“Archers…” I had just time to decide that it was definitely Ludovoco’s voice before the next word came: “Fire!”
I flung myself forward, pressed into the gap between the nearest giant’s feet and huddled close. I had no idea how it would protect me, but there was nowhere else to go. I scrunched myself small as I could, closed my eyes and hoped that death might at least be quick.
Perhaps it would have been better to look, though. To do nothing but hear — the relentless swish of arrows cutting the air, the dry thunks where they struck the earth, the wetter sounds where they found flesh and the occasional, horrible sobs and gasps of pain — was almost unbearable. It seemed as if it would never end, and through every moment I felt certain I’d be next.
But in the end, the rain did slacken — and, finally, did stop. While it might have been a concession to mercy, I thought it had more to do with the need to reload. In the silence, I could hear a gurgling sound, weird and unfamiliar. Though I knew my hiding place hadn’t done a thing to protect me — the three arrows spaced haphazardly up the giant’s leg were ample testament to that — I didn’t want to leave it. Even an illusion of safety seemed better than none, and I was sure I was better off not knowing what made that odd, unsettling noise.
Then again, it was moving nearer. Maybe ignorance wasn’t so beneficial after all. I untucked my head from beneath my arm and dared a glance.
There was no question of where to look. At least a dozen of our small troop had been hit, but where their wounds had left them alive, they were expressing their anguish with familiar and very human cries and groans. I had to turn my eyes higher — to where one of the giants had stepped back from the circle, barely avoiding the survivors he’d been trying to protect. He turned slowly around, and at the same time crumpled to his knees, a wheeze escaping his blubbery lips — as if there was nothing but air holding him up and it was all escaping now.
There were any number of arrows in him, embedded into his back and thighs and shoulders. But I was sure it was the one rooted up to the fletching in his eye that had done for him. When he had no lower to sink, he toppled forward, and with a last, tectonic twitch, lay still.
The remaining giants, perhaps too stunned to move, made no attempt to close the gap in their ranks. Therefore I could see the Pasaedan lines clearly beyond them, the rows upon rows of archers each readying another arrow. And there, towards their front, I recognised the man who’d given the order that had just killed a creature out of legend. The smile upon Ludovoco’s lips was almost worse, in its smug cruelty, than the horror I’d just witnessed.
I wasn’t the only one to have seen him. Stepping quickly into the breach, Alvantes barked at the very top of his lungs, “Ludovoco! Will you end this with a massacre? Have you no honour?”
The archers were almost ready for another volley. In unison, they were raising their bows, angling to fire once more over the giants’ shields. They weren’t hurrying — and why should they? They could keep this up all day, which was more than could be said for us.
When at the last moment Ludovoco raised his hand, I didn’t believe the motion could possibly be enough to hold back the coming tempest. Yet as one, the archers dipped their bows — and all of them watched him a little curiously.
Ludovoco took a few casual steps towards Alvantes. By the time he came to a halt, he was almost as close to our side as his own. “What do you propose?” he asked, his tone amused. “That we let you leave now, and go through all the trouble of breaking down your gates to kill you later?”
“We began a duel, all those days ago,” replied Alvantes. “Would you care to see how it would have ended?”
“I know how it would have ended,” replied Ludovoco. “And I know how it would end now. You never stood a chance then; now, you can barely stand. Will you really be so obvious, Captain? A last, noble sacrifice to buy the lives of your friends?”
“A sacrifice?” Alvantes smiled — not a reassuring expression on his granite, blood-spattered face. “Why don’t we find out?”
“So,” said Ludovoco. “It’s clear what you gain if you kill me. I promise to let you leave, yes? And our army has one less commander, of course. But what can you possibly offer me?”
Alvantes didn’t hesitate. “Not a thing, Ludovoco. I’d promise you our surrender, but everyone in Altapasaeda knows what you’ll do to them if you get inside those walls. All I can offer is the pleasure of killing me by your own hand, rather than standing by and watching like a coward.”
I’d heard better offers. If I’d been in Ludovoco’s place, I’d have ordered another volley without hesitation, and probably gone for a cup of wine, far enough away that I wouldn’t be bothered by the sound of our dying screams.
But Ludovoco wasn’t me, of course. And something told me that the possibility of getting his hands bloody might just be the best news he’d had all day. “Yes,” he said. “I think that will do nicely.”
CHAPTER TWENTY
I’d thought I had a fair idea of what Ludovoco’s standing in the Pasaedan camp might be. Now I was sure. A quiet word from him had brought their entire army to rest; not only that, it had turned them into his audience, an expectant throng clustered round to witness his martial prowess. Too, there was the fact that no one had dared challenge him. I could see others who, from their elegant dress and decorated armour, were evidently officers of high rank; yet no one had thought to suggest that the war for a city shouldn’t be reduced to a scrap between two men.
No, with the King vanished, presumably hustled off to some point far from danger, it was obvious who was running this show — which meant that while Alvantes’s gesture was undoubtedly reckless, it at least wasn’t stupid. Taking Ludovoco out of the picture might really buy us a chance at escape.
It was only a shame Alvantes hadn’t the faintest hope of beating him.
If Alvantes had reached the same conclusion, however, it wasn’t evident from his manner. He had his sword in hand and was wiping it busily with a fold of his cloak. I hadn’t much experience of such matters, but I guessed it was bad manners to fence with an opposing officer while your blade was soiled with the blood of their soldiery.
“A duel, then,” he said finally, once the blade was glisteningly clean. “To the rules of the Crown Academy?”
“Of course,” replied Ludovoco, with a none-too-pleasant smile. “What other rules are there?”
“But — to the death.”
“Oh, certainly. I’d say this is sufficiently a matter of honour.”
It was Alvantes’s turn to smile. “Or the lack thereof, Commander Ludovoco.”
Ludovoco failed to disguise the anger that flushed his narrow face. “But then,” he said, “aren’t such questions always decided by the winner? I assure you, Captain, that when they speak of your death, and of how you let your city fall, and of the things that happened there in the days that followed, not one of the words they use will be honourable.”
Alvantes twirled his blade in a tight figure of eight, as if experimenting to see how well it carved the air. “Maybe,” he said. “But fights aren’t won by talking.” He took a step forward, raised the sword in nonchalant salute.
Ludovoco mirrored the gesture. I could see his good cheer was returning now that the prospect of violence was near, for there was a lightness to his movements that hadn’t been there an instant before.
“One moment, Commander!”
I looked to where the call had come from, recognised Ondeges. He had broken free of the surrounding circle of men and stood now just inside, watching Ludovoco and Alvantes intently. “I never trained in the Academy,” Ondeges said. “But isn’t it the case that there ought to be seconds? I mean, according to their rules?”
“I hardly think that…” Ludovoco began.