The man had more than luck and skill to help him win.
Knives were not always what they seemed. A blade could have inbuilt weaknesses and snap under pressure. Or the hilt could be hollowed to contain various vapors which could be spurted through holes in the guard. Abo's blade held indentations which held a numbing paste.
Dumarest cursed his stupidity but he was trapped in a game over which he had no control. There had been no chance to examine the weapons. None to take elementary precautions and, had he fought to avoid being cut, the odds would have fallen too low.
Now only speed could save him.
He met Abo's rush with a flick of his hand, the blood it had held flying to spatter on the smiling face, the cruel eyes. An attack followed by his own rush and the air shook to the thin, harsh ring of steel, the crowd roaring as Dumarest sent his blade home in a vicious slash which would have spilled Abo's guts had he not twisted to take the edge on his hip.
A cut followed by another, a third, deep gashes which laced the torso and marred the smooth brown skin with a patina of blood.
Backing, Abo fought back. He was quick, skillful, alert now to the real danger. The smile gone now, replaced by a snarl as he turned into an animal fighting for its life. Matching the one Dumarest had already become.
Time became meaningless, the universe itself diminishing to a matter of cuts, parries, dodges, feints, thrusts, attacks, ripostes. As life became a matter of crippling cuts, weakening blood loss, of speed and instinctive action unhampered by the slowing need for thought.
Abo lunged, missed, received a slash which crippled his left arm. Spinning, he brought up his edge, the blade halting as Dumarest blocked the motion with the barrier of his forearm against the other's wrist. A moment of strain then they parted, Dumarest seeing his target, aiming for it against the growing numbness.
Feeling the jar of metal against bone as a sun burst in his eyes.
It was a flare of light so intense as to be a physical pain and Dumarest stepped backward, hands lifted, feeling the ice-burn as steel cut into his body. A blow repeated as he moved blindly to one side and he tasted blood in his mouth and the pain as metal scraped over bone. A thrust which had penetrated a lung, another searing into his bowels, a third tearing at his liver in a storm of edge and point to send him down.
To lie blinking on the floor of the ring as vague images replaced the blackness-the lights, a shadow standing tall against them, one smeared with blood, grinning in the rictus of impending death, but still standing, still upright.
Abo enjoying his victory.
"Earl!" Angado was at his side. "You're hurt! How badly- God!" His voice rose as he called for help. "Get him to the doctor! Fast!"
Dumarest sagged in the rough hands which grasped and carried him. Pain was something not to be ignored, an agony which filled every crevice of his being. The pain and the knowledge that, at last, he had reached the end.
It happened and, in the arena, it could happen to anyone at any time. A slip, a moment of carelessness, a touch of overconfidence and, when least expected, death would reach out its waiting hand. He had seen it happen to others and now it had happened to him. The luck which had served him for so long had at last run out.
"Earl!" Angado was pleading. "For God's sake-Earl!"
A voice like a whisper in the darkness echoed by others, one stronger than the rest.
"… internal injuries and there is profuse hemorrhaging… needs extensive medical care but it'll be costly… cryogenic sac… move to the institute… need to waste no… must hurry… hurry… hurry…"
The doctor pronouncing the sentence of death, his voice becoming ragged, lost in the encroaching gloom. Death by inaction. Death from reasons of poverty. Death because he couldn't pay for the treatment necessary. Death, smiling wider now as he always smiled, coming closer… closer…
"No!" Dumarest forced open his eyes fired by the spark deep inside of him, the urge to survive which gave him a transitory strength. Darkness still clouded his vision and obscured shapes but one, close to his face, had to be Angado.
"Earl! Those bastards fired a strobe-laser into your eyes. There was almost a riot from the crowd. All bets are off."
Which is why he was lying on the bench with the doctor treating him with basic remedies. Stanching wounds and killing pain while knowing he could only stave off the inevitable.
"My arm!" Dumarest lifted his left forearm. "Get a banker-machine. Money, you understand? I've money."
"… hang on and and maybe I can get something arranged. A loan or-"
"Money!" Dumarest snarled in impatient anger. "Listen to me! Get a banking machine and do what's necessary. Do it." He sank back, blood welling to gurgle in his throat, to drown him with his life's fluid. To spray in a carmine fountain as he coughed and spat and said, while he was able, "I've money, damn you! Credit! Use it and…"He felt himself beginning to fall into an eternal oblivion. "Angado-I'm relying on you!"
Then there was nothing but the endless spinning tunnel of darkness and, at the end, the single point of a glowing star.
Chapter Eleven
Avro screamed; a shout which illuminated the shadows of his sleeping mind. A challenge hurled at the wind, the sky, the male hovering before him on spread wings. An aggressor, young, ambitious, fired by the biological need to perpetuate his genes. One screaming his intent as Avro screamed his warning but knowing, even as he screamed, that this time it wouldn't be enough. And to strike first was half the victory.
Wind gusted around him as he launched himself from the peak with a thrum of wings. Pinions which threshed the air as he fought to gain height, to turn, to hurl himself at the challenger, arms extended, fingers spread, feet lifted to deal a devastating kick. One which missed as the other twirled aside, to kick in turn, to register a blow which sent Avro spinning.
Whirling as he was attacked again with feet and hands, toes and fingers ripping at his wings, adding to the strain they already fought to overcome.
The penalty of age when the body grew too gross and the great pectorals, the deltoids, began to weaken. A time when lift was slower, agility less, vulnerability a growing menace.
The moment of truth for an angel who refused to yield his nest, his women, his position in the community.
A thing Avro knew from the instinct buried in the body and brain of the host he dominated as he knew that to fold his wings and fall would be to signal his peaceful withdrawal from the conflict. An act which would save his life and leave him to fly alone as long as his wings would carry him. To join the flock of other aging males who had been forced to yield to younger blood. Tolerated and even cared for as long as they recognized the victor's right.
But Avro was too new to this body and its way of life. Too entranced by the novelty of emotion and conditioned by the subtle knowledge that, for him, death in this body would not mean extinction. So he fought until the blood ran from a dozen wounds and his wings were in tatters. Fighting on until he began to fall, to continue to fall despite his struggles, wheeling in circles to the rocks below, the wheeling becoming a tumble, a drop, a sickening plunge to the jagged teeth waiting to smash out his life.
An impact which was the hammer-blow of extinction, filling his eyes with a flash of vivid light.
One which lingered as he jerked upright on his bed to sit, fighting for air, hands clasped over his eyes.
"Master!" Byrne calling from beyond the door attracted by his screaming. Concerned by it also; it was becoming too frequent. "Master?"
"All is well." Avro lowered his hands. "Enter."
He stood upright as the acolyte came into the room his face masked, hands steady. The chamber was as it had been when he'd retired for the sleep which should have refreshed him but had not. And the pressure at the back of his skull seemed to have grown worse.