Dragon Castle (26 page)

“Now,” Temny says. “Kill your brother.”

Black Yanosh leaps between Paulek and me as my brother turns the enchanted sword toward me. I know what our old weapons master has in mind. I've seen him do it a dozen times. Block up with the left blade to lift the opposing sword as his other blade slides across to twist the weapon from his adversary's grasp. It's an effective tactic to harmlessly disarm an opponent.

Paulek's never been able to counter that move before. Until now. Paulek spins, steps sideways, and strikes down at the first blade. The baron's glowingruned blade sends a pulse of power down the length of the old man's sword. Black Yanosh's left hand convulses and lets go of the sword. Our old teacher is stunned by that surge of magic, frozen in place, open for a killing blow. Paulek simply shoves him out of the way.

Paulek takes a step toward me, the glowing blade held low. It's a position he's never used in any of our countless sparring sessions. Behind him, eyes still closed, Temny is in a similar stance. Red, unblinking eyes glare at me from Paulek's face. It's my brother's body, but not my brother about to attack.

Temny must have done this sort of thing before. Smotana and Peklo have come to stand, weapons drawn, on either side of the baron. Guarding him from attack.

There's something else in Pavol's pouch that might help me. I felt it when I first reached in. But I can't reach in now.

The blade held by my brother's unconscious hand stabs toward me swift as the strike of an adder . . . and just as silent. No shout of
Utok!
or
Stavka!
or
Udriet!

My reflexes can move faster than my thoughts. I avoid that deadly thrust at my heart with a quick leap back. There's an opening for me to counter, but a slash of my weapon would cleave through arteries and tendons and would cripple him for life. He might even bleed to death. I can't do that, not to my brother.

“Paulek,” I shout. “
Prestan!
Stop.”

No response. Temny's unblinking, crimson eyes still stare at me from my brother's strangely calm face. Paulek himself is no more aware than a wooden marionette whose arms and legs are being manipulated by a puppeteer.

Led by Temny's blood red eyes, Paulek's body attacks with a quick pair of cuts. The first is aimed to remove my head, the second to take my legs off at the knees. The rune-edged blade itself sings as it slices the air. Yet I duck under the first strike and leap over the second.

Again, I see an opening. There's one after each attack. It's almost on purpose. Does the baron have less control over my brother than he thinks? Is part of Paulek fighting back by leaving himself just vulnerable to counterblows? Sacrificing his body to save me is just the sort of thing my brother would do. But I am not ready to badly injure my brother to save my own life.

“Hyb sa!”
Black Yanosh shouts. “Move!”

I dive and roll to my left, barely escaping a whirlwind of strikes, one after another, that my brother's strong body is delivering. I'm thinking too much now. If not for my old teacher's warning, one of those blows might have connected.

I come up in a corner, my back against the wall. Paulek's last blow intersected with the edge of the dais. The rune sword sheared through the heavy oak planking as easily as a knife cuts through fat. I shudder at the thought of being caught by even a glancing blow from that deadly blade.

My brother turns, raises the sword above his head in both hands. Behind him on the podium, Temny has taken that same stance. Oh no! I can see what is coming. It is a rush straight at me. Here in the corner I can't leap to the side. He'll be open for a lethal strike from my sword, but that awful rune blade will come down from above onto me at the same time. There's a satisfied smile on Temny's face. His intent is to kill us both with this move.

Somewhere, behind those reddened eyes, is my brother. Both he and I are descendants of Pavol. Is it possible that we both have Pavol the Good within us?

I lower my bone-handled sword so that its tip touches the floor of our hall, the hall that is part of Hladka Hvorka, part of all that Pavol made.

“Bratcek,”
I say in a soft voice meant for Paulek's ears alone. “Brother.”

A ripple of light dances across the floor from my sword toward his feet. And as soon as it touches him, his eyes close. When he opens them again, the blood color is gone. He shakes his head, then his whole body the way a dog does when it comes out of the water. He lowers the sword that was held high overhead.

