the mace shattered the bones of his forearm and he dropped the weapon. For a moment he stared at his hand dangling at the end of a crushed arm, and then he began to scream.
There was no other sound in the room. The air seemed to hang perfectly still, as if it had turned to glass and held every object secure in its place. Croy felt rooted to the spot, unable to move an inch.
It was no magic spell that made Croy feel that way, but the simple focus of battle joined. It was clear this barbarian would not surrender without a fight. Based on what little Croy knew of his people, that was no surprise. The barbarians of the eastern steppes were born warriors all—they spent their entire lives hunting and fighting, and they were renowned for their pure bloody courage. Only a thin range of mountains separated their land from the kingdom of Skrae, but that fluke of geography was a true blessing. If the barbarians ever came to Skrae in pursuit of conquest, even Croy doubted the kingdom could stand for long against them.
Now he was face to face with a perfect specimen of that warrior culture, and he didn’t know if he could prevail.
“I believe you wished to say something,” the barbarian said. His lips drew back in what might have been a friendly grin—if the posture of his body and the set of his muscles didn’t suggest he was about to spring forward in a deadly attack.
Croy scowled and drew his sword. He had trained for fighting, himself. He had made a study of taking down opponents like this. He considered his strategy in the moments he had left before the attack came. He could parry the axe, he knew, if he used a cross slash cut, but that mace was too heavy and the arm that wielded it too strong to be effectively blocked. He would need to duck under its swing, and lunge forward at the same time, bringing his sword down in a weak slash that might—
“Ghostcutter,” the barbarian said, as if he were greeting an old friend. He nodded at the sword in Croy’s hand. Then he flung his arms out to the sides and dropped both axe and mace.
Croy frowned. “You know my blade?” he asked. The sword he wielded—the only weapon he’d brought to the signing of the banns, and that only for ornament—was famous in certain circles, of course. It was an Ancient Blade, one of seven swords forged at the dawn of time to fight no lesser opponents than demons themselves. Ghostcutter was made of cold-forged iron, with one edge coated in silver. Runnels of melted silver streamed across its fuller. It was made to fight against magical creatures, curses, and the abominations of foul sorcery. It was damned good at cutting more mundane flesh, as well.
“I should recognize it anywhere,” the barbarian said. He drew his own sword and launched himself forward, straight at Croy, in a fast cutting attack that would have overwhelmed a less disciplined warrior’s defense.
The two swords clanged together with a sound like the ringing of a bell. When two well-made swords met like that it was called a conversation, for the repeated ringing noise as they came together and checked each other’s strikes. Croy knew this conversation would be very short—if he didn’t cut the barbarian down in the next few seconds, the other man’s strength would end the fight before it had a chance to properly begin. The first clash nearly brought him down. He struggled to hold his parry against the strength behind the blow, his eyes fixed on the point where the barbarian’s foible met his forte. The weakest part of the barbarian’s blade, up against the most resistance Croy could offer, and he barely held his ground. Iron slid against iron with a horrible grinding that would blunt both edges.
Then the barbarian’s blade burst into light.
It was no reflection of a candle flame, but the pure clean light of the sun, and it came from within the metal of the blade itself. Croy was blinded and he shouted an oath as he jumped backwards, falling on his haunches away from the light. He flung up Ghostcutter before him in hopeless defense. If he could not see the barbarian’s next attack, he could not properly meet it. The man could kill him a hundred different ways without resistance.
Yet when Croy managed to blink away the bright spots that swam before his eyes, he found not a sword pointed at his face, but a massive hand reaching down to help him back to his feet.
“Dawnbringer,” Croy said, with proper reverence. “You wield Dawnbringer.”
“Yes. Will you take my hand,” the barbarian asked, “and call me brother?”
Croy grasped the barbarian’s wrist gratefully, and allowed himself to be hauled to his feet. Dawnbringer was already back in the barbarian’s scabbard. Croy sheathed Ghostcutter, and stepped forward into a warm embrace.
CHAPTER SEVEN
“I think … they’re hugging each other,” Malden said. He was lying on the stairs above the common room, watching the fight and reporting on it to Cythera and Coruth, who were standing in the doorway of the private chamber. “They’ve put their swords away. They’re … talking. They actually look quite friendly.”
“Good. It’s over,” Coruth said. “Now we can eat.” She stepped back through the door and disappeared. Cythera glanced down at Malden, threw up her hands in resignation, and followed.
Malden found the two of them sitting at table, picking apart a cheese between them. “But,” he said, “it was—it looked like it was to be a fight to the death,” he said. “Clearly they were going to kill each other.”
“Yet for some reason they’ve decided not to,” Cythera pointed out.
“You saw the big man, though. He’s a beast! The bloodlust had him. What kind of man can just go from wanting to kill an enemy to embracing him like that?” Cythera shot him a knowing look, and it was Malden’s turn to shrug. “Other than Croy, I mean. I admit that’s exactly the kind of thing Croy would do.”
Cythera and Coruth nodded in unison.
Croy had a sense of honor that other people often found confusing. Malden thought of it as sheer stupidity, but sometimes he was glad enough for it. One of his tenets was that he tried never to let anger overcome him when he was fighting, so that he never struck anyone down for ignoble reasons. More than once Malden had benefited personally from that compunction. “I still don’t see it, though. The barbarian just left six men in a moaning heap. He maimed some of them for life. Now Croy’s acting like this fellow’s as blameless as an honest priest.”
“Don’t try to figure out Croy’s reasons,” Coruth said. “You’ll tie your own brains in knots.”
“I usually just wait for him to explain himself later,” Cythera pointed out. “He’s never shy about telling me how things ought to be. Or how he thinks they should be, at any rate.”
Malden pursed his lips. “I noticed that earlier. When he was talking about how he would lock you away in his castle so you could have his babies. He made it sound quite … safe.”
“There are worse things in this world than being secure.”
Malden stopped himself from speaking. He wasn’t sure how much he could say in Coruth’s presence. Yet he longed to be alone with Cythera so he could discuss things with her. There had been a time when she had seemed to care for him. More than that, perhaps. She had seemed to love him. After her father died, and she was free to renew her pledge to marry Croy, that had all seemed to just melt away.
For her, anyway. Malden’s feelings for her were just as strong as ever.
When Croy had invited him here today, to witness the banns, he had accepted in a state
