LITMIR.BIZ

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and sincere. I hated him for being so openly the better man. I caught his eye and in that instant I knew. He pitied me.

      ‘Cross swords with me, Brother Orrin,’ I said. ‘You’re right to think of peace. Why should my goat-herders or your pig farmers suffer in a war to see which of our backsides polishes the empire throne? Cross swords with me and if I yield, then on the day you come to claim the empire I won’t stand against you. Come, draw your blade. Or have your champion try his luck if you must.’ I nodded to the man beside him.

      ‘Ah,’ Orrin said. ‘You wouldn’t want to fight him. That’s my brother Egan. God made him to stand behind a sword. Scares me sometimes! And besides, the two of you are too alike. Egan thinks all this talk is a waste. He would set our farmers on your herders and drown the world in blood, would you not, Egan? I have a dream for the empire. For my empire. A bright dream. But I fear all Egan’s dreams are red.’

      Egan grunted as if bored.

      The Prince dismounted. ‘Clear the path and let no man interfere.’

      ‘This is—’

      ‘I know, Makin.’ I cut across him. ‘It’s a bad idea.’

      Makin climbed off his horse and stood beside me as Orrin’s men pulled away. ‘He could be good,’ he said.

      ‘Good is fine,’ I said. ‘I’m great.’

      ‘I won’t argue that you’re world class at killing, Jorg,’ Makin hissed. ‘But this is swordplay and only swordplay.’

      ‘Then I shall have to play the game,’ I said. The Prince hadn’t asked what I would demand of him when I won. That left a bitter taste.

      We stepped together then, two of the hundred, the lines of emperor and steward met for battle.

      ‘We could do this the clever way, Jorg,’ Orrin said. He had enough of my measure not to say the easy way. ‘Support me. The new emperor will need a new steward.’

      I spat in the grit.

      ‘You don’t know what it is you want, or why you want it, Jorg,’ he said. ‘You’ve seen nothing of the empire you want to own. Have you been east, chasing the sun to the wall of Utter itself? Have you seen the shores of dark Afrique? Spoken with the jarls who sail from their northern fastness when the ice allows? If you had been spawned in the Arral wastes then all the miles you covered in those roaming years of yours would have shown you nothing but grassland. By ship, Jorg, by ship. That’s the way to see the empire. Have you even seen the sea?’

      The grey let out a long complacent fart, saving me from an answer. I always loved that horse.

      We circled. Like much in life, a sword fight, especially a longsword fight, is about choosing your moment. A swing is a commitment, often a lifetime commitment. You wait for the best odds then bet your life on the chance offered. Against a man in plate armour you have to put muscle into it. All your strength. To put enough hurt through that metal so he won’t be taking advantage as you draw back for the next attack. A lunge can be more tentative. It needs to be precise. To find and pierce that chink in the armour before he finds and pierces yours.

      I swung, not to hit him but just to let our blades meet. His sword held a smoky look, something darker alloyed to the Builder-steel. The clash rang out harsh across the slopes. Somehow he rolled his blade in the instant they met and almost took mine from my hands. I didn’t like that at all. I pressed him, short swings to keep him busy, to numb his hands and stop them being so tricksy. It felt like hacking at a stone pillar and left my palms aching, pain stabbing up my wrists.

      ‘You’re better than I expected,’ he said.

      He came at me then, lunge, half-swing, lunge. Combinations too fast to think about.

      We train so that our muscles learn. So that our eyes talk to our arms and hands, skipping the brain and the need to bother with decision and judgment. It’s like learning the notes for a piece on the harp. First you think it through, A, C, C, D … and in time your fingers know it and you’ve forgotten the notes.

      My sword arm made its moves without consulting me.

      ‘Really not bad at all,’ he said.

      But when you try to play the piece faster, and then faster still, and quicker again, at some point your fingers falter. What comes next, they want to know? What’s next?

      A heavy metal bar to the side of the head is what’s next, apparently. At least that’s what the flat of his blade felt like. I said something that was half-curse, half-groan, and all blood, then fell over as if he’d cut all my strings.

      ‘Yield.’ It sounded as if he was calling from the far end of a long tunnel.

      ‘Fuck that.’ More blood, possibly some bits of tooth.

      ‘Last chance, Jorg,’ he said. The edge of his sword lay cold against my neck.

      ‘He yields.’ Makin at the far end of the same tunnel. ‘He yields.’

      ‘Like hell I do.’ The difference between sky and ground had started to reassert itself. I focused on a dark blob that could well be Orrin.

      ‘Yield,’ he said again. Warmth down my neck where blood trickled from his shallow cut.

      I managed a laugh. ‘You’ve already said you won’t kill me, Prince of Arrow. It’s not in your interest. So why would I yield?’ I spat again. ‘If you ever get to my borders with an army, I’ll decide what to do then.’

      He turned away with a look of disgust.

      ‘The High Pass,’ I said. ‘I’ll give you free passage to the High Pass and you can bother the earl with your moralizing. You earned that much.’ I tried to stand and failed. Makin helped me to my feet.

      We watched them ride on. The brother, Prince Egan, gave me an evil stare as he passed. Orrin didn’t even turn his head.

      We watched until the last horse vanished over the rise.

      ‘We’re going to need a bigger army,’ I said.

       Sir Makin is almost the handsome knight of legend, dark locks curling, tall, a swordsman’s build, darkest eyes, his armour always polished, blade keen. Only the thickness of his lips and the sharpness of his nose leave him shy of a maiden’s dream. His mouth too expressive, his look too hawkish. In other matters too Sir Makin is ‘almost’. Almost honourable, almost honest.

       About his friendship, though, there is no almost.

      7

       Four years earlier

      We’d ridden for two hours since the Prince of Arrow left for the High Pass. Two hours in a very different kind of silence to the one that kept us company for the first part of our journey. I had the sort of headache that makes decapitation seem like a good option. Any idiot could tell that it wouldn’t take much for me to make their neck the practice run.

      ‘Ouch.’

      Well, not every idiot.

      ‘Yes, Maical,’ I said. ‘Ouch.’ I watched him through slitted eyes, teeth tight against the throb in my skull. Sometimes you couldn’t tell old Maical was broken. Whatever piece was missing from him it didn’t always show. For whole moments at a time he could look ready for anything, tough, dependable, even cunning. And then it came, that weakness about the mouth, the furrowing of the brow, and the empty eyes.

      Maical had found his way back to the Brotherhood within weeks of our victory in the Highlands. Lord knows how, but I suppose even pigeons can find their way home with nothing but a drop of brain in their tiny skulls. In the months since I made the Haunt my home he’d served as stable-boy or assistant to the stable-boy, or dung-collector, or some such. I made it clear I wanted him fed and given a place to sleep. I’d killed his brother after all. Gemt hadn’t cared much for

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