Going Downhill

Excellence came naturally to the Dragon-Blooded, perfection didn't. Perfection required utter devotion, focus, and an endless commitment to constant improvement. It required the exclusion of all else. It required the abandonment of the soul for a greater ideal. Among the Grass-Spiders, none had attained it. But Ruk and Tiamat came close.

The two men sparred for untold hours, every night. No breaks, no nights off, no repeats. Every night, something new was learned, something untried was tried. While their colleagues laughed and drank as the sun laid itself to rest, Ruk and Tiamat greeted the moon as it lit the empty Training Grounds - the real Training Grounds - albeit dimly. The time had come for real work. The two veteran Grass-Spiders were near their peak - young enough to remain spry and battle-ready, seasoned enough to have over a century of combat experience under their belt. They were simultaneously much less and much more than human; they cared little for material wealth or personal relationships, yet their utter devotion to their craft made them appear veritable avatars of swordsmanship itself.

At once a deadly duel (the men had long since abandoned the notion of practice blades) and a dance that seemed almost choreographed (although it was not), the two senior Grass-Spiders had launched immediately into their full-speed cadence. Along with practice blades, they'd also abandoned warmups - it was time wasted for swordsmen who never cooled down. To the onlooker, beauty would fail to describe the duel taking place. Each stroke not only perfectly placed to kill, but to impress - the men were as deadly as they were elegant. It was difficult to tell whether form followed function, or the opposite. It did not matter. Like the larger goal of the Order itself with the art of assassination, their swordplay seemed to redefine the meaning of the concept. Tiamat, in Exalted fashion, wielded two of the massive, curved blades, one in reverse grip and one held normally. The more conservative Ruk fought back with a single blade. All three were forged by Oak from Chiaroscuran glass, and their quality would have made even the owners of some jade weapons envious.

Only the quiet slicing of the air by the blades penetrated the silence - the footwork of the men, assassins even before swordsmen, was as silent as the void itself. Tiamat, with a side-arm swing of his forward-held blade, swung a less-than-graceful haymaker slash at Ruk, which Ruk easily sidestepped. As soon as the blade passed Ruk's midsection, Tiamat lunged forward another step, using the momentum of the first slash to propel himself around at incredible speed. As his back temporarily turned to Ruk, he swung his reverse-held blade in the same fashion, although the strike was more targeted. The move was utterly unexpected, even to Ruk, who was forced to make an inelegant parry. The clang of metal echoed briefly in the alcove of trees that surrounded the sparring arena.

Ruk smirked as he recovered and made a return strike, which Tiamat easily dodged. The two settled into a slash, dodge, slash, dodge rhythm again before Ruk spoke up.

"You've been watching Mesa fight."

Sidestepping an overhead slash from Ruk, Tiamat smiled and replied, "You've got me there. He has a comparatively poor level of discipline and mastery for a Member his age, but his refusal to train forces him to be constantly improvising in combat, whether he means to be or not."

Tiamat slashed at Ruk with both blades, in orthogonal directions. Ruk, for his part, anticipated the slightly different timing between the slashes, dodging one first, then the other, with blinding speed. Tiamat continued to speak calmly as he made his attack.

"Every now and then I'll spot something coming from him that seems worth adding to my repertoire."

Ruk and Tiamat, for all their prowess, were both notably humble. They were just as likely to borrow moves from an associate as they were Oak or Nazareth. They had no qualms about finding their inspiration anywhere, and as Dragon-Bloods in an increasingly Celestial age, were constantly reminded that the underdog could excel with a lucky strike or a clever plan of attack. Their sparring continued and the two fell back into a rhythm, having such hopeless mastery of their art that despite their efforts to remain focused, it was all too easy to slip into conversation and planning while executing and countering attacks most of Creation's Terrestrial Exalts could never hope to emulate.

"You know, Ruk, I'm not surprised that the White Veil Society had the influence to force the Seventh-Legion to attack the Range Homes... But the way that went down was disturbing," said Tiamat, between the slashes of each of his swords.

As he dodged, Ruk replied, "Oak and I dispatched the attacking Rangers with minimal casualties on our end. The old man might not have the grace he used to, but what he lacks in finesse he makes up for in raw power."

Tiamat finished his other slash, replying, "Of course, but that isn't what I'm talking about, Usagi. I'm talking about Naru." Usagi was a diminutive for Usanagi that only Ruk's closest companions dared call him; Tiamat had managed earn Ruk's close kinship through his performance during their training sessions.

