NBA Dramatique, Prelude 13

He was known as the Black Knight. He was something else, though, and you knew it as soon as you saw him. For starters, he never wore armor. He didn’t need it. He was calm, poised, and confident in his manner. His demeanor only changed if those that fought beside him were letting him down, and then he would loudly tell them so. More than anything, it was his eyes that set him apart. He never looked at you without analyzing how you could be destroyed. He saw through your confidence straight to your weakness. He was a natural-born killer. He was the assassin.

In the garden of the grand castle of the Western Banner, the monk trimmed the errant branches from a small tree. He heard the chirping of birds, heard the buzz of insects quickly zipping by, heard the splashing water in the fountain behind him. He felt the sun on his face and on the back of his neck and on the back of his hands. His expression was unreadable. It would appear to an outside observer that the monk was at peace in a peaceful setting. The monk was almost never at peace. That was part of the discipline – fight to achieve the peace that he knew he would never attain. It was perhaps this quality that made the monk similar to the assassin.

The assassin who was often called the Black Knight was practicing his attack. He had mastered the killing blow and still wanted to improve it. He had learned to be quiet and fast but was reaching for silent and instantaneous. He was skilled at the dodge and parry but sought a way to become invisible and intangible. For every move he knew to make, he went through the motion five hundred times so that his muscles and nerves and the bones and the blood could not forget how the move was made. He wanted his body to act without the need for conscious thought because then he could use his brain to create newer and more deadly strikes in the heat of battle.

The monk who was often called the Master walked slowly out of the garden and made his way to the castle courtyard. Before he even saw anything, he sensed that he would not be alone when he got there. He expected many of the young knights to assemble in the courtyard this afternoon, at which time he would help them find the focus and inner resolve that was an essential part of their combat training. It was, though, still morning, and several hours before the knights would assemble. He came around the corner and saw exactly what he projected he would.

He watched the assassin without speaking, his own silence matched by the quiet efficiency with which the killer trained. For not a moment did he believe that the assassin was unaware of his presence, though it was not acknowledged. He watched the exercises and recognized what was being practiced, knew the skills that were being honed. That move was to kill a man from far away. That spin was to confuse an opponent and open his vulnerability. That step was a way to more quickly slip past a defensive parry. The motions were perfect. The monk knew perfection well.

The exercises stopped and the assassin stood still, letting the perspiration on his skin cool him. The monk approached as quietly as possible.

“You continue to impress me. Your dedication to the art of war is unrivaled. It is my hope, friend, that our army does not fall into old habits when fighting eventually breaks out. We both know that fighting will break out again, and soon, I think. You left a path of corpses for them to follow last time, and they helped you go far, even though we fell short in the final days. I will make sure they retain the discipline that they demonstrated in the last campaign, and I will push them over that last hurdle so that we can finally reclaim the Prize. I need you to do only two things: let them know that you trust them to succeed again, and destroy everything that gets in your way.”

The assassin said nothing. He did not move, and kept his eyes closed and his head bowed. The monk was initially surprised and mistook the assassin’s silence as an insult. But then it dawned on the monk what was actually happening. In the courtyard of the castle of the Western Banner, the assassin was silent as a showing of respect to the dead. The dead that he was about to go forth and create.