their backs. I sliced some flesh and the blood spouted. A hoarse shout rose from the assembled warriors and then, out of nowhere, I felt a keen blade slice down my side. I swiveled and lurched away and I felt the blood running down my side; but I did not put a hand to it. There was no time.
Kov Nath bored in, his four blades wheeling with as much ferocity as when we had begun.
“You are a dead nulsh now, Notor Prescot!”
I had discarded the idea of throwing a djangir. I could have done so — as could he — but I think we both realized we had the skill to slip a blade. But the hurling of a djangir was something he could afford better than could I, for he had four.
“Prepare to meet your pagan gods!” he bellowed again, and charged, and the four blades sang and whistled about me. I thought of nothing much thereafter, except a memory of three things — of Zair, of dealing with the savage beasts of Kregen, and of Delia.
I concentrated on cutting him up piece by piece. I would not be clever, or go for the big one. As I had the shorgortz and the Ullgishoa and the boloth, three out of many memorable combats, I would deal with this wild leemshead piecemeal.
He was very quick and very clever and he bored in without allowing me a moment’s respite, now that he thought he had me and I was done for. I let him come in and so twisted and leaped far to the side, away from the point of his attack. As I leaped both my djangirs came down onto his upper right arm. I hacked with tremendous force, and, together, the blades struck, cutting and shattering the arm so that the white bone showed bloodily through the skin.
Immediate yells broke out from all around the sacred court. Kov Nath staggered back, looking stupidly at the ruin of his arm. His fingers could no longer hold the djangir and they opened, and the blade — it had some of my blood upon it — slid jangling to the floor.
I did not give him time to recover from the shock.
I came in low, almost bent double, surged up, and hacked across his lower left forearm, taking off the wrist, the hand, and the djangir in a splashing gout of blood.
The Djangs have an astounding agility and an almost superhuman strength. Shock and amazement shattered Kov Nath, but he came back at me with fearful courage and ferocity. I had to hack and slash and slice and fend him off, but, all blood-smeared with his two ruined arms flailing, like some ghastly monster from the deepest hells of Kregen, he pursued me. I backed up and turned and waited. Then, as he lunged with a fearful scream to sink the djangirs in my throat, and I fronted him and smashed them aside, I saw the first faint crack in his psychology, the first chink in his armor of courage. But he would not give in as easily as that. The stump of his left lower arm battered my body, bruising me around the ribs. I swung away, and as he bellowed and charged to follow I let him have a Krozair of Zy foot-kick. I missed the target, but he screamed and backed away, and I slashed — rather foolishly — at his throat, for I wanted to finish this ghastly business quickly now. His return sliced down my arm, drawing blood and making me grip the djangir tightly, for I thought I’d lost control of my arm then. He saw that, and the chink in his armor closed. He stood for a moment glaring, his chest heaving, blood and sweat rivering down his magnificent body.
“By Zodjuin of the Stormclouds! You will die now, apim!”
I felt that I might usefully add an observation to the so far one-sided conversation. I said, “By Vox, you nurdling onker! You have but two hands now! You are less than an apim now!
And, by Zim-Zair, you will be less than a dead apim before a mur or two!”
He flinched back.
Oh, yes, he was magnificent, even pathetically smothered with blood, with his two useless arms dangling. But the two he had left still clutched sharp steel, and he made a final enormous effort to bear me down with him. He jumped and roared and the two djangirs lanced for me, one to the eyes, the other to the belly.
I parried them both.
He knew then, did Kov Nath Jagdur, that this was his end.
For, marvelous fighter that he was, he recognized that I had not instantly followed the parries with attack. I had held back, poised to destroy him at my pleasure. He saw all that. He was too fine a fighter not to recognize the truth. He had tried all his tricks, and they had failed him. He knew that I had not riposted through fear of closing with him; he understood I had him at my mercy now, for I had read all his cunning and skill and bested them.
It was in my mind not to kill this man, for I valued him as a fighter and as a man, even if he was a wild leemshead who had brought near-destruction to the country I loved.
“Kov Nath!” I called to him. “I am minded to spare you your life, if you will-”
“No bargain, rast! The Kov of Hyr Khor does not bargain with rasts of apims!”
“It is your own blood.”
I spoke as mildly as I could, but he flinched back, seeing that old devil look upon my face. Brutality and war wreak a fearful havoc upon a man.
“Aye, my own blood! And I would shed it all again to rid my country of Obdjang and apim!”
“In that you are an onker, Kov Nath.”
“I am the King of Djanduin, cramph!”
“You were, for a short space only. But you brought the country to ruin. I would rather not have your blood on my hands — or any more than there already is.” At this I heard the roar of coarse and appreciative laughter from those watching. The Kregan often has a bloody line in jests. He was bleeding profusely now, and he dropped one of the djangirs to grip the shattered arm. He felt it with great and ghastly disbelief. He glared at me, his coppery hair wild about his face, the silver fillet long since lost.
“What bargain do you offer me — the Kov of Hyr Khor?”
There appeared no strangeness in that the two of us, who were in the midst of so violent a combat, could talk thus.
“If I am to be King of Djanduin, as men say I am, for the good of the country, I would not relish a wild leemshead within the realm.”
“That would not be wise, I promise you.”
“So you would find a new home, somewhere in Havilfar.”
“That I could never do, Notor Prescot.”
I did not fail to perceive his change of tone.
I decided to press a trifle. “You are a dead man if we fight again. I can slap you, my two arms against your two. But I see in you some good you cannot see in yourself. Kregen would do ill to lose too many men like you, leemshead though you are.”
A growl ran around the packed men watching. I wondered what their reactions truly were, and then forced them out of my mind. Slaying for the sake of slaying is a pastime for the perverted, for the insane, for the kleeshes of two worlds.
He rallied. His blood dropped ever more rapidly upon the mosaics, making their colors blot with a more dreadful stain.
“And if I leave Djanduin, what is to become of my people of Hyr Khor?”
“They will be treated with honor. Hyr Khor is a part of Djanduin. If I am to be king I will not permit one part of Djanduin to set itself above another part.”
There might be explanations due to Kytun; he would get them.
Kov Nath sagged back. How near death he was without treatment we did not know, but he would not leave here until he had given his word.
He knew that. That subtle chink in his psychological armor, opened when he recognized he had met a man who could best him — and that man an apim! — widened more as he saw a way out. He forced himself to stand upright, panting now, the blood running, the sweat sparkling redly upon him. He threw the last djangir upon the floor.
“I accept! If I am to leave Djanduin, then it is to you, Dray Prescot, Lord of Strombor, that I pass on the Kovnate of Hyr Khor! To you I bestow Hyr Khor!”
This was perfectly legal, although I fancied the little crippled girl with the Bolinas would have to be seriously consulted. But, too, I saw his cunning ruse. He would hand me his Kovnate of Hyr Khor and with it, he surmised, the enmity of his people, who would seek to revenge him upon me. I was prepared to accept anything to get this great gory, sweaty man out of here as safely as might be.
