Only then, as Saviar bore in one more time, did Subikahn blaze in a thrust for Saviar's gut. He moved like lightning, but his foot mired in detritus, slipping. His stroke went low, opening his upper defenses. Saviar slapped a triumphant, side of the sword "killing stroke" against Subikahn's ribs with bruising force.
Then, agony seared Saviar's left thigh as flesh parted before a line of exquisitely sharp steel. Against his will, his leg folded under him. He rolled from instinct, stopped short by pain so achingly intense it stole all focus. He found his swords raised in his defense without any conscious memory of hefting them, and Subikahn stood over him with an expression of helpless terror.
"Modi!"Trained to wall up pain and keep fighting, Saviar struggled to a stand. Subikahn's left-hand sword skewered the outer part of his thigh, resting solidly against the bone. "Mooodi!"
"I'm sorry," Subikahn said. "I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to-"
They had both seen many wounds before, as well as death itself. Yet, the image of his own leg encasing a sword, knowing his brother had inflicted the injury, left Saviar stunned for several silent moments. "Get it out," he finally said.
"But-" Subikahn started. Renshai training included only enough herbal lore to help prevent infection. They battled to the death, and survivors' scars were considered badges of honor. Nevertheless, they both knew to leave a penetrating object in place. Its removal would start bleeding they might not be able to staunch, the usual cause of death in combat.
Saviar did not care. The pain encompassed his entire being, and the area where steel wedged against bone was so excruciating it made coherent thought impossible. "Pull it out, damn it! Pull the damn thing out! Pull it out!"
"Savi, I'm so sorry. Please forgive me. I swear I didn't mean to-"
Saviar found himself incapable of concentrating on words. "Pull… it… out!" He braced his hands on the protruding hilt, his breathing turning to ragged gasps of anguish, "Subikahn, pull it out, or I'm killing… both of us."
"All right. Lie down." Subikahn gave his brother a light push.
It proved too much for Saviar's delicate balance. He collapsed, and the impact sent another shock of pain through his thigh. He tried to shift position, but his injured limb would not obey. "Gods! I can't move my leg."
Subikahn dropped to the ground beside Saviar. "Of course, you can't move your leg. It's pinned to the ground."
Pinned… Realization struck Saviar in a jolt. The blade had not just penetrated his thigh, it had run him through completely. His fall had buried the point in the dirt, fixing it in place.
Subikahn knelt over his fallen brother. "Savi, you know we're not supposed to remove-"
Saviar had taken all he could stand. He lunged toward his brother, seizing the fabric of his tunic, near the throat, in both hands. "Pull it out, Subikahn; or I'll pulverize you!"
Apparently wise enough to shut his mouth, Subikahn did not mention that, affixed to the ground, Saviar could not pulverize a butterfly. "All right. Just let me prepare some bandages to stop the bleeding."
"Hurry," Saviar growled, releasing his brother. Torke's lessons had often left him with a myriad of bruises and contusions; but, all of those together did not equal the pain he suffered now. He closed his eyes, listening to the sound of cloth tearing and rustling, invoking the Renshai mind techniques that usually allowed them to fight past the agony of even a fatal wound. "Hurry," he whispered.
"Ready," Subikahn announced. Something cold and sticky flooded the wound, its sting a welcome contrast to the blaring, biting agony. Then, the pain intensified, and Saviar felt steel slide backward through his thigh. The sword clanged against rock or wood, freed from his leg, and the sound shocked Saviar into opening his eyes.
Subikahn took no notice of this new distress. Instead, he stuffed wet rags into the hole in Saviar's leg, then wrapped it around with bandages so suffocatingly tight they rivaled the pain already in his thigh.
Saviar glanced to where he had heard the noise. Sure enough, Subikahn's sword lay in the dirt. The sight scandalized Saviar, even through his pain. "Your sword is… it's on the… ground."
"Yes." Subikahn acknowledged the most terrible crime in Renshai law. "I thrust it through my own brother. Nothing could dishonor it worse."
Subikahn had a point. He already needed to atone to the weapon, yet he made no move to do so. It was a process that would take weeks or months. Hoping to speed it along, Saviar sat up and said softly, "If it helps, I forgive you."
"You forgive me?" Subikahn's eyes were hollow, empty.
"I forgive you."
Tears glazed Subikahn's eyes into black marbles of self-loathing. "Well, I don't forgive me. I can't ever forgive me, and I doubt the gods or my sword can either." He caught Saviar into a frantic embrace. "I'm sorry, Saviar. I'm so so very sorry."
"I know you are." Saviar wrapped his arms around his brother. "But it's just as much my fault as yours. We knew better than to spar in anger, without torke present."
"But what if…" Subikahn could no longer hide the tears; they came out in his voice, even muffled against Saviar's tunic. "… what if I've… killed you?"
"Killed me?" Saviar remained in position, knowing Subikahn needed the contact. "Do I look dead to you?" He answered more from bravado than truth. They both knew what happened to badly wounded warriors, in spar as well as battle.
"What if I can't stop the bleeding?"
Saviar examined the bandages. "It's not soaking through. I don't see any red at all." Only then, he noticed scarlet splashes across the fallen leaves and a small puddle where he had lain. "Except what's already on the ground, and that's not a lot."
"What if it gets… tainted?"
Saviar knew the only possible reply and spoke it without need for consideration, "Then, I attack you, and you finish me off so I can die in battle and find Valhalla." He tried not to dwell too long on that point. Punctures, it seemed, nearly always infected; and the deeper the wound, the worse the outcome. He had never seen one all the way through a limb before. Those Renshai dying of disease or illness nearly always came to Calistin, trusting him to end their suffering in a way acceptable to the Valkyries.
"What if," Subikahn started in a voice so small Saviar had to strain to hear it, "I can't do it."
The suggestion was sacrilege. "Then," Saviar said firmly, disengaging from his brother, "you doom me to Hel." Not liking the turn of the conversation, he staggered to his feet. His left leg ached with the slightest pressure, and the muscles felt lax as winter weeds. He limped toward a sturdy mirack trunk, seeking a branch that could serve as a crutch.
Subikahn remained on the ground, looking as pitifully wronged as his sword. And sobbed.
CHAPTER 26
It is heroic and glorious to die for one's country. But, whoever has seen the horrors of a battlefield knows it is far sweeter to live for it.
As the miles disappeared beneath Silver Warrior's hooves, Ra-khir's thoughts gave way to a new cycle of worry. Now that he had received the warning, he could see the myriad boot and hoofprints stamped into the road. A large group of people had recently passed. He doubted the prints belonged to the Renshai, who had more likely forsaken the easy roadway for the deeper cover of the woods.
The sun stood high in the sky when Ra-khir discovered an enormous break in the foliage where a regiment of men and horses had broken through it. Leaves and twigs splashed across the roadway, and broken branches clung to shattered new growth trees and vines. Notches in the trees revealed where wild sword or ax slashes had injured them as men hacked through the undergrowth. Hoofprints packed down the brush to make a new and obvious opening into the forest.
Ra-khir followed, with trepidation. He heard no horn blasts or screams, no chiming of weapons slamming against one another. If a war had occurred, it was finished now, leaving the woods eerily silent. Still, he could not help wondering if he was about to enter combat. He did not fear it; he could hold his own in battle. The Knights of Erythane trained daily and to a superiority that any but a Renshai would envy.