Blind God's Bluff A Billy Fox Novel - By Richard Lee Byers Page 0,101

and bleeding. The carpet fell over Wotan’s head.

He clawed at me anyway, and would have torn my face off if I hadn’t dodged. I ran around him to a little table with a porcelain vase of flowers on it. I snatched up the vase and, without looking or breaking stride, lobbed it over my shoulder in the direction of the windows. It crashed down a moment later.

The idea was to buy me one more second. To make Wotan look the wrong direction as he yanked the rug off his head.

Maybe it worked. Because in another moment, I was almost to the ballroom doorway, and he hadn’t overtaken me yet.

But there were fight fans blocking my way. Luckily, they started to scramble aside. It made enough of a hole for me to bull my way through. I ran on.

Behind me, someone screamed, and the floor shook. I realized Wotan was rushing up behind me like an Amtrak train hurtling down a track. I’d meant to circle around the poker table, but I dived and rolled across the felt instead, smearing it with blood as I tumbled along. I knocked over clattering stacks of chips. My foot clipped the chest of deeds. Then I dropped onto my feet and stumbled onward.

I heard the crash when Wotan flung the table out of his way. Easily, I’m sure, but it cost him another instant. Time enough for me to make it to the chair where he’d been sitting, grab the sword he’d left there, and jerk it out of the scabbard.

Before, I’d sensed that the sword hated everybody in the world except Wotan. But the Pharaoh had said he’d turned it against its owner, and now I could feel that, too. It would still have been happy to cut anybody who came in range, but its bloodlust was focused on the giant who stopped short at the sight of it. In fact, it almost felt like it was trying to yank itself out of my grip and fly at him, although really, that was just a mental thing.

So that was all good. It still left the fact that I’d never even touched a sword before. But the Army had taught me to fight with a knife, and given me about two minutes of bayonet training. I wrapped my fingers around the hilt and hoped that what I knew would transfer.

Meanwhile, Wotan snarled and snatched up a chair. The sword had canceled out his reach advantage, but now he had it back.

I rushed him and hacked at his fingers. He blocked with the chair, and the sword clanked against it. He straightened his arms and ran at me.

I twisted out of the way a split second before the chair legs would have rammed into me. And if normal me had managed just that, it would have been amazing, considering the shape I was in. But normal me didn’t have Shadow’s talent for dishing out punishment, and maybe the sword helped, too. I kept pivoting, spun completely around, and cut into Wotan’s back as he lunged by.

The sword didn’t chop into his spine like I wanted. But at least it made him roar and lurch off balance. At least, when the blade jerked out of the wound, I finally got to see some of his blood. I grinned and ran at him, trying to land another shot before he could turn back around.

But he did turn, and the chair turned with him, whirling just an inch or two off the floor. I couldn’t dodge it in a sensible way, so I tried to jump high into the air and let it sweep by underneath me.

The hero in an action movie could have done it. Maybe even Shadow could have done it, if I hadn’t been beat to hell and bleeding all over myself. But as it was, I didn’t do it. The chair smashed into my legs and smashed pain into them. I slammed down on the floor.

Wotan swung the chair repeatedly, and I flung myself back and forth to keep it from pounding down on me. It was like a stamping shoe, and I was a roach that didn’t want to get squashed. Finally it broke apart in his hands—we were having trouble killing each other, but we were hell on the furniture—and maybe that startled him, because he hesitated. I wrenched myself around and sliced his leg just below the knee.

He bellowed. I tried to scramble up and stick the sword in his chest,