Path of the Eclipse

by Chelsea Quinn Yarbro

  Nothing was said, but both men selected a position that would not force the other to look into the sun. This was no longer a simple challenge, but a contest of both skill and honor. The men watching on the battlements were silent; Tzoa Lem and Rogerio were silent.

  “Ready!” Saint-Germain said, lifting his point once again.

  Saito Masashige brought his sword up at the same time, grunting his assent. There was a difference in their movements now. They were quick, crisp, cleaner, more dangerous.

  Yet neither did more than stand for some little time, sword ready, watching the other. Once Saito Masashige shifted his weight as if nervous, but Saint-Germain was not deceived. He kept his position, and his sword did not waver. He would not be lured by such an opening. His dark eyes were as enigmatic as they were intense and did not leave the hands of his adversary.

  The exchange, when it came, happened swiftly. At one moment both men stood apart, waiting, still, and in the next instant there was a rushing, a shining arc as Saito Masashige’s katana was deflected by the circle of Saint-Germain’s long sword that began above his head and swept downward, shielding his body. The scrape of the swords was the only sound on the hillside. Then the men separated again, each taking up his anticipatory stance.

  Saito Masashige planted his feet as if determined to force Saint-Germain to come to him. The long curve of his sword glistened from the sweat that had run down his arms and over his hands. His right foot, somewhat advanced of the left, seemed hardly to touch the ground.

  Outwardly, Saint-Germain was as serenely alert as Masashige, but his mind was filled with alarm. He had felt a shudder pass through the long sword as it struck the katana, and he knew that had the blow been direct, the fine Damascus steel would have shattered. He could sweep the other man’s sword aside, but could not risk a direct blow from that weapon. How long would it take Masashige to understand the full extent of his power? One more exchange, two at the most, and his opponent would make Saint-Germain’s blade his target. The pressure of the francisca under his belt was comforting, though he dared not depend on the little throwing ax.

  He was so preoccupied with this problem that he missed the slight tremor of Masashige’s hands before he made a sudden leap forward, his sword sliding downward, snapping as it turned to move upward, the bow of the blade pressing toward Saint-Germain’s side, exposed now as he brought his long sword up.

  Again the blades met and sparks danced where they struck. Both men confined the engagement to one move—attack, parry—and then they were far apart, Saito Masashige less than an arm’s length from the walls of the fortress, Saint-Germain almost standing on the low-growing scrub that lined the trail.

  Now that he had a moment, Saint-Germain was tempted to pull the knife from his shoulder, though he did not. The blade was painful but there had been little bleeding. Once it was removed, there would be nothing to stop the blood. By force of will he eased the tension in his neck and jaw and back; tightness would slow him down, and against a weapon that was faster, he could not afford the most minute delay. He moved cautiously, his sword ready, to a place slightly nearer Masashige. His left hand, holding the long sword, did not waver, but he knew that with the little knife sunk in his shoulder, his right hand would be weakened. He paced forward another three steps.

  Saito Masashige was poised for a renewed rush, but did not expect Saint-Germain to alter his tactics and sprint toward him, the long, heavy sword aimed squarely at his chest. At the last instant his katana sliced sideways and the long sword nicked the armor covering his hips before Saint-Germain could swing it toward Masashige’s head.

  Now that he felt the tidelike rhythm of this fight, Saint-Germain was able to move with it, his well-knit body graceful in its power, his sword arm relentless. Five times he and Masashige sped together, their swords flickering over one another like flames, then separated.

  On the sixth pass, Masashige faltered, so very slightly, in the speed of the turn of his katana, and Saint-Germain pressed the advantage. His only chance, he knew, was to tire the other man, to outlast him, since he could not match him for quickness. Until this battle, he had thought his Byzantine long sword a superior weapon, but he realized now that it was clumsy and slow. Dangerous as he knew the katana to be, he could only admire it, and the unparalleled skill of the fighter who used it.

