With fist tightened about hilt I advanced as she did, then raised my sword quickly to block the first of her swings. Great was the strength behind that swing and those which followed, backed by the rage and spite which filled her, yet had I expected no other thing. I, too, was filled with rage, and the strength and speed I had ever found more than sufficient to best any I faced now became no more than enough, just sufficient to hold and meet this Feridani female. So pleasurable was such a state of affairs that the purr of the hadat rose to my throat, vocal evidence of the truest battle glory I had ever known. Here, for the first time, was I faced with true challenge, and to stand victorious at the end of it would be the sole fitting testimony to true skill.
The female pressed me hard in her initial onslaught, her golden blade seeking all about for entry to my flesh and vitals, yet was there ever another golden blade to halt her thrusts and slashes, the blade in my fist which she, herself, had provided. I, too, was halted in my attempts to attack; though while I found such halting no more than a thing to be overcome, the female I faced looked upon her own frustration in a different light. At first did her fury grow greater that she was unable to reach and end me, and then did fear begin its creeping return, the fear she had felt when first she had looked upon me. I was to have fallen before the viciousness of her onslaught, and when I did not she had naught of confidence in her own skill to bolster her.
“How?” she demanded breathlessly after coming near to being spitted, stepping back in an attempt to disengage. “How are you able to stand against me? Why aren’t you dead?”
Her voice had risen to a screech of pure frustration, a child being denied what she considered her due, and again a smile of amusement touched me.
“Jalav is able to stand against you, for Jalav is the chosen of Mida,” I informed her as I advanced to pursue the battle. “Are you not able to recall that you, yourself, made it so?”
“You’re crazy!” she cried, desperately striking my blade from her as she backed yet farther. “You’re nothing but a crazy barbarian savage, and you can’t . . . .”
Upon hearing the hated word “savage” yet again from the lips of one I loathed so greatly, I rose up with a fury which was impossible to control. Like one taken by a madness did I fall upon the Feridani female, swinging at head, arm, torso, and legs, and then did I strike away her blade and bury mine in her middle, bringing forth a gout of blood from her gaping mouth which her widened eyes no longer seemed aware of. No more than her death was the female aware of, and with such an awareness did she slide to the reddened flagstones, her soul, were one such as she to have a soul, already fled.
“Jalav, you did it!” cried Aram from behind me as I freed my blade from the putrid flesh of she who had dared to face me. “I don’t know how you did it, but you sure as hell managed it!”
I turned then to face the wildly elated stranger male, and at that moment did S’Heernoh and Mehrayn and Ceralt make their hasty entrance, all three grim-faced and with swords in their fists. The heaviness of their breathing gave testimony of how hurried they had truly been, and although S’Heernoh carried my breech and swordbelt, he seemed unaware of the fact. All three appeared braced for further battle, and I smiled as I approached them.
“That this one was mine may not be denied,” I said, handing my sword to Aram so that I might take breech and swordbelt from S’Heernoh. “You, my fine Walker of the Snows proved how small a skill you possess by facing that other. Had I not earned the right to do the same with she who had presumed to call herself Mida?”
“Indeed,” said S’Heernoh with a grin and laughter, looking down upon me as Ceralt and Mehrayn paced forward to inspect the carcass I had seen to. “Indeed was the right to it yours lady war leader. You are not harmed in any manner?”
“Had she the heart to match her skill, it would surely have been otherwise,” I replied with a headshake, finishing with my breech and beginning to close my swordbelt about me. “Think you there are others of their ilk hereabouts to be seen to, Aram?”
“I seriously doubt it,” returned the male, holding my sword gingerly the while I covered myself, and then returning it with the eagerness of one who is unused to the presence of spilled blood and that which spills it. “If there had been any more of them, they would have been set up as gods right along with these two. I’d say that except for whatever mopping up is left, the battle is over—with us as the winners.”
The grin of the male matched the pleasure in S’Heernoh and myself, for no longer were there Feridani about who might bring the ills of slavery to our world. Such a doing called for a victory celebration like no other ever indulged in, and surely would I have spoken of the matter had another not spoken before me.
“You heard,” said Mehrayn to Ceralt, his voice calm and even as he gazed upon the second male over Mida’s remains. “Our duty has been seen to, and all responsibility gone by the boards. We are now no more than two men with none looking to them for leadership.”
“Indeed,” said Ceralt with a matching calm, returning the gaze being sent to him, his left hand gently arest upon the hilt of his sword. “There is naught now before us of greater import than our own concerns. I regret the need, for I have come to know and respect you, yet does this matter go beyond brotherhood and friendship.”
“I, too, feel regret, although you have spoken truly in regard to our need,” said Mehrayn. “To give up all claim to a woman out of friendship to another man, is to prove that the woman is not truly the woman of your heart. As I am unable to withdraw, so do I recognize your inability to do the same. ”
“Where shall we see to the matter?” asked Ceralt, looking about critically at that which surrounded him. “This chamber seems somewhat limited, and yet might it do should the need arise.”
“I have no true preference,” returned Mehrayn with a shrug, also looking about. “There are surely sufficient chambers in this place that one might be found without the clutter of this one, and yet shall it certainly do should we find no other to our liking.”
“They can’t be talking about what I think they’re talking about,” said Aram softly to S’Heernoh, stepping forward to take the place beside the Walker that I had left. Without being truly aware of the doing I had backed from where I had stood, surely an attempt to deny intentions which I could not bear to accept. “We’ve got to do something to stop it—if there is any way to stop it.”
“I shall find a way,” said S’Heernoh grimly, and then did he and Aram begin walking toward the two who meant to face one another, no matter the attempts of others. S’Heernoh might speak and Aram might protest, yet would naught save the death of one prevent the meeting the two intended. Truly had I forgotten what victory in the battle might come to mean: a personal defeat I had not the ability to face. None might speak upon the doings of warriors, and Ceralt and Mehrayn were warriors; as I could not speak to halt them, neither was I able to watch the thing; even before S’Heernoh and Aram reached the others, I turned and fled the chamber.
Corridor after corridor slipped by beneath my feet, my surroundings doing naught to bring themselves to my attention, the illness so strong within me that I was aware of naught else. With one hand to my middle did I stumble from the unbearable, till at last I found myself emerging into the vast cavern where battle had taken place. Unmoving forms lay everywhere, some few of them Midanna and Sigurri, yet by far the greater number of warriors sat with naught save wounds, being tended by others at the direction of Lialt and the roundish male. Blood spattered the stranger male’s covering, the cloth tied about his arm saying some part of it was likely his own, but he was more concerned with those he tended. I turned to my right, away from the sight of healing, knowing full well that even the skills of the roundish male would avail naught were Ceralt and Mehrayn to face one another. One at least would surely fall, never to rise again, and the pain that thought brought me could not be borne. I had faced the one called Mida and stood victorious, and had gained naught from the doing; far better would it have been had I fallen in her stead.