The Doomfarers of Coramonde (45 page)

The atmosphere
of the Court hit them like a storm front, compounded of the heat of revelry and
its exertions, the smells of the drinking, the seductions and the sweaty
laughter of the evening’s merrymaking. They were stopped for an instant by its
tropical intensity, as tipsy surprise changed the faces of the guests there.

The Prince was
shoved aside from behind by Reacher as an arrow hissed down past him to
splinter on the hard flooring stones. Court archers were warned, and marshaling
to carry out their duty, while terrified courtiers flooded toward the main
doors. The three ogre-guards had closed ranks around Strongblade, who stood in
white-faced fury on his dais. The Usurper’s lips were drawn back, his hatred of
the true Heir plain. His hand clutched Flarecore’s hilt at his side.

Gil and Van
Duyn were through into the throne room, adding to the uproar with the sound of
gunfire, concentrating on the bowmen along the walls. Kisst-Haa had unslung a
wide shield from his scaly back; using it to cover himself and Dunstan along
with one of the raider archers, the prowler-cavalryman, he barged his way to
the main doors, scattering the mob to either side with brutal ease. Even in
former times, the Court had known its affluent and idle, and under Strongblade
this had become the common type, no challenge to Kisst-Haa.

The raider
archers were sending arrows of their own winging at their opposite numbers
along the walls as trumpet calls came from the outer halls, the guards reacting
to the unprecedented invasion. The two Americans were firing hastily, thankful
that the wall archers were in plain view rather than hidden behind iron or
stone.

The Prince
could see no sign of Fania, and took no time to seek her. Some of the nobles
had mustered themselves and were counterattacking at the behest of the
screaming Strongblade. An Earl in golden finery, known to Springbuck, came at
him in a frenzied flèche; but the Prince sidestepped, locked hilts with him and
delivered a thrust through his ribs with the knife. He searched for Yardiff Bey
but couldn’t see him.

A knot of
courtiers had gathered at the foot of the dais. These were rugged men, brutes
and bullies who’d been set at Strongblade’s feet by hunger for power and
privilege. They saw their precious, newfound rank at hazard and were determined
to make sure it wasn’t ended by the premature death of their false
Ku-Mor-Mai.
Springbuck moved toward them, even as Ferrian and Hightower crowded past
the two Americans to help. There began the deadly carillon of swords.

Reacher had
sprung to the near ledge before the archers there were well aware of his plan;
he killed one with a single ripping blow of his clawed glove, and began moving
on the rest, using the corpse as a shield.

Kisst-Haa had
made the main doors by means of fangs, armored tail, shield and outsized
broadsword. He caught two advancing soldiers’ polearms on his shield and
bulldozed them into those behind, sweeping the household troops from the room
with one push and driving them back into the corridor. He jumped back as the
prowler with him fired two arrows through the still-open doors. Kisst-Haa swung
the portals shut, threw the thick bar and left Dunstan and the archer to keep
it from being reopened; then he turned and lumbered back toward the dais.

The sharp smell
of gunpowder was in the air. Two men at the foot of the dais were down with the
Snow Leopardess’ knives in them, and the remainder wavered before the onset of
Ferrian, Hightower and Springbuck. Andre was close by, trying to locate Yardiff
Bey without success.

So quickly and
willfully had the raiders begun that they’d done amazingly well. The archers
who hadn’t been shot or knocked from the ledges by bullets, arrows or the
Wolf-Brother had jumped for their lives, and the majority of the courtiers
still hadn’t presented much of an obstacle. The two remaining raider archers at
the dais end of the throne room—the Horseblooded and the man of Freegate—moved
to join the third to hold the main doors.

But swords and
other weapons were appearing among the crowd. Even the dissipaters maintained
by Strongblade and Fania would do damage when forced to fight for their lives.
Several seized a bench for a rush at the doors. Katya, seeing this, yelped,
grabbed a fallen sword and ran to stop them; Reacher jumped to help her. There
was bloody fighting at closest quarters.

Archog, leader
of the ogre-guards, grunted to his fellows and those two advanced down the
steps of the dais roughly pushing aside those who were in their way and moving
into the mayhem. The first fell into an exchange with Hightower, who was hard
put, even with his renowned might, to meet those strokes. Yet somehow he did,
but had to fall back step by step and could effect no attack of his own.

