Sunny - Mona Lisa Awakening

"Never lead with your knife hand and leave an open target out there for your enemy. That stupidity you will only see on TV where we want the bad guy—who always happens to be threatening the good guy with a knife, of course—to lose. No, the only time we extend the knife is when we are using it, otherwise it is held back protectively against your low chest.

"The target for the open leading hand is your opponent's eyes. But it is not important that you actually strike the eyes—though that would be ideal—so much as you impair your opponent's vision in any way. Such as by throwing dirt into his eyes, a towel, or just thrusting your ringers toward the eyes and causing them to close in reflex. Practice going in hard, with full force. Lead hand strike. Knife hand thrust. Like so."

Chami pounced into the pillow mannequin, fingers stabbing the eyes and thrusting the other hand with savage force into the left chest, again and again.

They watched the impressive, lethal display with wide eyes, all sense of play sobered by the deadly reality of what they were learning.

"Stab, remove. Stab, remove, for as many times as you can. Keep striking until your opponent is down. Then finish the kill by removing the heart or, far more easier, the head."

Not exactly a pretty bedtime story , I thought, deliberately suppressing my guilt, but we lived now in a scary, deadly world.

Amber and Aquila returned from their outside reconnaissance and settled down in the other sofa to watch with the rest of us as Chami took the others through their paces.

"Harder," Chami told Rosemary. "Think of it like a frozen steak you have to stab through," he told the cook, and had her repeat the thrust-strike move until he was satisfied with the force of her lead and follow-up blows.

Stuffing popped out from the stabbed pillows and was quickly repaired with masking tape, over and over again. If it was play, it was deadly, earnest play.

When they were all comfortable with the maneuver, Chami had them sit and rest while he continued lecturing. "That was the face-to-face approach. A more ideal approach is from the back, which would be much better for you ladies. For us all, actually. It is easier to kill someone when you do not have to look into their eyes. Rear take-outs are taught all the time to soldiers.

"The optimal entrance into the spinal cord is through the base of the skull. With a rear attack, you place your free hand down hard over your opponent's mouth or chin and pull down as you thrust the knife through to the front of the neck. Do not worry about him trying to bite him. Believe me, when your blade is slicing through him, biting you will be the last thing he thinks of."

Chami turned to me. "Milady, if you will help me demonstrate." I went reluctantly forward to play his intended victim, not a task I would have volunteered for. Facing away from him, I waited for his move. Chami struck with a quickness and strength that was quite frightening, in truth. His hand was suddenly there over my mouth and yanking me back as he thrust two fingers, simulating a knife, into the base of my skull. Sheesh, I'd have had no chance.

Having demonstrated what he wanted, Chami had them pair up once more and practice the move first on themselves, using their fingers as he had done. Then, turning over the pillows and drawing a new rear target, he had them try it with real knives, taking great pains to ensure that they did not stab their own hands.

More stuffing flew out.

"He's good with them," Gryphon murmured to me.

"That's because he's a child himself," I said, sotto voce.

"I heard that," Chami said. "No appreciation."

"You appreciate yourself enough for all of us," I retorted.

"You wound me, my Queen."

I snorted. "After that demonstration? Not likely."

Chami finally called a halt to the practice. "Enough for today."

"That was cool," Thaddeus said, handing me back my knife in the correct manner, blade pointing away from me.

"Come on, Jamie," Thaddeus said, the two of them totally at ease with each other now. "Let's go surf the Internet. I want to check out how much a dagger like that costs and where I can one."

"You're hooked up to the Internet? Awesome!" Jamie exclaimed, trailing up the stairs after Thaddeus like an eager puppy.

Gryphon and Thomas left to make their rounds outside as Tersa and Rosemary went into the kitchen, chatting about what they had learned. Above it all, I felt the fullness of the moon calling, beckoning us. We could be answering its summons soon.

Chami plopped himself down beside me. "Your turn."

"Mine?"

"Try calling your knives to your hand," Chami said softly.

I stood up reluctantly, knowing he was right. Many of the things I had done had been in the heat of battle. Some, like channeling the energy through my hand and searing Miles's flesh, I doubted I could reproduce. Unless I was fighting, power and the use of power made me uncomfortable. Still, I needed to know if I could call my knife to me reliably, as I had called Mona Louisa's blade when she had tried to stab Gryphon.

I concentrated. The silver dagger came easily to hand. Nothing happened, though, with my non-silver dagger.

"How do you call the silver dagger?" Chami asked.

"I think of silver. How it tastes, smells, feels in my hand."

"Do the same with your other dagger."

I brought the blade close to my nose, inhaled the faint metallic smell, stuck my tongue out and licked the blade, concentrated on the weight of the dagger, how it felt in my grasp. I resheathed it along the outside of my boot, and knelt down with my hand a foot away and concentrated.

It came to my call.

"Nice," Chami said. "Try it standing up."

A more concentrated effort but still it came. I felt the force of it as it left my boot.

Amber, who had remained with us, watching, handed me his forty-inch Great Sword. With my strength, the weight was not a problem so much as getting used to the feel and balance of the larger weapon. The smell was unique and the taste different from other metals—old, with the smell of ancient battle and spilt blood, as if it had absorbed some of its prey's pain and power.

I laid the sword on the glass coffee table, stepped back, and called it. It flew to my hand like a deadly giant winged bird, hilt first.

"Give me your silver dagger," Amber said and walked to stand with the distance of the room between us, about thirty feet. "Gall it to you."

A pulse of power and it flew to my hand, straight and true.

"Wow," Jamie said from the stairs where he and Thaddeus watched with fascination. The small surges of power had probably drawn them down.

"I've never seen anyone do that before," Jamie said.

"That's because no one else can," Chami said dryly. "Try my knife." He tossed his silver stiletto to Amber, who snatched it from the air.

With a burst of concentration, I called it to me. Silver blades seemed to be no problem. I tossed it back to Chami and he snatched it with an easy flick of his wrist, sheathing it.

"Not too bad," Chami said.

"Not bad? That was amazing!" Thaddeus exclaimed.

"You must familiarize yourself with all of our knives, milady," Chami said, "so that you can call any of them to you should the need arise."

"It's a good suggestion, Chami, but some other night," I said quietly and sank down onto the beige sectional sofa.

Chami acquiesced to my wishes with a nod, seeming to sense my discomfort at being the core of attention, and drew the boys' interest from me with an impressive display of twirling stiletto play.

If Jamie and Thaddeus felt the edginess restlessness, the eager anticipation the rest of us felt as the witching hour of the full moon brushed nearer, they showed no signs of it.

When it was almost midnight, Chami asked, "Would you like me to speak to your brother about tonight?"