as much space between them as he could, but the ring of shields was only so big. That was the point of it.
They slowly circled each other, Dow strutting with easy grace, sword swinging loose, as cocky and comfortable in a duel to the death as Calder might’ve been in his own bedchamber. Calder took the doddery, uncertain steps of a child just learning to walk, mouth hanging open, already breathing hard, cringing and stumbling at Dow’s every tiniest taunting movement. The noise was deafening, breath going up in smoky puffs as the onlookers roared and hissed and hooted their support and their hatred and their…
Calder blinked, blinded for a moment. Dow had worked him around so the rising sun stabbed past the ragged edge of the standard and right in Calder’s eyes. He saw metal glint, waved his sword helplessly, felt something thud into his left shoulder and spin him sideways, making a breathless squeal, waiting for the agony. He slid, righted himself, was shocked to see none of his own blood spraying. Dow had only slapped him with the flat. Toying with him. Making a show of it.
Laughter swept through the crowd, enough to sting some anger up in Calder. He gritted his teeth, hefting his sword. If he wasn’t attacking he was losing. He lunged at Dow but it was so slippery underfoot he couldn’t get any snap in it. Dow just turned sideways and caught Calder’s wobbling sword as he laboured past, blades scraping together, hilts locking.
‘Fucking weak,’ hissed Dow, and flung Calder away like a man might swat away a fly, heels kicking hopelessly at the slop as he reeled across the circle.
The men on Dow’s side were less helpful than Hansul had been. A shield cracked Calder in the back of the skull and sent him sprawling. For a moment he couldn’t see, couldn’t breathe, skin fizzing all over. Then he was dragging himself up, limbs feeling like they weighed a ton a piece, the circle of mud tipping wildly about, jeering voices all booming and burbling.
He didn’t have his sword. Reached for it. A boot came down and squashed his hand into the cold mud, spraying flecks of it in his face. He gave a gasp, more shock than pain. Then another, definitely pain as Dow twisted his heel, crushing Calder’s fingers deeper.
‘Prince of the North?’ The point of Dow’s sword pricked into Calder’s neck, twisting his head towards the bright sky, making him slither helplessly up onto all fours. ‘You’re a fucking embarrassment, boy.’ And Calder gasped as the point flicked his head back and left a burning cut up the middle of his chin.
Dow was trotting away, arms up, dragging out the show, a half-circle of leering, gurning, sneering faces showing above the shields behind him, all shouting. ‘Black … Dow … Black … Dow …’ Tenways chanting gleefully along, and Golden, and Shivers just frowning, weapons thrusting at the air behind them in time.
Calder worked his hand trembling out of the mud. From what he could tell as red-black spots pattered onto it from his chin, not all of his finger-joints were where they used to be.
‘Get up!’ An urgent voice behind him. Pale-as-Snow, maybe. ‘Get up!’
‘Why?’ he whispered at the ground. The shame of it. Butchered by an old thug for the amusement of baying morons. He couldn’t say it was undeserved, but that made it no more appealing, and no less painful either. His eyes flickered around the circle, desperately seeking a way out. But there was no way through the thicket of stomping boots, punching fists, twisted mouths, rattling shields. No way out but blood.
He took a few breaths until the world stopped spinning, then fished his sword from the mud with his left hand and got ever so slowly to his feet. Probably he should’ve been feigning weakness, but he didn’t know how he could look any weaker than he felt. He tried to shake the fuzz from his head. He had a chance, didn’t he? Had to attack. But by the dead, he was tired. Already. By the dead, his broken hand hurt, cold all the way to his shoulder.
Dow flicked his sword spinning into the air with a flourish. Left himself open for a moment in a show of warrior’s arrogance. The moment for Calder to strike, and save himself, and earn a place in the songs besides. He tensed his leaden legs to spring, but by then Dow had already snatched the sword from the air with his left hand and was standing ready, his warrior’s arrogance well deserved. They faced each other as the crowd slowly quieted, and the blood ran from Calder’s slit chin and worked its way tickling down his neck.
