“So we should limit ourselves to Neweden?” D’Mannberg shifted his massive bulk on the stool. Wood creaked under him. “Maybe we should even make a bid for power and kill a few of the kin-lords, neh?”
Aldhelm glared. “And why not just Neweden? It’s our culture and our society. That’s what killed Sartas. And why don’t you just say all that’s on your mind, d’Mannberg? You think I killed Gunnar without giving him proper warning and a chance to defend himself? I live by the code, even when I feel it’s wrong.”
“Is that why you felt Ulthane Gyll’s vibro, because you followed the code? We all know better, Aldhelm. You almost ignored it once, and that was with Gunnar, too.”
“I’d still never slay a person in shameful ambush, without letting Dame Fate have Her chance.”
“You can say that,” d’Mannberg said with some heat. “You talk a good defense, but words are just words.” Deliberately, he turned away from Aldhelm, looking at the other kin around him. “You see, Aldhelm is always right. The rest of us are just too stupid to see it.”
“Talk
to
me if you’ve something to say, man.” Aldhelm trembled with interior rage.
D’Mannberg ignored him, continuing to speak to the others. “He’d ignore the code on the practice strip, but expects us to believe him in all other things. If Aldhelm thinks I’m that stupid, he’s an ass.”
Aldhelm’s face went scarlet, his hand moving to his vibrohilt. His stool clattered backward, his boots stamped packed earth. Aldhelm pulled the hilt from the sheath and flung it down in front of d’Mannberg. It skidded across the table’s surface, stopping hilt foremost half off the wooden planks. D’Mannberg looked up at Aldhelm, a long slow smile forming behind the russet beard. “First blood, kin-brother?”
Aldhelm, tight-lipped, nodded.
Serita, behind d’Mannberg, gestured to the wide-eyed apprentices staring from the door to the kitchens. “Get Thane Valdisa and Ulthane Gyll,” she said, gesturing harshly. “Move, you fools!”
• • •
They stood before the Thane, Aldhelm and d’Mannberg. Aldhelm seemed tense, on edge, his arms akimbo. His weight shifted from foot to foot, impatient, and he watched Valdisa with a grimace of pride. D’Mannberg seemed eagerly confident, legs wide like a surly dwarf given stature. He seemed almost happy—his blue eyes danced from the Thane to Ulthane Gyll.
Valdisa liked neither one’s attitude. She also did not like the way Gyll sat behind her, silent, one hip up on the edge of her desk like some critical overseer. Valdisa paced, back and forth between the desk and the two antagonistic Hoorka, trying to find some way to discharge the tension in the room, trying to ignore her own feeling of pessimistic inevitability. She seemed tiny against d’Mannberg’s height and girth, sour when placed next to Aldhelm’s masked stoicism.
Much the way d’Embry seems to me. Too damn much like d’Embry.
“The two of you do nothing but argue. I’m sick of hearing about it—you can’t settle it talking, can’t fight it out on the practice strips. Now you demand first blood—what was it this time?” She could hear the irritation in her voice, melded with fear of her inadequacy—sharp, petty, nasal.
D’Mannberg glanced at Aldhelm and shrugged. “Does it matter, Thane?” he asked. “We seem to be able to reach no better solution. My honor would like the blood he demands.”
“Your honor also demands that you do what’s best for Hoorka-kin. Fighting among ourselves only weakens Hoorka. We’ve enough problems at the moment without risking injury to appease somebody’s wounded pride.” All the time walking—to the desk, back again.
“You fought Bachier, Thane.” Despite his restlessness, Aldhelm’s voice was calm. His eyes seemed to mock her. “That was no doubt a great help to our kin.”
In the midst of a step, Valdisa whirled about, her nightcloak billowing out like a dark wing. “I
had
to fight Bachier—he insulted me during Council. Every decision I make seems to be grounds for open discussion among the elder kin; I had to prove myself worthy to be Thane, and I had no wish to hurt Bachier. I’ve seen the two of you, watched you both. You circle each other like tiger cubs, constantly seeing how far you can go before the other lashes out with claws. You want to hurt each other too much.”
“We only want first blood. Thane. Nothing more. It’s our right, under the code, to be allowed to have it,” Aldhelm said.
Valdisa nodded. She inhaled, held it, then let the breath go with a sigh. “Can’t you wait a few nights, see if it’s still this important to you then? If your blood cools, maybe you’ll be able to talk out your misunderstanding. I’d be happy to arbitrate, to help the two of you sift out the problems.”
“You can’t stop them, Thane.” Gyll spoke from behind her, his voice natural, unstressed: a simple, factual statement. She turned to him, accusing.
“How can you be so certain of that?”
