“It’s a fancy piece of iron,” I said. “But a weapon is as good as the man behind it.”
“Look on Balingore!” Roosevelt held the sword out so that the blade caught the light. It was a slab of edged and polished steel, six feet long, as wide as my hand, and Roosevelt’s brawny arm held it as though it were a stick of wood. “It was forged for your once-great ancestor, Richard of the lion-heart. It served him well—but he was a greedy man. He went too far, grew fat on gold and wine. Richard Bombast, they called him in the end. He lay drunk in his chamber while the French attacked the walls of London and his people opened the gates to them. He bought his life with this. He handed it, hilt-first, to the Dutch mercenary who led the forces of Louis Augustus, and swore the submission of himself and his house, to the end of time!”
“Fairy tales,” I said.
“But a fairy tale you believe in.” Roosevelt tilted the sword, made light wink in my eyes. “I know why you’re here, Plantagenet.”
“Do you?”
He nodded somberly. “Somehow—and later you’ll tell me how—you learned that Balingore was the key object through which the lines of power run. You imagined you could steal it, and win back all that you lost, so long ago.” He shook his head. “But the weapon is mine, now! Its touch would shrivel your hand. All the probability energies built up in seven hundred years of history flow through this steel, and every erg of that titantic charge denies your claim. I offer you your last chance for life and its riches. Plantagenet! Submit to me now, and you’ll stand first below the throne in the new order. Refuse, and you’ll die in an agony beyond your comprehension!”
“Dead is dead,” I said. “The method doesn’t matter much. Why don’t you go ahead, do it now? You’ve got the weapon in your hand.”
“I should have killed you,” he said between his teeth. “I should have killed you long ago!”
“You kept me alive for a reason,” I said raggedly. “But it wasn’t your reason, Roosevelt. All along, you’ve thought you were in charge, but you weren’t. Maybe fate isn’t as easy to twist as you thought it was—”
One of the men behind Roosevelt gave a muffled yell; a rat as big as a tomcat scuttled out between his feet. Roosevelt cut at it with the sword—and I whirled and sprinted for the altar.
I expected gunfire to racket, a bullet in the spine, a wash of agony from a nerve-gun; but Roosevelt shouted an order to his men to hold their fire. I jumped up on the low platform, gripped the altar-stone, and heaved at it. I might as well have tried to lift the columns of the Parthenon. Roosevelt was coming toward me at a run. I jammed the broken sword in under the rock, felt it clash on metal—
The Universe turned to white fire that fountained round me, then dwindled away to misty gray…
“My lord, will you attack?” Trumpington’s voice came from beside. I looked up at the sun, burning through the mist. I thought of England’s green fields, and the sunny vineyards of Aquitaine, of the empire I might yet win. I looked across toward the place where the enemy waited, where I knew death waited with a message for me.
“I will attack,” I said.
“My lord,” Trumpington’s voice was troubled. “Is all well with you?”
“As well as can be with mortal man,” I said, and spurred forward toward the high gray walls of Chaluz.
The chapel of St. Richard swam back into solidity. Roosevelt was running toward me; behind him, his men were spreading out; one brought his gun up and there was a vivid flash and I felt a smashing blow in my shoulder that spun me back and down…
Roosevelt was standing over me, the bared sword in his hand.
“You can’t die yet, Plantagenet,” he said in a voice that seemed to ring and echo like a trumpet. “Get on your feet!”
I found my hands and knees, dragged them under me. My body was one pulsating agony… like the other time, when Renata had shot me with the nerve-gun. Remembering Renata helped. I stood.
“You’re a strong man and a proud one,” Roosevelt said; his voice swelled and faded. My hand burned and tingled. I remembered the sword, blinked the haze away, saw it still projecting from under the altar-stone where I had jammed it just before somebody shot me. I wished I could get my hands on it.
“You’ve run a long way, Plantagenet,” Roosevelt was saying. “I think you knew how it would end, but still you fought. I admire you for that—and soon I’ll let you rest. But first—make your submission to me!”
“You’re still afraid…” I got the words out. “You can’t swing it… on your own.”
“Listen to me,” Roosevelt said. “The storm is all around us; it will reach us here, soon. You’ve seen it, seen what the Blight is! Unless we resolve the probability flaw now, it will engulf this world-line along with all the rest! You’re holding the fault-line open with your stubbornness! In the name of the future of humanity, give up your false pride!”
“There’s another solution,” I said. “You can submit to me.”
“Not though the pit should open to swallow me alive,” Roosevelt said, and brought the sword up, poised—
I used the last ounce of strength in my legs to lunge for his wrist, caught it, held him. I reached past him, toward the scarred hilt of my weapon. His hand closed on my wrist. We stood there, locked together, his black eyes inches from mine.
“Stand back!” Roosevelt shouted as his men came close. “I’ll break him with my own hands!”
My fingers were six inches from the hilt of the sword. I could feel a current, not a physical pull, but a force as intangible as hate or love flowing from my hand to it.
“Strive, Plantagenet,” Roosevelt hissed in my ear, and threw his weight against me. My hand was forced back, away from the sword…
“Balingore!” I shouted.
The sword moved, leaped across the intervening space to my hand.
There was a sensation as though fire poured through my arm, not burning, but scouring away the fatigue. I threw Roosevelt back, and swung six feet of scarred and rusted steel in my two hands. He backed away, his eyes fixed on the old sword, nicked and blunted, but complete now. An expression passed across his face like a man who’s looked into the furnace doors of Hell. Then his eyes met mine.
“Again, I underestimated you,” he said. “Now I begin to understand who you really are, Plantagenet, what you are. But it’s far too late to turn back. We meet as we were doomed to meet, face to face, your destiny against mine!” He lunged, and the False Balingore leaped toward me, and the True Balingore flashed out to meet it. The two blades came together with a ring like a struck anvil and the sound filled the world…
…I saw the shaft leap toward me out of the dust, felt the hammer blow in my shoulder that almost struck me from the saddle.
“Sire—you’re hit!” Trumpington shouted, and reined closer to me in the press of battle. For an instant weakness swept over me, but I kept my seat, spurred forward.
“My lord—you must retire and let me tend your wounds!” Trumpington’s voice followed me; but I did not heed him. He galloped abreast, seeking to interpose himself between me and the enemy.
“Sire—turn back!” he shouted. “Even a king can die!”
For a moment we faced each other among the plunging mounts and struggling men.
“More than other men, a king knows how to die,” I said. “And when, as well.” Then the charge of the enemy host separated us, and I saw him no more…