The Blood Knight - J. Gregory Keyes [202]
“Ambria!” he gasped, and went down on his knee. He took her hand and found it cold.
“Leovigild Ackenzal, I presume,” someone very near said.
Leoff was proud of himself; he didn’t scream. He straightened, lifting his chin, determined to be brave.
“Yes,” he whispered.
A man stepped from the shadows. He was massive, with a grizzled half-shaved face and hands the size of hams.
“Who are you?” Leoff asked.
The fellow grinned a horrible little grin that sent a profound shiver through the composer.
“You might call me Saint Dun,” he said. “You might call me Death. Right now, you just consider yourself warned.”
“You didn’t have to kill her.”
“Don’t have to do nothin’ in this life but die,” he replied. “But I work for His Majesty, and this is what he asked me to do.”
“He knew all along.”
“His Majesty, he’s busy. I haven’t spoken to him lately. But I know him, and this is what he would have wanted. Lady Gramme didn’t know about me, you see. I didn’t figure in her plans.” He stepped closer.
“But you know about me,” he added softly. “And I reckon you need to know I can’t be bribed or otherwise bought, like some here. Now His Majesty knows who his friends are, or he will when he returns to find ’em still alive. And as for you, I’ll ask you to make a choice.”
“No,” Leoff said.
“Oh, yeah,” the man replied. He gestured at Ambria’s corpse. “That’s the price she pays for this little attempt. Your price is to choose who dies next: Gramme’s little brat or the landwaerden girl.” He smiled and tousled Leoff’s hair. “Don’t worry. I’m not asking you to make a snap decision. I give you until noon tomorrow. I’ll come up to your room.”
“Don’t do this,” Leoff said softly. “This isn’t decent.”
“The world aens’t decent,” the killer replied. “Sure you ought to know that by now.” He pointed with his chin. “Go on.”
“Please.”
“Go on.”
Leoff returned to his room. He glanced at the bed where Ambria had lain, remembering her touch. He went to the window and gazed out at the moonless night, taking long, deep breaths.
Then he lit his candles, took out the unfinished music, pen, and ink, and began to write.
THIS WAS no joust, and there was no clever turning at the last moment to glance the blow. Not with horses galloping flank to flank, not when any deflection of spear by shield risked having it plunge into a battle-brother to the left or right. One might try to skip the blow upward with a last-instant tilt of the shield, but then one would lose sight of the target.
No, this was more like war galleys meeting at full oar, prow to prow. What was left was flinching and not flinching.
Neil didn’t flinch; he met the shock of the killing point in the center of his shield, blowing out his breath as it happened to prevent it being knocked out of him.
His opponent, in contrast, panicked and shifted his shield so Neil’s spear struck the curving edge. As the stun of contact went through him, Neil watched his weapon deflect and drive to the right, striking his foe’s shield mate in the throat, shattering his neck into a bloody ruin and sending him hurtling back into the next rank.
The broken shaft of the first man’s lance struck Neil’s helm, turning his head half-around, and then the real jolt came as the full weight of horses, barding, armor, shields, and men slammed together. Horses went down, screaming and kicking. His own mount, a gelding named Winlauf, staggered but didn’t fall, largely due to the press that surrounded them.
Neil clutched for the blade Artwair had given him, a good solid weapon he’d named Quichet, or Battlehound, for his father’s sword. But before he could do that the head from a lance in the second rank of Thornrath’s defenders slipped its slaughter-eager point through his shield and into the shoulder joint of his armor before the shaft shivered.
He felt as if he’d fallen naked through the icy surface of a midwinter mere; Battlehound came up in his hand, seeming to lift of its own accord. The horse of the man who had hit him was just tripping over the mount