“Look at them.” He nodded to the two assassins. “Neither of them wants to give in. Give it up, Thane. Let them have first blood.”
Valdisa blinked in surprised anger at Gyll’s indiscreet candor. Feeling the boil of temper rising, she turned back to d’Mannberg and Aldhelm. “You won’t wait? You insist on immediate satisfaction?”
D’Mannberg nodded, echoed by Aldhelm.
“Then you can have it.” Her voice was clipped, curt, official. She cloaked her feelings in the mask of distant authority. “Ulthane Gyll will judge the match. Call my apprentice as you leave, Aldhelm. Have her inform the kin of the match. Then prepare yourselves. You may go.”
She watched them leave, stonily, wrapping her nightcloak around her as if cold. As the door crashed shut behind them, she looked back to Gyll.
“Don’t”
—heavily—“
ever
advise me in that manner again, Gyll.”
“You’ve told me you want my advice.”
“As a friend advises a friend. Not like a god advises his worshipers.”
“Valdisa—”
“You can leave too, Gyll.”
He was suddenly contrite. “Valdisa, I’m sorry . . . I was way too brusque and you deserve to be angry. It just seemed so obvious that they wouldn’t have it any other way. I know what d’Mannberg thinks about Aldhelm—you must have heard what he said during their last practice.”
Valdisa suddenly lost her anger. Her shoulders slumped beneath the dark cloth of the nightcloak. “I’ve heard you voice the same suspicion—that Aldhelm might have murdered Gunnar. I still don’t believe that, Gyll. And it’s not worth shedding blood over.”
“If it’s true?”
“I believe my kin.”
Gyll hesitated. The rest of the tale was on his tongue—his suspicion that Aldhelm had lied that night, his subsequent failure at finding the supposed Irastian smith. It was, after all, the Thane’s business—if kin had done the dishonorable deed, then it was the Thane’s right to be aware of that and to mete out the punishment. Yet he couldn’t say it. He told himself that it was because it was still uncertain—Gyll might have missed the smith, or perhaps Aldhelm had some other task in Sterka that night, and Gyll had also not had the opportunity to confront Aldhelm directly. Whatever the reason, he said nothing; just nodded at Valdisa’s statement, wondering at his own arrogance in keeping this from her.
Valdisa smiled, touching his hand. “Hey, you have to judge this, neh? Go on, Gyll. I’ll be there in a few minutes.” A pause. She almost smiled. “Yah?”
Gyll squeezed her hand. He left.
Valdisa slumped back against her desk. “Damn,” she muttered to the walls.
• • •
The practice room, noisy with conversation, was crowded. The Hoorka-kin found what room they could, jostling good-naturedly. All other activity in Underasgard had stopped. A few Hoorka, vibrofoils in hand, stood about with sweat-slicked skin, breaths quick and loud, their own practice abandoned. Even Felling, with his stained apron over the swell of his paunch, was present. The blood-duel was not to be missed.
It would be quick. All of them knew that. First blood only (though it was whispered by some who had seen the two before that Aldhelm would not be contented with a simple scratch), and Ulthane Gyll was notorious for being a quick hand with his own foil in judging such matches. A nick would end it, if Gyll had his way. Cranmer, an apprentice towing his hoverholos, was hastily setting up his recording equipment, casting appealing glances at Gyll. The Ulthane strode back and forth along the chosen strip as Aldhelm and d’Mannberg feinted with shadows at either end.
Gyll glanced at Valdisa as she entered the cavern. She moved forward as the ranks gave way before her, leaving her standing in a small, clear circle of ground. Gyll didn’t know if that was deference or an indication of some uneasiness in her presence. He did know that the kin had never treated him so, and he could see from her stance that she was uncomfortable with the distancing. Valdisa nodded/shrugged to him.
Gyll stepped to center strip. “Kin-brothers, are you both ready?”
His clear baritone sent the muttering of the kin into silence. Aldhelm and d’Mannberg came to the middle of the strip.
“Your weapons, please.” Gyll quickly examined the vibrofoils (pull the control ring down, twist it sideways three clicks, let it snap back into position, locked), then he plunged the foils into dirt alongside the strip. Both went in easily, earth kicking up around the tips and the shivering vibrowire. He handed back the weapons and pulled his own foil from the rack. As the growl of vibros grew loud, he checked his own blade. “You will remember that this is first blood only,” Gyll said. “If either of you try to go beyond that, you’ll also be fighting my blade. Neither the Thane nor I wish kin to fight in this way—when it’s necessary you’ll do it by the code.” He glanced from one to the other.