  Two more swift engagements came rapidly and for the first time Masashige was forced to retreat. Saint-Germain did not make the mistake of extending himself too far when his own position was perilous. He whirled his sword over his head once as he stepped back, and saw that Masashige had darted a swift, apprehensive glance at the knife lodged below his collarbone. Under other circumstances Saint-Germain would have been grimly amused by this, but this combat was far too stark to allow this.

  Saint-Germain was ten or eleven paces away from Saito Masashige when he saw the other man lift his hand, and suddenly there was a sharp pain in his thigh. A second knife had been thrown. This time he could not ignore it. He reached down and tugged at the knife, and that was when Masashige ran at him, sword lifting for the ultimate blow.

  The Byzantine blade took the full impact of the katana’s downward sweep with the sound of breaking walls. Saint-Germain had just swung it aside when the Damascus steel made a sound not unlike a sob, then broke, leaving him holding a stump of a weapon.

  Saito Masashige flicked the katana, confident that it would end the battle, but Saint-Germain was out of range. Though there were two knives in him now, though he must surely be in pain, he appeared to have lost none of his strength. For the first time superstitious fear gave voice to the questions that puzzled him. The foreigner in black had announced he was a magician, and his name implied mastery and skill of imposing potency. He approached the man carefully, his sword held up.

  Saint-Germain moved with uncanny swiftness. Wherever Masashige struck with his katana, Saint-Germain eluded him. Three more knives were thrown and two found their mark, one high in his left arm, the other grazing his calf as he sprang from the hard-packed earth where they fought, to a boulder standing beside the road. As he gained his footing on the rough stone, he reached for the francisca in his belt, tugging the ax free. It shone as the sun winked on the wedge-shaped blade as Saint-Germain began to swing it.

  Masashige was striding nearer, katana rising before him.

  The francisca made a disquieting purr as Saint-Germain gave it one test swing. He vaulted onto a rocky outcrop, out of range of the katana.

  “What cowardice is this?” Saito Masashige yelled at him, voice cracking with fatigue.

  Saint-Germain braced himself, certain that if he remained on the tumbled boulders, he would be picked off with those little knives that served Masashige in place of a coronet. The francisca moaned as he swung it again. “Don’t force me to kill you.” It was strange to say that, and to know that it was true: he did not want to kill this man. There had been too much of killing, too much of the numbness that denied grief. His compelling eyes were without anger.

  For a reply, Masashige threw another knife, giving a sharp, pleased shout as it left a furrow along Saint-Germain’s brow.

  Saint-Germain was already giving the francisca its final swing when the ram’s horn sounded again. He did not allow it to distract him, but felt momentarily disappointed that so fine a fighter as this Saito Masashige should use such a ploy. He was ready to throw the ax when he heard Rogerio’s shout.

  “Master! The gate!”

  At this, both Saint-Germain and Masashige turned. The huge gates of the Chui-Cho fortress were swinging open.

  “No!” Masashige yelled, and tried to leap to the boulder immediately below Saint-Germain, where he would be able to get a clear stroke. His yell turned to a scream as he missed his footing and fell.

  Saint-Germain kept to his place on the outcropping, his francisca ready. He watched Saito Masashige get to his feet, shaking his head as he reached for his katana.

  “Don’t make me kill you,” Saint-Germain said
quietly.

  The realization that he had been completely vulnerable and yet was spared filled Masashige with sickening shame. He stared at the katana in his hands, and then up at Saint-Germain and the ax. Then his eyes traveled to each of the knives protruding from Saint-Germain’s body, and he paled.

  Eight horsemen had come out of the fortress and had halted at the place where the combatants faced each other. The foremost rider, a balding man with eyes permanently narrowed by failing sight, addressed the two. “I command you to stop.”

  Saito Masashige’s face sagged and he could no longer meet Saint-Germain’s penetrating eyes. “If that is your wish, Warlord Mon,” he muttered.

  “It is. A man who fights as this one does deserves our honor. In all the years you have been with me, Masashige, no one has bested you.” He turned his attention to Saint-Germain. “I heard you call yourself Shih Ghieh-Man.”

