaved me in half. I stood thinking about the way Delmar's helmet split in half that night in the tavern. That could be my whole body. I thought as I blocked a horizontal slash aimed at my face. The impact behind it knocked my sword out of my hands and sent a vibrating pain through my hands.
"You were given the most powerful sword the world has ever seen, and you have no skill in wielding it," she said. There was an urgency in her voice I had never heard before.
"Are you worried?" I asked her. I'm sure the disbelief in my voice was noticeable.
"Of course, I am. I can handle being the target of aggression, but those jerks were after you. What if you get attacked and I'm not there?" She asked.
"Will there be a time when you aren't here? You haven't been more than a few feet away from me since you moved in with me," I said.
She fiddled with the blade of her sword as she considered what I had just said to her.
"Look, there's a lot you don't know or understand about me. Those things don't concern you, so I keep you out of them. But I do need you to understand that there may come a day when you wake up and I'm gone," she said.
I expected her to make some kind of joke or witty remark after that statement, but she just quietly waited for my response.
"Are you expecting something to happen to you? Is that why you're being so intense? Or did those guys scare you?" I asked and folded my arms in front of me.
"Yeah right, there is no being living, dead or otherwise that scares me. My only fear is losing you. That is my motivation for training you," she said and got back in her attack stance.
I raised my sword and prepared to defend myself. When we practiced with sticks, I did get pretty good at sparring with her. I just couldn't get the hang of real swords though. They were heavy and when they clashed it hurt. It took all the effort I could manage just to hold on to my sword. When I did go on the attack my timing was usually off. Teresa had the kind of speed that made me second guess my vision. I would go for an attack and just after the attack landed, I would realize she wasn't really standing there. That usually led to me getting punched or kicked and reminded that in a real fight I would be dead.
Teresa sprinted at me holding her sword low. She had done this before; it was a more fluid style of fighting. Instead of hard, rigid strikes, she would let her strikes flow together. It was almost like a dance, except the intended outcome was death. She led off with an upward swing. I dodged it and slashed at her face with my sword. There was a split second when I thought the attack would land. I didn't purposely do it but I felt my hand twist slightly. The attack missed just over her right shoulder.
"What the hell was that?" she yelled and hit me with the hardest right hook I've ever felt. The punch blurred my vision.
When my vision cleared, I looked up at the blade of her sword. I could feel the tip of the blade poking into my face just below my right eye.
"Please tell me that you didn't purposely miss an attack, because if I find out that you did, I have to kill you," she said a little too calmly.
"Why would you have to kill me?" I asked. For the first time since meeting her I was afraid Teresa would actually hurt me.
"Well love, I can't stand the thought of some lowlife that you took it easy on, killing you. That would completely destroy me. So, if you are determined to throw your life away, it might as well be me that takes it," she said and stared at me casually.
"I didn't mean to do it, but I also don't like the idea of hurting you. So that's probably why it happened," I said.
She stood up and helped me to my feet. She was suddenly smiling. It was one of those smiles that always means something bad is about to happen.
"Stay here," she said and ran toward the house.
I stood there alone daydreaming about taking a bath in our private hot spring. Maybe I'll invite Bella in and try to pick up where we left off last time. I thought and then shook my head to clear it away. I scolded myself for even thinking about her that way. I did have to admit though that the more time I spent alone with my thoughts, the more images of her invaded my mind. Something moved in the grass behind me and startled me. I turned around and two men stepped into the clearing with me.
They were both wearing dirty clothes and armor. They were also both long dead. The one on the left was taller and carried a spiked club. The pale skin on his face cracked and peeled to reveal clean jaw bones and teeth. The one on the right's left arm was nothing but an open hole. I could see darkness where the rest of his organs should've been.
"Hey fellas, you here for the afterlife special?" I said and got ready to attack.
"There you go love; I got you some training partners you can feel fine about hurting," Teresa said from behind me.
They both attacked me with wild heavy strikes. I did my best to fight them off at the same time. It was difficult to stay in front of them and avoid getting hit. I was faster than them, but my strikes were like nothing to them when they landed.
"They're dead love, you have to disable them. They won't get tired or bleed out, take off limbs! Show me how much strength that new body has in it.
"It would be great if they would just go back to being dead for me," I said as I dodged a club swing.
The two corpses stopped moving suddenly and dissolved into dust. I stood motionless in disbelief.
"What just happened?" Teresa said as we both stared dumbfoundedly into the landscape.