Two

Chapter 9

Yet again, Maul wasn’t there when she woke the following morning. Thankfully, she hadn’t woken during the night. But they were down to the last scraps of the food and while Nima had been trying to eat more, she felt guilty for doing so as now they had less food.

Nima left the little hut and stopped as she saw Maul carrying two wooden staffs. It seemed like that was what she would be learning first. She walked over to him and he handed her the shorter of the two staffs. With one end on the floor, the staff was the same height as her. Maul looked conflicted for a moment but then twirled the staff.

“These will do for now,” he said. “They are made from a strange plant in the forest but they seem strong enough.” Nima just nodded, not sure what else to do.
“What am I going to learn?” she asked.
“I will teach you how to block first.”

Maul demonstrated the four different blocks, though they were also similar and didn't seem too difficult to learn. Until she tried.
“Keep it closer to your body,” he said, watching as she tried to do it again. His brow furrowed as he watched and demonstrated the first one again. Nima tried to copy it but it just didn't seem right. “Move your left hand inwards.”
Nima stared blankly at him. “How far?” Maul muttered something before sliding her hand a few inches towards the centre of the staff.
“Hold it out in front of you.” Nima did as he instructed. “Your want to keep the staff split into roughly equal thirds.”

He then directed her how to stand and told her to do it again. While it was better, it was not great. She repeated it until Maul found it satisfactory and then they moved to the next block where the same thing happened. Maul would show how to hold the staff, the proper stance and then Nima would repeat until Maul deemed it good enough.

When the sun was above them, Maul let Nima rest. Her arms were aching, covered in sweat and she was sure that if she didn’t sit down soon, she would simply collapse.
“Is there food left?” asked Maul.
“Not really,” she said, looking down at the floor. It reminded her of her guilt for eating so much.

“Can you cook with those spices I gave you?” he asked and Nima nodded.
“Yes, I’ve saw my mother cook with two of them before, I’m not sure about the other two,” she replied, quickly adding: “But I can probably figure it out.”
“Put these in the corner, start a fire, I will return.” Maul gave her his staff. She wasn’t sure what wood they were made of but they seemed sturdy enough. Nima wasn’t sure what to say but she nodded and turned to head to the hut.

She rested them both in the corner, leaning against the wall at an angle. Kneeling down next to where she had set a fire before, she started to make a fire.

When Maul returned, the fire had been lit and Nima was sitting on the edge of the bed. What he held in his hands was once a small creature, it had been skinned. Nima had discovered there was a cutting board, a grill and a sort of pan. She cut away the fat and put it in the pan on top of the grill. Then, she cut the meat into small chunks and put them in the pan. A little more searching in the cupboard and she found another knife.

After a while she added the spices and stirred them around in the pan, remembering how she had sat on the table and watched her mother cook. There were no plates as such so she supposed she would eat it from the pan. It did mean there was less things to wash afterwards.

“You seem to know what you’re doing,” said Maul. Nima flinched as she added a little more of one of the spices.
“Um, yes,” she said, nodding. She had forgotten he was in the hut with her, for some reason she had thought he had headed back outside. Apparently not.

Deciding the food was finished after tasting one of the chunks of meat covered in spices, Nima took the pan and set it on the floor. She waited for it to cool a little before starting to eat it. It wasn’t quite like what she remembered her mother’s cooking to be like, she was sure there were more spices than this, and the small creature tasted off but nice. It wasn’t like anything she had tasted before.

“Do you want some?” asked Nima. She realised she had cooked a lot more than she had expected to eat. Maul stared at her, he had eaten the remaining scraps of meat before she had even started eating.
“You don’t want to eat it?”
“I do, it’s nice,” she said. “I haven’t tasted spices in a long time but… this is a lot more than I could hope to eat.”

Hesitantly, Maul nodded and Nima passed the pan and knife to him. He disregarded the knife and picked up the food with his hands. She waited anxiously for his judgement on her cooking.
“It is nice,” he said finally.
Nima smiled. “You like it?”
“I do, but I think you deserve to eat what is left,” Maul said as he handed her the pan back. “You did cook it.”
“Thank you.”

Nima was happier than she expected after he had complimented her cooking. She hadn’t had the chance to in years, she missed it a little. At least now she had the time and the freedom to do so.

“You may rest for the rest of the day,” said Maul as he stood and headed to the door, lightsaber in hand. “Pushing you any further would be pointless today.”

Nima nodded and smiled to herself. She could never have expected this would be her life now.