Sword Destiny

by Robert Leader

  Kananda rolled in the dirt, gasping and struggling as his rearing horses plunged and pulled and dragged him by the reins still looped around his left wrist. He swung his sword blade desperately to cut through them, but by the time he was free, Sardar had again turned his broken and half demolished chariot and come back. Now it was Sardar’s horse team that reared above him, the sharp hooves kicking and slashing down as Sardar strove to rein them in on top of him.

  Kananda rolled over again in the choking dust as a hoof grazed his face. He was dimly aware of Sardar standing as high as he could on the dragging chariot, trying to keep him spotted and to keep the horse team twisting and turning after his wriggling form. Sardar was leering and laughing happily, trying to simply trample him into the ground.

  Kananda was choked and blinded by the churning dust, but in all his frantic efforts to squirm clear of the wildly neighing horses, he had kept his grip on his sword. He made one last, heaving roll, and in the same movement he hacked upward and back with all the remaining strength of his sword arm. The keen blade cut deep into the hock of the nearside animal, almost severing the leg. The horse screeched, dropped forward and rolled helplessly, dragging its teammate down with it. Kananda continued to roll and only just escaped being crushed beneath the falling steed.

  He pulled himself to his feet, staggered back and waited. With the back of his left hand, he wiped the dirt and mud away from his eyes while he gasped in air and again readied his sword.

  Sardar was still hanging on to the back of his broken chariot, but slowly he realized that his horse team was down and going nowhere. He threw down his reins and looked for his opponent, almost unable to believe that the prince of Karakhor was still alive. With a roar of rage, he drew his sword and stepped down on to the plain.

  There they were at last equal.

  Kaseem could do nothing to help as Laurya was carried through to the flight deck, and although his presence was intangible and unseen, he had the awkward feeling that he was in the way. He backed up and emerged from the spaceship. Again his spiritual form soared high, relieved again to be free. His first instinct was to rush back to his body and make preparations to receive the woman he loved, but now that he was flying high, he could not resist one last aerial survey of the battlefield.

  Below him, the chariots of Kananda and Sardar were wheeling and turning in the first mad rushes of battle, but after a moment he tore his gaze away and took note of the wider scene. The warriors of Karakhor had moved forward to watch, Devan and the younger princes leaning forward in their chariots, the rank and file resting and leaning on their spears, the butts firmly planted on the ground. There was a wide avenue before them, where the two chariots dueled, and then the Maghallan lines beyond. Behind them there was now another open avenue between their backs and the river.

  Kaseem frowned. There was an undefended route into the city and he wondered whether the enemy had noticed. He swooped down, looking for those whom he knew were the most dangerous. Nazik and Tuluq were both missing from the front lines of Maghalla and he found their chariots in close conference, side by side at the rear. Instinctively he knew that they were planning treachery.

  Tuluq had been annoyed when Nazik called him aside. He had no great love for his father, but he had wanted to watch the spectacle of this last grand gladiatorial combat. It mattered little to him if Sardar lost, for he still intended to renew the battle. If Sardar proved victorious and the men of Karakhor were to lay down their weapons, then that would be an easy slaughter. If not, he would lead the slaughter anyway. Then slowly his grim annoyance became a smile as he realized that Nazik also shared his views.

  With his staff, the hawk-faced High Priest indicated the gap that had appeared behind the enemy lines. “Two fast forces of chariots can now fall upon Karakhor from behind,” he pointed out slyly. “While Prince Devan and the others watch the centre, they leave their backs and the city exposed. They may still have the naive sense of honour to believe that this war can still be settled by one single combat, but we cannot let a certain victory slip away, even if your father is defeated.”

  Tuluq only had one question. “Two forces of chariots?”

  “Yes. We will circle behind them. You will lead a score of chariots from the left. I will lead a score from the right. When we charge, we will meet and turn in the centre and fall upon Devan and his surviving princes from behind. We must move into position quickly now. When this single combat ends, whether it is your father or the Prince of Karakhor who falls, that will be our signal to attack.”

