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"How was school, honey?"
She tries to make the kids' favorite meals on their first day of school, but when she asked Iomedae's favorite meal the girl first stared at her blankly and then after some extended clarifications proposed that they could roast a pig, and she can't actually roast a pig, so dinner is pork chops, and potatoes, and salad from the farmer's market. Iomedae is not a picky eater.
(The girl is in fact clinically obese. The doctor suggested they talk with her about cutting back on junk food, but the social worker said that was a bad idea, with a kid new to care - don't restrict her food access at all, just get her more exercise. So Jenny signed her up for swim lessons at the YMCA and for track and field at school. Iomedae balked at the swimming lessons on the grounds that swimsuits were immodest, and they do actually make hijabi wetsuit things but apparently not in her size. Hopefully track and field she'll actually enjoy.)
Cináed has a spare sword!
He will let Robert hold it and patiently walk him through the steps of throwing a flat snap. "See, you want to start with the sword up here - elbow a bit up from there, in the default stance you're using it to protect your head as well as to prepare to attack. Then you want to push your shoulder and your hip forwards and rotate to get power - more relaxed than that, you'll hurt your elbow if you death grip the sword - then you're turning the blade horizontal, see, so it passes over my shield -"
There are several minutes of additional corrections to Robert's stance and form before he can hit Cináed's helmet with perhaps a third of the power that Iomedae delivered off the bat, but from what he was watching out of the corner of his eye earlier, Cináed kind of suspects that this is partly just because he doesn't have Iomedae's kill instinct.
Robert really does not have a kill instinct! Robert played baseball in high school but he was only all right at it and baseball does not really require a kill instinct.
Cináed shows no visible sign of flinching or being bothered whatsoever when Robert hits him in the head. Helmets work.
"Alright, now try that again but really try and turn your wrist - almost like you're serving soup and you're not spilling it while you present the bowl. You want to hit me with this black line and not the white one, because that's the blade edge - there you go!"
Robert finally reaches the stage where Cináed actually feels the need to use his shield or block because he'd rather not be hit ten times that hard in the head while he's trying to teach.
"If you want to try getting hit, we'd need to find you some spare kit you can borrow. But a lot of newcomers just find it helpful to do that against a fence post a few times and really try to get a feel for it." Cináed offers his shield, so Robert can feel the weight of it. It's pretty heavy!
Well, obviously. It would not be very gracious to say this. "God say many ways help build paradise."
Cináed suspects he wouldn't normally be able to find enough free loaner armour for Robert in a single day - it'd take raiding the Baronial storage for any Iron Key that might still linger there, asking individual people to bring things of theirs that might work, a post on Facebook, and maybe making some things custom with the spare leather and plastic in his shed. Luckily, when Gabriel told everyone 'foster child of uncertain size in a horrible situation', the barony really came through. Within a few minutes Cináed is back with a pile of gear in his arms.
"I don't know if we have a full kit here, but we've got the absolute minimum and we'll tell everyone to go very easy. See if this helmet fits you. And here-" he drops the pile of gear so he can hand Robert the plastic cuirass which Nicole earlier declared a poor fit for Iomedae.
Sure, Robert will try to armor up with whatever gear is handed to him. The first helmet doesn't fit him but the second one does. "You know, this isn't too bulky, really," he says, trying to stretch in his cuirass. "Not much worse than football gear."
"Honestly, it depends on the gear you're wearing! We have people who wear a whole variety. There's folks in fifteenth century full plate, and other people who mostly wear hidden armour." He gestures at himself.
It's mostly impossible to see Cináed's armour. He wears light plastic plates that let him move fast, layered under a Highlands great kilt which hides the modern aspect of his kit and provides the illusion he is wearing almost no armour at all. His elbows, which are left visible, are made of wax-hardened leather painted with subtle Celtic knot designs. The overall look gives the impression that he just came straight from kicking the Roman Empire out of Scotland.
"You can try fighting me if you've signed the waiver - otherwise please do that, or Sir Reynhard gets nervous."
Cináed is very patient when he's helping the absolute newbies. He will walk into Robert's space and gesture menacingly, with absolutely no intention to attack, until Robert attacks him. Once he does he lifts his shield up to block, deliberately exaggerating the movement to make Robert feel like he achieved something, though careful not to exaggerate it so much that he ends up coming across condescending.
He gives Robert a moment to recover and then lightly taps him on the helmet in response.
This is painful to watch. Iomedae does not endorse finding it painful to watch anyone do any good and virtuous thing. "Maybe we can fight him two on one."
"Oh, I don't know, honey. I worry about you, you know, with the recent events? I worry about it being too real for you."
Jenny lowers her voice. "You - the incident involved a sword. And now you want to fight with swords. And I just - I want you to be active and feel safe, but I don't want it to get - too real, if that makes sense? I don't know if that would be good for you."
"Oh! This no about Martin. I wanted to be holy warrior since small child."
"Oh. I see.
Iomedae, there is something else I wanted to talk to you about. The man, Barry or 'Sir Gabriel', who fitted you for armor and taught you the rules."
"Sometimes, even if a person seems good and helpful and kind, those aren't their real intentions, right? Especially when kids are in foster care, there are some people out there who want to take advantage of them. And there are lots of good people, too! But - a good person won't try to talk to you alone, or ask you to keep secrets, or tell you that you're special and that no one understands you - do you need me to say this slower -"
Oohhhhhhhhh. Iomedae is so reassured. Jenny was simply worried that Iomedae was a blithering idiot.
"Ma'am - Sir Gabriel is not a holy warrior. I have to defend what is God's from him as from any man. If I alone with him, I inspire him to evil, and I cannot sword him so I must be sure never alone with him. I know this. Little baby know this. God not choose a holy warrior who forget her word to God because a man wear steel."