Sumunguru had drove his sword into the belly of one escort, spilling he and his entrails into the churned-up soil. A rescuer rode up, screaming a battle cry. It soon turned into a brief screech of pain, with Sumunguru parrying his blow before delivering his own to his assailant’s ribs. He ducked in time a lance thrust, shearing the haft of it, before slamming home his blade like a fang into the throat of its unlucky wielder.
“Die Dog!” cried out a red bearded horseman, bloody scimitar aloft.
“Not today! And not by such as you, carrion bound bastard!”
Like two predators in their prime and fighting for dominance of all around, the two champions dazzled the spectators with the display of their lethal skills. Abu Shama was a keen blade master, one of the finest in the region. Was. Sumunguru rained down blows that would have gave pause to a charging rhino. His arm numb, sweat blinding him, Abu Shama saw his end approaching as an unavoidable retribution of heaven, then the cold bite, and the blank of oblivion, as Sumunguru drove his blade into Abu Shama’s chest, its force snapping links of mail front and back. Before the dead man could topple from his ornate saddle, a swift reacting Sumunguru grasped him by his beard and beheaded him with a side slice up of his sword, leaving a lateral stump gushing blood.
Stunned witnesses looked on in disbelief, then terror as Sumunguru placed the back of the severed head’s neck in his mouth sinking his teeth into the flesh. Hands thus free, he soon cut down another of the surviving escort, whose shock at the ghastly sight coming towards him chilled his soon to be spilt blood, still. Leaping over the fallen guard and reaching the silk and leather covered cart Sumunguru leaped from his saddle into the cart, to a chorus of screams Removing the trophy, he spoke matter of factly, as if at a far more peaceful endeavor.
“I’ve no time to be gentle, darling, come along.”
Thrown out bodily was a screaming slave girl then the daughter of Malik Battur was seen hanging limp over his shoulders, as Sumunguru jumped down from the cart to take swift strides to mount the relatively fresh mount of the late Abu Shama, who had stood loyally by its master’s crumpled corpse. Throwing the woman across the saddle Sumunguru sprung into the saddle and tore off westward up into the hills, the grisly bounty gripped firm in his teeth. Any interference was shown to be fatal as he cut down an overeager light horseman in his path, keen to attempt to avenge his leader’s son’s fate and mortally wounded another too slow to make a clear path to the djinn thundering his way.
The handful of Battur’s men left were fleeing, closely pursued by the riders of the Silver Panther. But their leader Kalawun now felt they were pawns meant to cloak the demon in their midst.
“Our lord is not going to like this one bit, friend Kalawun,” said the ex- Mameluke, the Turk Ilghazi, as they both sat their steeds in the midst of the stricken crossroad. Kalawun shrugged his broad shoulders, then sent a stream of phlegm from his broken nose onto the torn ground.
“All things considered, Muamir didn’t like this boy all that much, just the mother. As for that “peace offering”, that djinn or whatever, is headed in the right direction.”
He looked off at the small speck fast fading from view as it got amongst the rock-strewn west hills.
“Take twenty who still have Allah’s gift of balls and keep him headed in that direction. The rest of you’–raising his voice so those still on the field and unhurt heard– ‘get ours out from among these gifts to the buzzards. Qutub, get your ass back to the hold and tell our lord all that has happened here! There is a chance that the ceremony might still be able to go on tonight.”
He shivered, hopefully not too visibly. Though long gone from the strict path of his youth, even he knew what Ashad had been doing for the last decade or so was ever so . . . soul cringingly . . . a wounded man of Battur’s, Hassan, cried out when death finally, violently, sank upon him.
Having found a stream Sumunguru rested and watered his horse as well as himself. He threw off his shredded khalat, to expose his mail clad body. Then the prize of Abu Shama’s head was wrapped in a good piece of it, another long thin strip was used to bind the woman known to him now by the name of Dihya. The young woman was cursed by having the facial features of her father the caid. A too broad forehead went down to a small chin, topped by a very small mouth. A moustache and beard did not mask that feature. Large brown eyes stared at him as he went through the saddlebags of his new horse.
“Here, eat some of this bread and cheese. We’ll more and likely be hunted through these hills so I won’t have time to forage for us, so eat up. Go on, or are you worried about me, your highness?”
“Who-who- who are you? What do you call yourself amongst we mortals, devil?” she said gaining control somewhat of the tremor in her voice. She made as if to hold her head higher on her long pale neck.
Sumunguru smiled, acknowledging the young woman’s courage despite all she had been through.
“I am Sumunguru Kante of the So peoples. From the lands far south of here, below the sand and rock sea, in another world altogether. But the emotions and deeds of men are the same there as here.”
“Such as,” she said, her curiosity rising, despite her fear.
The few of his color she had seen
