Egert knew seventeen defenses and twenty-seven attack maneuvers. The entire allure of the sport consisted of connecting these maneuvers so that they created a mosaic tapestry that he wove with his sword, then scattered and reassembled anew. Egert was unable, afterwards, to repeat many of the improvisations that resulted from this weaving: they were born from inspiration, like verse, and they were usually crowned with a wound, if not death. Alas, with this student before him, even with a sword, Egert was limited to using one particular maneuver, a maneuver so simple and vulgar that it resembled smoked herring.
Turning away from yet another clumsy attack, carelessly fending off strong yet inaccurate blows, Egert turned his head in search of Toria. Once he saw her pallid, almost vacant face in the crowd, he mounted his own attack, and the student did not even have time to understand what was happening. Egert dramatically held the tip of his blade near the student’s chest, and the audience yelled out rapturously. Only the tall, gray-haired boarder maintained his calm.
This was repeated again and again. The student could have died ten times already, but Lord Soll prolonged the game, playing with the youth like a cat plays with a mouse. The student thrashed about, brandishing his sword. Pebbles skittered away from under his dusty shoes, but his enemy was like a shadow, ever-present and untouchable.
Egert’s intentionally pedantic, toxic voice never ceased admonishing the student. “So! Ah-ha! Like this! Why do you squirm so, like a snake in a frying pan? Again! And again! Ha! Yes, you are a lazy, indolent pupil! You must be punished! Now!”
Every cry of now was followed by a small jab. The student’s coat, lacerated in several places, hung in rags, and sweat poured down his drawn face.
The combatants once again stood facing each other. The student was worn out and bewildered, while Egert was not even out of breath. Looking into his opponent’s desolate, hate-filled eyes, Egert sensed his own power, an idle, unhurried power that did not even need to be used, only enjoyed.
“Are you afraid?” he asked in a whisper, and in the same breath he read the answer in the student’s eyes: Yes, he was afraid. Terror stood in front of Egert, whose sword was like a serpent’s sting pointed at the poor man’s chest. Egert’s opponent was defenseless against him; he was no longer an opponent, but a victim, and rage had long since given way to anxiety and the desire to ask for mercy, if only his pride would allow it.
“Should I show you mercy?” Egert smiled with just the corner of his mouth. He felt the student’s terror on his skin, and this feeling sweetly thrilled his nerves: all the more so since, in the depths of his soul, Egert had already decided not to penalize the boy too harshly.
“Should I show mercy? Well?”
Despair and terror forced the student into a new, hopeless attack. At the exact same moment, Egert’s boot came down in a puddle, forsaken by the rain, and lost its solid connection to the ground. The legs of the magnificent Egert splayed apart like the limbs of a newborn colt. He barely kept his balance, and the student’s sword grazed the guard’s shoulder, slicing off his epaulet. That proud military affectation hung by a thread, like a dead spider, and the crowd—that cursed crowd, always on the side of the victor—broke out into delighted howls.
“Ha, Egert! He got a hit!”
“Keep at it! Keep at it! He’ll fall back!”
“Bravo, student! Teach him a lesson! Thrash him!”
When guards who had been observed in some villainy or cowardice, or who had been convicted of treason, were expelled from the regiment, they suffered a shameful punishment: Their epaulets were publicly shorn from their shoulders. Without knowing it, the student had brought great shame upon Egert, who saw his comrades exchanging glances, smirking and whispering amongst themselves—for shame!
Everything further transpired instantaneously, in the space of a breath.
Forgetting himself in his fury, Egert sprang forward. The student, absurdly throwing up his sword, leapt forward to meet him—and froze, his astonished eyes staring into the guard’s. Egert’s family sword blossomed from his back; it was not lustrous as usual, but dark red, almost black. Standing for a second more, the student fell down as awkwardly as he had fought. The crowd became quiet; a blind man would have thought that there was not a single soul in the back courtyard of the tavern. The student slumped heavily onto the trampled dirt, and Egert’s unmercifully long blade slipped out of his chest like a snake.
“He impaled himself,” said Lieutenant Dron loudly.
Egert stood, his blood-soaked sword lowered down toward the ground, and stared dully at the form in front of him. The crowd shuffled slightly, letting Toria through.
She walked carefully, as if on a wire. Paying no heed to Egert, she approached the youth on tiptoe, as though she were afraid to wake him. “Dinar?”
The young man did not answer.
“Dinar?”
The crowd dispersed, averting their eyes. A reddish black stain crept out from under the lad’s dark coat. The innkeeper sniveled in a low voice, “Oh, these duels! Young blood is hot, everyone knows it. What should I do now? Well, what am I going to do?”
Egert spit to get rid of a metallic taste in his mouth. Glorious Heaven, why did it go so wrong?
“Dinar!” Toria gazed pleadingly into the young man’s face.
The courtyard emptied slowly; as he was leaving, the tall gray-haired boarder cast a glance in the direction of Egert, a glance that was intent yet incomprehensible.
The student was buried quickly, but with all the proper decorum, at the city’s expense. The city was flush with gossip for a week. Toria addressed a complaint to the mayor. He received her, but only so that he could express his condolences and lift his hands in dismay: the duel proceeded according to all the proper rules, and although it is extremely unfortunate that the youth died, did not he himself challenge Lord Soll? Alas, my dear lady, this unfortunate incident can in no way be called a murder. Lord Soll is not under arrest. He fought on the field of honor, and he too might have been killed. And if the deceased gentleman student did not carry weapons and did not know how to wield them, well then, this misfortune falls to the student and is in no way the fault of Lieutenant Soll.…
Four days had passed from the day of the duel, three from the day of the burial. In the gray early morning, Toria abandoned the city.
The week of her stay in Kavarren lay on her face in black, funereal shadows. The student’s bundle dragged on her arm as she plodded out to the carriage waiting by the entrance; her eyes, extinguished, ringed with dark shadows, watched the ground as she walked, which is why she did not immediately recognize the man who courteously lowered the running board of the coach.
Someone’s hand helped her cast the bundle onto the seat. Mechanically offering thanks, Toria raised her eyes and came face-to-face with Egert Soll.
Egert had been watching over the fiancée of the student he killed, though he himself did not know why. It is possible that he wanted to apologize and to express his sympathy, but it is more likely that he entertained certain vague hopes in regards to Toria. As a worshipper of risk and danger, he was accustomed to taking a relaxed approach to death, his own and others’. Should not the victor have a right to count on an allotment of the relinquished inheritance of his vanquished foe? What could be more natural?
Then Toria met Egert’s gaze.
He was prepared for a display of wrath, despair, or hatred, and he had fortified himself with words appropriate to the situation. He even intended to accept a slap in the face from her hand, but what he saw in Toria’s splendid yet heartbroken eyes repelled him backwards like a blow from a steel-clad fist.