Gleaming Onyx, Tarnished Lead

[Lesingnon]

Rick chuckled softly as L'aire launched into her giggle fit. Apparently all the various implications of what he'd said had occurred to him before speaking.

"Well, first you need to make sure they aren't in a position to block it if they're armed. That kind of sweeping attack is fairly easy to pick off. So you either need to bait their weapon high or wait for them to get a bit careless with their guard."

"Then you want to make sure they're moving. Stances are key to any fight, and it's much easier to take someone off their feet if you can catch them in a moment when they're not rooted in one. Get them in a moment when they're not balanced perfectly and it's a lot harder for them to catch themselves in a fall. Maybe they only have one foot on the ground at a moment, a lot easier to sweep that than two. Maybe they're just landing from a leap and don't have their feet set well enough to be able to hop over your strike, etc. etc. Main thing is, it's an opportunistic attack. You can't launch it whenever you feel like it. And if it's something you want to use, and you see an opening, you don't hesitate. It might not last long."

"Of course, there is a way to pull it off even if they are all nice and balanced." He brought his staff around again, lightly tapping the back of each of L'aire's knees. "I've never seen someone good at keeping their feet after being hit there. Land a good blow," his smirk matched her own as he gently started applying firm pressure there with his staff to demonstrate the point, "and their legs will buckle, dropping them right to their knees."

[Lesingnon]

"Nah, I'd agree with you there. Light on your feet as you are I think it'd be pretty difficult to take you down like that. Probably wouldn't even try in an actual fight." More likely to waste an opportunity than anything, he supposed.

"And yeah, you're right, the timing of everything's definitely huge. Timing and planning. A bad fighter tries to take openings that aren't there, a competent one takes the openings he sees, and a good one thinks ahead to create openings to exploit."

"And, oh," he snaps his fingers as he remembers one other possibility. "There's one other decent way to knock someone down, if you're quick about it." He stepped to the slide; sliding his staff along the front of one of L'aire's shins, between her legs, and back out behind the opposite calf. One step forward torqued it lightly against the her shin, causing the other end to push forward against her calf. "And I mean real quick, to make sure they can't just step over it. But you can use one of their legs as a fulcrum to lever the other right out from under them. Can work especially nicely if they're already stumbling and already have their feet spread out a little."

[Lesingnon]

"Well, I'd expect any opponent with half a brain would notice pretty quickly that you're graceful and light on your feet. So I don't think they'd be surprised by it. But that doesn't really make it any less of an advantage, either. Similar to how no one would've been surprised to find that Swilla's strong as an ox."

He wasn't quite sure what the best way to reply to the allusion to her durance was. It was always a touchy subject.

So as that teasing snicker snuck into her tone he responded in kind. "Well at least you're well versed in handling it." The staff tapped playfully against the back of her calf as he spoke, a bare half inch higher. Then he paused for a second, head tilting to the side as he regarded her. And he pondered just how surprising it was that she was teasing back and forth. Last year when Terri had poked fun at her about the thickness of walls L'aire had done her best impersonation of a Flamesiren. He'd expected her to do much the same here. "You know, you don't start blushing nearly as easily as you used to."

[Lesingnon]

"Ohhh...you meant underestimating you at the start of a fight. Yeah, I could see that happening. There are plenty of people dumb enough to look at a pretty woman and assume she's afraid of breaking a nail, or something." He chuckled softly, "Few things are quite so amusing as watching them get disabused of that notion."

He paused for a bit at her...half answer. Just, looking at her as he sorted through her responses. He didn't doubt that she was telling the truth about being a bit more exposed. Apparently it hadn't quite gotten rid of all her reservations about discussing it, though. "Come now, it's just sex." This time the playful tap of his staff came just above the back of her knee. "Nothing bad is going to happen because you say something about it. I'm not going to think any less of you because you've shared a bed with someone. It's sex. I've had it, you've had it, all sorts of people have it for all sorts of reasons. Might be just for fun, might be because they care about the person they're doing it with, might be something else entirely."

"But you shouldn't worry about telling me about any of it. You're my motley mate. You can always talk to me."

[Lesingnon]

"There's nothing wrong with recreation. No rule that says that the Antler Courtiers are the only ones that get to indulge. We just keep other things in mind, too." Rick didn't exactly sound serious when he mentioned the Spring Court like that. Well, at least not for the most part. More of a slight joke to cut the awkwardness than anything else, probably. "And come on now, surely I'm not quite so hideous that you have to keep your eyes averted like that."

After that, though, he did get more serious. He studied her for a few seconds as the staff was slipped free, and tossed aside. Then his hands came up to rest on her shoulders, squeezing gently. And his voice was soft, reassuring. "We've all been burned, Sasha. I've felt that pain too, I know the sorrow it can bring. And I know it always sucks. The important thing is always to accept it and be able to move on...but I suppose I hardly need to lecture the Onyx Queen on that."

"Besides, it sounds like you've at the very least started doing that anyway." One corner of his lips quirked up in a slight grin. "And it's always wonderful to feel...freed, in any case."