  Tuluq grinned and nodded and swiftly swung his chariot away as he hurried to organize all the chariots that were left to them into two groups.

  Nazik watched him go, but then hesitated before he followed. Something held him back, a psychic awareness that he was being observed. The fine hairs prickled at the back of his neck and down his spine. From the astral plane, he sensed a presence.

  Kaseem knew that he was no longer unsuspected but he was startled by the speed with which Nazik transferred himself to the astral plane and appeared abruptly before him. Kaseem’s own efforts to make the spiritual shift had always been slow and labourious, involving a great deal of preparation, relaxation and inward concentration. The High Priest of Maghalla seemed to achieve all of that in an instant, his physical body simply slumping away to sprawl in the bottom of his chariot while his astral form leaped skyward. There were many skills on this level of existence, Kaseem realized, and he was not yet proficient in all of them.

  So, it is you again. Nazik flashed the thought at him. But you are alone. Where is the golden one?

  “I am alone,” Kaseem agreed, speaking aloud “But Sardar is busy on the plain. He cannot help you.”

  “I do not need him.” Nazik again wore his half-man, half-eagle image, and now the clipped words came thick with contempt from the hooked yellow beak. His yellow eyes glittered and suddenly he thrust forward his right arm and his staff. Instantly the harsh wood bark became black scales and the square brass tip turned into the flared head of a lunging male cobra. The snake’s tongue was flickering, its fangs bared as it spat white venom toward Kaseem’s eyes.

  Kaseem had seen this trick before, and as Kharga, his reactions were lightning fast. He flung up a hand to protect his eyes and parried neatly with his sword. The full force of the white spray hit the back of his hand, only a few drops spattering to touch his forehead and his cheek. The swordplay that would have blocked another blade cut through the snake’s head just below the flaring hood. The cobra image shriveled and the severed top of the priestly staff of office fell away.

  Nazik laughed and simply shook the shortened staff again. Instantly it became another snake, this time a coiled python with mottled scales of grey, black and green. Even as it appeared, the reptile was swelling and inflating itself to a monstrous size. The loathsome coils seemed to spiral forward and with incredible speed they had wrapped themselves around Kaseem’s body. One coil flung itself around his neck, another around his chest, and a third around his sword arm. He was crushed, unable to breathe or move and the hissing serpent head reared up into his face, the blazing eyes only inches from his own.

  The bright black eyes were hypnotic, freezing his mind and his soul, and Kaseem felt his strength and his will draining away from him. He could not move. The snake was mercilessly flexing its scaly body with a series of muscular contractions and Kaseem was being suffocated as the breath was forced out of his chest. The tail was tightly wrapped around his right forearm, effectively preventing him from using his sword, and only his left arm was free. The coil around his neck was strangling him and the creature’s jaws opened wide to engulf his face and head. Its forked tongue flickered in a wild dance to caress his cheek and its breath was sweet and foul.

  He faintly heard Nazik laughing even more loudly, a hideous cackle of gleeful triumph. The sound spurred a last residue of defiance in the choking Kaseem, a blind instinct to refuse defeat and fight. He flung up his left hand and grabbed th
e upper lip of the open, gaping mouth. He dug his fingers deep into the snake’s flared nostrils, deep enough to hurt, and for a second the coils slackened. Kaseem dropped his sword and, with a huge effort, got his right hand high enough to claw his fingers on to the lower lip, and then with all his strength he heaved the jaws apart. The jaws were hinged to allow the snake to swallow its prey whole, but Kaseem kept hauling them back until at last the scales and flesh tore on either side of that gigantic, opened maw. The crushing coils suddenly writhed and loosened and then vanished and were gone. In one second he was staring down into the vast red cavern of its throat and in the next he was free.

