The Shadowsteel Forge (The Dark Ability Book 5) by D.K. Holmberg Page B

But always think to question. Something doesn’t look right, or doesn’t sound quite right, you got to push. Trust your gut. You’ve done well so far trusting your instinct. Now—”
    He flung a knife at Rsiran without any further warning.
    It wasn’t lorcith. Rsiran pushed on one of his knives and knocked Haern’s from the air. Haern smiled at him and threw another knife, but as he did, he rolled to the ground and unsheathed his sword. With a quick slashing movement, he swiped toward Rsiran and almost managed to hit him.
    Rsiran Slid back a few steps and emerged, unsheathing his sword.
    “Good,” Haern said. “Now try without Sliding.”
    “I don’t need to try without Sliding,” Rsiran said.
    “What if your ability fails? You’ve already seen how you can be too weak to Slide, or too sick to Slide. There may come a time when you can move, and fight, but you can’t use your abilities. Need you to be prepared for that.”
    Haern lunged at him, and Rsiran brought his sword up to counter. Without meaning to, he pulled on the sword as well. Haern seemed to have expected the move, and reversed the angle of his sword and jabbed it under Rsiran’s blade.
    Rsiran Slid backward.
    “Without Sliding,” Haern said in a grunt.
    Rsiran swiped at Haern with his sword, bringing the blade around in a sharp cut, before swinging down. Haern countered, driving the tip of Rsiran’s sword down.
    The clang of metal on metal echoed through the forest. Haern attacked, forcing Rsiran back, and Rsiran continued to struggle against the urge to Slide. He also resisted the urge to push on the sword. Fighting this way felt like fighting in the dark. He had grown accustomed to using his abilities as he attacked. Haern had trained him so that he would use them, and made certain that Rsiran had the skill needed to fight with not only the knives that he made, that he could push on, but also adding his ability to Slide to them. The combination had been how he’d managed to stop Evaelyn.
    Now, he fought with only his mediocre sword skill. His heartstone alloy blade created a bright bluish light in the forest, illuminating Haern, but he still struggled using the sword as more than a long knife. Nothing like the skilled sellswords that were found guarding the warehouse.
    “Keep your focus, boy,” Haern said.
    He smacked the flat of his sword against Rsiran’s arm, and he dropped his sword. “Damn!” Rsiran grabbed at his arm, feeling a welt already starting to form. “You’re asking me to fight without any of my abilities but you don’t limit yours.”
    “Limit? What advantage do you think me being able to See gives me?”
    “Can’t you predict where I’m going to attack?”
    Haern grunted and flicked Rsiran’s sword back to him. Rsiran pulled on it, and it came flying up to his hand. “With others, yes. But you know I can’t See you. That makes you dangerous for me. You’re the kind of person I would’ve avoided when given an assignment. Not enough to See, you know?” Haern took his attack stance. “Besides, you don’t need to use your abilities to defeat me. You got size and strength. Use that to your advantage. Working as a smith made you strong, so use that if you need to.”
    “Like this?” Rsiran ran at Haern and knocked him to the ground before Haern had the chance to react. He wrestled Haern’s sword from him, finding Haern much stronger than he would have expected, and then stood.
    Haern remained on the ground, holding his arm. “Like that,” he said. “Anyone else, and I would’ve Seen it coming. That’s your advantage, Rsiran. You’ve got many, but you got to remember to use them. Slide if you need to. Push on the metal as you do when you can. But if it comes down to it and your abilities fail, you need to think about what you’d do to get away.”
    Rsiran sheathed his sword and reached out a hand to help Haern stand. “I’ve had my abilities taken from me already, and we’ve managed to get