A look of deep regret comes over his face. I was right. Part of him remained aware of how he was being used.

It's all right,
I mouth to him.

Thank you, brother,
he replies just as silently.

He holds up the rune sword and looks at it in distaste. “Too fancy. Not my sort of blade.”

I know what he is about to do.

Too late. Paulek turns and hurls the enchanted blade point first, back at Baron Temny. If Temny was a target dummy or another man, it would have pierced him to the heart. But he's neither. Temny opens his eyes and extends his mailed right hand. The glowing weapon slows in midair, turns, and settles its hilt into his palm.

“If one wants something done right,” Temny says in a disappointed voice, “it seems that one must always do it himself.”

He leaps, twice as far as a normal man unaided by sorcery might jump. His red eyes are as predatory as a leopard attempting to ambush an unsuspecting deer.

Not being a deer, however, I do not wait for him to fall on me. I hop back and the downward stroke of his sword misses me by a foot.

Temny immediately attempts another move. It's one I've seen before—the same first blow that Paulek never completed—a low rising slash that turns in midair into a thrust toward my throat. I parry it to the left.

Ka-ching!

Sparks fly as his sword clashes against mine.

But there's no paralyzing surge of power from his blade to my hand. The silver sword in my hand quivers as it absorbs the force of Temny's magic.

I riposte with a quick return thrust toward the chest that almost skewers the surprised baron. He is forced to briefly retreat, but then plants his back foot and renews his attack.

Magic or not, he's a more than capable swordsman, perhaps almost as good as Black Yanosh. But I have an advantage. I've already fought a trial match with him when his eyes looked out of my brother's face. I know his style of attack. His arms are strong, his reach a bit more than mine, but I keep his blade from connecting—first to my thigh, then my shoulder. Down toward my forearm, then a quick thrust to my eyes.

Strike, parry, back and forth we go. Beads of sweat form on his brow. His lips move as he mumbles one spell after another. None of them work. The power of my own enchanted sword and my years of training are protecting me from both the seen and the unseen.

There's a moment that may come in any fight, whether practice or mortal combat, when you know exactly what your opponent is going to do before he does it. At just such a moment I parry Temny's blade across his body, take half a step back, and then thrust straight toward his heart. Instead of piercing his chest, the point of my blade skitters to the side. Through the rip in his velvet blouse I see that the baron is wearing a mail vest of ornate gold and black.

Still, my blow knocks the wind out of him. He stumbles to one side with a curse, raising his sword as he does so. Good thing for him. Otherwise my sideways slash might have removed his head.

Not completely good for the baron, however. The keen edge of my blade cuts through the metal of his mailed glove just below the pommel. It severs his index finger and sends the rune sword spinning.

“Nie!”
Baron Temny screams, his voice higher than usual. He steps back, clutching his wounded hand.

“Ano.”
I lift my sword up in a mocking salute.

I'm not sure what to do next. Ask him to surrender? Make a quick thrust at some part of his anatomy that is unmailed? His throat, perhaps?

Temny scuttles sideways like a crab, his bleeding hand held tight to his chest.

“Pomoc!”
he shrieks. “Help!”

Two huge shapes block my path. They've appeared so quickly that I suspect the baron's magic assisted their arrival. It's Peklo and Smotana, of course.

“Now you die,” Peklo growls, starting to swing his sword down at me.

“You will . . .” Smotana begins to snarl.

I don't have time for boring threats. I knock Peklo's sword to the side with a backhand parry and then kick him so hard in the belly that he folds like a creased sheet of parchment. Smotana's unfinished fulmination is punctuated in mid-sentence by my elbow, which removes his front teeth. As he falls, a knife skitters out of the sheath at his waist. Appollina darts forward to pick it up and add it to the several she has already thrust under her belt. She does like knives.

I turn toward the dais where the baron has retreated. Poteshenie has retrieved her husband's rune sword. Temny is wrapping a cloth about his injured hand. He's not looking at me, but behind me.

