Caliste raised his blade to meet the falling axe, and steel kissed steel with a clear, bright note that filled the cave and shivered along the walls. In that single touch, he learned what he needed. The axe was not merely heavy; it was a weight given will, a gravity housed in metal. If he tried to catch it, the sword would snap. So he did not catch it, and  let it pass.0

Caliste softened his arm and drew the blade back a hand’s span. The axe edge scraped along his sword with a harsh rasp and cut empty air. In the same breath, he turned his wrist, brought the blade across the hollow he had made, and sent the point for Ketal’s throat.0

“Up we go,” Ketal said, his chin tilting as if he were greeting a friend, and he bent his neck just enough for the point to miss. The axe, which had fallen in an arc meant to cleave, lifted instead and cut upward as though the motion had been the plan all along.0

Caliste did not give ground. He slipped a step deeper, rotated his hips, and let the axe climb past his shoulder. The floor shook. The axe carved a bright path through the air and struck nothing. Caliste slid through the gap his movement created and drove for Ketal’s heart.0

The axe, still rising, stopped as if it had struck a hidden bar. Ketal changed the angle by a right angle, brought the haft across, and turned it into a cudgel. It came for Caliste’s temple with the kind of...0