“We are in this together, yes?” he said, taking a swig. “Best you had remember that, lest I spank you like a little boy.”
“I’d like to see you try,” I snapped, full of self-recrimination as I replayed my mistake with Eva over and over in my head, wishing I wasn’t such a cack-brained prick.
“Challenge accepted,” he replied, deadly serious. “We shall see at dawn.”
Chapter 12
This morning I had the pleasure of facing Jovian in mock battle as the wardens gathered to begin their own daily drills. We picked up wooden hafts instead of real weapons and I eyed mine dubiously, clutched as it was in traitorous hands that could now barely hold a flask of whisky. It might not be steel but it would still hurt when he beat the crap out of me, and I supposed sparring with goose-down pillows wouldn’t be much of use to anybody.
Still, my own big mouth had landed me here, so I just had to shut up and take the punishment. Hopefully it wouldn’t prove completely humiliating. He stripped to the waist in a circle of cleared snow, and as he rolled his shoulders and stretched, the wiry little Esbanian’s impressive collection of scars earned from hundreds of fights garnered a measure of respect from the circle of wardens surrounding us. I kept my damn clothes on. Nobody wanted to see a mop-haired, rake-thin, ugly old git like me half-naked. Besides, it was bloody cold.
I cricked my neck from side to side and took a stance, right leg leading, and assumed a basic guard with the weapon held in front of me. Even I knew that much of bladecraft. Jovian stood loose and easy on the balls of his feet, giving no indication of what he was about to do.
“Fight,” Coira shouted.
All I could do was desperately block as Jovian exploded towards me, sword cutting down and right towards my neck. Not that it connected. My parry sailed out to the side as he twisted his wrist, sword tip slipping up and over my haft to smack me on the forehead.
“First blood,” he said, grinning. I had died in half a second. We both took our stances, and this time I started cheating. Magic flooded my muscles as I waited eager for action. This time things would be different.
“Fight!”
I darted forward with blistering speed. Lunged and cut low at his exposed knee. He slipped his leg back out of reach and swung straight down at my head.
Crack. My head throbbed. Dead in half a second again. Duels were not as thrilling and glorious as the bards depicted.
“Second,” he said, smirking.
We began again, and again I darted forward, barely avoiding impaling myself on his weapon as he did the same.
I scrambled back, barely avoiding his darting point. I was off-balance, and he was on me like a cat worrying a rat, a flurry of blows that even my magically-enhanced strength and speed barely kept up with. This was the first time I’d properly used a weapon in months and my clumsy damaged hands were betraying me at every turn. My grip slipped and he was through my guard, sword smacking me on the arse as he slipped past me. He spun back to face me, grinning insolently.
“Third,” he said.
“Fight!”
He whacked my shin.
“Fight!”
He tapped my elbow, exposed by a clumsy strike. I fumbled and almost dropped the weapon and in my ire drew deeper on my magic. Frustration boiled over as he took me apart with consummate ease.
“Fight!”
He rapped my knuckles, then spanked me with his hand on the way past. The wardens snickered and whispered, mocking.
I was done playing. I gritted my teeth and waited for the next bout. My Gift throbbed with the torrent of magic flooding my body.
“Fight!”
The world slowed to a crawl as I flashed forward and tossed my sodding stick at a mocking warden’s stupid face. I could barely use it anyway. I’d always been better with knives and fists. Jovian’s eyes widened as I slapped his weapon aside with my gloved hand and the other found his throat. I heaved the little Esbanian up and off his feet, then slammed him down to the icy earth, squeezing.
He slapped the snow with open hands, a sign of submission. After a moment’s hesitation, I let go. The magic protested. It wanted me to use even more, a greater display of my righteous might. The Worm of Magic always lusted for more. The wardens murmured amongst themselves, surprised at me putting him down so brutally, so casually.
He coughed and sat up, rubbing his neck. Somewhat chagrined at my loss of control, I offered my hand and pulled him to his feet. “A dangerous man,” he said. “You were playing with me, yes? Ah, one day I will be your match, this I swear.”
I stared at him as he winked. The little bastard had let me win to soothe my pride and solidify my standing as commander. In his eyes he’d done me a big favour. At that moment I knew he could have spanked me like an unruly child if he’d wanted, even with all the skill I had with body magic. It was a pointed warning about overconfidence. I nodded grimly.
At some unseen signal the wardens broke away and began packing up camp. Today we would reach Kil Noth, and for that Jovian’s warning was timely indeed.
Six bodies in Clan Clachan hunting plaids, half-buried in the snow and frozen solid. An equal number of dead Skallgrim in thick furs and chain scattered on the slope below them. The Clansfolk bore ragged claw wounds around their arms and faces while the Skallgrim sprouted arrows from their backs.
Jovian sighed. “It was a fine ambush. The Skallgrim advance scouts were well feathered but those Clansfolk forgot to look up. We shall not make that same mistake, I think.”
I peered into the grey sky. “Staying alive is the one thing I’ve proven to be good at. Despite everybody’s best efforts, including my own.” Jovian grinned at that. “That, we have in common.”
Vaughn abruptly dropped Biter’s reins and whooped in delight as he plunged his hands into the snow, retrieving a beaked Skallgrim war axe that had to be half my height. It was a fine thing, the metal acid-etched and adorned with bronze trim. He grinned at us and swung it one-handed. The big weapon suited the huge brute and I wasn’t one to complain about looting a corpse; why, it was practically a second profession for us poor Docklanders.
At least one of us was happy amidst the frigid wind and drifting snow, but then he was too stupid to worry about the coming bloodshed, or maybe he really didn’t care – it was still better than rotting away in the dank depths of that prison cell.
We left the frozen corpses where they lay and kept on trudging through the snow, a long line of men, women and pack ponies. As we grew closer to Kil Noth my paranoia kept my magic ready to lash out, so I was the first to sense the strongly Gifted mind waiting for us. I gently probed, finding their mind a silent fortress immune to anything bar a fully-fledged assault. I withdrew before they felt me, and warned the other magi to expect company. Scouts soon passed back word that a Clansfolk emissary from Kil Noth awaited us further down the valley.
A mere slip of a girl, perhaps a single summer past full womanhood, sat cross-legged on the mossy back of a fallen standing stone. Her hair was white as snow and spilled over a strip of embossed leather across her forehead to hang free to her waist. In defiance of the freezing weather she was naked and her flesh inked all over with whorling blue and black tattoos. She boasted delicate, almost fragile, features and her eyes were closed, her expression serene and innocent. Her appearance was deceptive – I knew it masked something gut-heavingly vile.
“What are you doing out here dressed in such an indecent manner, girl,” Granville said, shivering in his thick Arcanum robes, fox-fur gloves and cloak. His misted words hung in the still air like a bad fart. “Have you taken leave of your senses? Somebody fetch the heathen a blanket before she freezes to death.”