Ruk, no fan of rhetoric, leaned underneath Tiamat's second slash as he dropped his sword, then wrapped his right arm around Tiamat's left forearm. As he did, he questioned, "She was kidnapped and later returned. What about her?"

He jerked Tiamat sideways and used their momentum to drive Tiamat's left sword, still in Tiamat's hand, deep into the ground. Leveraging the Eight-Legged Harvest Promenade's focus on effective holding, he utilized Tiamat's brief surprise and wrapped his left arm around Tiamat's right forearm. With their arms locked, Ruk's grasp began to resemble the arachnid wrestling tumble it was meant to emulate. Ruk attempted to take the fight to the ground with a low, sweeping trip kick. Tiamat, righting himself quickly, easily jumped the kick and planted both of his feet squarely in Ruk's undefended chest. He pushed off with all his might, freeing himself from Ruk's grasp and launching himself into the air. The Air Aspect glided backwards with a feline grace and casually flipped over, landing on his feet. Still, he hadn't exactly won the engagement - escaping from Ruk's grasp had forced him to abandon both of his swords, one lying on the ground next to Ruk and the other stabbed into the earth, nearly to the hilt, a victim of Ruk's initial disarm attempt. Ruk, for his part, had been knocked down by the kick. As Ruk got to his feet, Tiamat answered his question.

"Why kidnap Naru? While valuable to us, the level of information she could provide to them that they didn't already know seems modest at best, and hardly worth the effort."

Ruk didn't bother to pick up his sword, assuming a low stance with his arms held high. The pose was as bizarre as the arachnid martial art that conceived it, but served as an ideal launchpad for the complicated, mobile grappling attacks that characterized the style.

As Tiamat approached Ruk in a more traditional fighting stance, Ruk began to see the reasoning behind Tiamat's suggestion. Still, Ruk, ever patient, allowed Tiamat to continue his explanation. Tiamat obliged his silent invitation.

"Think about it. What did the White Veil Society hope to gain by launching that attack? To demonstrate that they knew where we were hidden? No way, they already did that. To wipe us out? With only 25 rangers? I don't think so. If their intelligence is half as good as they claim there's no way they could have reasonably hoped to defeat us with only 25 rangers. They wanted their prisoner back."

Ruk replied, "And they got her." With that, Tiamat sprang for Ruk, who stood between the Air aspect and his swords. At the same time, Ruk made his patron arachnid proud, lunging forward just as Tiamat began to jump at Ruk. Ruk's stance was conducive to a low lunge, and as a result, Ruk found himself beneath an airborne Tiamat. At the very moment Tiamat was directly above him, Ruk redirected his momentum into a rapid grab at Tiamat's legs. He successfully snared Tiamat in mid-air, at which point Ruk himself jumped backward, pulling them both into the air and away from Tiamat's blades. This was a trademark of the Eight-Legged Harvest Promenade: Ruk had immobilized Tiamat by snaring his legs, but Ruk's own legs remained free to move. It was this focus that made the Order's martial art form so feared and so effective against crowds - mobility while grappling.

The two exchanged a series of rapid moves attempting to maintain dominance of the grapple, seemingly ignorant of the fact that they spun through the air as they did so. Just before they landed, Ruk managed to wrap his legs around Tiamat's and used their collective momentum to rotate the pair such that Tiamat hit the ground first. As they slammed into the unforgiving earth, Tiamat extended his arms and caught them both, landing in a push-up position, albeit with Ruk on Tiamat's back, their legs entangled by Ruk's hold. Tiamat immediately pushed off the ground and rotated rapidly, slipping Ruk's grasp. Tiamat hit the ground again on his back, launching into a kip up that sent him vaulting over Ruk's now-prone form. Ruk immediately got to his feet and struck another stance from the Eight-Legged Harvest Promenade, this time with his arms extended outward and his above his head, like the front legs of a spider threatening to attack. His torso leaned forward slightly, and he placed one leg in front of the other. It seemed the stance left the torso completely unguarded, but in reality, any Grass-Spider worth his salt could move quickly enough to block attacks directed at their midsection; the open target was designed to provoke an attack which was easily parried straight into a hold. Tiamat, while Ruk assumed his stance, had landed from his kip up a few feet from his blades. He considered picking them up, but they'd done enough sword fighting for the evening. He turned around and assumed a stance of his own, a low, defensive pose similar to Ruk's previous stance. His choice of a defensive position was an unspoken invitation for Ruk to launch the first move.

