Project Empress xxx

 I never finished any of my stories here. 

So this time I am going to post the ending first. Followed by the beginning of the story. This time, the story is complete and I'll just fill out the bits in between.

Chapter n

It had taken Cara many years, battles and constant struggle. On the way here she had lost friends, made new ones, rivalries had come and gone, she had experienced so much. Yet until this day, despite what others may say, she had never thought of herself as a master. There was still so much left to learn, so many other styles she needed to investigate and there was always the echo of one of her greatest teachers in her mind: “Those who call themselves masters of the art, aren’t.”

She did have students though, many of which were now great martial artists in their own right. She had fought and won enough battles, had decoded the works of the mad Portuguese master. The one thing that she was missing, was to write her own treatise. She smiled putting her pen back to paper, finishing the last words of her own book describing her view of the art. Her smile almost turned into a frown when she thought about all the work it would entail to type up her manuscript later. She shook her head, focusing on the present again. Her smile growing bolder and broader she finished her work, adding a few more sentences that intended, endings are hard. 

She sighed, put her pen aside, took a deep breath, enjoying the nights silence and the warm feeling of accomplishment. Now when others called her master she would not feel all that uncomfortable anymore. 

She sat back up and took a sip of her now very cold tea, when Liam burst through the door. 

“Cara! Cara!” he screamed, waving his arms.

Cara first almost choked on her tea, then almost spit it all over her freshly finished manuscript, in the last second she could stop her self from runing her magnum opus, instead coughing the tea into her nose from where it gushed all over her.

“Liam!” she snapped, but before she could add anything else Liam added: 

“A lost manuscript has appeared. Some private collector just died and his family is getting rid of the old man’s library in an auction, the whole thing almost went unnoticed in the historical martial arts world but then one of…”

“Liam.”, Cara said, wiping away the tea from her face, all thoughts about her own work forgotten. “Liam, what kind of source is it?”

Liam stopped talking, his eyes growing big he told her: “About 200 folios more than 60 drawings of the highest quality…”

Cara’s heart skipped a beat. “One of the lost Spanish grand masters?”

“The people selling it have no idea what they have in their hands but I saw the pictures. It is one of the lost Spanish long sword sources.”

“Where?”, Cara asked.

“Andorra.”

“Get your things, contact the others, we hit the road within in the hour.”

“Which weapons should I take?”, Liam asked.

“All of them, you’re going to need them.”