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[Kale ab'Arawn]

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The sword was uncomfortable in her hand.

She stood in line, as rigid as the rest of them. Well, maybe as rigid as most of them. Naedra, a few heads down, was cutting up and had been slow to follow the movement sequences that were called.

Poor crazy fool.

Not following directions in a timely manner incurred a swift punishment that Imryrr wasn't very hesitant to hand out. As a body hit the ground a few feet away from her, Kale smiled. It felt like old times.

They broke formation and commenced the night's training. The upper ranks took them through various exercises of similar nature to those they'd practiced in Umbra. It felt so long ago, a lifetime since then. The hours of the night grew long and the motions of battle became familiar once more to her, but the sword was still uncomfortable in her hand.

She'd known she was out of practice, but this was pretty embarrassing. At least to her. The others just took her for the latest initiate. It was almost expected that she seem untrained. But for Kale, it was downright infuriating.

The sword, once so comfortable in her trained hand, had never failed her in those days. Now, it was a foreign object held in a fool's grip. It took all of her concentration just to keep Abby or the others from knocking it completely out of her grasp during the training. If only she had not grown so lax with her practice!

Or maybe...

She cursed herself for a true fool as realization washed over her. The sword was only comfortable in her hand in those days because it had been comfortable for her. Just as the memories she'd used had been stolen from her mother, so too must have been the sword skills.

Well, that solved that mystery. It also ticked her completely off. What next? Would she forget how to walk, too? If the damned sword wouldn't work for her by the next training, she would put it on a shelf and be done with it.

She felt more of a connection with the arcane, anyway. Ever since she could remember, she'd been drawing her runes. Perhaps it was time to use what she had been given, and not what she had taken.

Down the line now, someone was mentioning Abby's lack of footwear. She mused as she dug through her pack and drew forth an extra pair of boots.

She still had bigger boots to fill.