Sullen cloud penned us in from on high, but the air was humid, hot and still. We had the feeling of being trapped underneath the lid of an iron pressure cooker, and the gray of the sky spoke further to that impression. The scrub grass was thirsty in its adolescence, and all manner of growing and living things seemed as if to reach upwards in anticipation of a rain was seemed just as intent to roll us by completely.

Mr Sadiqi stood in an unbuttoned white cotton Kurta and sunbleached Levis, with one hand pinching the brim of his wide [Tyrant Beaverskin] hat, and half a mind towards the prediction of weather.

Two of his hands that day were in my company and under his management.

Lay on the ground nearby, and sheltered under a lean-to of ply wood and hawthorn stump, Single Nick protected his honey-colored guitar from the inclement. As a man, he was featured typically of an Anglo overexposed to the sun: being the pale of burnt milk, and having a weak chin on an otherwise square face. From his prone lounging and ease, he plucked out simple notes one at a time and hummed wavering tones in accompaniment.

To my front was the hand we called Fat Mike, sweating with great profusion. He was a bald, middle aged man who was the color of acorns, with red-orange eyebrows and arm hair. He described himself as octoroon and Irish, and he had a belly wide enough to excuse – but insufficient to explain – his nickname. He held in his hands a long hickory pole, and his eyes a resolute expression, and then with a lunge he stabbed me in the shoulder with that blunt bit of wood.

In this manner I employ a narrative device in which I withhold from you, my audience, the implied conclusion of a critical discussion. Now, one might employ such a method for the purpose of dramatic effect, but my intention here is to preserve the moment until we have together laid the necessary foundations for a clear kenning of what had been said – for there are hidden matters yet which I intend to reveal to you. Then in due course, we might revisit Ashli Hektor with a clear view of the significance and consequence of her choice, which would come to have profound effect on my own history.

Returning to my shoulder and the interception of lumber, Fat Mike raised up out of his stance and ran one palm slick over his pate. He leaned against his staff and produced a chain of thoughtful, impatient tsks (which is to be interpreted as the alveolar dental click).

“Well that’s a great way to die,” he grumbled.

“I would not’ve died straight away,” I growled back. The men about shifted as if to rebuke me at once, so I rushed my words to cut them off. “I could have lived a long and humble life with naught but one arm, lopsided and satisfied. Truly gentlemen, you are too inconsiderate of the condition of disablement.”

I evoked a gruff chuckle from Single Nick, but that was all. Mr. Sadiqi did not even turn to look.

“Todd, once your arm is ruined, how will you defend against the next strike? And the next? How will you guard your leg when he makes to wound you further?” Mr Sadiqi sighed. “When a man, or a beast, sets themself against you, and your life is at stake, there is no such thing as ‘turning it around’. It is the first blow which decides the advantage, and the advantage determines the fight.” Placing one hand on his hip he ran his other over his lip and then gestured for Mike to move back into position. “Anything you lose in the bleeding is lost forever. Don’t treat it any other way.”

I bent at my knees and angled a broom handle (for that was my spear today) into neutral guard: firm low and angled upward, with a spread grip. Be sure though, I was in this no Camillo Agrippa. Then my dancing partner made the same lunge as before, his body dipping low and his staff extending far and high. This time I had the better sense of it, and guided the line of my stick so that it deflected against his weak margin and his outer side. My form was not entirely terrible.

Ideally, the next move would be to step out into a new center, to control his line that I might punish his over-extension with an advance. But my left foot was improperly placed, and I could not prevent his reset. Instead I chose to retreat into guard. The next jab which threatened me was short. It would have been sufficient to hold my distance, but instinct called for my parry. The moment my point wavered, my instructor beat my weapon out of position and into bind, from there he simply walked his staff in and tapped my breast.

“Clean. Lung,” he announced softly.

The casual ease with which I was being overcome rankled me. “You’re not giving me enough time,” I complained peevishly.” The impulse to throw the broom came and went: as all men are subject to tantrum desires, and it is our measure to deny them. I moved back into guard instead.

For the sake of safety, my shirt front was padded with rags, which gave me the look of a songbird or a flighted turkey; I felt strike-sore through it anyway. Michael took his ease instead of matching me, but it was Nick who spoke up from the ground.

“The talent of soft men is making excuses instead of improvements,” the guitarist murmured, as his plucked strings painted the first strokes of the traditional music of his people.

“You would know,” Michael replied in good humor.

“Yes, but I make continual improvements to my excuses,” the younger man chuckled in the shade. “That counts, hell in that regard, I’m surely the hardest man here.” He struck out louder into the three note chords which were characteristic of Arena Rock.

Mr Sadiqi was silent for a long moment, then he wiped dust from his eye and cleared his throat. “Don’t be teaching the boy to be foul,” he whispered. His hat came off into his hand. “You know I saw them live in ‘82?”

“No kidding?”

“With my uncle. First concert in the States.” The first hand smiled wanly. “Not the same, acoustic.”

“No.”

“Todd,” Mr Sadiqi replaced his hat. “Nothing wild, nor ‘vader, nor thug is going to give you more time than they give you. It will be your job to take the time you’ve got and make it enough.” He indicated for us to begin again. “Mister O’Carroll,” he requested of Michael, “once more a little slower if you please.”

From there, my education progressed in much the same practical manner, and with the slow collection of bruises. Though our exercise may have been conducted through utility of the broomstick, I trust you apprehend we meant it as an analogue for the herdsmans’ spear which I named before as the vakero. I am certain this scene would have been more heroic should you imagine a bloody unforgiving tutelage, from atop a shrouded mountain peak: with jagged stone underfoot and true sharpened steel flashing without clemency for error.

But my mentors were not insane people, and neither was I.

I do admit our lessons were slow to absorb: our method was full of impracticality. None of them, Mister Sadiqi, Michael, or Nicolas had any particular background in instruction. Nor were they formally trained for martial defense in any established tradition. Therefore were were without the forms or vocabulary of the art, and instead relied on example and intuition, and the most basic directional instructions.

Much later, I would find need to unlearn certain bad habits I developed in my spear-play on the ranch. But the core principles, which were keeping the sticking end pointed in the right way and not to be tripped up by your own feet, were a sufficient enough foundation for a young man out of the reach of war.

So while the weather withheld itself o'er the turning of the afternoon, I was pincushioned by a man called Fat Mike as the closest man I had to a father punctuated our exchanges with various advice in the subjects of courage and temperament. And all the while as my grip and posture grew less intolerable, Single Nick began to play.

♪ In the center there’s a mountain and it’s got twelve thrones ♪

♪ yea, they the ones from up on high, who rule everyone ♪

♫ and though they be not kind – oh! ♫

♫ we lived with peace of mind ♫

♫ under heaven’s law, the mem’ry of the King. ♫ ♪ I’d never thunk that ragnarok’d start with my sedan ♪

♪ but dragons, giants, horny goats’n plagues yea that’s on brand ♪

♫ five come kings of evil – ‘n! ♫

♫ eight their knock off sequel ♫

♫ settin’ fire and blood, to everything they can ♫ ♪ I don’t know if it’s we who erred, from what I know of sin ♪

♪ it’s punishment, or just bum luck, that’s let the devil in. ♪

♫ but though they emptied hell – oh! ♫

♫ to make their war as well ♫

♫ yea that ain’t near ‘nuff, ‘cause man’s built tough, we’ll win. ♫