by Joseph Malik
“He killed everybody?” Ulo asked. “Everybody?”
“To our best knowledge,” said Loth. “Twenty men.”
“So? I’ve killed twenty men,” bragged a warlord.
“Not in a row,” snapped Loth.
He wished he could’ve been there to see it, though. One lone knight, laying waste to what amounted to an entire phalanx. It was another plane altogether. They were dealing with a god of war incarnate.
And now, with twenty of Gar’s best men cut into small pieces, the missives in the hands of the Lord High Inquisitor, Gar himself imprisoned in Falconsrealm, and Gavria expecting a declaration of war, there were words stronger than disaster but no one dared use them.
“Who is this man and why isn’t he on our side?” Mukul asked.
“He’s a warrior from Ulo’s homeland,” Loth said.
“He’s no warrior,” said Ulo. “He’s . . .” How to explain a stuntman? “. . . an actor.”
Loth was incredulous. “The King of Gateskeep brought an actor to train their knights?”
“He teaches actors how to pretend to fight,” said Ulo. “To make it look real.”
“For . . . for theatre?” asked Mukul. “Acting?”
“Are you saying Gar’s men are pretending to be dead?” asked Loth. “Because I’d say this is pretty damned authentic.”
He knew the plan, loosely: lure Jarrod to an underground storeroom and make him talk. Back it up with enough men that he couldn’t fight at all, much less fight his way out.
All he could figure was Jarrod must have beaten them there somehow, and arranged the room to his advantage. Maybe he’d stashed a weapon. But what weapon?
Twenty men.
Loth thought back to how Jarrod had pulled the castle out from under him a moon ago. How he’d been beating the hell out of Jarrod until the world had cartwheeled out of control and he’d ended up on his back, helpless, shattered with fear, Jarrod standing over him with eyes like knives.
And that, he knew, was it.
Jarrod may not have thrown them each through the air, but whatever he’d done, the concept was the same. Those boys had gone into the fight knowing precisely what they were doing, until Jarrod showed them that they didn’t.
One way or another, he’d gotten ahead of them all.
“He deals in the illusion,” said Ulo.
“The hell he does,” Loth grumbled.
“So he is a sorcerer,” said Mukul.
“No,” said Ulo. “He’s no sorcerer. Just a fighter with a gift.”
“So he’s a mercenary,” said Mukul. “Then he can be bought.”
“No,” said Ulo. “He can’t.”
“You don’t understand,” Loth said. “The King of Gateskeep brought him here to train their knights.”
“Then he can damn well train ours!” Mukul snarled.
Ulo held up his hand for silence. “I’m going to High River tonight, with Mukul,” he said. “We’ll negotiate for Gar’s release.”
“And if they refuse?”
Ulo’s eyes met Mukul’s.
“They won’t.”
“So, I told you to do something worthy of song,” said Javal, “But damn.”
Jarrod’s cane leaned against the table in the dining hall. “Just following orders,” he slurred around the swelling of his face and his broken nose. His beard had been trimmed short and his hair now jutted at wild angles from his ponytail where the clots had been clipped out; his first fighter’s cut.
Javal smiled and clapped him on the shoulder gently. “Do you want a slab of bacon?”
“My mouth hurts,” said Jarrod, “Oats are fine.”
Javal gestured to Jarrod’s bowl. “Oats, huh? So you’re a horse, now?”
“A common misconception,” Jarrod muttered, “when viewed from the waist down.”
“At least your sense of humor isn’t injured. The final count looks like seventeen,” Javal said. “Four lived, including Gar.”
“One does what one can,” Jarrod grumbled.
“You probably won’t ever have to kill anyone again.”
Jarrod swallowed. “Meaning?”
“Meaning no man in his right mind will ever cross swords with you.”
“You say that,” said Jarrod. “Give it a week.”
“You’ll be laid up more than a week, my friend.”
A broken hand, a broken nose, probably a broken sinus bone, a deep cut on his calf that had required stitches, and the puncture wound that had led to the collapsed lung. Plus dozens of contusions, abrasions, and cuts; both knees and his tailbone bruised so black that he could barely walk. The padding in the impact armor was the only reason he hadn’t fractured enough bones to effectively paralyze him.
