“If you’d like me to assist—”

“Don’t touch me, witch,” he hissed and instinctively placed his right foot on the circular panel, weighing it to the mat.

Luscia didn’t stop him in his endeavor. She’d seen the routine before. His stubbornness deserved the multiple tumbles he was about to take.

Succeeding with the right, his left heel touched down on the opposite side, causing his arms to reach out into nothingness for balance. A proud smirk promptly replaced his scowl. He swung his head to boast in her direction, which disrupted his fragile balance atop the klödjen. In a clumsy dance, he plummeted to the mat, landing firmly on his backside.

“Again,” Luscia ordered, banishing her desire to laugh. It was going to be a long morning, and chuckling at his misfortune would only prolong it.

He snapped into an upright position. Darakaians despised postures of submission, much less at the feet of a small Boreali woman. Standing, he brushed off his pants and tried again, repeating his initial approach. This time, Luscia watched his knees bend beneath his abdomen, causing him to land directly atop the globe. Being male, she imagined that was far from pleasant and expected it to alter his methodology once he recovered.

It did not.

Again, he collapsed, but to the side this time, crashing upon his hip bone. Then to the other, nearly bending an ankle. He landed on his palms, dislocated his shoulder, and on one attempt almost shattered an elbow. His ordinary bones were so breakable, but he refused to stop.

“Heh’ta, enough,” she finally interrupted, weary from his failed attempts. “Crescent wraiths rely on three principles—predominantly, balance of the body and mind. The klödjen cannot be conquered unevenly. This,” Luscia emphasized, pushing one side of the viridi panel to the mat, “will never work. You cannot center yourself upon a foundation of unbalance.”

“Then how do you suggest one mount your stupid klödjen?”

Luscia stilled her mouth. Due to his lingering Darakaian accent, he pronounced the northern term more like cloud-june, which in Boreali loosely translated as “master’s hog.”

“You jump,” she answered, spreading her feet apart into a leveled stance. “The whole body must leap from one balanced position to another. Your entire form must commit in order to succeed.”

Bending at the knees, she pulled her shoulders back and evened her elbows. With an exhale, Luscia leapt atop each side of the wooden panel and dipped into a crouch to lower her center of gravity. Once secured, Luscia rose into stable position.

Hopping off, she returned to the edge of the mat and nodded at the klödjen. “Again.”

Grimacing, he mumbled foreign syllables but proceeded to mirror her example. With an angry grunt, he launched himself at the globe, almost overshooting it. Rocking back on his heels, he crouched deeply and waited for the swaying klödjen to settle before rising.

“Good. Waedfrel. Now, focus on your breathing. Uncontrolled, breath alone can undo this symmetry,” Lucsia instructed as she moved to a wall that hosted an assembly of weighted discs. Selecting a few, she returned to his side. “In a moment I am going to touch you, and I’d prefer we not repeat the last hour. Do hold still.”

With a fleeting tap of her fingertips, Luscia nudged his forearms to open and extend outward. Choosing one of the discs, she slid the accompanying leather tie over his fist and upward, to rest upon the muscle. Observing he was right-handed, she switched to his left and did the same, yet doubled the weight on the weaker arm. She saw the veins in his forearm protrude beneath it while he adjusted to the difference in heaviness.

“Second, the wraiths demand a balance of strength,” Luscia continued as she added another disc to each arm, assessing his frame could handle more. “You have two arms. Both must carry the same burden. Your right is sufficient, but your left is too weak. Without balance of strength, there is no unity. Without unity, there can be no balance in your mobility. And as I said yesterday, neither of us would benefit from your self-inflicted beheading.”

The al’Haidren snorted stiffly as he stretched his neck from shoulder to shoulder. “So considerate. What a puzzle, that a heartless y’siti would care about my possible decapitation.”

“Despite the bias of your first education, the Boreali are not sorcerers, nor are we heartless.” Luscia shook her head, picked up a bag of chalky gripping powder, and began to scatter it over the mat around the circumference of the klödjen. “On the contrary, we tend to feel a great many things,” she whispered to the floor.

“A bold claim from a House of creatures who hunt their own offspring.”

“The murder of our cross-castes is gruesome and tragic.” Luscia felt her teeth clench as she rose and positioned her face directly under his, more than a foot higher. “Had jurisdiction been extended to our Najjan, the guilty party would’ve already been apprehended and brought to justice. Darakai’s delay is bought at the price of our innocents, not yours. Don’t you dare pretend these deaths are of any consequence to the House of Darakai.”

A flippant laugh broke free from his flattened lips.

“All I know—” Kasim grunted when his corded forearm constricted under the weight of the disc. “—is that my men never found a slaughtered child floating in the water like another stall in the bazaar until your colorless kinsmen entered my city.”

A wave of vertigo washed over Luscia’s senses. Alora had never mentioned a body in the bay. His tone was callous, but lacked any trace of sarcasm. The al’Haidren wasn’t misleading her; he thought she’d already known.

Luscia put space between them, as if his nearness made the words truer. Methodically, she dusted the gripping powder from her palms and clutched them behind her back to bridle their shaking. Luscia needed to inform Alora straightaway, but a rush to her side might solidify Darakai’s suspicion of Boreal’s role in the cross-caste deaths. An absurd deduction, but substantial enough to threaten her House’s insecure standing with the Ethnicam.

“The third principle,” Luscia managed, “is sheer endurance. The resolve of the wielder must be greater than the discomfort of his circumstance. The chalk will reveal how many times you dismount. Your objective is to do so only once, when you can endure no longer.”

“That’s it? This is your lesson?” The al’Haidren scoffed, irritation calling a flush to his angular cheeks. “How much time do you expect me to waste standing here like this? An entire hour?”

“If you consider a mere hour the extent of your endurance, then wem. Yes.”

At her challenge, he sucked his teeth defiantly. “What is the record?”

“Twenty-six.”

“Hours?” The corners of his lips fell, teasing hers to rise. “Twenty. Six. Hours?”