darkened blade_ A fallen blade novel - Kelly McCullough Page 0,27
hour past dawn and word just came down from one of our ears—there’s a couple of priests asking around up top for a group of four malcontents and a renegade Hand. Boss thought the description sounded like your lot, and that you might take kindly to a nod before they got much closer, as they’re trailing a good score of badly disguised temple soldiers in their wake. . . .”
“Your boss is a smart woman.” Kelos tossed the fellow a silver coin. “How close are they?”
“Not so close that you need to take shit’s highway.” He nodded toward the rabbit run. “But close enough you might want to go out the long way behind the bar . . . for a small fee, of course.”
“Of course.”
6
There is nothing, absolutely nothing, half so tedious as messing about on barges.
As a mode of travel barges drive me to distraction. They’re slow. They’re cramped. They’re damp. It would have been a good deal faster to walk from Tavan to Uln on the tow path that followed the river, and much cheaper, and that’s almost certainly what we would have done, too, if it weren’t for the risen. Running water impedes the passage of the restless dead and the Tamar River was deep and wild.
The barge master had cleverly used the load of planks she was carrying upriver to Uln to create a sort of second deck atop the barrels and crates of her other goods. Add in the padding of heavy tarps, and it made a perfect fencing ring—irresistible to a bunch of bored Blades. . . .
I stopped my swords halfway to their sheathes when Siri indicated she wanted to go a round—I’d just finished a pass with Faran. “I’m up for it if you think you’re ready.” I flicked a look at the all too fresh scar where her left forearm ended. “But one hand against two hardly seems fair.”
It was only a few weeks on from the self-amputation of her left hand, and the first time she’d indicated any desire to spar with anyone.
Siri’s smile was confident. “It’s all right, Aral. I’ll go easy on you.”
Don’t underestimate her just because she’s lost a hand, sent Triss—the barge master couldn’t miss that we were something well outside her normal run of passengers, but there was no reason to give her the answer, which meant the Shades had to stay hidden. Siri’s handled the risen all right.
The risen aren’t exactly a challenge on the individual level. It’s numbers that make them dangerous. Five or ten on open ground is a serious problem. In ones and twos with walls to guard your flanks, not so much.
I seem to remember them very nearly having you for dinner a couple of times back when we were helping Maylien recover her baronial seat. And that was only ever one or two at a time.
That’s different. I was a drunken wreck then, and I hadn’t recovered these yet. I squeezed my hilts.
We’ll see.
As Faran waved for us to begin, Siri and I circled each other slowly. It had been nine years since the last time we’d had a bout, and both of us had changed a lot in that time. Siri’s missing arm was merely the most visible sign of that.
Despite what Triss might have implied, I had no intention of treating Siri lightly. She was one of the deadliest swordswomen that my order had ever produced. In the last year before the fall of the temple we’d fenced regularly, and if I scored one point for every three she did, well, that was a good day on my part. For that matter, I was only two years on from my drunk days. While I had been rotting away in a dive bar in Tien, Siri had been training daily with Ashkent and Kayla. My extra hand would probably reverse the old advantage in my favor. But I didn’t expect to get off without losing points and, probably, a little blood into the bargain—given that we were sparring with live steel.
I sensed more than saw Kelos when he arrived and took up a position opposite Faran to watch us, so focused was I on Siri. We circled and counter-circled and circled again, all without engaging. Finally, impatient to get things moving, I offered her a very slight opening. Low, and left, ideal for a right-handed sword and her current edge position. She ignored it, and ignored the next one as well.