Deep in the center of the clouds of red rage that roiled in her head, Linsha kept a desperate grip on a small struggling core of self-control. She’d heard the term “beserker” before, but she had never experienced such a transformation until now. Her common sense whispered that yes, her rage was fueled from days of pent-up animosity, disappointment, loneliness, and guilt, but there was something more, something artificial that boiled in her brain and set her blood on fire. She wanted to damage Malawaitha, to spill her blood, and tear her to pieces by any means possible. It was both frightening and exhilarating.
In the cooler, detached center of her self-control, a little thought said, Be smart. Use your rage to your advantage. Don’t give in completely to the fury.
Easier said than done.
Linsha swung her axe up with both hands and just barely blocked a powerful swing by Malawaitha that would have removed her arm if it had connected. The shock jarred down her bones. Malawaitha grinned with malice and switched the handle to her left hand and swung again. Linsha ducked out of the way and landed a kick on the Tarmak’s ribs. Breathing heavily, she danced out of Malawaitha’s reach while her foe gasped for air. Linsha did not give her a moment to regain her strength. Malawaitha was too well trained with the battle axe. She knew how to hold the intricately carved brass handle that could slip so easily in a sweaty grip. From years of practice she understood the weight of the blade and how to use it to its greatest advantages. She knew the best way to use the butt end of the handle to smash it into Linsha’s nose or eye or mouth. With her longer reach and greater strength, she swung the weapon with bloody efficiency and skill. Linsha’s only hope was to stay out of the way of the blade and try to wear Malawaitha down before her own strength waned or this berserker flame in her body died.
With a wild shout, Linsha leaped again at Malawaitha. Her foot lashed out and deflected the axe far enough for her to knock the young Tarmak’s feet out from under her and send her crashing to the ground. She swung her blade toward her enemy’s head.
Malawaitha twisted out of the way and made a swipe at her ankles that forced Linsha to leap away. In that moment Malawaitha catapulted to her feet and faced Linsha again.
The crowd cheered wildly.
Linsha saw the pleasure in Malawaitha’s eyes, saw the sneer of confidence that she would soon be the victor. Her anger rose to new heights that seared away almost every sense but her sight. She felt no pain from aching muscles, or the bangs and bruises on her arms and legs, or the shallow slash on her abdomen, or the tingling of the blue paint on her skin. She did not taste the blood that trickled over her lip or hear the crude shouts from the spectators. All she saw, all she wanted to see, was her opponent. She noticed how the sweat glistened on Malawaitha’s face, and blood from a deep graze on her shoulder gleamed red against the blue paint. Her eyes followed the Tarmak’s every movement, every shift of her dark eyes, every twitch of her face.
They traded blows again, their blue bodies struggling back and forth across the stone paving. Their axes clashed viciously, blade against blade or blade against handle. Soon they both bled freely from lacerations on their arms and upper bodies. Linsha’s cheek and eye swelled from a hard blow from Malawaitha’s elbow, and the young Tarmak limped from a battered knee cap.
This can’t last much longer, Linsha’s inner thought told her. Although she couldn’t feel the fatigue yet, she could see her muscles trembling with the effort of movement. Malawaitha, too, was struggling for breath and for balance, and she was less accurate in her attack.
Linsha bared her teeth. Gods, she loathed this woman. Malawaitha was the figurehead of everything she hated about the Tarmak-the arrogance and tyranny, the bloody-minded stubbornness that kept her trapped here, and the malice that meant only harm to herself and her friends.
Linsha swung her axe.
—
She swung again, bringing the blade down hard on Malawaitha’s in time to the words that pounded in her head.
—
The axes crashed, sending a shock down Linsha’s arms.
She gritted her teeth and struck again.
—
The blades clashed together a fifth time and Linsha felt the blades lock. The handle slipped in her weakening grasp. The blade deflected off her foe’s axe and slid sideways in her sweating palm. The unexpected twist threw her off balance, and she staggered and fell against Malawaitha’s arm. Her axe slid from her aching hand and crashed to the stones.
The Tarmak woman staggered sideways under Linsha’s weight and lost her hold on her own weapon. Seeking an advantage, she managed to snatch Linsha’s hair and drag her down with her. The two women landed side by side on the ground.
All at once Linsha felt an arm snake around her neck and she found herself pinned in a death grip with Malawaitha’s arm locked across her throat. She felt the Tarmak’s embrace tighten around her like iron bands. She tried to breath and realized she could not draw in a breath. Her throat was being crushed beneath Malawaitha’s powerful forearm and her head was immobilized.
Malawaitha’s breath blew hot on her ear. “I will kill you slowly with my hands,” she hissed in Tarmakian.
Linsha could not reply. Pain registered in her mind, screaming in her neck and back and lungs. Blood pounded in her head and behind her eyes. Panic clawed at the rage that still fired her mind. Her hands tore at Malawaitha’s arm, but she might as well try to tear out stone. Her vision blackened as her eyes strained again the mounting pain and pressure in her head. Her feet kicked, trying to connect against Malawaitha’s shins or knees or feet. It was all of little use. The implacable pressure on her throat continued to crush the life out of her.
Then her fingers touched a familiar hard disk hanging at her neck. The chain was caught under the Tarmak’s arm, but the two dragon scales lay free on her chest. Linsha snatched them. She knew from touch which was which. Lord Bight had edged the bronze scale with a thin rim of gold. However, Iyesta’s scale had been given on the spur of the moment and there had been no time since to match the rim. The brass scale was hard as metal, thin as a disk, and sharp enough to do damage. Linsha’s fingers angled it and slashed the curved edge down Malawaitha’s forearm. The Tarmak made a gasping noise, but she did not scream or loosen her grip. Her strength ebbing, Linsha tried again. Desperately she slashed Malawaitha’s arm a second, a third, a fourth time. She could tell the scale was cutting deeply into the woman’s arm, because she shuddered each time and her blood ran down warm and slippery onto Linsha’s chest. Yet still she clung tenaciously to Linsha’s throat.
There was no air left in Linsha’s lungs. Her mind was shutting down; her head throbbed. Frantic now, she summoned the last tatters of her waning strength and hacked the dragon scale against the back of Malawaitha’s wrist. Something gave beneath the edge of the scale.
A sound somewhere between a gasp and a choked-off scream burst in her ear, and the Tarmak’s arm slid off just enough for Linsha to gasp for air. Her throat hurt abominably and her air passage felt pressed flat, but a thin stream of air slid out of her aching lungs and blessed fresh breath flowed in. She gasped again and coughed. Malawaitha shifted under her, and the woman’s uninjured arm moved as she sought to get another grip around Linsha’s neck. The terror of being pinned again shot a burst of energy through Linsha’s flagging muscles. She lifted her head as high as she could manage and brought it down hard on Malawaitha’s face. Pain shot through her head, but she guessed from Malawaitha’s cry that it was not as bad as the damage done to her enemy.
Taken by surprise, Malawaitha had taken the full brunt of Linsha’s head blow on her nose. Groaning, she clapped a hand to her injured face. Linsha rolled off and scrambling to her hands and knees, she sought for an axe. The Tarmak scrabbled away from her, blood streaming down her broken nose and pouring from her arm. They both saw the closest axe at the same time.
Both women lunged for the weapon. Malawaitha’s longer arm reached the axe a fraction of a second sooner, but Linsha’s hand swerved in mid reach, bunched into a fist, and smashed a powerful upper cut into Malawaitha’s broken nose. Blood splattered them both. The Tarmak sagged over the axe, stunned by the blow.
Trembling with the effort, Linsha lunged after the second axe, crawled to her feet and stood over
