Of War and Warriors

When he chuckled it helped to ease a bit of the tension in her shoulders. Maybe someone else would have been embarrassed by his reaction to their attempts to seem natural in this new environment, but she was very aware of how ridiculous and awkward she looked. She wanted to look ready to learn and comfortable in the arena as she faced the Warlord, but she just wasn’t capable of that just yet. Perhaps one day that would change and she could confidently stand here for a real fight of her own, but for now she was happy to just absorb every bit of knowledge she could get her paws on.

Tamsyn took all of the notes she was given and adjusted her stance accordingly. Her paws shifted as his larger paws tapped each of her limbs until she had the steady, stable stance he had described. She let her toes spread till they were able to dig into the sand, her claws anchoring her on the soft ground. Her tail ended up laying flat in line with her spine. Now that she was in this fighting stance she could feel the noticeable difference between this and how she would normally stand. She could feel herself flexing muscles that she hardly ever used before now. She nodded in understanding as he instructed her to practice this stance often. She gave a curious glance to the stones he put by her paws, but as she relaxed into her normal stance and then shifted back into the fighting stance he had placed her in before, she saw how they helped mark her place in the sand. They were certainly helpful as she practiced falling into the stance more quickly, trying to learn how to do it without needing to think about each paw every time.