  “That is correct, Mon Chio-Shing,” Saint-Germain told him, after a troubled glance at Masashige.

  “You’re aptly named: only a powerful magician could continue to fight with those knives in him.” He motioned to one of the other horsemen. “Attend to him.”

  Saint-Germain bowed slightly, and for the first time felt the full impact of the tenacious pain of the knives. “My servant,” he said with a suddenly weak gesture toward Rogerio, “will attend me.” To his consternation he saw that this simple statement had appalled Saito Masashige even more. “You are an extraordinary fighter,” he said, studying the closed face, but seeing little.

  “You are welcome at Chui-Cho fortress,” Mon Chio-Shing said with as formal a bow as his saddle would permit.

  What was it, Saint-Germain asked himself, that so horrified Saito Masashige? He might have asked the man himself, but then Rogerio was waiting at the foot of the rocks, and the knives seemed to be expanding in his flesh, and it was too much trouble to speak, or to think.

  A letter from Olivia in Rome to Saint-Germain in Lo-Yang. The mendicant friar carrying the letter to the merchant outpost in Turkestan was captured by deserting European soldiers from the Crusade; the friar and the letters entrusted to him were destroyed.

  To Ragoczy Sanct’ Germain Franciscus in the city of Lo-Yang, which may or may not exist, Olivia sends her most earnest greetings from Rome:

  Your letter, which has been on the road more than two years, surprised me, and made me aware of how very much I miss you. Your memory has lain in the back of my mind, dozing, and needed only the sight of your eclipse seal to come fully awake.

  Perhaps I should tell you that the last letter I had from you before this one arrived more than twenty years ago, at which time you informed me that you were going east along the Old Silk Road. It was shortly after the Jews were banished from France and that mob in Lyon put three of our blood to the torch. You told me that the knights were spoiling for another Crusade, and that they would probably practice on anyone they could label a heretic. Well yes, you were right about that.

  Tell me, have you found the haven you wished for? When you were there before, you said that the people respect learning and put high value on tolerance. But that was centuries ago, my friend. Is it as you remember? I confess that I hope it may be, so that you will not have to bear so much. The suffering endured by those of our blood is terrible to think of, but is isolation the only alternative? I have lived in Rome a very long time and have learned, as you said I would, to live in a way that attracts little notice. Surely you could live here with me. After all, this is your house, and has been for more than a thousand years. Come here to me and return to a familiar place. I promise you that you will be protected—I will let it be known that an eccentric relative will be sharing the villa, and your way will be smooth.

  By the way, I think you will like the way the north wing has been rebuilt. You gave me permission to make alterations, and I think that what has been done will please you. The builders were most upset, but followed the orders they were given. The atrium has been widened and is a proper court now. There is a gallery around the second floor so that all the rooms have access to the court. It is not unlike the house we shared in Tyre. You see, I have never forgotten. Though I have not seen you, heard your voice or your footfall for more than four hundred years, yet they are familiar to me, and I will catch myself waiting for them.

  You have probably not heard that the English King John has at last submitted to the Pope. Everyone in Rome is busy taking credit for this, and His Holiness is unbearably smug about it. I don’t mention it, of course, but I feel sympathy for John. That brother of his was impossible. He put all of his kingdom in debt and went off to war with never so much as a moment’s doubt that his debts would be paid. And to make it worse, he never made a wife of his Queen. If Richard Lion-Heart had been able to overcome his inclinations long enough to produce an heir, matters would be different in England. Certainly Richard was a splendid leader in war, very brave, a superb warrior, and so forth. But these Crusades are insanity, and Richard’s devotion to war, I think, was at least partly spawned by his reluctance to touch Barengaria. It is an unfortunate prejudice in a king. Other men may have their pages and apprentices and students and urchins, but for a king to spurn his wife, that is another matter. If he could not endure her at all, he could have found her a discreet lover and said the child was his. That has happened often enough before. So England went to John and now Pope Innocent is preening like a cock on a dunghill.