Ric d’Mannberg was tense—his nervousness showed in the banded swirl of muscles in the back of his hands, thick fingers flexing over the foil’s grip. The polished guard threw back the underwater light of the nearest light-fungi; a slash of emerald crawled his arm. He rubbed his beard with a forefinger, scuffled the packed, resilient earth with bare feet.
Aldhelm was an enigma. The vibrofoil was held casually, the luminous tip down and swaying a few centimeters above the lined dirt. He glanced at d’Mannberg with a curious lethargy, as if the anger had cooled to a dispassionate dislike, as if he no longer viewed d’Mannberg as a person, but as a problem to be studied for the best method of execution. He simply nodded at Gyll’s admonition.
“This is the last chance,” Gyll continued. “I’d prefer that you reconsider. A disagreement, as Thane Valdisa told you”—he glanced at her; yes, she’d noticed the contrition in his voice—“needn’t be settled by blood.”
“On Neweden, that seems to be the way of things, Ulthane. Everyone supposes that you must seek blood to redeem yourself.” Aldhelm didn’t look at Gyll, but at d’Mannberg. The tip of his foil swayed. A muscle in his jaw twitched the scarred cheek. “I assume d’Mannberg still stands by his words to me?”
“Did I say any untruths, Aldhelm?” asked d’Mannberg.
The scar flicked again, fungi-light staining the flesh. “It doesn’t really matter, does it?”
“We’ll let the Dame decide.” D’Mannberg let the tip of his vibrofoil graze Aldhelm’s weapon. Metal whined and clashed; the foils bucked in their hands.
Gyll whipped his foil up, knocking the weapons aside. “You’ll begin when I start you, not before.” His eyes warned.
Watch this one carefully,
he told himself.
There’s been too much hurting of kin.
“Salute each other and begin,” he said. He stepped back from the strip.
Vibrofoils came up, met high with a clashing that sent quick sparks cascading to the earth. Their vibrations thrilled the air. Then the foils moved in a sudden dance, d’Mannberg stepping forward with an audible grunt, taking the high inside line. Parry and riposte—Aldhelm’s weapon moved with a lithe grace, and the meeting of foils gave birth to a bright, dying rain as vibrowire hissed in anger. Aldhelm moved his blade in a quick circle, a counter-parry of quarte, then lunged to the high inside line. D’Mannberg knocked the foil away with a beat, stepping back, but Aldhelm’s foil pursued. D’Mannberg kicked at Aldhelm’s foil hand, suddenly, but his foot found only air and as he wavered off-balance, Aldhelm thrust. Vibros screamed, whining as the foils scraped along each other’s length. The kin could see d’Mannberg’s foil held too low, the guard allowing access to shoulder and bicep. The larger man desperately lifted the weapon as Aldhelm’s foil slithered toward him. An intake of breath—those beside the strip were certain of a touch. Gyll moved forward, ready to halt them; Valdisa, in her inviolate circle, frowned.
But Aldhelm moved back, two quick steps, disengaging. D’Mannberg didn’t pursue. The cavern was suddenly quiet without the clashing of vibrofoils. The two Hoorka stared at one another. A droplet of sweat ran from d’Mannberg’s temple into his matted beard. Some inner communication seemed to leap from man to man. Then d’Mannberg took a step, sweeping his foil in a wide, looping arc like a saber. Aldhelm batted it aside easily. The foils barked metallically.
A breath.
Then Aldhelm took the initiative once more, quickly backing d’Mannberg down the strip. His foil beat d’Mannberg’s aside; he kicked out, his foot nearly finding d’Mannberg’s knee, slamming into the thick muscle of the thigh. The huge assassin stumbled backward and Aldhelm lunged.
But d’Mannberg was powered by instinct, going with the motion and half-falling to one side. His own counter-thrust was made in desperation, blind, trying to find Aldhelm before he himself was touched. His foil came under Aldhelm’s foil, past the flailing arm (even as he felt the agony of Aldhelm’s blade in his shoulder), and into Aldhelm’s unprotected stomach. The weight of Aldhelm’s lunge added force to d’Mannberg’s foil. The weapon, slicing upward, parted diaphragm from stomach, slid into lung tissue, the vibro tearing at flesh. Aldhelm, a look of astonishment on his scarred face, fell even as Gyll cried “Halt!” and strode forward. D’Mannberg—eyes wide, his breath halting—had already snapped off his vibro. Blood-slick wire hissed into the hilt. Aldhelm was prone, hands clutched over his belly, his foil kicking dust beside him. Thick blood flowed around his fingers, ran down his hands and arms. Gyll tossed his weapon aside and crouched beside the man. D’Mannberg knelt, bewildered, as the stasis holding the Hoorka broke.