I send my message strongly urging Chordwain to choose a champion, in as delicate a way as possible. And I send Colblain to deliver it, because Colblain will do his damnedest to encourage the governor to choose the course that will leave him alive at the end of the day. I am not surprised when Colblain doesn’t return: I’d been hoping he would plead for amnesty and save me the trouble of having to guard, feed and shelter him.
Ragna helps me don my armor in silence. I reflect that it no longer matches my bizarre coloration: white leather suited when I was white and gold and red, but now I am…well, every color but green, and that also if you stare in my eye long enough. I feel odd when she’s done, as if I’ve put on someone else’s clothes. Almost I want to tell her: take it off me. Strip me and let me fight naked.
But sense wins over mysticism. Properly accoutered, I head out with my entourage to the designated field. Chordwain’s people are waiting for us, and I hope, hope that he has done the smart thing.
I see him: he is not dressed in armor. My chest loosens in relief. Master General Nedwin has drawn the rectangle, and Casandre stands outside it with the governor. Their people shift in discomfort as we take our places on the other side.
“The challenged shall step in place,” Nedwin says.
I step over the line.
“The champion of the challenger shall step in place,” Nedwin says.
I look up, wondering—
—and I choke on my next breath as my heart skips once, twice, thrice.
“Silfie,” I whisper.
She wears brown leathers accented in brass and black; her bright curls are drawn back with a leather tie, leaving her sleek face exposed, like an unsheathed knife. She advances like a predator, sword already naked in her hand. I look for softness in her gaze and find none; confused, I look for insanity, but see only her eyes, her fierce and angry copper eyes.
“This duel ends at the killing blow,” Nedwin says. “Begin.”
“Don’t hold back,” Silfie hisses. “You know I’m better at this than you are.” And then she lunges for me. I retreat, wings flaring in shock, and she backs me all the way to the end of the strip.
I can’t fight Silfie. I can’t. I can’t kill her! But I can’t lose Shraeven either!
Her blade slices through the leathers at my leg, leaving a skin wound that smarts all out of proportion to its severity.
“If you want me to humiliate you before you die, I can oblige,” she says, baring her sharp little teeth at me…and slaps my cheek.
I understand then. This is my life and Shraeven’s, and she would do her best to take them both. I don’t have to understand why to die. I shove her aside with a wing and dart past her, winning myself the room on the other side. Flexing my fingers on the hilt of my sword, I growl, “Come on, then.”
She leaps for me. This time I am ready. This time I am willing to face her as an opponent, rather than as a lover I still hope to save. This time I put my heart into it.
...but she’s right. She is better at this than I was; she’s always been. Even when we sparred during those first months of our acquaintance, she was better. Time and bitterness have only improved her, while time and exhaustion have made me slow. I become aware that I am laboring, that sweat is slicking my hair to the back of my neck, that I am panting so hard my exertion has become nausea. My arm is shaking. My entire body trembles. The next time she lunges for me, I ignore it for a feint—
—but it’s no feint. She ducks past me, beneath one lifted wing, and I feel her blade rip up my back, across the dense muscles there, so richly supplied with blood. I feel one of those wings go limp, dead weight dragging. And then I feel steel at my throat—
—pulling across my throat—
She shoves me forward and I fall onto my palms and knees, then my elbows. Blood pours from my body, puddles around my fingers. I stare at it, shocked. I can’t die like this. I can’t. It’s just not possible.
“The duel goes to the challenger,” Nedwin says. “The champion may now ask her boon if she so wishes.”
Spots are beginning to cloud my vision, but I find myself staring at Silfie’s back. Betrayer. My murderer. She is wiping her sword. “I would.”
“What may I grant you?” the governor asks, smugly pleased.
“This,” Silfie says, and there is the flash of metal and the gurgle of shocked breath bubbling in a throat. Chordwain falls heavily at her feet. His blind, shocked eyes face mine, but there is nothing left in them. She says, “I am repaid.”
My head strikes the ground.
Hands on my shoulders
husky alto: hara hara anghara
dont go
* * *
you abandoned me, you all abandoned me
flash of copper eyes and curls
so sorry i’m so sorry you were getting so strange i was afraid
flash of blue water against copper cliffs
you left you left us you didnt belong to us and you left us
flash of rolling plains beneath blue skies
we werent sure of you we werent sure you were new and alien we had to know you had conviction
flash of blue skies above black waters
who says we abandoned you?
i saw it
did you?
…flash of copper blood splashing from the wing muscles
...head held so hard in place, thin slice across skin
...being pushed so hard forward that the blood spurting from those wing muscles spills forward over shoulder and neck, so that it looks as if a white throat is bathed in blood—
...!
* * *
“Wake up, wake up, Angharad, Angharad!”
I focus on the pebble near my eye. Right next to my eye. It’s blood-soaked. So is the earth.
“Gods!” I hear her curse, realize dimly that weight on my back is her pressing on the giant rip she made in my body. “Someone get a damned healer! Branden, get Branden!”
Bran-who? Flash: mongrel, chirurgeon, griffin-shaped. Oh. It occurs to me that I have my cavalry commander back.
“What the blue hells did you think were you doing!” I’ve never heard Donal so angry.
“Killing Chordwain!” Silfie snarls. “And keeping this province in one piece!”
“You made her lose!” Donal bellows. “How is that going to help?”
“She didn’t lose,” Silfie says. “She’s still alive! The person who loses has to be dead!” A pause and then a whimper. “I think she’s alive, anyway. Angharad! Stay with us, the healer’s coming!”
“This,” a voice says behind us, “is most irregular.”
“Shut the hell up, Nedwin,” Silfie says. “He got what was coming to him.”
“And get away from us with that sword or I’ll kill you myself!” Donal growls.
What protectors I have. Gods save my enemies. Gods save me!
“If she lives—”
“She will!” Silfie says. “I knew what I was doing!”
“If she lives,” Nedwin continues, “this duel will be forfeit, you know. You’ll have used it as a convenient way to murder the governor. Made a mockery of tradition.”
“You want to know what mockery of tradition is?” Silfie says. I can almost hear her spitting. “Mockery of your tradition, Nedwin? It’s the governor of Shraeven spilling himself in the wombs set aside for the Godson’s use. How’s that for mockery?”
Even I can sense the shocked stillness then, past the distraction of hot blood matting on my neck and shoulders.
“He did what?” Nedwin whispers.
“He raped the women meant for the Godson’s harem,” Silfie says. “Don’t blame me for sticking a sword in him. He stuck his in me first.”
“Sssilfie—”
Is that me? I guess it is.
“Angharad!”
“Love you,” I mutter, and then lose the world entire.