Chapter 4

Ariel stood with her arms crossed holding her twin swords, blindfolded, and waiting.

Nathan was still skeptical, but with what she has been doing lately he was willing to give her the benefit of the doubt. He was standing in front of a pile of rocks with two in his hands, standing about twenty feet from her.

Suddenly he lightly threw two hand sized rocks her direction about a second apart and cringed as he watched them fly towards her.

Moving faster than he thought possible, Ariel cut each rock out of the air with a single stroke of each sword.

"Quit being a baby, I told you I know what I'm doing. I'm testing myself. Throw harder," said Ariel with a smile from behind her blindfold.

"I'm still not comfortable doing this," said Nathan.

They had been practicing this for months. At first she kept her eyes open then later she moved to where she often closed her eyes as she did this. But today was the first day she was doing it blindfolded.

Nathan was nervous what if he hurt her?

"This was the logical next step. I need to know I can depend on my senses even if I can't see," said Ariel.

"But..." began Nathan.

"Nathan, trust me please?" asked Ariel. "Even if you hit me you can take me in the house and take care of it, ok? So please let's try seriously?"

Nathan took two stones and threw them much harder Ariel's direction.

Seeming to barely move, both swords again flashed as she cut them out of the air.

"Better, but you're still holding back. Put your back into it," said Ariel smiling.

Trusting her judgment, Nathan started to really fling stone after stone at her, and each time her swords flash as she cut them out of the air.

Soon there were no more stones to be seen and Nathan had to stop.

"Ok, I'm out of rocks. But you have to tell me how are you doing this?" asked Nathan a little winded.

Ariel was lightly breathing hard herself, but Nathan seemed to be the one most out of breath. It still marveled him how great her stamina was now, both in and out of bed.

"It seems to be a combination of hearing and feeling the air the stones displace as they approach me. I can hear the approach and with the air to me it feels like it's almost a presence as the stones come at me. Care to try it?" asked Ariel with a smile as she lifted her blindfold.

"No thanks. I know I shouldn't depend on my eyes so much, but something about self preservation tells me that I probably will end up getting hit in the head a lot if I try," said Nathan with a smile of his own.

Having warmed up Ariel and Nathan both started into a heavy work out to hone their sword skills. Ariel put up her hand crafted twin swords and Nathan took off his shirt, and both of them hefted a heavy practice sword each to get started.

Since they had very nice swords, but they didn't really want to test dulling them on each other, they had went back and purchased blunt practice swords from the same smith in town they got their good sword from. But they requested that he make them heavier than he thought possible for practice.

But after watching them swing around the finished product in his shop, he was again marveled at the pair of them.

Today as they worked out, Nathan was starting to adjust to Ariel's new speed. It took him months to catch up to her because of the fact she was now physically faster than him, but over time he gained the ability to keep up with her. Now he was starting to surpass her most of the time.

But she had yet to display the same speed she showed in the weapons shop when she first got her weapons. She had mentioned that she couldn't understand how she could do what she did, but not be able to duplicate it again somehow.

But she was still extremely quick with her matching swords. And he wasn't sure that he would ever match that speed she had shown on that day though. Not without using magic that is. And he was trying to avoid that if at all possible.

He might be better than average, but she was as well, but with both of her hands, and that made a wicked combination for him to overcome with a single sword.

But regardless, both of their swords flashed in the light extremely fast.

It was hard to anyone watching to know exactly what they were doing as they sparred. Their average speed for sparing was already faster than what most normal users ever reached even while serious.

And as they trained together, Nathan threw out a few things for conversation.

"Keith requested that we look into a recovery matter for him," said Nathan as he blocked an overhead attack at the same time he raised his knee to stop a round house kick from Ariel.

"Really it wasn't that long ago that we just found the forest tree panther for him," said Ariel. "I wonder what he needed it for. And is he also still saying he wants to be a mage one day?"

As she spoke she was putting up both of her arms to stop a reverse elbow from Nathan as she dropped to try and sweep his legs from under him.

Easily jumping and doing an overhead attack that was also easily blocked by Ariel, Nathan said "Yes. He keeps saying that if he practices daily his meager skill will eventually get better with time, but I can't shake the feeling that he knows more magic than he's letting on. He says it because he's well read, but it doesn't feel that way to me."

"Well even though we've only been here for three months so far, most of the men have given up hinting that I should come visit them when you're not around. But he's one of the few that still makes vague and sometimes open hints about it at times.

"Nothing over the top, but it's like he's fishing or hoping one day I'll say yes. But still it's nothing that I can't handle," said Ariel with a smile as she aimed her sword low at his ribs at the same time she swung a swift and vicious kick at Nathan's head.

Nathan did something he had never tried before, and he dropped his sword to catch Ariel's sword in one hand and her kick in the other.

Smiling at her look of shock he let them both go.

"You know if I was serious you'd have lost that hand," said Ariel frowning.

"If it was a truly edged weapon I wouldn't have tried it. But with it being blunt it was worth the look on your face when I did," said Nathan with a large smile now on his face.

"Long as you know the difference I can live with that," said Ariel smiling back at him as she came in close to kiss him, smacked his butt, and then took back up her on guard position to start again.

Nathan just laughed as he bent over to retrieve his sword and got ready himself to start.

Later they would practice some unarmed combat and grapping, but he knew where that might lead and he was anxious to get started with that as well.

But lately Ariel kept hinting heavily that it was well past time that he learned a second and third weapon, but he kept putting her off as he really liked his bastard sword, and eventually he knew that she was going to surprise him with a new weapon during training one day. He was sure it.

But as Nathan sweated through the weapons workout with Ariel, once they took a short break, his mind drifted back to when they first met Keith.

After asking around, and checking with a few people, Ariel and Nathan found that for hire jobs would be posted on a covered board on the outside side of the building of Dottie's shop.

As they approached the board and looked it over among a few other potential people, Ariel decided that there were two jobs she found interesting and suggested that Nathan see which one's he found interesting and she would meet him in the Inn across the street to discuss which one to take first and try to contact the patron about more info on the job.

As she crossed the street to enter the Inn, Nathan realized that the men around him were now all watching her as she left. He knew they were all watching her well rounded hips sway back and forth as she slowly walked away.

Those new pants really did more for her figure than he believed she realized. But he enjoyed the view as well as the men around him so he wasn't complaining.

But as he turned back to look over the board, he realized that a man with reddish blonde hair that had obviously been in the back, had pushed his way up to the front and was now tacking up a new job.

As he read it over his shoulder it was pretty easy job for the amount work that was needed. Nathan realized that it was a few different magic ingredients for a very low level green spell. But some of it would require climbing and entering caves to gather.

As Nathan looked over the man from behind he seemed slight of build and about an inch shorter than him. He wasn't unhealthy thin, just didn't give the impression that hard work was anything he engaged in on a regular basis.

But as he curiously looked at the man, he realized that the man was also watching his wife enter the Inn along with the other men around him as he tacked up the job to the board.

As Ariel disappeared from sight the man turned back to make sure the job was securely posted to the board.

As he turned around he saw Nathan looked over the posting. He then asked "Interested in the job? I'm paying well for some of the items."

"Sure but why can't you just go get these items yourself?" asked Nathan.

"Because some of these things are in swamps or caves and I won't be able to fend off the creatures that live there on my own. It's just easier to pay someone who can do well against them than chancing it myself," smiled the man.

"I'll have to talk it over with my partner, but we may be interested," smiled Nathan.

"Well I wish I was the partner of the woman who just left here. I bet her husband and/or boyfriend is just loving life when he gets to sleep next to that at nights," said the man as he turned and again looked back at the Inn Ariel entered.