Linda Barlow (67 page)

There was a long silence. At last Francis said, "You would risk your life so recklessly just to prove yourself my equal?"

"Not to prove myself. To free myself of the long shadow you have cast upon my life. Anyway,"—Roger actually smiled—"it may not be as much of a risk as you think. I have been in constant practice. And since you were wounded, your sword arm is no longer what it was."

"My sword arm is fully recovered."

"Good. I would not wish to feel that I had an unfair advantage."

"You mean it, don't you? You're looking forward to this."

"I've been looking forward to this for a long time."

"Very well." Lacklin's voice was heavy. "You’ll have your fight, if it’s so important to you."

"No," Alexandra said once more, but her voice was low, despairing. They did not so much as glance in her direction. The matter was already decided.

Chapter 39

The great hall at Whitcombe Castle flickered with the light of a dozen extra torches as the servants moved the trestle tables and benches and prepared the room for the first duel of honor to be fought there in recent memory. The two participants had stripped to shirt and hose and selected their weapons, fine Florentine rapiers of flexible tempered steel. Up on the dais, from which the family and retainers were to observe, Alexandra stood gripped by apprehension.

Roger also was nervous. He tested the strength of his blade against his boot and wondered if he would be alive an hour from now. He hoped so, for the sake of Alix and the babe.

Francis approached him, looking fit and strong and entirely at ease. And why not? When had he last been defeated in a trial of this particular weapon? Had he ever been defeated? Recently, in practice, Roger had scored several hits against him. But they had never had a bout in which Francis did not also score, usually in
quarte
—the line that guarded Roger's heart.

"You are certain you wish to go through with this? It's not too late to call it off."

"Worried, Francis?"

"Of something you and I have done so many dozens of times? No. In this you are my partner. In this I know you as well as a lover knows his longtime mate."

"An apt allusion, if somewhat imprecise," Roger said scathingly.

Francis smiled. "If I defeat you I will not kill you. I will, however, demand another forfeit."

"Another sheath for your sword?" Roger tossed the words off as if in badinage, but inside he was shaking. He felt fifteen years old again, and threatened. "If I defeat you, you will certainly die."

"Good. Life holds scant joy for me now."

Shortly thereafter, the two men faced each other in the ready stance. George Dawes, the baron's master-at-arms, stood beside them, his arm raised over his head. "Any special rules?" he asked the two men.

"First blood decides it," suggested Francis.

"No," said Roger. "To the death."

Francis shrugged and flexed his sword. "As you wish."

They saluted each other formally, and then took several steps back. Roger glanced over to the dais and saw Alexandra, her eyes huge and round, her expression one of ill-concealed despair. But as he met her eyes, she smiled, and he cherished her spirit, knowing the smile was one of the braver acts of her life. He gave her a reassuring grin. Another man-at-arms had positioned himself behind her. Roger had ordered him to restrain her if she tried to interfere with the duel. I
love you, I love you,
he told her silently.
Forgive me, but this is something I must do.

He turned back to Francis. The referee lowered his arm, and the match began.

Roger opened aggressively. He hoped to set a quick pace and tire his opponent. He was younger; he believed he could make up in stamina what he lacked in skill. His plan included a constant, unrelenting attack on the high lines, where Francis should be weaker now, because of his chest injury.

As Roger attacked, Francis parried effortlessly, smiling slightly as their swords played, the blades flashing silver in the torchlight, clicking and sparking with the contact. They circled once, twice, three times, taking each other's measure as if they had never fought before. Francis' silver-gray eyes were wary and intent. Respectful, too, Roger realized. Despite his skill, Francis was making no assumptions about the outcome. Yet he was confident, as he had every right to be.

They circled yet again. It was Lacklin who was retreating before Roger's advance, but Roger could detect no weakening in his technique. Every attack was met with a smooth parry and riposte, and every counter-riposte of Roger's was coolly repelled. It did not take long for Roger to realize that Francis was conducting no offensive of his own. Experimentally, he feinted off-balance, leaving his right side undefended and eliciting a gasp from Alix. Francis' eyes were bland as he ignored the opening and fell back.

"Stop mocking me," said Roger. "Fight, damn you!"

"I am admiring your technique."

"Torment me, if you will. But this is unfair to the spectators, and Alix has suffered enough. Let it be decided, one way or the other, without undue delay."

Francis did not reply, but he began to move with the skill of a master.

From the dais, Alexandra watched the two men with growing, albeit reluctant, admiration. She had not caught their words, but she had heard them speak, and then something had changed. The bout that had been careful, measured, almost dull, transformed itself into an elegant, stylized dance of death.

They were well-matched. Better matched, somehow, than they had been last summer in the forest. Then Roger had clearly been on the defensive. Now he was more assured, more determined, and more threatening. A certain dramatic flair characterized his movements as he beat, parried, thrust, riposted in perfect synchrony with Lacklin's identical movements. Tall and slender as he was, his grace was evident, but so was the power in his strong shoulders and long arms, the subtlety in his firmly flicking wrists, the palpable masculine force in his lunging thighs. Francis Lacklin is not so beautiful, she thought idiotically as they wove a trail of silver ribbons through the air around them.

And she wondered at the perversity in human nature that could create such an illusion of beauty at the very borderline of death.