  He sucked in air, still helplessly gasping and choking, and flashes of white light still blurred with the after-image of that hissing reptile to impair his vision. He was dimly aware of Nazik making a contemptuous circular gesture with his staff and then he was surrounded again. Nazik had tired of snakes and this time it was a viscous, sticky web that entangled Kaseem in a net of slime. As his vision cleared, he saw a dozen large black shapes the size of dinner plates all around the edge of the web. They scuttled into life, each one rising up on black stilt legs as they lunged toward him. They were spiders and he knew instinctively that the bite of any one of them would be deadly.

  Nazik stood in front of him, again grinning. He made a move with his staff and the advance of the spiders stopped. The nearest was only inches from Kaseem’s trapped shoulder, its fangs already bared. Again Kaseem’s whole body was held fast and helpless.

  “I am tired of all this.” The High Priest of Maghalla sounded bored. “And I have work to do in the world below. It is time for you to die. I think I will tear your heart out.”

  His astral image sharpened, the eagle form taking over completely. His fingers became hooked golden talons, his mouth a fearsome golden beak. He moved closer for the kill, the delight showing in the bright, black pupils of his golden eyes as he savoured the moment of ripping his victim to shreds.

  In that moment, Kaseem suddenly realized that this was a battle fought with thought constructs. Nothing was real except for the few seconds during which it was held real in the mind, although in those seconds the reality was sharp enough to kill. There was nothing physical here and the victor in this mental struggle would be the one who could think more quickly. Nazik was already striking with his talons for his bared chest, when Kaseem simply willed a Gheddan hand lazer into his fist. He squeezed the trigger and modern technology joined astral mind play in a blaze of white fire. A scorched hole was punched through Nazik’s heart and the shock snapped both his astral and his physical life short. On the astral he vanished forever. Far below, in the chariot he had left behind, his physical body spasmed violently as all life there was also extinguished.

  As Sardar stepped down from his chariot, he could see that although Kananda was back on his feet, he was still staggering and disoriented. It was a chance to use his brute strength to full effect and, true to his name, Sardar the Merciless rushed forward swinging his sword. Kananda retreated before the ferocious attack, desperately blocking each savage cut. An equally skilled swordsman could have finished him there and then and it was only Kananda’s instinctive wielding of his blade that saved him. Jahan had given him many such a hammering in training and now the old Warmaster’s severity and attention to every form of fighting trick and treachery paid dividend. There was no time for Kananda to think and it was as though his sword arm had a will and foresight of its own.

  Sardar tried to batter him down, pushing him backward with crashing blows of steel upon steel. Kananda gave ground and sucked in air to steady his breathing and then slowly he began to fight back. Sardar was a squat bull of a man, easily the more powerful of the two, but Kananda was taller and faster. As Sardar failed in his first mad, rushing attack, Kananda’s skill slowly began to turn the contest. The ring and echo of colliding blades was just as deadly, but now it was Kananda who was delivering the blows and Sardar who was fighting to turn them aside. The tide of the battle ebbed and flowed and again it was Sardar who was being forced back.

  Sardar knew that he was out-classed, but he had not become Lord and Ruler of Maghalla through brute strength alone. He had a cunning mind and nothing that would serve his ambition was beneath him. They fought over a battlefield that was already soaked in blood and strewn with dead of both sides. In amongst all this horrific carnage, there were dismembered limbs and decapitated heads. Sardar suddenly leaped to one side and snatched up a severed arm with his free hand. The arm had been half-chopped and half-wrenched out of a shoulder socket and Sardar gripped it hand to hand and used it as a flailing club.

  It was an obscene, improvised weapon and Kananda recoiled from the sheer horror of it. The raw stump of the upper arm was spattering blood in his face as Sardar swung it before his eyes. He stepped back and only just managed to parry Sardar’s lunging blade. The two blades scraped together in a screech of tortured steel and then their sword hilts crashed as Kananda pushed Sardar’s blade to one side. Sardar continued to barge forward and they hit chest-to-chest. Sardar wore an iron breastplate where Kananda’s chest was now stripped bare of his shredded tunic. The wind was again slammed out of Kananda’s lungs and Sardar saw his chance to drop his gruesome club and wrap his left arm around his opponent in a fierce bear hug. Kananda’s back arched and his head sagged backward. Instantly Sardar closed his arms, taking a left-handed grip on his own sword wrist and tightening his crushing embrace.

