Then the Taurentian struck again and again and I moved his steel to one side.
He then stood back, stunned, and withdrew a step, and put himself at the ready.
The crowd cried out, confused, not understanding, then angry.
I laughed, the keen ring of the fine steel still burning in my ear.
My entire body suffused with pleasure. Elation, like Ka-la-na, suddenly flooded every muscle and vessel in my being. I laughed again. Gone was the guilt. I had heard the ring of steel. The Physician must heal; the Builder build; the Merchant buy and sell.
"I am Tarl Cabot," I laughed. "Know that. Know too that I understand that you can see. Know as well that I can see you. Leave the arena now or I will kill you."
With a cry of rage he threw himself at me and the cry died in his throat, he sprawling in his astonishment, his death and his blood, crosswise in the sand.
I went to the next man and spun him about.
"I do not play games," I told him. "You are a Taurentian. I am Tarl Cabot. I am your enemy. Leave the sand or die upon it."
The man turned and attacked and I laughed suddenly with the thrill of the steel, the flashing ring of work upon the Warrior's anvil.
He cried out and fell before me, twisting in the sand, clawing at it.
"He can see!" cried one of the Taurentians.
The crowd, struck, was silent. Then, sensing the intended execution, some of them began to scream angrily.
The other men in the helmets, and the attendants as well, one for each original pair, turned to face me. One or two of the attendants ran from the arena. I gathered they had no wish to stand between Warriors.
"Leave the arena," I told the Taurentians. "Men die in this place."
"Together!" cried their leader. "Attack!"
He died first, being the first to reach me.
In a moment I fought surrounded by Taurentians, said to be among the finest in the guard.
The crowd how began to scream angrily as the many rushed upon and swirled about the one. The fans of the games of Ar had been fooled. They did not relish being witness to the private joke of some high person, doubtless the Ubar himself. As fans they shouted their anger at the deceit which had been practiced; as men they roared their fury at the unfair odds now designate upon the sand.
My world now was small, bright, alive, consisting of little other than swift, flashing, ringing patterns before me, then to the side, and once more before me. I moved swiftly drawing one Warrior or another after me, and he who was swiftest died first; I turned and spun, accepting or not accepting an attack, always to isolate a man; vaguely, as though far off, I heard the screaming of Philemon in the Ubar's box, the shouting of Taurentians; in a moment's resite I saw a Taurentian slay a citizen who would have leaped into the arena to aid me; other Taurentians, with their spears, were forcing back the crowd, which seemed enraged.
"Kill him! Kill him!" I heard Philemon screaming.
Another Taurentian fell from my sword.
One of the attendants with a whip struck me as I fought and I spun on him. He threw the whip to the sand and ran howling from the arena. Another approached me warily with his hot iron.
"Be gone," I told him.
He looked about himself and dropped the iron and fled. The other attendants followed him.
I now stood and faced some six Taurentians, who stood in the defensive picket formation, three men forward in this case, and, in the interstices, three men back. This permits the men in reserve to move into the forward line to form a solid line, or, if the first line withdraws, to have space to take its place. It allows a great deal of mobility and, on the level of squad tactics, has its affinity to the Torian Squares; the space allows the swordsmen, of course, room in which to handle their weapons, room in which to properly attack or defend themselves; in this case I expected the center man to engage me, defending himself on the whole, while the flanking men would strike; should one of these three fall, of course, his place would be taken by one of the men in the reserve line.
Slowly, swords ready, the picket advanced on me. I stepped back, over fallen bodies. It is hard to break or attack the picket. I pretended to stumble and the center man rushed forward to press his putative advantage.
"Wait!" cried the leader, in the rear rank.
The man who had been the center man was at that time dead.
I pretended my blade had been wedged between the ribs of the center man.
Another Taurentian, by instinct, but not trained instinct, hurled himself forward, and so died.
The four remaining men attempted to retain the picket. Moving back warily I remained as close as I could to the picket, but out of reach, hoping to draw yet another Warrior prematurely into attack. They remained together. As a Warrior, though it was not to my advantage, I found this satisfying.
A close-formed military formation is difficult to maintain over rough terrain. Indeed, the Torian Squares, which I have mentioned, common among Gorean infantries, with their superior mobility and regrouping capacities, had, long ago, made the phalanxes of such cities as Ar and, in the south, Turia, obsolete.
The Gorean phalanx, like its predecessors of Earth, consisted of lines of massed spearmen, carrying spears of different lengths, forming a wall of points; it attacked on the run, preferably on a downgrade, a military avalanche, on its own terrain and under optimum conditions, invincible; the Torian Squares had bested the phalanx by choosing ground for battle in which such a formation would break itself in its advance.
The invention and perfecting of the Torian Squares and the consequent attempts to refine and improve the phalanx, failures, were developments which had preceded the use of tharlarion and tarn cavalries, which radically changed the face of Gorean warfare. Yet, in the day of the tharlarion and tarn, one still finds, among infantries, the Torian Square; the phalanx, though its impact could be exceeded only by the tharlarion wedge or line, is now unknown, except for a defensive relic known as the Wall, in which massed infantry remains stationary, heroically bracing itself, when flight is impossible, for the devastating charge of tharlarion.
It seemed to me obvious that the men who faced me intended to do so as a group; already two had been lured from the picket and had died; I did not expect that another of the four would singly rush upon me. I backed among the bodies of the fallen Taurentians. Unevenly, with difficulty, the picket followed, their eyes on me. Then the picket charged but, as I had intended, across the field of their own fallen. I leaped to one side. The end man stumbled in an attempt to turn to me and I passed the side of the blade beneath the helmet and was behind them. Attempting to remain together they wheeled, each in place. One man lunged for me, but stumbled across another fallen Taurentian and his fellow, moving forward, fell across him; rather than attack the men who had fallen, on whom the attack would be expected, I struck the remaining man, he standing, the leader, engaging him singly in the moment and felling him. The remaining two Taurentians who had stumbled scrambled to their feet, scraping awkwardly back through the sand.
He of the two who was senior told the other, "Withdraw." No longer did they wish to press the battle. No longer could they be as confident of the odds as they had been but a moment before.
The two men withdrew.
The crowd was howling with pleasure, well pleased at what spectacle they had witnessed.
Then they began to scream with anger. Taurentians, perhaps two hundred of them, were filing rapidly to the sand, weapons ready.
So it is thus I die, I said to myself.
I heard the leader of the men I had attacked laugh.
"How does it feel," he asked, "you who are about to die?"
The laugh died in his throat for through his breast there suddenly flew a heavy Gorean arena spear.