He came at me, blade sweeping from side to side, over and under, the tahn giving him speed and strength far beyond mine. I moved back, fending him off, too busy saving my own skin to attack the repeated holes Dagny left in his defences. My hand ached abominably every time I put any weight in a blow, hot pain spreading from my knuckles up my arm and down to weaken my fingers. Mistal’s leaf was doing me no cursed good at all.
Our swords locked on their guards; we held together for a tense moment while everyone fell silent. I managed to throw him away, muscles hardened by years of hard toil on my side, to balance the energy of youth and intoxicants driving Dagny on. I backed away, keeping a safe distance.
“Come and fight,” he taunted. “D’Olbriot’s man, all hair oil and no poke, that’s what they’re saying.”
So tahn made him talkative. “Who’s saying?” Was it the person who’d put him up to this? I’d pay good coin to know who that was. “Some whore trying making you feel better because you couldn’t show her the eye in your needle?”
Dagny thrust at me, that same direct stroke of his. I tried to roll his blade over to stab at his forearms but he swept the sword out and away, swinging it round his head to scythe it back at me. I had that instant of choice again, to go for his open chest or to save my own skull. Prick him with the point of my sword and I’d have the bout won, I’d take his blade in my ear all the same. I could tell from his glazed eyes that Dagny wasn’t about to pull his blow.
I countered the sideswipe with a block that sent splintering agony through my injured hand. I ignored the pain as I forced his sword down to the side. But he kept coming, turning his sword over and around, sliding a sweeping strike in over my guard, and this time I couldn’t block it. The throbbing in my knuckles was momentarily dulled by the icy fire of a slice biting into my forearm.
Dagny cheered himself, hands high in a self-congratulatory display. Even Den Thasnet’s men looked embarrassed and everyone else just yelled their contempt. Dagny hurled abuse back at the gesturing men, threatening those closest with his bloodied blade in defiance of all custom. The noise was deafening.
I let him strut like a dunghill cockerel, tearing at the rip in my shirt sleeve to look at the cut. Deep enough for stitches, Dast curse it, no mere token like the scratches Lovis and I had exchanged. No matter, I’d had worse, even though it stung like a father’s sorrow, and Temar’s strapping would soak up any blood that might otherwise foul my grip. I’d had enough of Dagny, I decided. After all, I’d my reputation and D’Olbriot’s to consider.
How could I end this without killing him? Because that would give us a brawl and dishonour both. It’d take a bad wound to disable a man with tahn masking any pain and that was an interesting notion, wasn’t it? Den Thasnet’s men couldn’t simply bundle him off if he was bleeding badly and Fyle’s wife was the best nurse hereabouts. With a potent dose of tahn tea on top of what he’d already taken, Dagny would yammer louder than a pig hearing the slop bucket. Then we might well learn something interesting.
I walked slowly to the centre of the ground as Dagny exchanged insults with the crowd. I kept my face impassive but for faint disdain. Stolley started D’Olbriot’s men on a rhythmic chant of my name, D’Istrac lending their voice, soon joined by Jord and other Den Murivance men.
Den Thasnet’s men shout for their own man was soon drowned out. Dagny turned to me, the boldness in his eyes fading beneath the onslaught of hostility from every side. What replaced it was all the vicious cunning of a privy house rat. He took up a ready stance, two hands on his sword, blade at belly level, ready to move to either side. I drew up my sword one-handed, hilt high above my head, the blade hanging down across my body ready to parry any move he made. I leaned my weight on my back foot and smiled at him.
The chanting stopped in ragged confusion as I saw perplexity cloud Dagny’s eyes. A sound like wind rushing through reeds hissed around the sand. “Aldabreshin!” “Aldabreshin!” I only hoped the ferocious reputation of Archipelagan swordsmen had reached whatever marsh Dagny had crawled out of and that someone had mentioned my enslavement down in the islands last year. Now Fyle and the rest could see I’d learned something more cursed useful than a warlord’s wife’s bed tricks.
Tension crackled in the air so palpably I wouldn’t have been surprised to see lightning strike. Dagny’s mouth twisted and he launched a hacking stroke at me. I met it even before he’d got the full force behind the blow, stepping in and grabbing for his sword-hilt with my free hand. That sent him scuttling back in confusion, remembering the way I’d pinned him earlier.
He tried to spit on the ground again but now his mouth was dry. I waited patiently with a mocking smile and when he brought his sword level I took up the same Aldabreshin stance. Dagny thought he saw an opening and tried his favourite thrust down at my legs, but as soon as I saw his shoulders tense I angled my blade down to defeat the blow, hitting him hard enough to shake his balance. That gave me an instant of opportunity; I twisted my wrist over and sliced deep into his forearm, the blade falling instantly from his nerveless fingers. Scarlet blood saturated his sleeve in a moment but he just stood there, gaping.
I ripped the torn sleeve off my own shirt and shoved up Dagny’s cuff to see the damage. It was a deep gash right along the meat of his forearm but I’d taken him so much by surprise he’d had no chance to turn his wrist. That should have saved the tendons but I’d hit a major blood vessel by the looks of it. I pressed the linen to the wound, my hands already sticky and slick. “Hold this down hard.” I took his free hand and clamped it down.
“But they said I had to kill you,” he muttered unguardedly, shock at the unexpected wound doubling the garrulous impulse born of tahn.
“Who said?” I demanded, too soon, too curt, but people were crowding on to the sand.
He focused on me and realisation shuttered his eyes. “I’ve ever fought against Archipelagan sword styles before. They said you weren’t fit to be chosen anyway.”
“Who said?” I repeated, pressing down hard on his wound, more to hurt him now than to staunch the blood.
“Let me see!” Den Thasnet’s man tried to pull my hands off Dagny.
“Back off,” I growled. “Send for Mistress Fyle.”
“She’s on her way,” someone said behind me.
“We’ve nurses of our own,” insisted Den Thasnet’s man; I heard fear in his voice. “Come on Dagny, we’re leaving.” He wrenched at my bandaged hand.
I swore at him but hadn’t the strength in the injured fingers to resist. A solid phalanx with trefoil amulets were pushing forward to surround Dagny, pushing everyone else away. I saw someone behind Stolley answer a brutal shove with a ready punch.
“Let him go!” I shouted. “If the stupid bastard bleeds to death in some gutter, it’s no loss to us.”
“Don’t be a fool, man!” Fyle tried to hold Dagny back, but Den Thasnet’s man smacked the provost’s hand from the lad’s shaking shoulder.
“You’re stopping us?” A thick-set brawler with foul breath and pox scars pitting his face stepped up to Fyle.
“Provost!” My curt formality got Fyle’s attention just before he shut the man’s mouth with his fist. “They came looking for a fight and they’ve had the only one they’re going to get. Their man lost and that’s all there is to it.”
I was relieved to hear a murmur of agreement behind me, led by Mistal and Temar.
“True enough.” Fyle looked at Den Thasnet’s man without a hint of good will. “Get your filth off my ground.”
The pockmarked man grabbed at Fyle’s shoulders, ready to smash the provost’s nose with his forehead. Fyle was too quick, making the self-same move an instant sooner and sending the big man stumbling back blindly.