by Joseph Malik
“Special Operations.”
“Interesting turn of phrase. Yes. The other orders hate us, and fear us, yet they envy us. We are the smallest in number, and the most feared. We killed the last known dragon around these parts. Every knight in the kingdom answers to us.”
“Okay.”
“You’re my sergeant. Most sergeants aren’t members of an order, but they hope to be. As a King’s Rider, you’re a probationary member of the Order of the Stallion, made so at the king’s request. The good news for you is, only the king himself can remove you from the order. I’m short a sergeant, as it happens, and for you, a sergeant’s billet is a good way to train you.
“The question I have is, what do I need to train you on? I’ve never heard of you. I have no idea what you did to win your warrant from the king—the king! Crius tells me you’re the champion of a land I’ve never heard of, and you tell me you’re disgraced. All you have is a letter from the king and a sword that’s worth more than my manor.”
“It’s a start,” said Jarrod.
“That it is. I hope you know what you’re doing.”
“I know I can’t undo it.”
“You stand an excellent chance of getting killed within the next year. Are you prepared to die?”
“Not needlessly,” Jarrod admitted.
The knight bit his lower lip as the words left Jarrod’s mouth. He perused them for a long moment, running them back and forth across his mind.
“Brave words,” he decided. “Well then, sir, let’s see what you brought, and then we’ll take you down to Master Argyul’s and see how much training you need.”
“What the hell is that thing in your mouth?”
“Baby’s little pacifier.” Argyul was the sword master’s name, and he laughed heartily at his own wit as he kicked clear a space in the straw of the gymnasium.
Jarrod flipped his mouthguard sideways with his tongue. When inserted, it gave the impression that his teeth were filed to points, with long vampiric white fangs when he smiled. “This is to keep him from knocking my teeth out,” said Jarrod.
“Good thinking. You’ll need it.”
Jarrod wore a black horsehide motocross jacket with a matching leather skirt, which was a custom job with padding and carbon-fiber plates riveted beneath, attaching to the jacket with heavy buckles. His longer mailshirt would cover the skirt completely but he didn’t wear it here. He did wear motocross gloves and heavy workman’s knee pads, steel-toed work boots, and a padded mail mantle and hood, all in black. He flipped the hood over his head and tightened the drawstrings.
Jarrod had watched Javal’s dislike for him dissipate as the knight had gone through Jarrod’s gear, concluding that Jarrod was a rich lord in his homeland. The coat of plates Jarrod had packed—a magnificent thing of burnished harness leather tanned to a deep whisky color with sandwiched plates of ultra-high molecular weight plastic—brought a string of curses that Jarrod had never imagined; the modified motocross jackets he used as gambesons even more.
Jarrod explained away the plastic and carbon fiber as materials that grew in his homeland. Javal knocked on them, tried to flex them, and pushed at the padding behind. “Fine, fine,” he’d said.
Javal had been especially taken with fencing manuals, of which Jarrod had brought several. The knight seemed physically relieved to see the pictures, and mentioned that he was eager to see Jarrod fight.
After playing with a heavy plastic training sword for a few minutes, Javal had agreed upon its use in sparring, and also mentioned that he wanted one himself. Jarrod had told him that he’d only brought the one set of training weapons, but gladly gave him a nice Gerber multitool with a spring action built into the pliers. Javal had thought the metal snap on the knife’s leather belt case was particularly slick. He now wore it on his own swordbelt, which was a simple, double-wrap affair.
Jarrod had brought a hand-and-a-half training sword, which he now bore against the castle’s master trainer.
Argyul was armed with a wooden sword a little shorter and heavier, with a heavy glove on his hand. He wore no armor except for a heavy leather jerkin and leather knee guards.
He was taller than even Sir Javal, barrel-chested with a potbelly and wide arms braided with muscle. He was old enough, Jarrod assumed, to be Javal’s father, but he moved with a bounce in his step and a focused heft to his shoulders that Jarrod had seen in enough aging martial arts masters to know that this was not a man to be fribbled with.
