Now Magratte eased back and said, “I regretted that I was not able to meet you that day in the third garden on Ovam Horder’s roof.”
“You were Hasbrick Gleffen?”
“I was.” He stepped in and presented Conn with the attack known as Tetsuro’s Bore, thrusting and stabbing with blinding swiftness. Conn countered appropriately but was forced to call up his maximum speed to keep the epiniard’s point from his throat. Finally, he stepped into the margrave’s attack and clashed guard to guard, driving the man back. But he was surprised at the strength of the aristocrat’s resistance before Magratte slipped away and prepared his next attack.
“I had heard of you before I knew what you were,” Magratte said. “You were considered one of the best technicians along The Spray.”
Conn replied not with words but with a classic Laganz, his blade snip-snip-snipping against the other man’s, seeking to create that minuscule opening through which the thin length of metal could suddenly slip in and meet flesh. But Magratte threw Conn’s Laganz back on him with a brilliant trifoliate riposte, and Conn had to propel himself backwards to miss being spitted on the epiniard’s questing point.
“But you see,” said Magratte, “I have met and bested almost all of the high technicians in private bouts.” And with that he came on in a whirling, stamping storm of an attack, in which his blade seemed to flicker and flash at Conn from two or three directions at once.
Again Conn must call upon his fullest speed to fend off the epiniard’s probing tip and cutting fore edge, and again his counterstrokes were contained and rendered innocuous by guards and parries that seemed to cost his opponent little effort.
“I am at least your technical equal,” Magratte said.
“It seems so,” said Conn.
“Then it comes down to rif?”
“Perhaps.”
“Then you are lost,” the margrave said and came on yet again in what seemed at first to be a repetition of his opening double quadriline, although this time at a cadence that taxed all of Conn’s pace and skill.
His training at Horder’s Emporium had been exhaustive. From boyhood he had fought experts and superlatives, and had honed individual techniques in practice against machines that simulated the styles and speeds of grandmasters long since gone to dust. He had become a brilliantly proficient swordster, and now he understood that his innate abilities had originated in the workroom at the top of the house behind him, where Hallis Tharp’s last project lay moldering on the workbench.
But had Tharp instilled in him that elusive quality called rif? Conn thought not. Not even the finest machine simulations could capture giftedness, and giftedness was what he sensed in Magratte.
The Flagits’ doomed soldiers needed no giftedness – only strength and speed and the inability to turn their backs on murderous folly until it killed them or wore them out. Thus their template must own only the same virtues. Conn’s musings broke off now as the margrave came in fast and perfect, again offering the double quadriline aimed at eyes and groin. But this time, as Conn matched – just barely – the tempo of the attack, Magratte extended the assault past the eighth stroke, moving seamlessly into a repetition of the opening slash, but doing so with an almost imperceptible shift in the rhythm between the first and second quartos, so that Conn was almost caught open and undefended. He managed to cover just in time, but only by aiming an awkward buffet at Magratte’s head while leaping backward.
He was thankful to land well because the aristocrat was right on top of him, a thoughtful smile lazing on Magratte’s lips as he executed another textbook attack – a grand allevant this time – then modified it by delaying the third thrust by a half-beat followed by a forward rush that caught Conn completely by surprise.
The lord stepped back and flicked a drop of blood from the tip of his blade. It was only then that Conn realized the man’s point had entered his shoulder. It was no more than a pinprick, but it was first blood. A sigh went up from the watching Old Earth aristocrats as they saw the red blossom on Conn’s shirt, and Jenore made a sound between a moan and a sob.
There were more formal gestures to perform, now that blood had been shed, as well as specific words to be spoken. Conn voiced the phrases automatically, while his mind raced forward. He was no match for Magratte. Technical skill must always yield to genius, and his opponent was clearly more than exceptionally talented. His opponent had true rif; Conn did not.
As he prepared to receive the next passage, almost certainly the final one of his career unless Magratte chose to prolong the occasion, Conn felt a flash of incipient anger at Hallis Tharp. Automatically, his mind reached for the Lho-tso exercise that would restore his tranquility.
But as the first syllable sounded in his head, another part of Conn said, No. Magratte might have rif in grand supply, but Conn Labro had rage. It was the founding sin of the small diseased society that the Flagits had produced here on Forlor and it was to be found in its most pure form in the inner landscape of the template.
In all his life, Conn had never allowed his anger to take him. But now his life was almost certainly over if he fought as he always had. The other way would give him at least an interesting match, Magratte’s rif against Conn’s supernal rage. It might even be decisive.
After first blood, it was permissible for the wounded party to call for an interval if he believed that the ensuing passage would bring his death. It was an opportunity for contemplation of the tragic undertones of the duelist’s life, perhaps for the creation of a spontaneous quip that the deceased’s friends could repeat as his epitaph once the final note was sounded.
Conn raised his off hand in the appropriate signal and stood with eyes downcast. He thought again of Hallis Tharp, then moved on to the Flagit brothers and the monstrous slaughter of – here he allowed the truth of it to flow into him – tens of thousands of Conn’s brothers. He thought of his upbringing at Horder’s, the deprivations of his childhood, the constrictions of his manhood. Now he thought of Clariq Wallader and the unjust termination of her life as a consequence of Magratte’s lust, and that brought him to the question of Jenore Mordene and her fate at the hands of the Immersion, not to mention Alwan Foulaine’s foul intent, if Conn Labro failed as her champion.