As it was, it hurt to move and he hated every moment of his waking life.
Jarrod was quiet for a while, staring at his oatmeal.
“You’re going to be okay,” Javal assured him. “You’ll grow through this.”
“Lines of silver,” Jarrod said. “Daelle gave me a cup that had broken.”
“That,” said Javal. “Very much, my friend, you are that. You are repaired, and you are magnificent.”
No one had said a word about the gun. Jarrod chose to leave it that way. He’d stripped it and cleaned it and now wore it at his side under his robe. Because Javal was right: no way in hell was he fighting anybody for another month at least.
“What happens now?” Jarrod asked.
“You heal,” Javal said. “From here, it’s an affair of state. The missives implicate Edwin. Gar says that Edwin killed Sir Aidan and Sir Rohn. At least, he directed the most interesting parts. I believe him.”
Jarrod nodded. “Are we going after him?”
“I am. You’re not. Albar doesn’t know this, yet.”
“What happens to Gar?”
“Ulo Sabbaghian and the Gavrian High Inquisitor are coming tonight to negotiate for his release.”
“Here?” Jarrod asked.
“Chancellor Sorenson, Master Gristavius, Albar, myself . . .”
“Son of a bitch,” Jarrod swore, grabbing his cane and rising with a series of groans.
“I don’t care,” Jarrod said to Durvin. “I need to be one hundred percent until tomorrow morning.”
They talked in the small study in Durvin’s work chambers. A chill blew in from the window. Jarrod smelled snow.
“It doesn’t work that way, sire,” said Durvin. “Drink this.”
Jarrod did. The same black, smoky liqueur he’d had upon arriving at High River. The pain rushed away in a riptide.
“That’s the best I can do,” said Durvin, sitting on the corner of his desk. “The damage will heal, but I can’t heal you any faster than you can heal yourself.”
Jarrod closed the door to the study. “A man may try to kill me tonight. A man no one in this castle can stop.”
“Then I suggest you find someone outside this castle,” Durvin said. “I can’t heal you.”
Jarrod flexed his hand as best he could.
It wasn’t much.
“Who can?”
Two floors below, Carter entered Daorah’s chambers in his war gear.
Unlike Jarrod, Carter had brought a full set of field armor.
Also unlike Jarrod, he’d decided screw local technology, and screw blending in. If he was in armor, he was out to put some blood on the walls, and he wanted anyone who saw him to know it.
Some years back, Carter had gone to the best armorer he knew with a few thousand dollars. “Scare the hell out of ‘em,” he’d told him. “I’m seven freakin’ feet tall. I bench press four hundred pounds. Let’s do something with it. No costume bullshit, either. I want to be bulletproof.” The result was what he was wearing now: a fully-articulated field harness, heat-blued to be almost black, that made him resemble a hellish god of war having a bad day.
The massive black pauldrons were peened and shaped into f
anged skulls with overlapping scalloped plates at his upper arms resembling dragon’s scales. The black helmet was a demon’s skull with evil, slanted eyes and spikes set as gleaming chrome fangs in a mouth that grinned.
The knee cops were skulls to match the shoulders. His gauntlets were steel claws with spiked knuckles.
Daorah’s cup of dandy shattered on the floor. She yelped and backed up, going for her axe along the wall.
He snapped the faceplate up. “It’s me, it’s me.”
“Holy hell,” she breathed.
He hadn’t put it on in months, so he’d been wearing it around the castle to make sure it still fit. Every so often he’d stop to adjust a strap, shake one leg or the other, smack himself about the helmet while he looked up or down, and so forth.
Some men had seen him and screamed.
His two-handed greatsword hung off his shoulder and a spiked, two-handed warhammer dangled from his belt beside a fantasy-style longsword—a serious, high-quality tool-steel blade but as ridiculously historically inaccurate as the rest of his getup.
“I . . .” she was at a loss for words.
