Cathexis: Necromancer's Dagger

by Philip Blood

  They worked their way over to Elizabeth, who searched her husband’s face as he approached. From what she could see, he looked in control and confident. She did a quick check on his aura and saw blue shades with a few orange and red tips flickering. Elizabeth read this as an indication that he was fairly calm, though more anxious than his demeanor depicted. As he approached she decided to bolster his confidence a little, so she smiled and said: “Milord is looking fit this evening, are you going to bother with a sword or will your dagger suffice?”

  Jatar guessed the reason behind her words but appreciated the attempt to lighten his worries. “If milady is so confident of her champion will she grant him the boon of a keepsake?”

  Elizabeth looked down and removed the wedding ring from her left hand. When she pressed it into her husband’s palm she said, “Take this ring that you once gave me as a symbol of your love, now as the symbol of my love, and as the token of my faith that you will return it to me.”

  Elizabeth looked into her husband’s eyes and witnessed the love within their depths. She released the tiny gold ring with its single clear stone into his large callused palm. She placed both of her smaller hands around his hand and closed his fingers around the keepsake. The ring was too small to fit even his little finger.

  There was a ripple of movement accompanied by a quiet murmur from the far side of the Ballroom; Lord Tysol had arrived. Leading the way through the crowd was the captain of his personal guards, followed by Tysol himself and then two more of his guards. Lord Tysol’s face was creased with the lines of a scowl as he surveyed his opponent. He could see Jatar standing across the room with his wife before him, both her hands still clasped about one of her husband’s hands. Lord Tysol was not scowling for the reasons most of the spectators believed; he was upset because Major Von Dracek, his confidant in this duel, was missing and nowhere to be found. Tysol could not understand why his friend had not been there to counsel him before his duel or why he wasn’t here to act as his second.

  Lord Brik Rinholt, ruler of Pruta, had been chosen to arbitrate the duel. He stepped forward between Jatar and Tysol and spoke in a loud voice: “Everybody please move back and clear a circle.”

  The crowd of spectators reluctantly backed up, leaving an empty circular area in the middle of the room. As the Seconds for the duel, Lord Tysol’s guard captain and Lord Trask met with Lord Brik in the middle of the circle to confirm the rules of the engagement.

  Then Lord Brik again spoke to the crowd: “This duel is to be fought with the traditional rules; each combatant is allowed one sword and no other weapons. I will call it finished when either man is incapacitated beyond the ability to fight or when either man begs mercy and accepts that he was wrong, and so apologizes, or when either is dead.”

  Lord Brik turned first to Jatar and said formally, “Do you, Lord Jatar Ardellen of Lindankar, swear to fight within the rules of the engagement as stated, with no tricks, lies, magic, or weapons other than your sword?”

  “Yes, I so swear,” Jatar replied with his eyes locked on Tysol’s.

  Lord Brik faced Tysol and repeated his question.

  Elizabeth read Tysol’s aura as he answered and she noted immediately that he was extremely agitated; his aura flickered and wavered wildly, with lots of red and yellow peaks to the outside. The elevated levels of courage were gone and she could read his immediate surface thoughts, he was wondering, Where is he?

  Where is who? Thought Elizabeth, The Tchulian? She said nothing because she saw no signs of treachery as he answered Lord Brik’s question.

  “I also swear,” Lord Tysol replied.

  Lord Brik continued: “If one of you should die, may G’lan protect your soul from destruction.” Then he backed away leaving them standing alone in the circle and said, “Let the duel begin.”

  Since armor of any kind was prohibited in traditional duels, Jatar was dressed in black cotton pants and a loose white shirt. For good footing, he wore soft leather shoes with no heel. Tysol wore dark blue silk pants with a sky blue silk long-sleeved shirt and tight fitting brown shoes.

  Each man used a rapier, with the blade approximately three feet long and about a thumb’s width across, sharp on both sides with a narrow point. They were quick weapons that could be used for either a slash or a stab and had a cross piece just below the grip to protect the hand.

  On their left hands, each combatant had on a leather fencing gauntlet, traditionally used to parry a thrust. Before donning his gauntlet Jatar had placed Elizabeth’s ring in the breast pocket of his shirt.

