Pirvan raised his voice. “Sir Darin, will you give us the command?”
For a moment Pirvan thought the younger knight would balk. Then he drew his sword, tossed it, caught it by the hilt, and held it upright.
In a great arc, Darin swept the blade downward, until the point touched the ground. As it did, he cried, in a great voice: “Begin!”
Two kender had been crouching behind a boulder, one peering out from either side. Now rain spattered the boulder, driven on a harsh wind that made them both wish to be in a forest or in some other civilized place. They scampered back to the rough shelter of another boulder that overhung a dry streambed.
They had had enough of camp, and it held nothing worth getting drenched for. Besides, there was no true friend in any human camp, and little in the way of dry clothes.
“We could build a fire,” one kender said. His name was Horimpsot Elderdrake, and in spite of his name, he was barely old enough to be traveling.
The other kender gave him a sour look. He was more than old enough to be traveling, and had indeed traveled more than most kender. One journey had taken him to the camp of a minotaur named Waydol, whom he had served loyally for the remainder of the minotaur’s life.
His name was Imsaffor Whistletrot.
“With what?” Whistletrot asked. “And how to light? And where to put it so that none of the humans see it before we’re warm?” All he got by way of an answer was a blank stare. “Oh,” Whistletrot added. “You are a wizard who can ignore all these questions?”
“Now you are being nastier than you ought to be,” Elderdrake complained. It was not quite a whine, and Whistletrot realized that perhaps he had gone a trifle far. Seeing a comrade killed in front of your eyes not halfway through your first journey was an experience the older kender had been spared, but Elderdrake had not. The young fellow had a right to be upset, as long as he didn’t do anything dangerous.
That covered more ground than usual, for a kender. Whistletrot was no more cautious than most of his people, but knew that sometimes even a kender ought to be careful to stay alive.
For one thing, they owed Zephros a debt for Edelthirb’s death.
For another, they needed to warn someone who would listen that people like Zephros were roaming the desert. Everyone in the camp already knew, so they had to get away to spread the warning.
But who would listen? Dwarves usually retreated to their caves to wait out human follies. Silvanesti elves did the same with their forests. Other kender were sparse in this land.
“We’re going to strike out for the citadel of Belkuthas,” Whistletrot said. “Starting now. Krythis and Tulia talk to everyone. That means they must listen to everyone, or nobody would talk to them. We’ll take the warning to them.”
“We will? What about Edelthirb? He hasn’t had any rites, and he won’t have them from the humans, so our duty-”
“Oh, be quiet. Only living kender can give rites to a dead one. We’ll be needing rites ourselves if we don’t travel fast.”
Elderdrake still looked dubious. “Shouldn’t we at least warn the other humans that Zephros will desert?”
Whistletrot laughed. It was a laugh that would have chilled to the bone anyone who believed kender were merry, lighthearted, light-headed little folk. It was a laugh that sounded more like fire tongs scraping together.
“Why should we? The farther Zephros goes from the other humans, the easier it is for us to catch him.
Elderdrake pondered that for a moment, then nodded and began counting his pouches.
It must have been this way among the first humans when two men had a quarrel. Knives (perhaps chipped from stone) in hand, naked save for loincloths, and friends looking on to cheer or jeer as the mood took them.
But this battle was different, too. There were rules, the knives were fine tempered steel (dwarven work, in Hawkbrother’s hand), and one of the fighters had no real friends in the square around him.
That spoke well of Hawkbrother’s courage, to place such faith in the honor of his enemies. Briefly, Pirvan held the thought that he had never before fought a man he would be so reluctant to kill.
Then he forced those fancies away. One did not go armorless into a fight with live steel while harboring kind thoughts of one’s opponent. He might not return such thoughts, and yours might slow you for one vital moment.…
It would be shameful to kill Hawkbrother without cause. It would be even worse to be killed by him through carelessness.
The two men spent the first minutes of the fight testing the ground and each other. Each walked cat-footed, alert for the least opportunity to launch a damaging attack. Both knew that knife fights were as often as not settled in moments, by the first slash or thrust that cost one fighter blood, speed, or strength.
Neither man gave his opponent an opening for such a stroke, however, or at least no opening safe from a deadly riposte.
Some knife strokes left no chance for a riposte. The victim was dead before the steel withdrew, even if he still stood on his legs. But these strokes were few, and much about them hung on sheer luck.
Without such luck, you could kill your opponent without taking from him the strength of desperation and the power to kill you before he died. That outcome Pirvan wished to avoid at all costs. Honor, Oath, and Measure required him to accomplish his mission in the south, which could be done with either him or Hawkbrother alive. It could not be done with both of them dead, barring a miracle. Pirvan had lived too long to put that kind of trust in miracles.
Twenty years before, when his night work in Istar was done with no weapon save a dagger, Pirvan could have ended the bout in minutes. Even those who lived by the bloody knife walked wide of him, knowing how many folk survived because Pirvan would not kill, rather than because he could not.
Though twenty years may be an eye blink in the life of an elf, it is a long time in the life of a man. Eyes and nerves, muscle and sinew, will none of them be what they were. Pirvan had kept in practice with knives as much as work allowed, which was much less than when he would no more have touched a sword than robbed an old woman.
Hawkbrother, despite his youth, was clearly a finished knife fighter-not at the height of his powers, but certainly Pirvan’s match. Though shorter than Pirvan, he equalled the knight’s reach, thanks to long arms.
Indeed, a wise man would not bet either way on this fight.
None of the onlookers seemed in a wagering mood. They stared at the fighters as if the sheer intensity of their gaze could bring the fight to a swift and bloodless conclusion. Haimya was pale under her tan. Eskaia kept her countenance better than either her mother or brother.
Most likely, she had not seen enough bloodshed to imagine all the horrors that might come to one or both of us tonight, thought Pirvan.
That thought was ill-timed. It passed through Pirvan’s mind as Hawkbrother moved in for his first attack. He came low, striking for Pirvan’s leg, to slow or disable him.
Pirvan saw the steel flash toward flesh and tendons. With an eye blink to spare, he pivoted on the other leg and came out of the spin, thrusting at Hawkbrother’s thigh. It was the desert warrior’s turn to spin away with equal agility.
Equal, but no more, in spite of his thirty years’ advantage in age. That gave Pirvan a useful hint. Hawkbrother might not be his opponent’s equal in fast footwork. If he had not learned tumbling, jumping, and climbing as thoroughly as Pirvan, the knight might have a surprise or two for his opponent. Now, how not to waste the surprises …
Hawkbrother had a mature head on his broad young shoulders. He would not be overconfident. Most likely, he could be surprised only once.
And that had best be soon, thought Pirvan, before those thirty years slow me enough that the surprise will go the other way.
Fit and trained as he was, the knight had no illusions he could match the endurance of an opponent amply young enough to be his son.