Killer of Men - Christian Cameron [106]
And then they all went away, and I was alone on the sand with a deadly opponent. He moved the way a woman dances, and I admired him even as I tracked his motion.
As far as I was concerned, he was beautiful, but he put too much energy into it. That is, he looked wonderful – and he was good, very good, a true killer. But he also played to the crowd.
He had not, on the other hand, run several stades and wrestled.
Early on, he came at me with his kill shot. All swordsmen have one – a simple combination they have mastered, that can get the fight over in a hurry. Listen – if you live past a man’s kill shot, it’s a whole different fight. But most men go down, in sport or play or on a blood-spattered deck. Calchas taught me that, and every sword-fighter in Ephesus said the same.
I didn’t buy the feint to my head and my shield caught his blow to my thigh, then I cut back at his arm and my blade ticked against his arm guard.
He nodded at me as we drew apart – acknowledgement that I’d hit him. Then we circled for a long, long time, until the crowd was silent. I wasn’t going after him. He was better than me. And he wasn’t in a hurry. And, frankly, I knew he was the best man I’d ever faced – better than Cyrus or Pharnakes, even.
Twice, we went in. The first time, he came forward gracefully – and fooled me, his swaying approach a trick as he darted to the right and his blade shot out in a cut to my right hip, of all unlikely targets.
I parried the blow on my blade and hammered my aspis into his. I cleared my weapon and tried to reach under his shield, but he didn’t allow it, and we were kneeling in the sand, shield to shield, pushing. The crowd roared but the judges separated us.
The second time, I saw him stumble. It was dark now; the fires gave unsteady light and the helmets didn’t help. But before my attack was even fully developed, he had his feet under him. He cut low and then high, and our blades rang together, and we both punched with our shields, leaning our shoulders into the push, and our blades licked out and we both rolled left and broke apart. The ocean cold of his blade had passed across my sword arm and my blade had ticked against his thigh armour.
I raised my blade for a halt. ‘He touched me,’ I said. I can be an honourable man.
But his blade had been flat on, and Athena was by me, and when the judges looked, there was no blood.
Stephanos gave me a drink of wine while the judges looked at my opponent. Archi pointed at him.
‘Back of his knees, brother,’ he said. He’d never called me brother before, and it was the warmest praise of the day.
‘Cleisthenes hurt his last man,’ Stephanos said. ‘He’ll face the winner here but his grandfather is mad as fury. The man he cut is bad.’
Cleisthenes came and started to catcall. He was a rude fuck, and while other men cheered, he jeered. My blood started to rise.
I decided to go for the Athenian’s knee. Archi was dead right – when you’re in the fight you don’t always see. He was a tall man and the back of his knee was the best unarmoured target on him.
He went for his kill shot again. I think he felt that he hadn’t got it off perfectly the first time. But as soon as he started, I knew the combination. I knelt, ignoring the head feint, and snapped my wrist in a long cut against the back of his left knee while his sword cracked on to my shield and bounced up on to my helmet – I’d knelt too low. The blow was hard – not as well pulled as his first, and I fell sideways with a bump on my scalp where my helmet turned the blow but not all of it.
He gave me a hand up and apologized.
I pointed my heavy blade at the black line of blood running down the back of his greaves.
‘By Athena!’ he said. ‘Well cut, Plataean.’
Men cheered, but Cleisthenes jeered again, calling us pansies. And then he insisted on fighting, right there.
‘I want this,’ he said. ‘Unless you’re afraid.’ And closer up, ‘I’m going to hurt you.