Ruk delivered without hesitation. A sudden leap into the air with all four limbs held close to the body signaled to Tiamat that his opponent intended to strike at the last second - his retracted limbs made him a smaller airborne target in the meantime. Even though he read Ruk's approach correctly, he still barely dodged the first two explosive strikes as Ruk descended. Just before landing on the ground in front of Tiamat, Ruk issued five lightning fast strikes - first, his left leg kicked forward in an attempt to catch Tiamat in the side of the face. When Tiamat jolted backward out of the way of the blow, the second leg attempted a lower kick, which Tiamat managed to veer out of the way of by contorting his upper body. With his chest now more exposed due to the contortion, Ruk threw a sideways chop with his right arm, catching Tiamat in the chest and knocking the wind out of him. Taking advantage of the blow, Ruk spun and caught Tiamat in the neck with a chop from his left hand. Continuing the spin, Ruk whirled around and delivered the fifth kick as he landed, but the winded Tiamat managed to duck it. Tiamat immediately sprang upward from the crouch, using the momentum to launch an assault of his own. The veteran Grass-Spiders again entered a ruthless, beautiful cadence of flawless attacks and careful dodges. Settled into their rhythm, their discussion continued.

Tiamat spoke first, saying, "Realistically, unless we've drastically underestimated their ability to conduct physical espionage - an area where I'm confident we have them beat - they probably stood zero chance of sneaking in and breaking Orchid out. And they knew it. So that left them with two options: diplomacy and brute force."

Ruk, weaving back and forth between Tiamat's blows as though they were a maze frozen in time, replied briefly, "With you so far."

Tiamat continued, "On the one hand, diplomacy was a difficult sell, as they didn't have much to offer us, at least not at the time. But brute force was not their game plan - 25 rangers assaulting the Range Homes was a pathetic showing if that was their intention. But it wasn't. They never intended to beat us into the ground and bust their prisoner out... They came to get a prisoner of their own. And why bother trying to grab a Grass-Spider when a mortal captive can get you the same ransom?"

Ruk nodded, leading Tiamat with the question that he knew Tiamat wanted to hear.

"You are correct, of course. They made no attempt to capture anyone but Naru... But how did they know to go for Naru?"

Tiamat replied enthusiastically, "Exactly. While I am fond of Naru, there's no way our Order ever would have traded Orchid for a mortal prisoner. It was almost as if they were aware of both Opal's infatuation with Naru and Opal's worsening mental instability. To me, it seems that the White Veil Society, quite correctly, anticipated that Opal was most likely to go rogue, and chose the perfect nerve to strike. There's no other reason to capture Naru - certainly she's knowledgeable, but we'd be crazy to believe the White Veil Society didn't already have their own experts in First Age technology, and they obviously have an in with the Lookshy Rangers, too - a better in than ours, evidently." Tiamat imagined the response Matsudo would give him if he tried to order an attack on a similar location.

"While most members of our Order are aware that Opal still feels a certain sense of... obligation... to Naru, I don't think many are aware of its extent, or Opal's mental status, which she hides quite well on the job, at least outside of the drinking. And that's hardly a distinguishing feature in her circle," Ruk said as he nodded.

Tiamat smirked and nodded in agreement. Ruk continued, saying, "So that's rather privileged information. What are you saying, Tiamat?"

Tiamat finally spoke frankly in his reply to Ruk.

"I'm saying that I think we have a White Veil Society mole among our made membership."

Ruk's eyes narrowed; the mere suggestion of such a compromise wounded Ruk's pride. The grizzled Water-aspect fancied himself the stalwart guardian of everything the Order stood for, and that level of penetration would be regarded by Ruk as a massive failing on his own part. Still, Tiamat insisted, though he noted Ruk's just-barely-hidden anger and spoke a bit more sympathetically.

"Think about it, Usagi. The pieces fit."

With a final aggressive parry, Ruk's threw Tiamat's last blow to the side and stood upright, tightening his sash.

Tiamat pleaded, "Think about it. That's all I'm saying."

Ruk begrudgingly acknowledged Tiamat's point with a subtle nod. He finally spoke up, saying, "For now, let's keep this between us. If what you say is true, we need to be very cautious about where this information goes. Tomorrow I will arrange a meeting with Gyoki, Samsara, and Nazareth. I'd like you to join me."

Tiamat nodded. The pair walked back to their cabins in contemplative, but tense silence.