Carter shrugged. “If they’re coming to kill me, I’m gonna make ‘em earn it.”
“I’d say,” she said. “How did you afford that?” she walked up to him and started knocking on the armor. “This is steel. The whole thing. It’s all . . .” she walked around behind him, “. . . steel.”
It was the equivalent, in Falconsrealm terms, of having a Lear jet made out of hammered gold.
“Even your mail is steel?”
“Even my mail is steel,” Carter said.
“I wouldn’t have any idea how to kill you in that. You could . . .” her voice trailed off. “Babe, you could walk through a war.”
“Let’s hope I don’t have to,” Carter said.
“How did you afford that?” she asked. “Are you a king? You’re a king.”
“I’m not a king,” he said. “My homeland is wealthy enough that steel is common. This was still very expensive.”
Jarrod knocked on the door to Daorah’s chambers. “Commander,” he announced, “Lieutenant Jarrod Torrealday for Chancellor Carter Sorenson.”
“Enter,” said Carter.
“Holy shit,” said Jarrod, in English. “You brought that? Seriously?”
“No,” jibed Carter, “I brought it ironically.”
Jarrod shook his head. Daorah could tell that they were ribbing each other.
“You look better,” Carter said, switching back to the Gateskeep dialect.
“Yeah. Durvin fixed me up. It’s a temporary thing, though. I’m numb, I’m still busted up. I still can’t close my hand all the way. Man, look at you. One-man army.”
“You didn’t bring your heavy gear?”
“No, I brought a gun.”
“A what?” asked Daorah.
“Nothing,” said Jarrod. “So, tonight. How does this go?” he asked Daorah.
“Ulo Sabbaghian will be there. Gar will be there. Gar will plead his case. We’ll negotiate with Sabbaghian and whoever else he brings. If he gives us a deal we like, we give him Gar.”
“No trial?” asked Jarrod.
“We know what he’s done,” said Daorah. “It’s just a matter of seeing what we can get for him. He may be of more use to us as a bargaining chip than as a corpse.”
Jarrod looked at Carter, then at Daorah.
“Be careful in there tonight. Both of you.”
“Don’t you have to be there?” asked Daorah.
“No. I can’t get up that many stairs.”
“But you can walk,” said Daorah.
“For now,” said Jarrod. “Javal told me to go to the Sticky Pig and get drunk with Saril. You should come,” he told Carter.
“I’m the Chancellor to the King of Gateskeep,” said Carter. “I have to be there. There’s nobody else who can do my job.”
“This has the potential to go bad, real fast,” said Jarrod.
“This is a cinch, brother. What’s he going to do?” Carter banged his fist against his chest.
Jarrod relented. In his helmet, Carter was nearly eight feet tall and the medieval equivalent of an Abrams tank.
“I’ll pick up a barrel of whisky,” Jarrod said. “If you’re right and I’m wrong, and this thing goes off without a hitch, it’s yours.”
“First drink is on me,” said Carter.
They shook on it.
Crius Lotavaugus knocked on the door to Jarrod’s chambers.
At first Jarrod didn’t recognize him, as Crius had a hood pulled over his head. He closed the door and took his hood down.
“I appreciate you coming incognito,” said Jarrod.
Crius smiled. “‘The Deadliest Man Alive,’ indeed. They said you killed twenty men.”
“Seventeen,” Jarrod grumbled. “And this isn’t over, yet. I may have to do it again, really soon.”
“We are immensely proud of you,” said Crius. “You’re everything we hoped you’d be.”
“Well, the war hasn’t started, yet,” said Jarrod.
“Have you got this figured out?” asked Crius. “Do you have anything I can take back or send higher?”
“Yes and no,” said Jarrod. “I think I have an idea of how this is going to unfold. The problem is, if I tell you what I know, someone will know you were here. Right now, anyone who talks to me is a target. So we can’t let anyone know that you healed me.”
“I understand.”
“You are going to heal me?” Jarrod assumed.
“I’ll do my best,” said Crius. “I can speed your healing. Can you last a week?”