It was like climbing a series of steps, rising through levels of raw, red emotion he had never experienced. It was glorious and uplifting, so that he felt as if bubbles of elevating gases had been transfused into his veins and arteries, filling him with ecstatic weightlessness. The epiniard, solid in his grip, became as light as a sigh. His lungs filled and rejoiced in the action, as if they could taste the air they encompassed and its flavor was delicious.
He looked up and it was as if the universe was revealing to him new dimensions he had never suspected were there. He saw Magratte limned in red light, the Old Earth lords behind him similarly surrounded by a crimson aura. And Foulaine – he was glowing as if he had been dipped in rosy fire.
Conn flexed the epiniard and looked Magratte in the eye, and saw the margrave’s refined features draw into a frown of concentration. “What is this?” said the aristocrat.
“Let us see,” said Conn, and heard in his own voice a bestial growl. He took up his stance, shivers of fiery energy rippling across his back and shoulder muscles, and said, “Come at me now.”
Magratte’s eyes narrowed. He circled right then smoothly reversed his footing to come in from the other side, his epiniard flashing in a complex pattern out of which he suddenly evolved a double thrust at Conn’s middle.
Conn twisted and sideslipped, but the second strike scored the flesh of his side just beneath the ribs. He felt the sting of the cut and even the tickle of blood running across the hairs of his belly. But there was no real pain; it was buried beneath the rage and he used the momentum of his sideways motion to initiate a new attack against Magratte’s off side.
He saw surprise on his opponent’s face as the margrave fell back, fending off a flurry of thrusts and slashes. Conn had nev
er known his speed to be like this: the anger seemed to have lubricated the channels of his nerves, and it was as if his muscles had found a new dimension of power and precision. The Vlens blade sang in his hand.
But Magratte showed no fear. He recovered his footing and assumed a watchful defensive stance, his sword hand low and close to his body, the point of his epiniard making tiny perfect circles in the air before him. His voice held no tremor as he said, “Try that again.”
Conn drew air into his lungs. He could feel his diaphragm heaving, his heart racing and the pulse pounding in his ears at a rate he had never known. The world around him faded to deep black except for the figure of Magratte, who glowed red as if cast from molten metal.
Conn took up the stance known as the impelard and threw himself across the space that separated them, his point oscillating as his arm muscles executed a harmonic sequence at greater than human speed.
Magratte remained still, his point still circling even as Conn’s attack burst upon him. The Old Earther made no attempt to beat off the onrush with his own epiniard. Instead, as Conn committed his weapon to its final thrust, aimed at the margrave’s throat, Magratte thrust up his off hand, the back of his fingers connecting with the shaft of Conn’s epiniard just below the razor sharp edge that lay behind the point, and gently guiding it the small distance necessary to carry it past its target.
At the same time, Magratte’s own weapon darted forward and entered Conn Labro’s torso beneath his ribs, passing through his heart and exiting his back between his spine and his right shoulder blade.
Conn felt the cold metal transfix his flesh, saw Magratte’s face close now to his own, the margrave’s expression that of a man who, intent on solving a difficult puzzle, believes he has found the answer. “Those who have it know,” the aristocrat whispered, “that there can be no substitute for rif.”
Conn’s heart continued to beat around the tightly contained shaft of Magratte’s epiniard.
“Now it ends,” said the Old Earther, and smoothly drew the blade free.
Conn felt the metal slide through his body. Again there was little pain. The epiniard came free and a gush of blood followed from the wound it had made. Conn heard a sigh from the lords around Vullamir, a curse from Erkatchian and his own name cried out by Jenore Mordene.
The blackness faded and the red aura that had bathed Magratte in Conn’s vision was gone. The margrave stood, his weapon pointed at the ground, waiting for Conn to fall.
Conn’s eyes met the other man’s. He saw that it took Magratte just a fraction of a minim to understand that his expectations were not about to be gratified. In that so brief a time Conn’s sword arm, still extended and holding the weapon out where the lord’s fingers had directed it, flicked sideways. The keen fore edge sliced through Magratte’s throat, blood and air bubbling out in a crimson froth.
Conn saw the astonishment in the man’s eyes yield to a moment of regret. But what the Old Earth lord may have been rueing would never be known, for Magratte had toppled dead to the checkered flagstones.
The Rhee Vlens blade went inert in his hand and he dropped it gently onto the corpse. Blood continued to flow from his chest, but the gush had become a trickle and he estimated that it would soon cease. Hallis Tharp had given him a heart with a complex but robust architecture. But the old man had also been right about anger. It drained the energy from Conn. He was tired now.
The fight had turned him around. The steps lay before him and the crowd at his back. Erkatchian had watched the duel from the bottom of the steps and now came toward him. Conn turned to look for Jenore, to order those who held her to set her free.
