Long enough for Haakon to reach out with his left hand and grab the tip of the Kitayan’s sword. Wrapping his fingers around the wooden point, he twisted his wrist sharply.
It was a training response-grab what is close to you-and attempting this move with sharp steel was decidedly dangerous. It was important to remember that wood was different from steel-a distinction that had caught Haakon off guard during his gladiatorial bout for the Khagan.
Haakon twisted and pulled, yanking the other man’s weapon out of his hands as the audience cheered and stomped their feet with approval. He tossed the Kitayan’s weapon aside, not caring where it landed, as he reversed his own weapon so as to bash his opponent in the face with the pommel. The Kitayan stumbled backward, his chin tucked into his neck as he tried to get away from Haakon’s wooden hilt.
He didn’t bring his hands up to block his face. Instead he fumbled with his shirt, and the motion was incongruous enough that Haakon sensed something was not quite right. He wasn’t that clumsy.
Firelight gleamed off polished metal as the Kitayan reversed direction, lunging toward Haakon. Something narrow and sharp was clenched in his fist, and Haakon dropped his right hand quickly, trying to block the Kitayan’s lightning attack. The wooden sword bounced off the Kitayan’s arm, spoiling his aim, and Haakon felt a finger of ice run up his chest.
The Kitayan danced away, his right arm tucked against his side, his fist held tight against his waist. Hiding whatever was clenched in his hand.
Haakon glanced down at his chest, and saw the ragged tear in his shirt. The icy line on his chest was burning now, and when he pressed a hand against the cut, it came away red.
The Kitayan had a knife. A very sharp knife.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
Crouched behind the wreckage of a weathered barrel, Hans watched the meeting between the Mongols and the Livonian Heermeister. He had been attempting to approach the Mongol camp stealthily, but too many of the obscured and secret routes used by the Rats had been demolished in the riotous hours following the Rose Knight’s death. He had been forced to skulk along the more well-traveled routes, and as a result, he had stumbled upon the standoff. His well-honed sense of self-preservation-the Rat sense that kept all the boys alive-warned him that he shouldn’t tarry, but as surely as the sun had risen, he couldn’t tear himself away. Especially after he heard the Livonian Heermeister offer to betray the Rose Knights.
He pressed his head against the barrel, and his fingers dug into the soft wood. He clenched his lips shut, trying to suppress the wordless cry quaking in his throat. Was there even time to warn them?
He flinched at the sound of the Mongol commander’s shout, and he recovered from this fright in time to see both of the Heermeister’s bodyguards topple from their saddles, pierced by Mongol arrows. He stared, transfixed as firmly as the Heermeister and the priest, as the Mongol group surged forward, surrounding the two remaining horsemen. There was some confusion for a moment as Mongol warriors seized the reins of the four Western horses and got them turned around, and then the entire war party galloped down the street.
Leaving the two dead Livonians.
One of them was still alive. The Livonian bodyguard lay on his side, facing Hans, and the man’s eyes rolled loosely in their sockets. His mouth kept opening and closing, like he was having trouble breathing, and blood dribbled out. His hand clawed at the ground, one of the fingers bent awkwardly-the lowest knuckle had been crushed by the hoof of a Mongol horse.
Hans didn’t know what he could do to ease the man’s suffering, but he couldn’t bear to watch him die. He edged out from behind his shelter, drawn toward the dying man by a primal sympathetic urge to provide what succor he could.
A hand grasped his shoulder and pulled him back. A tiny yip leaped out of his throat, and he lashed out with hands and feet in a frantic attempt to extricate himself from his captor’s grip. The man holding him grunted once as Hans’s elbow connected, and then Hans was wrapped in a tight embrace. “Hold still,” a voice hissed in his ear. Hans continued to struggle as he was bodily carried into an alley.
Fearing what would happen when he was out of sight of the dying Livonian-as well as any other passerby-he redoubled his efforts to escape from his captor’s strong arms. The man holding him let go, spinning him around, and as Hans caught sight of the man’s face, he took aim and swung his fist as hard as he could.
A hand caught the blow, turned it aside. The face behind it was weathered and aged, with a look not unlike wind-scarred wood or stone, worn down by time. Its gray eyes were alight with both amusement and a fierce intensity that Hans dimly recognized.
“Ach, you are quick,” the old man said. When he saw Hans hesitate, he lifted his chin so that the young boy could look upon his face more fully. “Do you recognize me, boy?”
Hans, his fist still clenched, nodded. “At the chapter house of the Rose Knights.”
“That’s right. After you met Andreas, he sent for me. Do you remember my name? I am Rutger. The Rose Knights are-”
Rutger gasped as Hans, recognition coming to him like a bolt of lighting, impulsively rushed to embrace the older man. A bemused expression on his face, Rutger lowered his arms around the boy and held him close. “We’ve come to keep Andreas’s promise,” he said. He pressed his cheek against Hans’s head. “Our fallen brother will not be forgotten.”
The air inside the ger was stifling. Zug lay as still as possible, for every motion was a struggle against the torpid air. His body complained endlessly about the beating administered by the guard, and while none of his bones were broken, his frame was covered with bruises and dried blood. To be spared grievous injury suggested the Mongols were not yet done punishing him.
All he could do was lie still and wait. Wait for the end to come.
Yet, his mood was not as dark as the bruises. He had endured worse discomfort. He had lived with pain before. This suffering would not last.
The fly that had dragged him out of his stupor buzzed in his ear again, and he tried to remember how to make the sack of flesh work, how to move his bones. Zzzzzzzzuuuuuu-
It wasn’t a fly. It was a man’s voice.
Orange and white sparks-like crazed fireflies-danced across his eyelids as he dragged them open. There was some light-the day had not yet passed-but it was a weak glow through the gaps in the hide walls of the ger. Most of the shadows were gray shapes flitting at the edge of his vision. He stared at the iron bars of his cage for some time, waiting for the pain behind his eyes to pass.
This was the same cage he had been in after his fight in the arena. They had beaten him then too, but the worst part of that punishment had been the quivering shakes as the demons in his blood cried out for alcohol. Those demons were gone, pissed out some time ago, and all that remained was the old hollowness. The ragged ghost who had haunted his mind since he had left home. Dead man, it whispered in the bleak emptiness. Dead…
With a groan that he felt all the way down to his toes, he forced his shoulder to move, and he rolled onto his back. He let his head flop over until his cheek rested against the sticky sand scattered across the floor of the cage.
He was not alone in the cage. Huddled against the bars was another sack of flesh. Black hair, matted with blood. Face swollen and purple with bruises. Did he look that bad?
The other figure peered at him with one eye, the other hidden beneath a mass of puffy purple flesh. “Zzzzuuuuggg…” The voice issuing from the man’s throat was a ragged whisper that slowly crawled across the sandy floor of the cage.