“Durvin did his thing,” said Jarrod. “I can make it.”
“I need you to tell me what you know,” said Crius. “You may not be as lucky this time.”
Jarrod told him what he knew. When he was done, Crius healed him.
Half of the great ringed moon shone over the edge of the world as the sun set. The skies, bitterly clear, were lavender and crimson out the windows of the Chambers On Nine.
Carter leaned against the side of the window, a beer in his hand, dressed for murder with Daorah across from him in a mailshirt and a swordbelt. Gar, freshly scrubbed and not too much the worse for wear, was in a corner, still gnawing at a bacon-wrapped rack of venison while two guards looked on.
Dinner had been magnificent. Carter was sorry Jarrod had missed it.
Javal had been disappointed that Jarrod wasn’t present, but he had given him a pass and no one wanted to ask him to climb nine flights of stairs in the shape he was in. Plus, if things did get serious, Jarrod in his current shape would be a liability.
Gristavius, a tall, severe man with a white beard and a shaved head, smoked a pipe against the other window.
Carter wished that he wore a watch. “Guy’s a damned wizard,” he fumed. “It’s not like he’s stuck on a road somewhere.”
“He said this evening,” Daorah shrugged. “It’s evening.”
Albar, at the long table, poured himself a short glass of whiskey from a decanter, then caught Carter’s eye and poured him one as well, rising to take it to him. Carter thanked him, raised the glass in a wordless toast, and pounded it. It was soft, and smoky, and warmed him from the inside like Iron Man’s arc reactor. “Is this from the Sticky Pig?” he hoped.
“Indeed,” said Albar. “Another?”
“Love one. Thanks.”
Albar took his glass. Carter watched a pegasus slowly winging its way across the valley, a lone rider on patrol.
“That’s the next thing,” Daorah told Carter, nodding out the window. “When this is done, I’m teaching you to fly.”
Ulo appeared in a corner of the room, in fine silver and black clothes, a sword in his hand. His hair flowed behind him as a wind kicked up in the chamber, scattering parchments.
With a blow of his sword against the air, he knocked Carter and Daorah out the window from
twenty feet away.
Carter caught the ledge with one hand, then two. Daorah grasped at his foot, missed it, and fell, screaming.
A body falls a hundred feet in two point four seconds.
Her screams stopped just about that much later.
Carter heard someone shouting for Jarrod, then what sounded like an explosion; like the world falling in. The tower shook beneath his hands.
The tips of his fingers scrabbled at the sill. His toes found purchase, then his knee, then his toe again, higher, and he threw an elbow over the ledge and heaved.
From here he could see the rest of the room. The stone table was on top of Javal, upended. Gristavius was still in his chair, a waterfall of blood gushing from his mouth. Albar’s neck was clearly broken, his face purple, frozen in a terrified gasp. Gar was face-down but not moving. The two knights who’d been standing guard at the door lay askew, rag-dolled and broken in their mail.
The last thing Carter saw as he heaved himself through the window was the impossible sight of Ulo dragging Adielle through the far wall.
Then, as suddenly as it had begun, the room was still.
Jarrod was at the Sticky Pig with Saril. A band played uptempo in the corner with a flute, a drum, and something strummed in cluster chords. A few people danced. Jarrod was eating a slab of stringy roast that the owner claimed was elk, but Jarrod had the feeling it was horse. The bartender pushed a bowl at him, small fried tubers with gravy.
Jarrod threw back his beer and ordered another. “Gavria is arming the gbatu,” he said quietly, leaning into Saril. “We’re just a few words away from full-blown, three-way war. Us, Gavria, and the gbatu.” He was a little drunk. “A great big goddamn war.”
“And when it’s over, Ulo is King of Gavria?” asked Saril.
Jarrod put his beer down.
The people in this world lived, and thought, in the immediate, and it drove Jarrod nuts. They didn’t think in global terms because they didn’t see the world as a cycle of larger events that happened outside of their perception. They didn’t have CNN. They didn’t have college courses in international studies or globalism or sociocultural anthropology.