  Tysol had on a black leather gauntlet made of thicker leather than Jatar’s, which gave his hand more protection, but allowed less dexterity.

  The two men approached the middle of the circle and faced each other. Their gleaming weapons swept up to the `on guard’ position with the sword hand low, and the sword tip at their opponent’s eye level.

  Basic instructions from his old fencing master passed through Jatar’s thoughts: Watch the eyes; they often signal your opponent’s intent to attack, but watch his chest even more for it must move to supply the power. Watch the sword least, for it will often trick and fool the unwary.

  Jatar looked into Tysol’s eyes and saw confidence in the disdainful squint that met his gaze. Jatar decided to be cautious; something was giving his opponent the belief that he held the edge in this fight. The two men slowly began to circle.

  Jatar was still trying to make sense of Tysol's challenge; he wondered what made the man so confident against an opponent with the reputation of a master swordsman? Could it be treachery, or did he really believe that his skills were that much superior?

  A slight tightening at the corner of Tysol’s eye gave a signal of his first attack. He tried a compound movement involving a low feint, which Jatar ignored, followed by a quick upward thrust toward the eyes. After the feint, Tysol’s body gave away the real move and Jatar sidestepped right to let the blade pass by harmlessly. The Lindankar ruler withheld the obvious riposte because he was not yet sure of his opponent’s skill with the sword.

  As Jatar stepped aside and Tysol’s sword missed the crowd gasped, to the unknowledgeable Tysol seemed to nearly skewer Jatar.

  Again the voice of his teacher echoed in his mind. Let an unknown adversary reveal his style before you commit yourself to showing him yours. Your patience may be rewarded when your opponent overextends in an attempt to get through your defense, and that is a good time for your first strike.

  Jatar analyzed the attack his opponent had just launched, it was skilled and the gracefulness of the feint showed the fine tuning of recent practice, yet the simple feint and attack were not up to Jatar’s level of expertise. He wondered if Tysol was acting in an attempt to draw him into underestimating his skill. Jatar continued to be patient.

  Tysol circled to his right while stepping carefully. The two sword tips were in constant motion as each swordsman tried to get the advantage of line. To the untrained spectators, it looked almost as if nothing were happening, yet whole attack series were conceived and as quickly discarded as an opponent countered the other's position with minute shifts of their sword or movements of their feet.

  Suddenly Tysol struck again, he beat Jatar’s sword to the side and then came in for the heart with a lunge. Jatar batted the foil of the sword aside with his gauntlet so that it passed to his left, yet he still didn’t make the riposte that presented itself; he wasn’t quite ready yet.

  “You fight like a woman Jatar, which is fitting since your puppet strings are held by one,” Lord Tysol sneered contemptuously as Jatar stepped back out of Tysol’s latest attack.

  “Your weight shift and footwork were sloppy on that last lunge, Tysol. You should work on that or it might kill you one day,” countered Jatar.

  With his face turning red, Tysol launched himself into a swift attack, involving a feint followed by a circular motion of the sword tip designed to bring his sword to the open side of Jatar’s defense.

  Jatar easily circ
led his blade to counter and brought it around to confound Tysol’s move. The opening was there and it held little risk, so Jatar performed his first riposte. He used a blindingly fast double feint that brought Tysol’s blade out of line, which left an opening for Jatar’s blade to glide through and pink his opponent shallowly in the upper left shoulder.

  Like a rose blossoming in the morning, the red blood of Tysol’s body seeped into his sky blue shirt in a slowly expanding circle.

  Tysol cried out in pain and belatedly beat Jatar’s blade aside. Then rapidly, with little finesse, he made a counter-riposte, but Jatar used his gauntlet and easily pushed the blade away from his body.

  A rage began to boil on Tysol’s face as his pupils closed to mere pinpoints in the irises of his eyes. A glistening line of spittle ran down from the corner of his tightly clenched mouth and you could almost hear his teeth grinding to powder in his mouth.

