Star Wars_ I, Jedi - Michael A. Stackpole [38]
Which was exactly what she and I knew would happen the second the exercise began.
As Kam began to layer in lessons about fighting with a lightsaber, sensing my opponent became more important. My ability in that area began to grow, but I didn’t trust it enough to abandon myself to it. Though we sparred with padded wooden practice swords, I treated each cut or slash as if it were from a true lightsaber. Very defensive, I relied upon the basics that Kam taught and found they stood me in good stead close to ninety percent of the time.
In that other ten percent, Gantoris inflicted some nasty bruises on me.
Kam’s instruction can’t be faulted at all in this regard because he taught us well the three rings of defense. The outermost ring consisted of four guard positions: upper right, upper left, lower right and lower left. The lightsaber’s hilt would end up wide of the body, with the tip coming back toward the middle to pick up the grand sweeping blows that are very powerful, but also take longer to deliver.
The middle ring also involved four guard positions: high, low, left and right. Whereas in the outer ring the blade tended to be held at a diagonal, in the middle ring up and down were parallel to the ground at head and knee height, while left and right were perpendicular to it. The idea with the middle ring was to pick up quicker blows and stop them before they could intersect with the body. Luke also noted that the middle ring was effective against picking off blaster bolts.
The inner ring involved parries instead of blocks and was proof against lunging attacks. For this third line of defense, the lightsaber was kept in close, with the hilt covering the navel. By angling the blade’s tip and picking up attacks on the lower third of the blade, attacks could be shunted aside, and a riposte to the opponent’s chest or stomach became a very real possibility. The inner ring was the last line of defense, dangerous to be defending from, and dangerous to be attacking from.
That afternoon saw me pitted against Gantoris in a basic sparring match. Because he was taller than me, he had something of a power and reach advantage. My only salvation would be quickness and the years I’d spent involved in rough and tumble battles as a CorSec officer. It also helped that, because of my CorSec experience, I knew I could beat someone as big as he was; whereas I doubted Gantoris ever had found himself in a real fight with someone like me.
We bowed to each other as we entered the circle described by our panting and sweating comrades. I turned to my right and saluted Master Skywalker, and then to my left and saluted Kam. Kam raised his right hand, then lowered it quickly and shouted, “Begin.”
Expecting a charge, I took a step back. Gantoris’ eyes blazed with triumph as if this concession of a meter’s worth of territory was somehow a great victory. He gave me a cold smile, then slowly began to pace forward, much like a stintaril stalking a tree-tick. He kept his feet shoulder width apart as he came in, and his knees bent, but I knew the attack wasn’t going to be coming until he rose on the balls of his feet and set himself to strike.
My sense that he was going to do just that came nanoseconds before I saw him gather himself for the attack. I almost lost the impression in the violence of his attack, but I’d begun to react to the Force-sense before the attack came in. My blade rose up to the upper right guard while I slipped to the left. I picked up his attack and knocked it aside so quickly that I surprised myself. Because I had moved out of the line of his attack and was already drifting past his left flank, with a flip of my wrists I could have brought the wooden blade down and across his stomach, but I didn’t. Instead, trying to cling to the warning I’d been given, I danced past him and set myself for a new attack.
Another one came hard and fast. Gantoris’ blade came up, around and down in a crowning blow that would have split me from skull to navel. I snapped my blade up into the high guard, bracing myself to pick up the blow, but it never