He saw her near the front of the crowd, the men who had restrained her had relinquished their grips and were now attempting to assemble their faces into arrangements that indicated they had been forced to follow distasteful orders. But Conn’s eyes dismissed them and went to the woman.
He took a faltering step toward her and she came out of the crowd, her arms extended, her face full of emotions she made no attempt to control. “Oh, Conn...” she began.
“Look out!” cried Yalum Erkatchian.
Conn’s eyes went from Jenore’s face to the people behind her. And there he saw Alwan Foulaine, arm raised, a gleaming length of pointed metal snug against his palm, fingers and thumb holding it in a thrower’s grip. An expression of purest hate had contorted his eyes into slits and his mouth into a snarl. His gaze was fixed on the woman who had denied him.
The rage came up in Conn again, but brought only a partial restoration of his strength. Erkatchian was moving forward and Jenore was turning to look behind her. But Conn knew there would not be time. Foulaine’s arm was already coming down.
Then from behind the knife thrower an arm snaked around his throat and yanked him sharply back, while another hand reached out and plucked the weapon from his faltering grip. Foulaine fell backwards onto the black and white stones, where he was swiftly rolled over and imprisoned in a holdtight.
Those around the action had pulled back and Conn now saw the person who had performed the disarming and capture stand up. She reached down into a pail that appeared to contain cleaning implements. From it she took a small device and spoke into it.
For the dark sky came a thrumming of powerful gravity obviators and a sleek vessel, black with green sponsons and fairings, descended to hover above the scene. The Flagits’ ison-cannon swiveled at the tops of their towers to bear upon the new arrival, but twin bursts of incandescent energy broke from emitter ports at bow and stern, and the house’s weapons instantly melted into dripping slag.
Jenore came into Conn’s arms, then she pulled away to lift his shirt. “Your wound,” she said.
“It is not serious,” he said. “I was made to withstand worse.”
The person with the communicator approached them. Conn saw that it was the woman with the prominent nose who had been assigned to clean his cabin. Now she seized the nose in one hand and twisted it free of her face, bringing with it her brows and a cheek that had borne a bristly wart. Beneath the disguise was the uncompromising face of Directing Agent Odell of the Archonate Bureau of Scrutiny.
“We need,” she said, “to talk.”
“I am somewhat tired,” Conn said.
“It won’t take long,” Odell said. “Are you the legal owner of this world?”
He displayed the bearer deed. “I am.”
“Do you have police services here?”
“I do not.”
“Would you like the Bureau of Scrutiny to provide those services for you? Temporarily and at no charge?”
Conn looked at Jenore. “Would that be good?” he said.
“Yes,” she said and held him close.
Conn looked at Odell over Jenore’s shoulder and said, “Feel free to do as you see fit.”
“Right,” said the scroot. Her hand signaled to the Bureau cruiser above them. At once a squad of agents in green and black descended on personal obviators, unslung their weapons and took up positions surrounding the crowd from the Martichor.
Lord Vullamir and his coterie appeared to have become anxious. Conn saw hands flutter in gestures meant to attract servants, but the attendants were not inclined to move while scroot emitters were aimed at them.
More agents descended on a railed platform. They entered the crowd and began to separate some of its members from the rest, beginning with the men in Vullamir’s livery, who had dropped their weapons when the cruiser appeared. The scroots also selected some of the servants – Conn noted Umlat was one of those taken – applied holdtights to the chosen ones and marched them off to where the platform waited.
There was a hubbub and twittering from the aristocrats when Odell approached them. It stilled when she said, “In the Archon’s name...”
Conn did not listen to the rest of it. Jenore’s tears had stopped but she clung to him.
“There are people on that ship,” she said. “Stolen people. They brought them so they could....”
<
br /> “It is all over now,” Conn said.
“They said they would give me to Foulaine,” she said. She shuddered. “He joined them.”
“All over.”
Later, when the cruiser had taken the Immersionists back to face the justiciars on Old Earth, he showed her the room where he had been created and told her the story of his beginnings. He did not take her down to the viewing room to see what had happened out in the killing fields. He did not want her to see it, nor did he wish to revisit it again.
She looked at the sad heap of bones and the little manling in the armature and cried again.
“So,” Conn said. “This is where I am from, and that” – he indicated the cadaver on the bench – “is what I am. So where do I go?”
“You cannot stay here,” she said.
“No.”
“Then where?”
“Erkatchian wants me to travel the Ten Thousand Worlds. He believes I will find one that suits me, and if I don’t I may come to enjoy the search. He promises me there are more worlds than I will ever live to see.”
“Will you go with him?”
“I think so.”
They were silent. After a while he said, “What about you? Where do you belong?”
“Not where I came from,” she said. She put her hand on the wound over his heart. It had already begun to heal over. “I’d like to believe that I belong here.”
“In my peculiar heart,” he said, “fashioned by Hallis Tharp for peculiar purposes.”
“Yes.”
“I will never be like other men,” he said.
“Then you’ll be unusual.”
Erkatchian and his crew were readying the Martichor for departure when Conn and Jenore came down the steps. “She’ll need a new name,” the spacer said.
“Why?” Conn said.
“To make a good beginning.”
“Then let us call it the Jenore.”
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