The Kingless Land - Ed Greenwood [98]
He'd fought as frantically before. On the Isles, yes, but when he was younger, too… in that hollow full of treacherous priestesses, for one…
***
As he fought his way to stand over his baron at last, the Golden Griffon stared up at him with darkening, failing eyes. There was blood on Ezendor Blackgult's rueful lips.
"You… right, Hawk," the man he loved more than all the world struggled to say,
"… but too late…"
Hawkril ruined the baron's agonized speech by blowing the second, brighter horn from his belt, as hard as he could, as he swung his blade in another great circle.
A priest tried to tackle his knees, and the armaragor clubbed the man's nose into oblivion with the horn before tossing it into another holy face; its job was done.
The singing in the air that marked the collapse of the spell shield across the entire hollow came an instant later-and Hawkril had the healing vial out and to his lord's lips in the instant after that. Then he tore away his codpiece, snatched out the second vial, slapped it into the baron's hand, and turned to stand astride the Golden Griffon and keep him alive for the next few frantic minutes until the other armaragors arrived.
Or until the spells of the furious priestesses of the Huntress claimed the lives of everyone in the hollow. There was a flash and a roar, and limp holy bodies were hurled in all directions. Hawkril cursed loud and long; he'd given orders that were very blunt and even more clear that the horn-helmed women were to be cut down the moment the spell shield was raised-but someone had failed to get far enough, or been distracted by leather-clad beauty, orA second flash spattered the hulking armaragor with blood and dirt and ploughed a huge trench in the soil that stabbed at the moaning baron-but just failed to reach him.
These priestesses obviously didn't care how many fellow holy exalted clergy of the Lady they slew. Hawkril saw one of them caught in a ring of armaragors, glaring at him from afar-and then there was a different sort of flash, and the world became a place of white mist, sparks, and muffled sound, where Hawkril stood over his fallen master, and the priestess hovered above them both, with no one else to be seen. From somewhere outside, a sword stabbed into the mists and melted away into smoke as it came, until a bladeless hilt was drawn back.
The priestess had a sword, however, and she swooped down at Hawkril and stabbed at his face. Hawkril saw what she was about, and instead of ducking away he caught her blade with his own, forced them both past his nose, and brought his parry far to the left, overbalancing, so that she tumbled helplessly past the baron instead of getting a clear thrust at him.
The meeting of their blades gave birth to swarms of swirling sparks, and Hawkril surged through them to meet her next dive with a parry that bound their blades together. Nose to nose they struggled, and the furious priestess snarled, "You risk being damned by the Lady, warrior! I have only to name you before the Lady! Stand aside-you were forbidden to enter the hollow!"
"How so?" Hawkril wared back. "My Lord the baron agreed to attend a parley alone and unarmed! I attended a battle, as I am trained to do-aiding one man, who stood alone against the treachery of eighty! Who are you to forbid or to damn?"
"I have but to say the words," the priestess purred as they spun around each other, blades locked together, muscles straining against magic, "and your life will no longer be worth living."
"Loyalty makes life worth living, priestess," Hawkril blazed back. "And keeping one's word, and standing by comrades. Priests and gods may fail to help, or be revealed in deceit and corruption, but swordbrothers dare not cross each other. We prefer to die rather than fail each other!"
He was shouting now, as her surging magic forced him back. "Gods fail," he bellowed at her, "but honest men prevail! "
"A pretty speech," the priestess sneered, as Hawkril's blade exploded in a shower of sparks, and her own sword darted at him, "but none can withstand