His friend produced a short pole of dark wood, smooth-polished in the light, and the old woman took it to weigh in her hands. “Honorable,” she said.
Drazha held out her own spear, with its two wickedly curving blades. The old woman examined it, handed it back to her. Her voice was heavy. “...honorable.”
They each received their weapons, their gaze not breaking from each other across the circle. Drazha’s original staff was taken to rest in someone else’s hands, and the old woman left them in the center, stood outside that stone edge.
“Death is not our object,” the chieftess recited. “But we bear the danger nobly. He who yields, yields his purpose.” She raised her hands. “Be joined in honor.”
Drazha exploded into action.
Khal was fast. I’d seen him be fast, before, with the giant cat, the monster. Now I saw where it came from, that fluid technique, that fierce focus. His staff blurred, his steps taking him backwards as Drazha pressed the attack. His heel almost touched the stone edge of the circle and voices rose in warning from the sidelines.
Near the edge, he rallied. He turned, sending her blade past his shoulder and leaving her open. But he didn’t strike. He faltered a half moment, and she regained the upper hand and sent her blade slicing through his forearm, to whoops and shrieks of shock.
“Blood,” she barked, and it took me a moment to register it as language before she yelled, “Yield!”
He readied his staff. “No.”
She pressed the attack again.
Khal was fast, but he wasn’t vicious. Drazha was faster. Now, blood drawn, it seemed like he tried to take the offensive, but his blows didn’t land, whether from his own reluctance or some weakness, I couldn’t tell.
Fabric ripped. A line of red bloomed at his thigh.
“Two blood,” she shouted. “Yield!”
He stood in a ready stance, the crimson soaking his trouser-leg, shiny on his hand where it gripped the bough. “I do not yield.”
“Foolish,” she spat, and attacked.
They were circling the ring, him almost always moving back, eyes trained on her. Drops of blood blended with the dust. In the next flurry he landed a blow, glancing her back, and the crowd gasped. He froze, and she took advantage to almost slice towards his chest, her son barely getting the staff up in time.
“You can’t fight me?” she snarled. “Is this what I trained you for?” She pressed in.
He was slowing. My heart was in my throat, strangling me.
“Is this what you do with my teaching?” A blow glanced offhis guard, and he barely stopped the follow-up from slicing into his shoulder. “Is this how you face your mother?”
He struck out, and I saw the moment he realized he’d moved in error, the moment her hilt struck his wrist, and his staff spun away into the sand.
Her blade stopped at his neck. “Yield,” she said.
They should both be breathing hard. I could tell Drazha was. Her bosom heaved, her blade the only part of her deadly still. Khal…I didn’t even know for sure how many wounds were seeping the blood that dripped down his fingers, only saw how steady he raised his eyes from the blade beside his throat to the woman with the spear. “No,” he said quietly.
The blade pressed against his neck, a thin line of red appearing. “Yield!” she barked.
He took a step forward, the blade following him, staying pressed against his throat. “I do not yield.”
The blade whirled, sliced again. Gasps rose. Not his throat, I held that fact like a lifeline. Not his throat.
“Yield!”
“I do not yield.”
The next blow took him to his knees.
She raised the blade to his throat again, lifted his gaze to her. Her breath was ragged. “Yield.” I did not know if she ordered or if she begged.
“My mother asked,” he said, “what I was trained for.” His gaze did not falter. “I was trained to keep my oaths. I was trained,” he said, “to not abandon my people.”
