'Kellen!'
He whirled at Jermayan's anguished cry, and stared in shock.
Running toward them was a mob of men and Centaurs with swords and clubs.
How… ?
Kellen stifled the automatic question. There would be time for questions later—if they survived. He summoned his battle-mind and ran toward the enemy.
He was closest to the group; they reached him—or he reached them— before Shalkan and Jermayan had taken more than a step or two.
Around him, the double-sight overlaid every one of the attackers; he fell into the fighting-trance without effort, and he met the attack of the nearest with no more thought than he had to put into taking a step forward. He had no shield, and his helmet was on Shalkan's saddle; that didn't matter. He automatically adjusted his defense to deal with those handicaps.
Jermayan hadn't had time to get his helm and shield either. And their opponents did have helmets, and shields that could turn or even stop a sword, and had the weight of numbers on their side as well. But they were facing an Elven Knight and a Knight-Mage, and their skills and their shields were not enough to protect them. Kellen knew that, bone-deep, blood-deep, and gave no more thought to it than that.
Kellen heard the slam of metal upon metal as Jermayan engaged his foe just behind him, and knew from the shouts and cries of pain just beyond Jermayan that Shalkan and Valdien were attacking as well. Good, he thought, then shut out all distraction to focus on his own battle.
He chose his target—a man wearing a shaggy bearskin vest with a chainmail shirt beneath. On his head he wore a close-fitting round helmet with a flat nosepiece, and carried a small round shield on his forearm, but his only heavy armor was a steel collar and shoulder guards. He smiled when he saw Kellen, and in that smile Kellen could almost read his thoughts—bright surcoat—fancy armor—no helmet —only a boy —easy prey.
Step and slash, Kellen told himself.
This was different from facing Jermayan in the practice ring. It was almost harder, because his enemy kept backing away, searching for an opening that Kellen wasn't willing to give him, all the while making wild swipes with his sword that had no chance of connecting. After a few seconds, Kellen realized that he needed to lure the man into attacking in order to finish him. He set up an easy patter of parry-right, strike-left, and parry-right, taking his parries farther and farther out away from the proper defensive line, and waited for the man to spot it and think he had found the weakness in his opponent's defenses.
As he'd hoped, the man rushed him, sword held foolishly high. Kellen stepped inside his opponent's swing with ease, felt the man's forearm jar harmlessly against his shoulder, grabbed the sword-arm with his left hand, and brought his own blade down on his foe's undefended shoulder with all his strength.
This time he did not turn his blade when he struck.
The razor edge of Elven steel slipped in between the steel shoulder guard and the steel neck-collar of his enemy's armor, sinking through bearskin vest, chain armor, flesh, and bone, to sever his attacker's arm cleanly at the joint.
The man reeled back, his torso spraying dark blood from severed arteries. He screamed in horror, pain, and shock, falling to his knees in a pool of spreading blood, groping after the limb that was no longer there before he fell over entirely.
Kellen dropped the arm he still held as if it had burned his hand, abruptly shocked out of his battle-trance. The man's screams of pain razored through him and he stood staring stupidly at the blood, and the dying man.
This was no game, no wondertale. It wasn't a practice session. This wasn't like the bloodless destruction of the stone Hounds. This was noisy and messy and real. He'd killed a man.
One moment he'd been alive, with a wife perhaps, or a sweetheart, siblings, parents. The next, he was dead.
And Kellen had killed him.
Then Jermayan jumped in front of him, shoving him back just as one of the Centaurs swept a spiked mace down just where Kellen's unprotected head would have been. Jermayan blocked, but the blow had caught him off- balance. The mace slammed into Jermayan's ribs, just where the jointed Elven armor was weakest, and Jermayan fell, crumpling awkwardly to the ground, his coiled black hair spilling free around him in a sudden untidy tangle.
No!
Kellen snapped back into full warrior mode again. Anger spilled around him, but did not touch him. He forgot everything but his training and his purpose. He stepped over Jermayan's body—always advance—and forced the
