Hohenfels

Arne silently cursed himself. He had completely and utterly dropped his guard, and only noticed it when he examined Katharina’s aura directly. It was the aura of a specialist – expertly defined, finely controlled, and dangerous. In a very different manner than Friedrich’s oppressive power, which could knock out lesser practitioners with a simple burst of intent. No, hers was a sharp knife, kept hidden until the very last moment. He was willing to bet that she could do very scary things with it, but he had no clue what exactly those might be.

He had known about her competency before, of course. It was the biggest reason why he was so wary of her – nobody learned to put up a fake aura as a smokescreen if they did not have a need for it. But he had gotten lost in the moment.

The only saving grace was that she was in the same boat as him. He was very aware just how flustered she was, even though she did her best to hide it. She had even forgotten to use the appropriate honorifics despite them being in a semi-public location. Only after the direct aura contact did she manage to catch herself, just like him.

Now, Katharina was letting her frustration out on the poor practice dummy. Arne had to admit that her form was decent for a silkling, with very little energy spent on flourishes and wasted movements. He suspected this was mostly thanks to a very talented teacher, who realized her disinterest and did his best to install viable basics in her mind as quickly as possible.

The biggest flaw she displayed was a severe lack of experience with corporeal magic, owed to a typical Western lady’s upbringing. Though thankfully, she was not a total beginner, and her extremely precise control facilitated rapid improvement whenever he pointed out problems.

The constant aura contact was, in theory, not necessary – he was keenly aware of the fluctuations in her magic even without it. It did, however, improve his senses by a significant degree, and it would be impossible to explain how he knew so precisely what she was doing wrong otherwise. And as an added bonus, it helped him understand the depths of her skill better. To his dismay, she had dropped her ‘shell’, something he had looked forward to examining more closely.

When Katharina prepared for yet another lunge, he noticed the telltale flickering of exhaustion in her magic and intervened, retracting his magic.

“That should be enough for today. Good job,” he praised, noting with amusement how she ruthlessly crushed an ember of childlike pride the moment she noticed it.

“Thank you, Your Highness” she smiled coyly, and once more he found himself glad to know of the terrifying mind behind the pretty face. “Would you say I’m qualified to wear a sword now?”