Seyun abandoned the hub approach without a heartbeat of regret. That turned his body in mid-sprint through the exact Returning Step he had first earned in the limewashed burial house and refined across years of hard opposition. Driving the ball of his right foot against a jutting rib of black dark rock five paces upslope, he reversed his driving force down the incline, sliding three yards through the flying sleet and thrusting his plain ash staff across the mouth of the granite recess. Just then, the leading edge of the upper returning shear dropped toward the top door beam. His Early Jade Answering Edge met the pale blade six inches above Hall Mistress Soran’s bent iron spear, angling the whistling force outward into the western rock face in a shower of white sparks and shattered granite.
The impact jolted straight down Seyun’s bandaged right forearm into his clamped collarbones and knocked him back a half-step against the threshold stone. His boots skidded in the grey ash by Vaska’s knee. Above his staff, the deflected upper shear carved a yard-long trench across the outer brow of the overhang instead of slicing through the hollow where Nara Soth and Vaska Ren sat. He had saved the roof for the space of one breath, and in doing so he had forfeited every pace of forward ground toward the lower returning hub.
