He could not have been stunned for more than a few heartbeats. When he came to, Oliva was kneeling beside him, wiping blood from his face and making anxious noises in Florengian. He seemed to be thinking only in Vigaelian. He struggled to sit up and screamed at the agony in his left shoulder. It was shattered. Some ribs were cracked, too.
Witnesses should not meddle in events.
“Lie down!” his mother said. “We’ll send for Healers.”
No! Every Sinurist in town would be overloaded already, and he was going to see the end of this battle if it killed him. His mother stopped resisting his struggles and helped him sit up.
The fight was slowing. The younger men might wear Stralg out eventually, but he was perilously close to the north door now. Did they even remember that danger? Dantio tried to locate the Florengian warbeasts he had detected in the grounds earlier, but his head was spinning too fast to register anything beyond the pillars. There was a fight of some sort going on out in the corridor, too.
Disaster! One of the Florengians either dropped low to come in under the monster’s guard, or just slipped… and in that instant Stralg closed his great reptilian jaws on the man’s skull. Growling triumph, the bloodlord jerked him clear of the floor and shook him as a dog would, snapping his spine like a biscuit. His buddy, whichever he was, leaped up on the Vigaelian’s back-and promptly started to slide off again, unable to find purchase on the scaly surface.
The Fist reared, spitting the corpse away like a grape seed and simultaneously trying to dislodge his burden. In the nick of time his assailant managed to stretch one front paw high enough to hook claws into Stralg’s collar. Unable to reach back with arms that had shrunk almost to nothing, the blood-lord twisted violently, swinging his passenger out like a flag and very nearly catching him with a snap of his great jaws. But then the Florengian had both front paws on the collar and could pull himself up and brace his back feet on Stralg’s shoulders. Holding the collar like reins, the rider heaved. The metal stretched and stretched again. He worked his feet inside it, and still he pulled until he was standing almost upright, cutting ever deeper into the bloodlord’s throat.
Strangled, Stralg dropped to the floor with an impact that made the candles flicker. If he hoped to crush the Florengian by rolling on him, he was too late. Stretched out to wire, the brass collar snapped with a twang. The younger Werist fell clear, still holding it. Deprived of his god’s blessing, Stralg gagged and thrashed and went into convulsions. And died. And retro-formed.
The black frog was suddenly Orlad, dancing around him like a mad thing, whirling the brass string overhead in bloody hands and yelling his triumph. “I won! I won! I am the winner!”
FABIA CELEBRE
knew how to bandage a broken shoulder, for she had watched while they took care of Paola. She grabbed a black sheet from the throne and ran to aid Dantio, arriving at his side just as yells of triumph from the north end of the hall told her that Orlad had won.
“Lift his arm!” she told her mother.
Dantio screamed, but that was to be expected.
Then another scream echoed through the hall, a howl audible over all the rising babble.
Oliva said “Oh, dear! What’s that?” in the tones of someone who could not stand any more surprises.
“Orlad.” Fabia was concentrating on working the sling under her patient’s arm. “He’s found Waels, I expect. They were very close.”
When the bandaging ordeal was over, she helped Dantio to his feet-this was definitely not the sort of night to be sitting around immobile. Only the gods knew who or what might invade the Hall of Pillars next. The elders were fussing around Stralg’s corpse. Other people were oozing in between the pillars, reluctant to enter the hall but being pushed by the press behind. The news of the Fist’s death would be everywhere in no time, so which horde controlled the city?
“We’ll sit you on the throne for now,” she said, supporting his good arm as much as she could. “This is an exciting homecoming, isn’t it? Is Celebre always this busy, Mama?”
Her mother blinked and sniffled, half-laughing, half-weeping. “No. I haven’t come to terms with it yet. I feel old and confused.”
“I’m young and more confused. We were told you’ve done an incredible job of running the government for the last year.”
“Oh, how I wish your father could have been here to meet you!”
“We all do. But we just put on the funeral games, didn’t we? Orlad slew the dragon and we can lay it at Papa’s feet as an offering. Celebre will survive and the Hrag horrors are over-thanks to your children! We got our revenge, Mama. We won in the end! Everything… oh, bless my fangs and talons! ”
That had been one of Waels’s sayings. It was provoked in this case by the sight of his body, which Orlad was carrying in his arms toward the catafalque. No one spoke as he solemnly laid the corpse alongside his father. One of the elders-Somebody Giali-had retrieved one of the dropped chlamyses, and now handed it solemnly to Orlad, who snatched it from him with a bad grace and wrapped himself to hide his nudity. Candlelight shone on his tears.
But Waels had not retroformed, so what lay beside the dead doge was a furry animal, something between a frog and an ape, its head mangled and bloody. Where was his beauty now?
Oliva saw desecration and protested. “No!”
Fabia said, “Let him be, Mama. It was Waels who won the victory. He let Stralg catch him, so that Orlad would have his chance.”
“No!” again.
“I saw it.” In that battle of instant reflexes, the momentary delay needed to kill Waels had made the difference. She helped Dantio to the throne, the only place to sit. He was very pale and obviously in great pain.
“We must find a Healer,” Oliva said. “Or a Mercy. You should be in bed.”
He grimaced. “And miss all the fun? I think the Good Guys have won the palace, at least. I can’t tell what’s going on out there… the city, I mean.”
Fabia hugged Oliva again. “All these years with only one of us to mother, and suddenly you have four. We did tell you Chies is safe, didn’t we? It will take years to explain all this!”
“You met Chies? You’ve seen him?”
“Yes, Mama. The Mutineer had him kidnapped, but he’s been well cared for and he was being very brave. They had not broken his spirit. You would have been proud of him!”
“Oh.” Oliva seemed to be at a loss for words. She was not as tall as Fabia, but broad and imposing. Care lines marred her face and her hair was streaked with silver, yet the resemblance was strong enough that Fabia could almost believe that she was viewing herself in a poor quality silver mirror.
“Chies certainly looks like Stralg,” she said. “But that isn’t his fault, is it? And it wasn’t your fault. You and Papa raised him and he’s a credit to both of you. We made him welcome, Mama, all three of us did.”
Oliva stared hard at her, searching her eyes for evidence of false comfort. “You are very kind. He was all we had, you know-after you had gone. He has been difficult these last few years.”
“What boy is not, at his age? His position cannot have been easy. Look after Dantio while I see to Orlad.” Fabia started in his direction, but Orlad was striding back to the bloodlord’s corpse. He pushed some gawking elders out of the way, took it by the ankle, and began to tow it. Evidently he had the same idea she had, of laying the carrion at Piero’s feet. More and more people were plucking up courage to enter the hall. Both doors were open, admitting Florengian men wearing brass collars-and in some cases nothing more, save bloodstains. Cavotti must rule the palace, as Dantio had said. She wondered when the Mutineer himself would appear.