subtlety of a battering ram.
“Speaking of examples, we were all in awe of Lord Arland’s escapades on
Karhari.”
Maud drank her wine, killing a wince before it started. Once she had
paid the blood debt for her husband’s murder, she had started looking
for ways to escape Karhari. In a desperate gamble, she had sent a
message to Dina with a random courier, never expecting it to
arrive. She’d included coordinates of a Road Lodge. Karhari lodges were
rough. They served as waypoints for mercenaries, bandits, caravan
raiders, and whatever other refuse floated in on the winds of the wastes.
It was a dangerous place, but she had to try for Helen’s sake and her own.
Then Dina arrived, bringing her werewolf and Arland with her. The
moment Arland, in his top of the line armor, stepped into the lodge,
Maud had known there would be a fight. And she was right. Arland had
recorded himself during the brawl and the recording had gone viral
throughout the Holy Anocracy.
Tellis was still smiling. “How many attackers did you take on? Was it
four or five, I can’t remember?”
“I was a little busy and I didn’t have time to make them count off. In a
real battle, things get a little hectic.” Arland was still floating in his own
private cloud of Zen.
“Would you care to give us a private demonstration, Lord Marshal? I’m
afraid that the game hadn’t quite lasted as long as we would’ve
liked. We still need a bit of exercise. If you don’t mind, that is.”
He did not just say that. Apparently, House Krahr was so weak that Tellis
hadn’t broken a sweat.
207
Arland looked bored. “I haven’t finished my wine. If I take the time to
engage in a demonstration, it will be warm by the time I return.”
Tellis blinked. Maud hid a smile. Yes, he did just tell you that his wine
getting warm was more important than you. Tellis would have abandon
all pretense of propriety to goad Arland into action.
“Of course, if the Lord Marshal is too fatigued from chasing his unwilling
human bride to redeem the honor of his House, I understand
completely. We have all enjoyed your noble pursuit, however, I do
believe the lady finds you wanting.” Tellis looked at Maud and smiled.
Yes, that would do it.
Arland sighed and rose to his feet, looking put upon as if someone had
asked him to take out the trash in the middle of a good movie.
“I’ll have your wine refreshed, dear,” Ilemina said. “Go and have some
fun.”
Arland turned to Tellis. “If you insist. Full armor, primed weapons, first
down?”
Tellis’ grin didn’t die all the way but definitely faltered. Under normal
circumstances, vampire weapons had the same limitations as Earth
weapons. They were made of an advanced alloy that provided greater
durability, and the vampire metalsmiths had developed weapon making
into an art, but if one tried to chop a large tree down with a vampire
sword, the sword would break before the tree did. Priming a weapon
flooded it with Rathan Rhun, the Shining Blood. Nobody, not even her
father, knew exactly what Rathan Rhun was. It was red and glowing, and
it flowed through the weapon emitting a telltale whine, spreading
through the metal just like its name suggested it would. Once you heard
a blood weapon being primed, you never forgot it. A blood mace
wielded by a strong vampire knight would knock down a telephone pole.
208
Blood weapons were not used for practice. Arland had just suggested a
fight under battle conditions, to the point where combatants were out
when they were unable to continue.
“Primed weapons?’ Tellis asked.
“You are the one who wanted exercise.” Arland looked at Tellis. “Was
my lord under the impression that the fight at the Road Lodge was an
exhibition bout? You asked for an accurate demonstration. I have
honored your request.”
Arland raised his head and bellowed, “Bring our guests their blood
weapons! Gather to honor their bravery for they are about to do battle.
And someone alert the medic. We shall require full use of his talents
today.”
Chapter 12 part 1
July 27, 2018 by Gordon
No Innkeeper next Friday – we will be on vacation at the beach.
209
This was stupid, Maud decided. In fact, this was one of the dumbest
things she had seen Arland do, and he was, by no means, a stupid man.
Arland eyed the two Serak knights that stepped forward to join
Tellis. Both held themselves with the seasoned confidence of
veterans. They had fought before, they had won, and they didn’t find
Arland’s presence or his reputation especially intimidating. In a word,
they seemed ready, and Maud didn’t like it one bit.
Arland raised his voice. “Are these the only brave knights House Serak
has to offer?”
What is he doing?
He looked around, spreading his arms. “Is there no one else?”
210
Two more knights stood up from their tables on House Kozor’s side,
Onda and a grizzled male knight, who looked like he would knock a
charging bull out with one punch. Great, just great.
“We are up to five,” Arland said. “Fantastic.”
Maud grabbed her glass and drank.
