one side, drawing the line of his body away from the descending axe, so that it whipped past his chest by the breadth of a hair.
As he did, his sword rose. The tip plunged into Bernard's flank, just above the belt of his trousers. Bernard stiffened, his eyes widening. He let out a short, harsh groan, and his fingers loosened from the handle of the axe. It fell to the battlements with a thump.
Tavi stared in horror. Aldrick twisted the blade as he tore it back out of Bernard's flank, then casually let him fall from the battlements, toward the chaos of the courtyard below.
"Uncle!" Tavi screamed.
Amara reached out a hand toward him as he fell. "Bernard!"
Fade let out a shriek, dropping his shield, and ran back to Tavi, clutching to the boy and gibbering incoherently.
Aldrick flicked his weapon to one side, and droplets of blood, of his uncle's blood, splattered against the stones of the battlements.
Amara's face set into a sudden mask of cold disdain. "Crows take you, Fidelias," she said in a cool, quiet voice. "Crows take you all."
Tavi didn't see her strike, so much as he saw a blur of color the same shade as the cloak the Cursor wore. She moved toward the swordsman with her guardsman's blade, and the sword made the air whistle as it darted at Aldrick.
The swordsman took a pair of quick steps back, no surprise on his face, no emotion. He lifted his blade, and caught Amara's blow on it. Three more blows followed, so fast that they chimed in what almost seemed a single tone, but the swordsman stopped them all, despite Amara's sheer speed, his blade close to his body, his movements very short, quick.
Tavi crawled forward, tears blurring his eyes, lugging the huge shield and the sobbing Fade with him. He recovered the dropped dagger and shoved it through his belt again, watching the battle, helpless and terrified.
Amara whirled and crouched and whirled again, her blade whipping at Aldrick's throat, knees, and throat again. The swordsman blocked each strike and then with a sudden, hard smile, his blade lashed out. Amara hissed, and the sword tumbled from her hands, falling to the stones near Tavi.
Aldrick whipped his blade in a horizontal line, and Amara let out a harsh cry, staggering against the battlements, her hair fallen around her face. Tavi could see blood on the mail around her belly. Amara turned toward Aldrick, unsteady on her feet and swung her arm at him in a strike. The swordsman
slapped her hand aside, and his foot lashed out at her knee. Amara gasped and fell to the stone. She struggled to rise again.
Aldrick shook his head, as though disgusted, and slammed one heavy boot down onto Amara's splinted arm. She let out a cry and jerked. She looked up at Tavi, her eyes not focused, her face bedsheet-white.
Aldrick did not pause. He drew back his blade, crouching, and with two hands swung it toward the paralyzed Cursor.
Tavi didn't stop to think. He seized the fallen sword in his left hand and lunged forward from his knees, toward the swordsman. The guardsman's blade flicked out and found the gap between the swordsman's mail and the tops of his boots, drawing an insignificant cut across the skin. But it was enough to make Aldrick divert the blow aimed for Amara's neck, to parry Tavi's clumsy thrust aside.
Aldrick snarled, his face suddenly suffused with scarlet anger, making an old scar stand out white against his cheek. He slammed his weapon against Tavi's. Tavi felt the jolt of it in his shoulders and chest, and his arm went numb in a tingling wash of sensation, from fingertip to elbow. The sword flew off somewhere behind him.
He rolled back and tried to lift the shield to cover himself, but the swordsman kicked it aside, and it tumbled out of Tavi's grasp and into the courtyard below.
"Stupid boy," Aldrick said, eyes cold. "Give me the dagger."
Tavi clutched his hand on the dagger's hilt and started worming his way back along the wall. "You killed him," Tavi shouted, his voice hoarse. "You killed my uncle!"
"And what happened to my Odiana is your fault. I should kill you right here," Aldrick growled. "Give up. You can't win."
"Go to the crows! If I don't beat you, someone else will!"
"Have it your way," the swordsman said. He whirled the sword in his fingers and closed toward Tavi, lifting the blade, eyes cold. "If Araris Valerian himself was here, he couldn't