Not so
Kisst-Haa, who’d flung aside his shield and locked in combat with the other
ogre. Of the two, the reptile-man was a trifle larger and his weapon heavier.
Yet it was a close thing, and the throne room resounded to the contestants’
bellows even above the tumult. Their enormous blades moved like darting tongues
of light, and men fighting near them could only do their best to stay out of
the behemoths’ way.

Gil, a new
magazine in his carbine, was the only one to spy Hightower’s predicament as the
old hero was forced toward a wall by the machine-like advance of the ogre he
fought. The American brought his weapon up and fired, but such was the
creature’s weight of armor that the bullet went
spanng!
and ricocheted
to the far side of the room.

The monster
loomed over its human adversary, preparing to deal a final flurry of blows,
when Gil ran up behind it, jammed the carbine muzzle into the opening between
the rear lip of its helmet and the armored neck, and squeezed the trigger as
rapidly as he could. Two shots crashed upward through thick bone into the
ogre’s brain before a spasm snapped its neck backward and the whole body went
rigid. The tilting helmet rim bent the end of the carbine barrel, but Gil couldn’t
stop the reflex that triggered the third shot and resulted in a small
explosion. The American was knocked down as a shard of metal plowed a groove in
his forehead, and other shards plucked at the mesh covering his chest and arms.
His cheek was scorched by the fireball effect, hit by grains of powder that
would normally have been consumed in the gun barrel.

Springbuck, who
with Ferrian had been trying to carve a path to Strongblade and who’d planned
to make his way through the opening at the foot of the dais left by the ogres,
was frustrated when the gap closed too quickly. He and Ferrian launched
themselves at the men, fighting for a chance to down Strongblade before the
inevitable arrival of reinforcements. Van Duyn’s shots at the Usurper were
useless as the heavily plated Archog protected Yardiff Bey’s bastard son from
bullet and arrow.

Two more came
at the Prince, a rash noble with an ambitious rapier and an officer of mounted
infantry with a long sword, but in doing so they both threw their lives away;
he was beyond the reach of common men and cut them down one and two, cleanly
and with hardly a pause.

Then fear
caught at his heart. He heard the dull booming of a ram and knew the household
troops were battering at the doors.

Events had
developed into two separate actions. The three archers, Dunstan, Reacher and
Katya—the latter two having taken up swords—were holding the doors; Springbuck,
Ferrian, Hightower and Kisst-Haa were trying to get to Strongblade. To one side
Andre helped Van Duyn pull Gil’s leg from under the corpse of the ogre he’d
killed as Gil swore uselessly.

Kisst-Haa dealt
his ogre-foe a final blow, driving his greatsword completely through the
sturdily armored torso. Withdrawing the blade, he took in the scene at the
throne and moved with decision. Since the Prince couldn’t get at his enemy
through the press of men, the reptile-man seized him from behind and prepared
to carry him, literally wading through a wave of steel. But he stopped as he
saw Ferrian kill a last antagonist and penetrate the defense there while
Hightower guarded his back. Archog’s temper parted and he drew his own
greatsword and charged this human upstart.

Kisst-Haa
shifted his grip on Springbuck; taking advantage of this new opening, he
carefully tossed the Prince over the heads of the remaining opposition onto the
dais. Strongblade saw him coming and jumped back as Springbuck landed
awkwardly. The Usurper, who’d pulled on a pair of gauntlets, brought Flarecore
out with a threatening sweep. Then Strongblade put a hand up to steady the
unadorned circlet of gold that was the Crown of Coramonde, as if to assure
himself it was still his. None of the men at the foot of the dais had time to
turn and help their liege; Gil was free and had drawn his sword, helping Andre,
Van Duyn and Hightower keep them busy. He used his trench knife and all the
skill he’d acquired in recent weeks, and needed them. Van Duyn’s M-l jammed,
and he drew back and jacked the operating rod handle to clear it, swearing.

Ferrian was
doing poorly with the ogre Archog, and Kisst-Haa was circling them, tail
lashing, seeking a chance to join the fight. At the rear of the room a crack
had appeared in the doors; as the rest of the raiders at that end formed a
perimeter of deadly swordplay around them. Reacher and Dunstan the Berserker
braced their backs against it.