“The Road Lodge offered me seven, but if five brave souls is the best your
two mighty Houses can scrounge, I’ll make do.”
What? The wine went down the wrong way, and she choked.
Four more knights stood up, two from Serak, two from Kozor.
“That’s more like it,” Arland declared.
Nine opponents. He’d gone insane. That was the only explanation.
The weapon racks were being brought onto the lawn. The knights armed
themselves. The sharp whine of blood weapons being primed sliced the
quiet. Arland hefted his mace. Their stares crossed, and he grinned at
her.
“He’s gone mad,” she muttered.
“Nexus,” Otubar said.
She glanced at him. “I don’t follow, my lord.”
“We have advanced quite far from the days when this castle was built,”
Ilemina said. “These days the conflicts between Houses are decided in
space. The ground battles are precious few. I doubt either Kozor or
Serak have ever truly fought in one.”
“Nexus permits no air battles,” Otubar said. “On Nexus, ground is fought
and won inch by inch, watered with blood and fertilized with corpses.”
211
“I knew I would have to send my son to Nexus twenty years ago.” Ilemina
smiled. “His father and I did everything we could to make sure he came
back alive. This is what he does best. Trust him.”
A young knight ran up to Arland and held out a round shield, about
eighteen inches across, made of the same dark alloy as the syn-armor. A
half-moon indentation had been cut out on one side, just large enough
to trap an arm. A buckler, she realized. Not just a bucker, her
buckler. She had shown him the buckler and blade technique during one
of their practice sessions at Dina’s Inn. He had asked abo
ut Earth sword
fighting and she had gone through several different styles with him. At
the time, he’d scoffed at the buckler. Vampire shields were
obsolete. The syn-armor offered superior protection without
encumbering and the only shields still in use were massive and designed
to protect the wielder during bombardment. Vampires either dual-
wielded or favored enormous two-handed weapons that made the most
of their strength and stamina. After she’d stabbed him a couple of times,
he had changed his tune.
Arland gripped the buckler with his left hand. The shield whined,
priming. Veins of red streaked it, and as he turned the buckler, Maud
saw its red tinted edge. It was razor sharp.
Aww. He had a custom shield made based on her buckler.
Tellis, carrying twin blades, laughed. “Are you so poor that you couldn’t
afford a proper shield or so stupid that you think that little toy will
protect you?”
“All in good time,” Arland said. “Wait, and I’ll show you.”
Ilemina leaned forward, focused on Arland. “A shield. Interesting. But
why so small?”
Otubar grimaced. “Because it’s lively.”
212
The nine vampires spread out, encircling Arland. Suddenly she
understood. Because there were nine of them, arranged around him in
a rough circle, each knight only had a forty-degree angle to work
with. The ideal distance for combat was about the length of your
weapon plus a step. If they had stayed at the ideal distance, they would
be nearly touching. They needed room to work, so instinctively they
backed up, giving themselves space, but now they were so far away from
Arland, they might as well announce their attacks before launching
them. He had more than enough time to react, and they could only come
at him two or three at a time, or they would get in each other’s way.
The knights realized it, too, but there was no time to plan any kind of
strategy. The longer they just stood there, the more it looked like they
were afraid, and their plan to humiliate Arland was going belly up.
“Today!” Arland bellowed.
An older knight on his left charged, the huge two-handed sword slicing
through the air in a vicious arc. Arland dodged. The vampire’s
momentum carried him past Arland who smashed his mace into the back
of the other man’s helmet. The force of the blow knocked the knight to
the ground. He rolled and lay still.
Onda and a blond knight to her right charged at the same time and
collided. A leaner red headed knight dashed in at Arland, thrusting his
sword. Funny thing about bucklers: held close to the body, they offered
very little protection, but when held out at arm’s length, not only did
they protect most of you, they also cut your opponent’s view down to
nothing. Arland let the blow glance off the buckler, directing it to his
right and brought his mace down like a hammer on the knight’s exposed
right shoulder. Bone crunched as the armor failed to fully absorb the
force of the hit. The red headed vampire dropped his sword, but Arland
was already turning to meet Tellis attacking him from behind.
213
Tellis’ left sword met Arland’s mace, his right glanced off the buckler,
leaving Tellis wide open for a fraction of a second, and Arland sank a
vicious front kick in his stomach. Tellis stumbled back.
A broad shouldered female knight leaped at Arland from the left, while
a tall male knight charged from the right. He stepped back, and the
female knight plowed into the male, both collapsing in a heap. Arland
smashed the woman’s back with his mace. She screamed and rolled off
the knight flailing under her. The knight tried to rise and got a face full
of buckler.