‘Your father died badly, as I remember,’ Dow called to him. ‘Head smashed to pulp in the circle.’ Calder stood in silence, saving his breath for another lunge, trying to judge the space between them. ‘Hardly had a face at all once the Bloody-Nine was done with him.’ A big step and a swing. Now, while Dow was busy boasting. Two men fight, there’s always a chance. Dow grinned. ‘A bad death. Don’t worry, though…’
Calder sprang, teeth rattling as his left boot thumped down and sprayed wet dirt, his sword going high and slicing hard towards Dow’s skull. There was a slapping of skin as Dow caught Calder’s left hand in his right, crushing Calder’s fist around the hilt of his sword, blade wrenched up to waggle harmlessly at the sky.
‘…I’ll make sure yours is worse,’ Dow finished.
Calder pawed at Dow’s shoulder with his broken hand, fingers flopping uselessly at his father’s chain. The thumb still worked, though, and he scraped at Dow’s pitted cheek with the nail, drawing a little bead of blood, growling as he tried to force it into the hole where Dow’s ear used to be along with all his disappointment, and his desperation, and his anger, finding that flap of scar with the tip, baring his teeth as…
The pommel of Dow’s sword drove into his ribs with a hollow thud and pain flashed through him to the roots of his hair. He probably would’ve screamed if he’d had any breath in him, but it was all gone in one ripping, vomiting wheeze. He tottered, bent over, bile washing into his frozen mouth and dangling in a string from his bloody lip.
‘Thought you were the big
‘Stand up, fucker.’ Dow’s hand thumped shut around Calder’s throat, quick and final as a bear trap. ‘For once in your life, stand up.’ And Dow hauled Calder straight, not able to stand by himself, not able to move his one good hand or the sword still uselessly stuck in it, not able even to breathe. Singularly unpleasant, having your windpipe squeezed shut. Calder squirmed helplessly. His mouth tasted of sick. His face was burning, burning. It always catches people by surprise, the moment of their death, even when they should see it coming. They always think they’re special, somehow expect a reprieve. But no one’s special. Dow squeezed harder, making the bones in Calder’s neck click. His eyes felt like they were going to pop. Everything was getting bright.
‘You think this is the end?’ Dow grinned as he lifted Calder higher, feet almost leaving the mud. ‘I’m just getting started, you fu…’
There was a sharp crack and blood sprayed up, dark streaks against the sky. Calder lurched back clumsily, gasping as his throat and his sword hand came free, near slipping over as Dow fell against him then flopped face down in the filth.
Blood gushed from his split skull, spattering Calder’s ruined boots.
Time stopped.
Every voice sputtered out, coughed off, leaving the circle in sudden, breathless silence. Every eye fixed on the bubbling wound in the back of Black Dow’s head. Caul Shivers stood glowering down in the midst of those gaping faces, the sword that had been the Bloody-Nine’s in his fist, the grey blade dashed and speckled with Black Dow’s blood.
‘I’m no dog,’ he said.
Calder’s eyes flicked to Tenways’, just as his flicked to Calder’s. Both their mouths open, both doing the sums. Tenways was Black Dow’s man. But Black Dow was dead, and everything was changed. Tenways’ left eye twitched, just a fraction.
You get a chance, don’t hesitate. Calder flung himself forward, not much more than falling, his sword coming down as Tenways reached for the hilt of his, eyes going wide. He tried to bring his shield up, got it tangled with the man beside him, and Calder’s blade split his rashy face open right down to his nose, blood showering out across the men beside him.
Just goes to show, a poor fighter can beat a great one easily, even with his left hand. As long as he’s the one with the drawn sword.
Beck looked around as he felt Shivers move. Saw the blade flash over and stared, skin prickling, as Dow hit the muck. Then he went for his sword. Wonderful caught his wrist before it got there.
‘No.’