They fenced with this beauty and precision for many long minutes, moving back and forth across the hall, up and down and around. But such perfection could not continue indefinitely. Sooner or later, one of them would make a mistake. When he did, the other would strike.

The thought had barely run through Alexandra's mind when Roger missed his footing. He recovered, but the moment cost him. Alexandra's heart nearly choked her when Lacklin feinted cleverly, then thrust high, catching the edge of Roger's right shoulder as his sword dropped in error to defend the low inside line. Blood welled up instantly, and the spectators groaned. The heir of Whitcombe could bleed. He could die.

It was a trifling wound, but Roger felt slightly ill as he acknowledged it. Francis had disengaged. His face was taut with tension. "First blood to me. I am satisfied if you are."

"No." Roger felt a stinging; no real pain and, more important, no numbness or stiffness. "We will continue."

"We have fenced scores of time, but always with blunted tips. It gives me no pleasure to watch your blood flow. Let us end this folly now. You may do whatever you want with me. Whatever you believe to be just. Turn me over to the crown. Hang me. It matters not. But please don't make me kill you."

"What a shame you felt no such scruples about the other people you killed." Roger raised his blade to reengage. "Defend," he insisted, and attacked.

It was as if his wound served to increase his energy, for Roger fought ferociously now, forcing Lacklin to retreat. Alexandra pressed her hands together, praying inarticulately. The pace increased, and soon both men were breathing rapidly. Roger drove Francis back against the tapestries that hung upon the walls, where, for an instant, the older man faltered. But he defended himself adequately against Roger's attack, pressing him back in turn while he swiftly recovered, finding an opening and seizing it. Another ring of steel, another parry, high this time as for a moment they grappled body to body. Alexandra moaned, unable to see, in the tangle of thrashing limbs, precisely what was happening.

They sprang apart, blades cutting wildly as the fine art of the match was abandoned. The referee yelled something and they disengaged, backing a few steps away from each other, both gasping air, both running with sweat. They eyed each other warily and circled again, engaged only at the tips. There was anger between them now. Alexandra could feel it. Control—both bodily and mental—was disintegrating as the raw passions that moved them built toward the flash point.

They fenced energetically for several minutes more, and then the pace seemed to slow. Alexandra guessed that they were both growing tired. Then, unexpectedly, Lacklin attacked again, driving Roger backward at the speed of a run. Roger missed a parry and Lacklin's blade snaked through his weak
quarte
defense. Alexandra cried out as the steel shot toward her lover's heart. But instead of falling to the floor in a heap, Roger did an astonishing twist in the air and avoided the thrust. Lacklin's immediate retort sent Roger to one knee, his blade thrust up like a crossbar, protecting his throat and chest.

There was utter silence for a moment; then Francis fell back. "Get up."

Roger's eyes blinked closed for a moment as he acknowledged the fear within him. Again, as usual, he was going to lose to Francis, and this time he would die. It had been foolish to think he could turn this particular tide. Here, at least, Francis would always be his master.

His dismay startled him. He had faced death before without faltering. But it was different today; he was not ready to die. Why had he allowed Alix to watch? He could not bear the thought of her witnessing his death.

He glanced toward her as he rose, noting her pale face.
Take heart, I'm not dead yet.
Then he saw something else. Behind Alix, leaning on Dorcas' arm, was the baron, his father. He had risen from his sickbed to see the outcome of this fight.

Body of Christ! He was amazed that Dorcas had allowed it. Surely this would qualify as precisely the undue excitement that his father was supposed to avoid.

Grimly Roger engaged blades with Francis once again. His father was dying. There was no love between them, it was true, but there was the family honor. His father's eldest son had died at Francis Lacklin's hands, and Roger was determined that the baron should not go to his grave grieving over the loss of yet another son and heir.

Steel clashed and rang as they attacked, parried, feinted, and lunged, neither of them exhibiting much panache now that they were so exhausted. Roger's shoulder was hurting, although the bleeding had stopped. His wrist was losing some of its power. And so far he had not penetrated Francis' guard, not delivered even so much as a scratch. He tried to concentrate on strategy, but all his plans seemed to have disappeared in smoke. He battered the high lines, watching intently for a slip, a momentary falter, an opening of any kind. But there was nothing. And his own defense was working on instinct alone, as he relied on his limbs to act without his conscious direction.

Suddenly he realized that his original strategy was working: Francis was even wearier than he was. Roger forced his gritty, burning eyes to study his adversary. Francis was breathing heavily; his shirt was soaked through with sweat. There were dark shadows under his eyes, the like of which Roger remembered from those days when he and Alix had hovered over Francis' bedside on the
Argo.
For the first time that Roger could recall, his old friend's swordplay was loose, careless. Once, as he extended his arm in an attack, the arm trembled, and his face contorted in pain.

Jesus. Roger feinted skillfully, then again, and watched in disbelief as Francis dropped his blade to parry the second feint, leaving, at last, an opening. Roger lunged; for an instant, gray eyes met brown. Francis leapt to the side so quickly that Roger's tip caught his arm instead of his chest. Cloth ripped and Roger felt the sickening jar of flesh giving way beneath steel. There was blood; more blood than there had been with Roger's shoulder wound. And this was Francis' sword arm.

"Very good," said Francis, as coolly if he were acknowledging a hit in a practice bout.