  Once more Sardar was in a position to exert all his brute strength, bending Kananda backwards and straining to break his spine. He was still wearing his war helmet, where Kananda’s head was unprotected, and for good measure he head-butted Kananda full in the face.

  The pain was excruciating. The steel nose bar of the helmet broke and split open Kananda’s nose. The impact of the hard steel against his temples was an explosion of light and spiraling darkness that almost knocked him senseless. He knew that within seconds his back was going to break, and even if it didn’t, then Sardar was going to smash him into unconsciousness. He was aware, even though he could not see through the pain and blood, that Sardar had drawn his head back for another mighty blow.

  He dropped his sword, snaked both hands up behind Sardar’s massive shoulders and blindly grabbed the cheek plates of Sardar’s helmet. He hauled back with all his strength, stopping the second head butt from coming down, and then forcing Sardar’s head even further back.

  For long seconds they hung there in that terrible embrace, each of them struggling for a more positive foothold in order to exert more pressure on the other. Sardar strove to break Kananda’s spine, while Kananda struggled to break his enemy’s neck. The watching armies of both Maghalla and Karakhor could only stand with bated breath. Then slowly Sardar leaned backwards, using his bull strength to lift Kananda off his feet.

  Kananda knew that this was the end. He had lost the trial of strength, but he had one move left. Before Sardar could give the final wrench that would have broken his back, he twisted Sardar’s neck sharply to the left, and then with all his failing strength he jerked it back violently to the right. Sardar’s neck snapped with an audible crack, and his hate-filled eyes glazed over.

  As the grip around his waist went slack, Kananda found his feet again. He stood swaying for a few more seconds and then released his own grip and pushed the dead weight of his opponent away.

  Sardar the Merciless fell with a solid thud.

  The silence held for almost half a minute and then from the ranks of Karakhor a thunderous cheer arose. Men howled and clapped and waved their swords and spear blades to the sky in a tumult of relief and joy.

  From high above on the astral plane, Kaseem had also experienced a surge of pure elation as he saw Kananda step back victorious from his battle with Sardar, but he knew that the larger war was not over yet. Tuluq had already discovered that Nazik was dead, and although he was fearful and completely mystified as to what might have caused the high priest’s sudden demise, he was in no
way thwarted. Tuluq was a true son of his father. The idea for treachery had been sown in his mind and his preparations were made. He simply turned away from the crumpled corpse and called for one of his chieftains to lead the second wave of chariots.

  Kaseem had watched as the two groups of Maghallan chariots took up their positions, one hiding behind the far left flank and the other behind the far right flank of Sardar’s army. From the astral plane he could not directly intervene in the events of the physical world and could only observe. His attention was almost fully divided between the last tense moments of the gladiatorial duel and the stealthy movements of Tuluq and his flying task forces, when suddenly he became aware of something else.

  Gujar’s single chariot was moving away from the wreckage of the crashed spaceship. Together he and Kyle and Kasim had maneuvered Laurya out through the hatchway and laid her carefully in the back of the chariot. Now, with Gujar driving and his two companions trotting gently alongside, they were circling around the two armies with the intention of taking Laurya into the city.

  The great roar of approval rose up from the throats of Karakhor as Sardar fell, but in that same sliver of time the elation of Kaseem turned to alarm as he realized that Gujar and his friends were taking the same route that Tuluq intended to follow with his chariots. They were moving slowly and unsuspecting, and they were directly in the attack path. Tuluq would overtake them and ride them down. All four of them would almost certainly be killed.