  Tysol leaped forward in an obvious thrust meant to pierce Jatar’s body, but Lord Ardellen’s blade pushed the oncoming blade aside, which caused the two men to meet nearly chest to chest in a bind, corps et corps.

  Tysol’s left hand made a quick twist and jerk that caused a hidden dagger from within his sleeve to drop into his waiting hand. Without hesitation, he brought it up in a wicked stabbing motion designed to angle between the ribs for Jatar’s heart.

  Jatar's attention was still on his opponent’s eyes and body, so he felt Tysol’s weight shift. With the athletic moves of a practiced swordsman, Jatar twisted his body at the last moment, which caused the hidden blade to miss its intended target and scrape along his ribs. Blood gushed from the ragged cut and quickly soaked into his shirt, but the blade had not penetrated into any of his vitals, so it was not lethal. The sudden shift of weight to avoid the blade cost Jatar his balance and the two men fell to the hard floor with Tysol landing on top.

  Tysol quickly shifted his grip on the dagger and raised it over his head and then plunged the blade straight down toward Jatar’s heart.

  The watching crowd gasped in horror at the treacherous attack, but Elizabeth’s gaze was locked on the dagger in concentration.

  As the blade struck Jatar’s chest it abruptly stopped; the tip barely pierced his heaving chest. The pinned swordsman didn’t give Tysol a chance to repeat his failed attack. All in one motion Jatar rolled the Datorian ruler to the side and violently tossed him away. The two combatants scrambled to their feet and were up and ready to face each other again a moment later. Blood soaked the side and breast of Jatar’s shirt. A few voices called out above the din to stop the fight, but Jatar ignored them and extended his blade with the point towards Tysol to discourage a lunge by his opponent. He quickly assessed his wounds and blood loss and decided that although he was not seriously hurt, he did need to finish the duel quickly before he lost too much blood and therefore strength.

  “Halt!” Lord Brik called out, “a foul has been given!” he exclaimed, referring to the dagger in Tysol’s left hand.

  “I waive my right,” Jatar called, to let the duel continue.

  Lord Jatar had watched Lord Tysol early in the match, and now he had analyzed his style enough to guess what form of parry Tysol would use to a specific attack. Jatar performed a feint, knowing where Tysol’s blade would go to parry his fake thrust, but Jatar sent the real attack in over his adversary's wasted parry. The sharp tip of his rapier pierced Tysol’s right upper forearm, which caused him to drop his sword.

  The next thing Tysol saw was Jatar’s sword tip at his throat. With abject fear crawling across his face, the Lord of Datoria dropped to his knees. The treacherous dagger fell from the grip of his left hand and he grabbed his wounded right arm.

  Jatar spoke to him with utter disdain and from his tone it was obvious that what little respect he had held for his opponent was gone. “You are forsworn and a disgrace to the title of ruling Lord. By all rights, I should kill you now, but I do not wish to soil this fair blade any further with the sewer water of your body. Get you gone from the sight of honorable men and women, and let no man of Lindankar show you the courtesy due the lowest of animals.”

  “I call foul as well; you bear armor to a duel!” Tysol accused, his eyes shifting to the crowd wildly.

  Jatar reached into his bloody breast pocket and removed Elizabeth’s ring, two furrows were evident in the soft gold, caused by the opposing edges of Tysol’s dagger where it struck the center of the ring. “Here is my armor, my wife’s wedding ring, given as a good luck token!” Jatar exclaimed, holding the ring high for all to see.

  Jatar turned to his guards and commanded, “See that this piece of trash departs my palace immediately.” Jatar turned his back contemptuously and walked out of the room, his wife joined him at his side.

  Tysol trembled with anger. “Help me up, you imbeciles!” he hissed to his guards.

  The watching crowd had been quiet until that point. They were caught up in the drama of the moment, but now the dam broke and debate exploded into a thousand forms of life.

  As soon as Jatar and Elizabeth were outside the room Jatar sagged against his wife, he was weak from the loss of blood.

  Elizabeth quickly helped him to a chair in their sitting room before going to close the door. “I knew you were more severely wounded than you let on! You had to try and end it quickly, didn’t you?”

