Hand-to-hand

Aram woke up with his arm better and they went early into the forest. Lucine was able to freely test her skills, view, smell, strength and agility. She did well in both human and wolf form. They took a snack and ate there to utilize the time.

“You're doing well, you can already control the force. What remains to be worked on is the emotional, knowing if you can control yourself under strong pressure, that's what we need to train. You also need to learn how to track, but this is something more complex. Lucine, I think we're going to need someone's help and Szafir is the only one I trust for this. He can train you while I'm at the lumber, the faster you evolve, the safer it'll be”.

She bit the sandwich and shrugged.

“Okay, if you think we can trust him”.

Aram smiled, finding her placement funny, as if the two were a team. In fact, in the current situation, they weren't too far from it.

“Don't worry, he is reliable. Let's stay here a little longer and then we'll go back home. I’ll set up a mat in the shed, you need to learn some forms of hand-to-hand combat, like taking down someone bigger than you, these things. You can’t always be an elephant in a porcelain shop, you need to learn to be subtle. The power you already have, now you need to learn to be effective, lethal and invisible”, he said in a serious tone.

Lucine thought it was funny that he referred to her that way, not in a thousand years could she imagine herself as someone lethal.

“What was that?”, Aram asked when she smiled.

“Nothing, it’s just hard to imagine myself as someone lethal”.

“That's why we're working”.

When they returned, he cleared the space in the shed. They both took off their shoes, stood face to face, and Aram began the lessons.

“First of all, always try to stay out of your opponent's reach. Raise your arms at face height to block punches. When the blow comes, you bend down and prepare to counterattack”.

He was doing the movements slowly and asking her to repeat. Quickly she got the taught sequence.

“Wow, all this clothing is getting in the way, besides it seems to be heating up”.

“It's the activity you're doing, it's still as cold as before. Take off some of your coats”.

Lucine took them off and was left wearing only a tank top she had on underneath and the tight gym pants. Aram also took off his clothes, he was only his shirt on, and the two kept practicing some other moves. Lucine was a good student, her body had good muscle memory, and she was fast to learn the movements.

“Now you need to use the strength of the opponent's attack to your advantage, use his movement to pull and throw him to the ground. This technique is particularly useful against bigger and heavier aggressors. Come on, attack me and I'll show you”.

Lucine tried to attack him, but with quick and skillful movements, Aram threw her to the ground.

“Now get up, it's your turn to try. Remember to control the force, the idea is that I don't break any bones in the process”.

"I swear I'll do my best!"

This time he attacked her, she dodged and applied the blow on him, using just the right amount of force to bring him down. However, when he fell, he pulled her in a counterattack, causing her to fall under him. And like that, they both kept there, she lying on her back and he with his knees positioned beside her body, holding her arms on the floor.

"Hey, that wasn't the deal", she complained about his improvisation.

He smiled, and suddenly his dimples appeared.

“This is for you to understand that your opponent can be unpredictable”.

She wouldn’t let it lie. Lucine concentrated a dose of greater strength and threw him to the side, ending up sitting on him, reversing the positions. Now she had the advantage.

“Now it is you who needs to learn a lesson. Never trust that your opponent is subdued”, she said smiling, elated with the small victory.

As her physical size was much smaller, being in that position left her face very close to him, their breaths almost mixed, as well as the heartbeats.

The fact that she had brought him down was in the background, Aram could only think that she was sitting right over his crotch. And due to lack of experience perhaps, she was not supporting her body, then their hips ended up pressed against each other. When she moved to improve his immobilization he was sure he was in trouble, that slight rubbing of her pelvis almost made him see stars and he knew it was a matter of seconds until his body denounced him. Acting quickly he turned away, pushed her lightly and stepped back so she wouldn't notice his excitement. He got up and gathered his clothes.

“No more classes for today, or we'll be late for dinner. I'm going to shower first”, he said, quickly leaving the place and entering the hut, as if he was being chased by the devil.

Lucine stayed behind to gather things. She thought she did pretty well for her first lesson, but now that it had passed, it was kind of embarrassing to remember the position in which she stood over him. Would she have done it the right way? Well, if it was wrong he would have said something about it.

She finished gathering her clothes and also went to shower and change clothes. It would be a long dinner at his friends' house, if she was lucky, she could keep quiet and they would barely notice her presence.