A familiar slim figure pushed his way through the front rank of the Wakers and stood facing Blade, hands planted on his hips. He threw his head back and shouted, «Blade, my daughter speaks with my voice. Come over to us now, and live. Stay where you are, and die!»
Blade nodded. This was going to be delicate. If the Dreamers thought he was really betraying them, one of them might put a spear in his back as he walked toward Krog. But he didn't dare say anything to them.
Slowly he moved forward, a step at a time, arms spread wide, hands empty, sword well-sheathed. Behind him he heard the Dreamers mutter and swear and spit on the pavement. «Who's a coward now?» one of them snarled. He heard a rasp of metal and took another step. He expected to feel a spear tearing through him before he took the next one.
He didn't. There was less than a hundred feet between the Dreamers and the Wakers, but Blade had walked ten miles with less strain and tension. Soon Krog seemed close enough to touch. Meanwhile the thunder of the battle to the north continued. Blade licked his lips. Time, time. Where were those damned reserves he had told Yekran to bring? If this didn't work. .
Krog took a step forward until the two men were only a yard apart. Blade held himself completely motionless, giving no sign of his tension. Krog took another step forward-and Blade moved.
Flat-footed, with no build-up, he launched a kick at Krog's kneecap. The man reacted while the kick was in midair, but he jumped sideways, not backward. He was still in range when Blade launched himself forward. One arm beat down Krog's guard by sheer brute force and the other fist crunched into the side of the man's head. Krog would have gone flying into the air if Blade hadn't grabbed him by the collar of his tunic. Before Blade could make another move; Halda's voice shrieked, «Kill him!» and a building seemed to fall on Blade.
The Wakers did not dare use their weapons while Blade held Krog, for fear of slashing their own leader to pieces along with Blade. For a moment Blade held the unconscious man up as a shield, then half a dozen pair of hands clawed at both of them and snatched Krog away. Blade drew his own sword and had it up in time to ward off a whistling slash. A backhand cut opened one man's neck, a blow to the groin dropped another. Several more went down from wounds inflicted by their comrades. The Wakers were too closely packed to safely swing their weapons the way they were doing. That was all that kept Blade alive, that and his own lightning speed and tremendous strength.
He thrust and slashed and parried in a lethal sequence, constantly changing, murderously unpredictable. He forgot about Krog, forgot about the battle to the north. He forgot about the Dreamers standing by and watching him die; forgot about them so completely he didn't even resent their standing by. Gradually he cleared a space about himself; gradually the men he cut down piled up about his feet or crawled away. Gradually he backed toward the wall so that at least he could protect his back. He took minor wounds, and the blood oozed down over his body until he looked like some nightmarish monster.
The knowledge that he was going to die was stronger than before. He was running out of breath, running out of strength. He fought in deadly silence now. Halda joined his opponents, and her light sword was as quick as a snake's tongue, darting in and out and sometimes leaving red where it fell. Was she just playing with him?
A roar erupted from behind him, a solid thunder of running feet, battle cries, and cheers. The faces around him suddenly turned and stared. Blade bowled a man over by sheer impact and planted his back firmly against the wall. Then an arm lunged up from below and seized his kilt.
Even as he stamped downward with his foot, he knew that this was the end. He was off balance, and Halda was rushing in, sword poised. He twisted frantically. Her thrust at his chest missed, but he knew that his throat was wide open. Then a scream rose above the uproar. .
«She's mine!»
. and the meaty chunk of a spear sank into flesh. Blade twisted again, staring at Halda, watching the sword that had been ready to end his life drop to the pavement with a clang. Both Halda's hands went up to jerk futilely at the spear transfixing her body. Her eyes stayed open for a moment, staring at Blade, then drifted shut as she joined the other bodies on the ground.
Not quite sure if he was sane or not, Blade stood and stared as Narlena and Yekran charged past him, screaming wildly, while a hundred or more Dreamers ran behind them in a solid mass. The charge struck the Blue Eyes like a battering ram hitting a gate. Once again there was a crash that nearly deafened Blade. For a moment the two fighting masses surged back and forth, clawing at each other. The shock of seeing both Krog and Halda go down struck the Blue Eyes, and their discipline and training broke. One more surge forward by the Dreamers and the Blue Eyes were fleeing madly down the street. Arrows, jeers, and a few overly bold Dreamers followed them. Blade was relieved to see Yekran dash after them and bring them back. He also noticed that a good number of the Blue Eyes were surrendering-and recognized many of them as former slaves he had trained himself.
The numbness of battle was gone now. Instead Blade seemed to be feeling everything, sensing everything, more intensely than before. Narlena seemed more lovely than any woman he had ever known as she stepped toward him, looking down at Halda's body.
«I said I would live at least until I killed her,» Narlena said quietly. «And I-look, there's Krog!»
Blade's eyes followed her pointing hand. The Waker leader was groaning and struggling to sit up. Narlena drew her knife and looked inquiringly at Blade. Blade shook his head, walked over to the man, and knelt beside him. He felt neither fear nor hatred toward Krog. In fact, he felt as if he were above all human emotion.
Krog's eyes flickered open, looked up into Blade's, and found no expression there. «Do you hear me, Krog?''
«Yes.»
«Will you take your gang and all the other Wakers and go far to the north, away from Pura?»
Krog was silent.
«If you agree, I will take your people prisoner when I catch them. If not, they will all die, and then you will.»
«All right. We will leave Pura.» With a faint smile he said, «I do not know if the Dreamers deserve to have the city, Blade. But I know that you do.»
Blade rose. He had to fight to realize that he had actually not captured all the surviving Wakers and driven them out of Pura. He found himself facing Yekran, noticing a long bloody slash across the man's muscular chest and the quiet joy in his eyes.
«We should have come sooner,» Yekran said. «But on the north side they just kept coming and coming. I remembered what you once told me about splitting one's forces. So I kept everybody there until the attacks stopped. We used everything we had, and killed more than half of them.»
More than half. How many was that, exactly? Blade didn't know. But he knew as if he had seen it engraved on a wall in front of him that the power of the Wakers was broken. They would have to follow Krog north-follow him, or die in Pura. The Dreamers-no, the Purans-would see to that.
But there were still things to be done. His brain was working with unnatural clarity, and he knew it.
«Yekran, give me a light.»
«A light?»
«Yes, of course.» Why couldn't the idiot see as clearly as he what needed to be done? «Some of the Wakers may be hiding in the buildings. Patrols have to go in after them, bring them out. Give me a light and half a dozen men, and I'll start.»
Yekran handed him one of the marconite lights but shook his head as he did so. «Blade, you are wounded and tired. And you have already saved us three times this night. You should lie down and rest.»