Springbuck and
Strongblade confronted each other for the first time in months. Seeing his
“brother” again, the Prince knew a twinge of doubt. Here was Strongblade, who
had ever been his master with a sword. Springbuck thought he could win, but was
he overestimating himself?

Then, with a
rush, determination came. He’d returned with the mightiest warriors in the
world at his back, graduate of battle and rightful
Ku-Mar-Mai.

He addressed
himself to Strongblade. As they came en guarde to decide the fate of the
suzerainty, he sent the heavy knife singing into the ornate wood of the throne.

“As it was
written before our births,” Springbuck said, “let us measure swords, one weapon
apiece, and the winner wear the crown.”

Strongblade was
still as capable a swordsman as Springbuck had ever met, but he also had to
move Flarecore, a heavier sword, and the Prince felt that this gave him an
advantage. For a moment he experienced the fear he’d always felt of Strongblade,
of his primal ferocity and cruel strength, then dismissed it resolutely.
Carefully preserved memories of his antagonist’s favorite attacks and advances
rose before him like an invisible chart of the duel’s possibilities. He tried
not to become preoccupied with them.

The match
filled the entire field of his senses, hypnotizing him so that he forgot the
fierce contest around him and coolly worked with a sword as he never had in his
life. And if his ancient blade didn’t blaze angrily against its rival, that was
the impression it gave those who saw it then.

Strongblade was
surprised by Springbuck’s new virtuosity but not distressed by it, as they
fought back and forth before the throne, neither gaining nor giving up more
than a pace or two. Strongblade made a semicircular parry, moving from a high
to a low line of engagement, and Springbuck threw all his sinew into a bind
that drove his foe to the very edge of the dais. When he had the Usurper at the
brink, the Prince stopped and stepped back, sweat running from his face, and
permitted Strongblade to return to the center of the platform.

“I’ll end your
reign here, so there’s no uncertainty about it,” he said.

The other,
outraged beyond anger, intoned in a low voice, moving Flarecore in slow passes.
The Prince’s eyes went wide as the sword’s blade grew bright, passing through
red to white, and ran with coursing flame.

Flarecore
burned! Strongblade had been given its activating spell. Gritting his teeth,
Springbuck began the duel anew.

At their first
tentative touch, black sparks jumped from the blades. The Usurper’s gauntlets
protected his hands. The Prince was thankful that he wore the leathers that
covered him from knuckle to elbow, and for Bar’s belled hilt. The conversation
of blades was a shower of dark fire-specks and they were both burned, though
Springbuck, with chest and upper arms bare, fared worse.

His opponent’s
swordsmanship was, as ever, excellent, barren of any frivolity or excesses. It
seemed, as it always had to the Prince, a stern sermon in motion and steel
against others’ overindulgence in flourish or bravado.

Meanwhile,
Ferrian could no longer hold against the advance of Archog and made to back
away. But the creature blocked his sword and reached out for him with its free
hand; in a moment both lost their balance and rolled on the floor. Ferrian,
having lost his sword, snatched a long knife from his boot top and pushed up
the visor on the ogre’s helmet as the creature gathered him in a terrifying
hug.

The man’s knife
was coated with the poison that his people used, so deadly that it would have
killed even the ogre quickly. But Archog released its hug and seized each of
Ferrian’s wrists in one of its own hard hands. With a ferocious caricature of a
laugh, it lunged forward and clamped its wide, fanged mouth over his right arm,
biting through flesh and bone and severing the limb that held the knife. Then
it flung the man from it and howled in maniacal glee.

His right arm
gone from midbicep down, Ferrian groped in some half-mad attempt to continue
the struggle. But Van Duyn was at his side and stopped him, then used his belt
as a tourniquet. He thought the wound too terrible for Ferrian to live, as the
Horse-blooded collapsed. Andre came to help, laying down his sword.

Kisst-Haa,
who’d seen all this but hadn’t been able to strike for fear of hitting Ferrian;
gave a bellow of sheer animal rage at this ruthless display and threw himself
at the ogre. They tumbled together on the paving stones, tearing chunks of
flesh from each other and snapping savagely. The reptile-man grabbed the ogre’s
wrists, just as Archog had done to Ferrian and, powerful as it was, the ogre
was no match for infuriated Kisst-Haa, who thrust his great muzzle against the
open visor of the other’s helmet. With a merciless bite, he took away most of
the exposed face.