Jarrod flashed his fangs. “This’ll be fun,” he assessed.
Argyul obviously had to be able to whip the arrogant young bucks—like Jarrod—easily and embarrassingly, or he’d never command their respect. He had power and explosiveness in his build, which made sense, because he likely couldn’t match someone with Jarrod’s grace and youth in any sort of enduring engagement.
Jarrod concluded that the old badger probably knew every dirty trick ever imagined, and had imagined quite a few of his own.
It was time to go to school.
Javal handed him a mail glove, for the right hand. Jarrod put it on over his leather gauntlet. Javal muttered, “That’s for the sword hand. Turn it inside out.”
“You’ve never read Fabris,” said Jarrod.
“One of those books you brought?”
“Yes.”
“I intend to,” said Javal.
Argyul beckoned.
Jarrod and Argyul stared at each other for a good five seconds, neither moving.
“Looks like a frightened mouse,” Argyul commented. “Aggression’s not your strong point, is it, mouse?”
Jarrod tongued his mouthguard sideways. “I’m wondering how you want to do this,” he said carefully. “Are we going full-speed? Light contact? Touch sparring? I don’t intend to kill you. I can crack your skull with this pretty easily, though.”
“Ha!” barked Argyul. “Can you, now?” He stepped forward and tentatively touched blades with Jarrod.
Jarrod engaged with a flash of motion and a kiai. Argyul’s sword clattered across the gym.
“I can,” said Jarrod, and fitted his mouthguard.
A page walked up and handed Argyul his sword again.
Sir Javal was now standing, Jarrod saw.
The swordmaster darted in. Jarrod swept up the blade with his own, slipped a foot behind, then locked elbows and wrenched Argyul off-balance, spinning him several steps away.
The heart and soul of Judo may be The Big Throw, but the most jarring throw in Judo, and also in savate, is the foot sweep. Jarrod’s grandfather had learned it from a Japanese-American soldier in North Africa and taught it to Jarrod as a way to deal with schoolyard bullies. Twenty years later, Jarrod regularly threw armored opponents, even the massive Carter, with it.
Argyul got his weight back under him, growled deep in his throat, and charged at Jarrod with a feint and a quick lunge. Jarrod countered with a coulé, the swords sliding against each other, but he missed the touch and Argyul was big and they ended up locked in a wrestling match, which Jarrod didn’t want. Argyul, much bigger, threw an arm around his neck and kneed him in the ribs and then in the face, which Jarrod managed to block with his elbows but the savagery of the blows startled him. We are not sparring, Jarrod thought. He is trying to put me away.
They disengaged and Jarrod swept Argyul’s feet as he backpedaled. Argyul landed on his tailbone, heavy and hard.
“Slippery little bastard,” grumbled Argyul, getting up.
Jarrod said, “Do you want to go that hard? Let’s be clear, I don’t intend to harm you.”
The sword master assumed a safe distance and scrutinized Jarrod again, then put up his blade and crouched a hair lower. “Don’t worry about me.”
Jarrod nodded. The black blade whistled as he saluted and dropped into a guard. This is me, not worrying about you.
Argyul stayed just out of long attacking distance, blade covering the high inside line in tierce, slightly extended,
body almost square. But Jarrod had seen that a thousand times. Standard play against a short southpaw. With a stomp and an “Et la-a!!” Jarrod tore into him.
Argyul seemed more ready this time, and the conversation of the blades began.
Argyul’s bladework was an amalgam of techniques familiar to Jarrod, but none that he had ever seen used together. He was attacking and defending as if his wooden sword were a double-edged blade. It wasn’t quite rapier fencing, not quite longsword combat.
His attacks were long, straight, and simple, which Jarrod expected from someone his size. Like many tall swordsmen, Argyul’s strides were overly large—covering distance quickly was to a taller fighter’s advantage—so Argyul’s composure went to hell for a moment whenever he was forced to change direction.