“Rashko,” Paulek's voice comes from my left.

I glance quickly in his direction. The wide back doorway on that side of our hall is filled with armored figures.

“Tam,”
another voice says from my right. “There too.”

My eyes follow the jerk of Black Yanosh's chin to our far right, where the other big entryway is disgorging even more uninvited arrivals.

More than the original remnants of the false baron's little army are thrusting their way into our great hall. It's not just those forty or more who were bruised and bloodied by the blast of wind from the eagle's feather. Twice as many more dark-armored mercenaries are with them, as well as a score of bowmen.

“It appears,” Appollina says from behind me, “that I need more knives.”

I turn. Yet another large group of mailed men has appeared in front of the platform where Temny and his wife stand. I swallow hard, but the lump in my throat remains.

Temny raises his hand and lets it fall.

The dark-armored men encircling us begin sliding forward, one slow step at a time. They tap their spears together in time on the hard metal edges of their high-held shields. The sound of their heavy boots scraping against the floor is counterpoint to the thunk of wood against steel and the accompanying exhalation in unison of breath from the soldiers.

Shhhhhh-thunk-hunh! Shhhhh-thunk-hunh! Shhhhh-thunk-hunh!

Black Yanosh readies himself, as do Paulek, Appollina, and her sister. All of them are now armed with weapons dropped by Temny's troops when the wind bowled them over. Ucta and Odvaha stand to either side of me. Everyone is ready to sell their lives dearly.

Nie.
I cannot let that happen. Think, Rashko! What can I do?

I hand the silver sword to Paulek, fumble the pouch open, and thrust my right hand in. The round object I'd almost grasped before comes to me. Its cool metal draws itself like a magnet to my fingers.

As I pull it out and lift it, it slides down over my knuckles and around my wrist. I hold it up before me. It's a simple unornamented bronze bracelet. The dull metal does not glitter like silver. No bolts of lightning burst forth from it. Yet I feel its connection and hear a breathless voice whisper to me.

“Sedem!”

The entire castle thrums like the plucked string of an enormous lute. Now that is dramatic! But not as dramatic as the hissing roar that comes from everywhere and nowhere at one and the same time.

The warriors crouch behind their shields. Temny and Poteshenie lift their hands as if to ward off a blow.

WHOM! WHOM! WHOM! WHOM! WHOM!

A series of heavy thuds follows next. They might be mistaken for the sound of a huge hammer striking the bedrock of the hill below us. But I recognize what it is—massive feet thudding up stone stairs.

KER-WHOMP!

The wall tapestry is thrust to the side as the hidden doorway behind it bursts open, bolt bent, hinges ripped free, thick planks splintered. A head as large as an entire draft horse rams through. Two floor-shaking steps and the rest of Sedem, Pavol's dragon, enters our hall, along with quite a bit of broken lumber, dislodged stone, and mortar. Our secret doorway is secret—and intact—no longer.

Appollina grasps my shoulder. Paulek wraps his free arm protectively around Valentina to draw her to the side. He points the silver sword I just handed him at Sedem's nose. Black Yanosh steps behind me and leans his back against mine. Even a dragon cannot distract him from guarding our rear.

Armored men are bumping into each other. Weapons are falling to the floor as they attempt a quick exit. They are shouting such various things as
“Dratchie! Dratchie!” “Nie!” “Pomoc!”
“Help!” “Agghhhh!” “Get out of my way!” “Nails and blood!” and so on. Strangely enough, none of them are making use of my own favorite oath—even though the head of the dragon is staring down at them.

The wide back doors of the hall clog with panicked mercenaries, tripping over each other and becoming entangled. Heavy armor provides protection against human weapons, but does not make it easy to retreat rapidly. Nor is it of much avail against a huge firebreathing beast.

The dragon lifts his long neck. His head rises up until it almost scrapes the high ceiling. Ucta and Odvaha growl deep in their throats.

I reach down to pat their loyal heads, but keep my focus on the huge emerald green eyes that peer down quizzically from high above.