'Was that a challenge?' Sardec asked calmly. Iciness had settled in his veins now. He was not going to be insulted by these oafs. He saw the officer he confronted swallow but he rallied and said: 'I will not cross swords with a cripple.'
'Perhaps you would prefer pistols?' Sardec suggested. His fury gave his voice a politeness and a calmness that he would never have suspected himself capable of. He was suddenly totally aware of his surroundings as he normally only was in combat. He saw the faces of the onlookers. The Terrarchs looked worried. The Kharadreans looked pleased to see this falling out among their conquerors. Rena was terrified. Despite the look on her face the words just slipped out. 'Or are you afraid?'
That was a challenge to which there could be only one response from a Queen's Officer and everyone present knew it. The group of drunkards had gone quiet now, the seriousness of the situation suddenly impressed on them. The officer swallowed again. There was a trapped look in his eye. Sardec gave a small cold smile of triumph.
'Or are you afraid?' he repeated.
The officer shook his head. There was a look of panic in his eyes. He was wondering how this situation had sprung up on him so quickly. Sardec felt the same way, but the whirlwind of combat had left him experienced in dealing with that sensation. 'Perhaps you would like to apologise to my companion,' Sardec suggested, partially to humiliate his foe, partially to give him a way out.
'I will not apologise to a monkey,' the officer blurted. Sardec slapped him. It was not a powerful blow, which made it all the more insulting. The mark of his hand blotched the other Terrarch's cheek. There was only one way that stain could be wiped off with honour.
'My name is Lieutenant Deakan,' said the officer. 'I shall have my seconds call on you to fix a place and time. Given your invalidity the sword would be a dishonourable choice, so I choose pistols.'
'That will be most satisfactory,' said Sardec.
'No,' murmured Rena. Sardec took her by the arm and sauntered away, feigning a casualness he was far from feeling. Behind him, he could hear Deakan's brother officers begin babbling advice and warnings. He felt a tug on his sleeve and turned to see the officer who had started the whole thing.
Sardec raised an eyebrow. 'Do you wish to fight too, sir? If so I will deal with you after I have settled things with your companion.'
The officer looked shame-faced. 'This is wrong, Lieutenant Sardec. Our behaviour was insulting to both you and your companion. I hope you will accept my apologies and forget about this matter.'
'If Lieutenant Deakan feels the same way, he can come and apologise himself.'
'He does not wish to, sir, but I do from the bottom of my heart. Please do not let this matter get out of hand.'
'He's right, my lord,' said Rena. The other officer gave her an angry glance; he did not like having her plead his case for him. Sardec wanted to tell her that he was doing this for her, but he realized that was a lie. He was doing it for himself, to salvage his own pride and to redeem himself from the fear he felt about the bite he had taken.
'The matter got out of hand when you started insulting my companion. I repeat if your friend apologizes to her the matter can be forgotten.'
'He cannot apologize to a human whor…' The officer bit of his words just in time. Drunk though he was he knew how close he had come to making matters infinitely worse. 'You know that.' he added weakly.
Sardec shrugged. 'Then the matter stands.'
Anger contorted the fellow's face. 'You have placed Deakan in an intolerable position, sir. If he kills you, he has murdered a cripple. If you kill him, he is dead.'
'Deakan placed himself in this position. He knows how to extract himself from it. I will ignore your own words, sir, since you are obviously distraught. I bid you good day.'
Arm in arm with Rena he walked off down the street. Despite himself he felt a small satisfaction at leaving the other Terrarch speechless.
Chapter Eleven
Sardec awoke before dawn. The chamber was cold and it was difficult to get out of bed. His dreams had been troubled affairs, full of vivid images of the spidery servants of Ulan Ultar and the hidden tunnels beneath Achenar where he had lost his hand.
For a moment, he was disoriented, not quite sure where he was. He had a nagging sense that something was wrong. Rena stirred beside him, her warm weight pressing against his side. She murmured something in her sleep, and he felt a momentary surge of affection for her. Then, suddenly, stunningly, it came to him: today was the day he was due to fight a duel with Lieutenant Deakan. Within a few hours he might be dead. The enormity of it shook him. From out of nowhere, in what should have been a peaceful time, death had reached out with his bony claws.
He sighed and swung his long legs out of the bed. His feet touched the wooden floor and he worried for a moment that he would get a splinter in his foot. He smiled nervously at the ludicrousness of the thought. In the not too distant future a bullet might come crashing through his brain and here he was worried about the prospect of splinters. How strangely the mind worked. He drew on his leggings clumsily and scratched at the scab on the back of his hand.
If a bullet found him today, it might prove a mercy. At least he would die while he was still himself. The conviction that the ghoul disease was destined to take him had settled in his mind, and he did not seem able to shake it. It had all the inevitability of the sunset. He wondered if such pessimism was a symptom that his mind had started to go, or whether it was just because he was tired and hungry.
He glanced out the window. The first faint glimmerings of light had just appeared in the autumn sky. The streets had a ghostly twilit quality that gave the shuffling vendors an unreal quality. Already the first of the street dwellers were stirring, picking among the nightsoil and the garbage, searching for something, anything that would help them survive another day.
How many times had he looked out of windows like this and never even noticed such people, Sardec wondered? They had always just been part of the scenery, animated bits of landscape that no more impinged upon his life than the signs for cheap habiliments that hung above their heads. Now he found himself wondering what it would be like to be one of them, to live their lives, to eke out their fragile existence, to never have to worry about honour, or place or preferment.
He turned and looked at Rena. A street like that was the place she had come from. Something told him that life was no less complex down there, merely harder, and it struck him forcibly and not for the first time just how privileged his life had really been. He had been born wealthy into one of the highest families in the land. His whole life until Achenar had been one of ease.
He concentrated on the girl as he continued to dress. How lovely she looked as she lay there, her hair a glossy raven's wing against the coverlets. He wondered at the way she moved him, in a way that none of his other lovers ever had, though they had been Terrarchs and closer by far to his station. Why was that? Had she uncovered some deep-seated flaw in his nature, or was it something else, a strength he had not known he had possessed? Perhaps a part of it was simple egotism. He was rebelling against his heritage, showing he was different from all the other Terrarchs. There was something about that which appealed to him, even as he knew how ludicrous it was. He was far from the only officer in the Talorean army who had a human mistress. It was likely that he was not the only one who cared for her either.
She was awake and looking at him, had been all the time. 'Good morning,' he said softly and smiled. She did not smile back. She looked appalled and saddened.
'Are you really going to do this thing?' she asked.
'I don't have any choice.'
'Yes, you do. You can simply not show up.'
'And I would be the laughing stock of the army.'
'It's better than being dead,' she said. The easy stock response came to his lips. Perhaps for you, he was