  “Yes, he surprised me with his confidence in his skills. I’m not sure, but I don’t think he intended to use that concealed dagger from the start; I really believe that he thought he could take me easily. Did you... OUCH, careful!” he exclaimed ruefully.

  Elizabeth continued removing his shirt, though she quit tugging so hard.

  He continued, “Anyway did you see the confidence he showed early in the bout? He had me thinking that he had more skill than he did. I was probably more cautious than I had to be, though that may have saved me in the bind when he went for his hidden dagger.”

  “My heart stopped when I read his intent just before he stabbed you, and I almost interfered with my powers. I wanted to run to you and cure the wound! Remaining outside the circle was the most difficult thing I have ever done. I did see from your aura that you weren’t mortally wounded, but then he was on top and he raised that dagger to plunge it into your heart, so I had to intervene. I only used a slight push to guide the dagger into the center of the wedding ring.”

  “You did that?”

  “I’m sorry if it angers you, but I could not allow his traitorous attack to put your life in danger! Besides, that dagger was outside the rules,” she defended.

  “I’m not angry, my love, I thank you for your assistance; besides, at that point, Tysol had already relinquished his rights. That was quick thinking to use the ring, it saved argument.”

  “Yes, I could have just stopped him, but everyone would have known,” Elizabeth noted as she examined the wound in Jatar's side. A look of concentration came over her face as she focused her aura powers. She used her Adept vision and saw his aura burning in high flames of black and red in the torn wounded area at his side. She began to soothe the aura around the edge of the wound while closing in slowly on the center. She reformed the damaged aura to match the existing white and blue healthy aura colors around it. She worked until the damaged area color and texture was even and indistinguishable from the rest. His body paralleled the change to the aura to fit the new pattern, and tissues re-knit and healed as the aura healed.

  “I’ll never understand how you do that,” Jatar said with awe in his voice as he looked at the fresh new skin of his side.

  Elizabeth moved her gaze to his chest. The bloody wound showed a round circle, where her ring had been pushed into the flesh of his chest. In the center, there was a slash where the tip of the dagger had also penetrated.

  As she concentrated her aura power into the wound she answered his question, “Think of the body and aura as one, when the dagger wounded the body it changed the aura to match, so when I change the aura back the body changes to match, you see?” She
answered, while healing the chest wound, “The aura and the body are linked; one is the reflection of the other.”

  As Elizabeth finished her minor lesson she decided that since she had cured his body it would be a good thing to take his mind off the whole nasty business. She leaned over Jatar as if to inspect his side, which gave him an interesting view of her low cut dress.

  “I hear, but I don’t completely understand,” Jatar answered, “but that’s all right, so long as you understand how it works, however, you do it, I thank you; I feel completely whole.” To demonstrate his health Jatar pulled Elizabeth into the chair on top of him and kissed her welcoming mouth.

  A moment later Elizabeth came up for air and said, “I pronounce the patient healed.”

  “Now I do think I remember something you said earlier about ruffled clothing later in the evening?” Jatar noted with a sly smile.

  “Now wherever did you hear me say that? Besides, I’m sure you’re too tired from your duel and need your bed rest, don’t you, milord?” asked Elizabeth with a cute little smile and a provocative wiggle.

  “I agree with you, bed is where we shall retire, though I doubt I will be asleep immediately.” The completely healed Lord Jatar picked up his wife and carried her to their sleeping chamber.

  The morning of Michael’s first birth celebration arrived with bright sunshine through the window of Lord and Lady Ardellen’s sleeping chamber. Jatar opened sleep encrusted eyes to see dust motes dancing in a beam of early morning sunlight. The empty rumpled white linens next to him were evidence of his wife’s recent occupation.

  Elizabeth’s melodic voice spoke from across the room, “Good, you’re awake. I was just about to get you up anyway.”

  “Vorg’s breath, you can’t hide anything from a sorceress! What did you do, see my aura change when I woke up?” Jatar exclaimed petulantly, his hair sticking out in all directions.

  “My, aren’t we grumpy this morning. And no, I didn’t watch your aura, you simply stopped snoring.”