During the initial exchanges Jarrod keyed in on the older man’s predilection for semi-circular parries and cutover attacks, noting also his Marozzo-esque bent toward anticipatory maneuvers, his overuse of tierce, and his general lack of pointwork except for a near-textbook Agrippa thrust delivered by throwing the shoulder forward and slipping the rear foot back. Jarrod adjusted for all this, deferred to Fabris to wring the most mileage from the off-hand mail glove, and pressed the attack. He thwarted the parries with doubles, over-utilized envelopments just to prove that he could, and built his fight around a series of elaborate feints which he knew from past experience raised all kinds of hell with guys who anticipate.
In a real fight he’d be nicking the edges of the blade by now, but he tried to keep his parries below the balance in case Argyul brought it up.
Argyul didn’t bring it up. He was too busy swearing.
As Jarrod accelerated his attacks to twice their pace, blade darting and whirling and clacking against Argyul’s, sometimes with one hand, sometimes with two, it became clear to the entire room that the mouse was in full control of the fight.
Jarrod bulled him across the gymnasium, then stepped out of attacking distance, made some space in the straw, and beckoned the swordmaster in.
Argyul brought his most fearsome attack yet, their blades banging and flashing so quickly that even Javal had to squint to see.
After driving Argyul across the gym yet again, and demonstrating that perhaps no one in the world could match the rapid-fire pace and unorthodox attack vectors that were his hallmark, Jarrod closed to a clinch, grabbed Argyul’s blade with his mailed hand, and twisted it expertly, smacking the swordmaster under the wrist with his pommel. The sword spun toward Sir Javal, who threw himself out of the way as it banged off the wall behind him.
Argyul punched Jarrod in the face.
Jarrod counterpunched an eyelash later, two heavy jabs and a heelkick to the thigh to shove Argyul out of range, and tossed his sword away, shucking the mail glove as Argyul recovered.
I’ll see your fisticuffs, and I’ll raise you la savate.
Argyul rushed in with an overhand punch, flat-footed and chambered over his shoulder. Jarrod leaned back to slip it, and as Argyul’s fist whistled past, Jarrod cocked his front leg and just missed his face with a knife-edge snapkick. Argyul stumbled back.
Impressed swearing erupted from the onlookers and everyone moved in for a closer view.
Jarrod shuffled in, now in a boxer’s stance—narrower in the feet, fists up, elbows guarding his sides—and popped him again with the jab, stepping back smartly to slip the counter as Argyul threw another haymaker and missed.
Jarrod jabbed again, heavier, reeling the bigger man back.
Argyul reached out and pawed to block the next jab, then shook his head and spat blood after Jarrod’s left cross snapped his head back. Jarrod followed it up with a roundhouse kick into Argyul’s guard that staggered him, but Argyul didn’t go down.
Jarrod bobbed. He weaved. He feinted with the jab. Argyul’s fist whistled through the air at the edge of his nose yet again.
Jarrod deduced that they didn’t have boxing, here. At the least, fisticuffs may never have been raised to the art to which it had on Earth. Argyul’s punches were crude, telegraphed, and easy to dodge.
Granted, if one of them connected, it would lay him out flat with X’s for eyes.
They may not have had boxing, but they sure as hell had wrestling, Jarrod concluded, as Argyul charged in low, hit him with an expertly-placed shoulder, and locked his arms around Jarrod’s waist trying for a classic Greco-Roman takedown.
Jarrod slid to a sprawl to counter and they grunted and slithered and whirled, and suddenly Argyul’s feet were in the air and he was going over Jarrod’s hip. Jarrod kiai’d as he drove Argyul into the floor, braking him with both hands still on the jerkin and careful to drop him flat on both shoulders, then cocked his left fist to deliver a finishing punch which he never threw.
They don’t have Judo, either.