  Tomorrow I will give this letter into the hands of a Cypriot captain bound for Thessaly. He has promised to hand it to a merchant or a friar going East. He has warned me that there are not so many travelers now, as there are rumors of great wars in the East and devils coming out of the desert to plunder the land. For your sake, I trust that this is not the case, and that a small band of brigands has been improved upon in the telling until a handful of men have become an army. It will take time for this to reach you, but when it does, know it for what it is, dearest Sanct’ Germain—the cry of my soul to you.

  Perhaps it is true that we are doomed to live as outcasts much of the time, and perhaps it is true that if our natures were generally known we would be loathed, hunted and killed by those who believe the worst of what is strange. But, Sanct’ Germain, no one has loved me as devotedly as you have. The bond that began that night when I watched you come into my chambers and was filled with terror has never been broken. Do you remember how kindly you used me that night? Without the strength of your love, I would have died before I was thirty. And do not remind me with that wry smile I like so well that I did die before I was thirty. It is not the same thing, and you know it. No one, my friend, no one has loved me as you have. That has sustained me for more than a thousand years, and will doubtless continue to do so until the true death claims me.

  How morbid I sound, and here I am trying to persuade you to return. Pay no attention to anything I say, but that I love you, have always loved you.

  I must end this before I become maudlin. It would not do for me to attend the reception for the King of Aragon in a distraught humor. It is times like these when I wish I had not lost the ability to weep, for tears might cleanse me. But red and swollen eyes will not become me, so I will tell myself that I was fortunate when the change deprived me of weeping, and my soul will mourn. Doubtless someone will provide me a distraction, and, who knows—I may find someone who will want to share my pleasures.

  And you, my dearest, have you found someone to share your pleasures, or are you still alone? If there were anything I might do to give you that which you seek, though it ended my life, I would do it. Empty words, with you so far away from me.

  I have sent for my servant and have given orders for my palanquin, so I must bid you farewell for a time.

  From my own hand on the Feast of St. Matthew, in the 1214th year of Our Lord, in Rome,

  Olivia

  3

  Saint-Germain opened his eyes. “How long?” he asked Rogerio, who stood beside the chest where his master lay.

  �
��Three days,” was the carefully neutral answer.

  He paused in his rising. “Three days?” His hand touched the places where the knives had struck his side and his shoulder, and felt only slight tenderness.

  “You bled a great deal.” Rogerio’s features betrayed nothing, but his eyes were not so well schooled and they were dark with distress.

  “I must have.” He sat up slowly. “This is Chui-Cho fortress?”

  “Yes.” Rogerio busied himself with putting out Saint-Germain’s clothes.

  “The old man … I remember he asked us in.” He put his hands to his temples. “There was a large room, I remember, and archers, but…”

  “You collapsed there. I asked that you be carried to a quiet room and your chests brought. I told them that you had to perform a certain ritual because of the combat.” There was a slight, telling pause. “I … I didn’t think it would take this long.”

  Saint-Germain raised his head. “You told them the truth: this is a ritual of a sort. Three days, though.” He swung his feet down to the floor and stood gingerly. “I’m weak,” he admitted, chagrined.

  Rogerio did not trust himself to respond. He placed the black silk sheng liao within easy reach and held out Persian leggings. “The Warlord Mon Chio-Shing has requested you to give him the pleasure of your company as soon as you have risen.”

  “Indeed.” He put his hands to the shenti knotted around his waist and noticed for the first time that the room was cold. “Has there been snow?”

  “The wind has shifted and it comes off the mountains,” Rogerio said as he took the shenti, his eyes turned away from Saint-Germain’s naked body and the wide white scars that covered his abdomen.

  Saint-Germain drew the leggings on, fingering the rapidly fading mark of Saito Masashige’s knife. He tied the leggings at his waist and fitted the leather codpiece into place when Rogerio handed it to him. “What hour of the day is it?” he asked as he reached for the sheng liao.