She moved with an agile grace that was almost hypnotic.
It wasn't the practiced, formal style taught in our combat classes.
This was something else, raw, efficient, and brutally effective.
She flowed between the attacking dummies like water, her body a blur of motion.
She wasn't just dodging; she was redirecting, using their momentum against them.
And she wasn't using a practice arrow. With a flick of her wrist, a sharp, crimson arrow made of solidified energy, a blood arrow, would materialize and shoot from her fingertips, piercing a dummy's core with unerring accuracy before dissipating into mist.
The whole display was terrifying and beautiful in equal measure.
So, she had been the person always training every time I had been here.
The relentless, percussive sounds that had become the background music to my own sessions, that was her.
The realization was like a jolt.
And the worse part was that I had never actually seen her here.