Onda smashed her hammer into Arland’s back. He must’ve sensed the
blow but with no way to avoid it, he simply hunched his shoulders and
took the hit. Onda must have expected him to go down, because she
stared at him for half a second. Maud knew from experience that giving
Arland half a second was a lethal mistake. He spun around, putting all of
his weight behind a horizontal strike. His mace connected with Onda’s
ribs. The hit swept her off her feet. It was almost comical – one moment
she was there, brandishing her hammer, and the next she was gone, lying
somewhere on the grass.
The six knights still standing attacked. Arland worked through his
attackers with methodical precision, crushing limbs, smashing bone,
ramming his buckler into their joints. They swarmed him, and he broke
them one by one, until they could no longer move. It was a cold,
controlled rage, harnessed and channeled into carnage.
Finally, only Tellis and Arland remained standing. Arland bled from a cut
on his left temple. Gouges and dents marked his armor. The right side
of his jaw swelled. Maud feverishly tried to remember all the hits he had
taken. There was no way to tell if he was okay or bleeding inside that
damn armor.
214
Tellis was breathing like he had ran a marathon. A bruise darkened his
left cheek. The armor over his left forearm had lost integrity, turning
dull.
Arland dropped his buckler and attacked. His mace whistled through the
air. Tellis blocked, letting the blow glance from his right sword and
shoulder. Arland lunged forward and punched Tellis. It was a
devastating left cross. Tellis stumbled and Arland brought his mace onto
Tellis’ left arm. The groom shied back. Arland swung again and Tellis
danced away.
They circled the battle field, Tellis fast and agile, Arland unstoppable like
a tank on a rampage.
They made a full circle.
Tellis kept backing up. Arland stalked him, but the other knight never let
him get within reach.
Arland stopped and waited. Tellis stopped too.
The lawn was silent.
Arland took a step forward. Tellis took a step back.
Otubar called out, “It’s not a dance. Fight or get off the field.”
Tellis looked at the eight bodies lying on the grass. Some moaned, others
simply laid still. His eyes were wide and glassy. Maud had seen that look
before. It was the look of someone who had seen his own death. Tellis
had forgotten that this wasn’t a real battle field. The urge to survive had
taken over. He had nowhere to go. Back was dishonor, forward was
Arland, pain, and death. So, like the bodies on the grass, Tellis held still,
too.
215
Arland shrugged his massive shoulders, powered down his mace, turned
his back to Tellis, and walked off the field. Maud let out a breath she
didn’t know she was holding.
He stopped by the table, beat up and splattered with blood, and looked
at her. You could hear a pin drop.
“We didn’t finish our discussion, my lady.”
Oh, she was more than ready to have a discussion. It would feature
topics like Why the hell would you let nine knights pummel
you? and What were you thinking? If he were bleeding
internally, this
was the only way for him to make a graceful exit. She had to get him out
of here and out of that armor.
Maud rose, aware of every stare. “In that case, my lord, I suggest we
retire to your quarters, so we may carry out our debate in private.”
“I’d be delighted.” Arland extended his hand towards the path.
Maud bowed her head to Ilemina and Otubar. “My apologies.”
Ilemina waved at her. “Think nothing of it, my dear.”
Maud started down the path, aware of Arland only a step behind her.
“Ahh, young love,” Ilemina’s voice floated to her. “Where is our medic?”
216
Chapter 12 part 2
August 8, 2018 by Gordon
As soon as they got to the tower and the door slid shut behind them,
Arland swayed and sagged against the wall.
“You’re such an idiot,” she whispered through clenched teeth.
Arland smiled. “Maybe. But I won.”
Ugh. She had no idea how badly he was hurt. He probably didn’t know
how badly he was hurt. They had to get him out of the armor. She could
just pull it off him here. Every House crest contained the basic supplies
217
necessary for emergency medical intervention. But if she took the crest
off him now and applied it, he would have to remain stationary in this
tower. They had to climb the stairs, cross the bridge, and get to either
his room or hers and they had to do it with Kozor and Serak
watching. Any show of weakness would dilute Arland’s victory.
The value of the beating he delivered wasn’t in humiliation of Kozor and
Serak. It was in fear and uncertainty. Both House Kozor and Serak came
to the fight reasonably sure what to expect. They had done their
research, they had watched the fight in the Lodge, and they expected
Arland to be a superior fighter. They didn’t expect him to be invincible. If
he had been carried off the field by medics or had limped away obviously
hurt, they could quantify it. “We almost beat him with nine knights, we
can kill him with ten.” But he had crushed them and walked away like it
was nothing. Now they didn’t know how many knights it would take, and