" Damned Cur!" shouted the companion drawing his scimitar. The Black drew his blade. With two swift sweeps, arm, sword, and head fell in opposite directions from the torso of the doomed brawler.
" I can't have this!"
Leaping to his feet and overturning the table, Shirkuh came on like a stampede of bulls. The warrior smiled humorlessly. They met in a whirl of blades, briefly, then it was the Hammerhand being beaten down, finally collapsing to the inn’s floor with a split skull.
Darting like a hunting hawk after his sky borne prey, he cut down two luckless others who had ventured upon him from behind. Scattering a crowd from a corner, he turned to face the beguiled denizens, stunned by the speed of his kills. He stood crouched, legs apart in a fighting man's stance, and his roaring laugh of triumph echoing in the inn.
" When you tell your miserable live stories to other maggots, tell them you saw the Son of the So, Sumunguru, rid the world of fools and the wind of his blade strikes cleansed your cringing souls. I'm still ready to dance, who's ready to be damned?"
The inn emptied, among those bolting Hassan. But it was not totally from fear. He thought he had found what his master the caid was seeking.
* * *
Sumunguru wiped his sword’s blade on the bodies then lanced his eyes at the frightened innkeeper peeping from the kitchen.
“I want a clean cloth, you hear me, to wipe the spew from my blade. Then a plate of that roast goat you are said to be noted for. And a flagon of the wine of this country, too.”
He caught sight of several females in back of the proprietor, two of them painted of features. He smiled at them most reassuringly reaching out an elegantly raised hand towards them.
“Heap my plate, man, I’ve worked up quite a hunger.”
* * *
As one incident played out down in the city and one messenger hurried off to deliver news he hoped would earn him reward, in an ancient walled manor not far from the scenes of celebration and blood, two figures sat across from one another over a low ivory tiled table. One was garbed in a swirl of colorful silks belted with a gold wire inlaid in semiprecious stones. Bald he was with a smooth triangular face. Under his heavy white brows two humor filled red eyes gazed out over a poniard sharp nose. It shadowed thin lips currently exposing teeth a fox would envy.
Darker complexioned was the second, a streak of gray racing through her thick mane of black oiled hair. Her smooth tan skin adorned a lithe frame wearing a most becoming yellow and red gown. Her face was not veiled, nor was there humor in her bright green eyes. Her full lips were trembling with anger she was trying to contain.
“I see no reason why we should be quarrelling, my sister,” the male said, especially sibilant on their implied relationship. “It is but a happenstance I have come to this place . . .”
“Goxjivme, spill that milk for one of your acolytes to lap up!”, the woman said through clenched teeth. “Your hatred for the warrior is well known and is most evident,” she said, now smiling mountain winter cold at Goxjivme’s empty left sleeve.
It was his turn to feel enraged. “Be careful, who you mock, witch! I’m not some imp to jump at the clapping of your hands!”
“No? So how did Lord Sumunguru send you into the bush, howling like a kicked jackal pup?”
“Here is where your beloved champion dies wench! Dethroned, alone and thousands of miles from his home.”
“Why Gox! The poets hereabouts surely must inspire you! A new safer career beckons ahead. You’d be wise to take it.”
The room was soon empty except for the purposely acrid wisp of dissipating vapor.
“What have I got you into now my true one?” she asked the room. Of course it did not answer.
* * *
Later that night after the main celebrations had left the squares and all but the most profane of taverns, the starlit sky shone on a paved road ascending the ancient slopes of the bygone Celtic fort, itself transformed into, first, a Roman temple, than a church of the semi civilized Goth inheritors/invaders, was the Alhambra of the Malik Battur. Like a lion at rest, its moon white washed stones emanated an air of coolness and power, its famed seven fountains sang a sound of solace in the more private of areas. But all that was a false note. For Malik Battur’s usually calm features were knitted in a mask of rage.
The eunuch who he had assigned to his daughter’s wedding escort, had been returned with a message. He couldn’t deliver it verbally, for his head had been delivered packed in a jar of ice. Formerly known for his skill as an informer on the doings in the harem, his sightless eyes said this was to be his last report. The six of the Silver Panther’s men who had escorted the messenger waited outside the audience room, detained and visibly nervous. They had said it was delicacies their master was sure the caid would most surely enjoy. Whether true and they were blameless expendables, or bold sardonic wolves in on the joke of their master, he had ground his teeth to decide what to do them if anything.
His advisor Umr Kaftawbr, and the captain of his guard the Christian mercenary, Sebastiano of Juerano, were with him in attendance in the brightly lit room in the north section of the palace.
“The dog is up to his usual games, my said, howling at his own wit,” Umr said in his cold atonal voice.
The sight of the unfortunate’s head had caused him to refuse the wine proffered to him. Sebastiano was not bothered in the least but he was keeping a wary eye on his client