Jarrod stood over the sword master and held his hand out. In a moment or so Argyul took it, and Jarrod helped him to his feet.
“Thank you,” Argyul said to Jarrod.
“The pleasure was mine, sir.”
Argyul motioned to the page, who brought both their swords.
Javal bowed to Jarrod, his fist over his heart, then raised the rock salute.
Argyul grinned at Jarrod. “Damn, son. Let’s do that again.”
Just before dusk, Jarrod and Sir Javal ambled, horsebound and fully armored, down a wide, muddy forest path. Jarrod was having a bit of a tough time with his horse, for this beast had a nastier temperament than anything he’d ever ridden. Every now and again, the black mare would snap her head up in a vain attempt to bite at Jarrod, and Javal would reach over from his own mount and rap her on her head with his mailed fist.
“Keep your knees on her, stronger. Show her who’s in charge.”
Jarrod locked his knees down. “I think she knows who’s in charge,” he grumbled, “And it ain’t me.”
They moved at a smooth, rolling gait that he was unfamiliar with; a little faster than a walk, a bit less than a trot. It jarred him less than any horse he’d been on before.
His gloved hand fell time and again to the rawhide-laced grip of the spear knocking against his leg.
The world was mud and fog and cold rain.
Javal’s traveling armor was a long black shirt of heavy-gauge mail slitted up to the crotch for riding, with twin gold braids—fourragères—designating his rank tied through his mail at his shoulder and looped under his right arm. His helmet, also black, had a hinged visor slitted for his eyes. He wore it open so that the rain dripped off it onto a leather gorget and mantle and a thick fur cape over his shoulders.
On a black riding horse, Javal led a massive black Friesian with a powerful neck—his destrier—that Jarrod swore was the biggest horse he’d ever seen. Tethered to the destrier but far behind was a sturdy brown pack horse who shouldered Javal’s spare shields, heavy weapons, food, tools, and bivouac gear. Behind the brown pack horse was a second, spotted pack horse hauling feed and all of Jarrod’s gear including the massive arming trunk. The trunk and rifle case had taken some work to mount, involving a lattice of poles.
Jarrod wore a shirt of ultra-lightweight titanium chainmail with a black nitride coating over his heavier jacket, which was thick pebbled horsehide with padding and carbon-fiber plates. He wore a stout leather gorget over the mail, Merrill trail boots, Gore-Tex gaiters, and his oilskin cowboy hat. The thick woolen trousers he’d first gotten from Carter when he woke up here were soaked through already, but still warm.
He was really glad he’d brought the gaiters.
He’d been given the spear; the rest of his gear was his own. The gran espée de guerre hung from his saddle, which had a built-in frog though it was on the wrong side for him, and the helm from his man-at-arms harness—a great T-faced Barbute with a high crown and a locking faceplate with a cruciform grille—hung from its chinstrap around the hilt of the big sword. A hood of titanium mail matching his shirt and stitched onto a cashmere cap was stuffed inside, a small ca
rabiner on the bottom buckled around the chinstrap of the helmet to keep it from falling out.
He was concerned about the amount of damage that a year in the rain would cause his gear. He had brought the titanium shirt as traveling armor mostly due to its corrosion resistance. It didn’t hurt that it was as tough as a steel shirt twice the weight. Similarly, the horsehide was as water-resistant as leather gets, but he’d brought a jug of Neatsfoot oil and a one-pound tub of Vaseline because damn, it rained a lot here.
Jarrod knew his gear was a game-changer and on the one hand he felt a bit like he was cheating the system. On the other, he had the feeling that fair play and sportsmanship would likely go out the door once people started trying to take him apart with axes. And Crius had insisted that nothing would be considered cheating.
“I am going to your homeland,” said Javal, looking over at Jarrod, “And buying a shirt of that mail.”
“It never hurts to have good gear, sire. But without mindset, knowledge, and practice, the best gear in the world is just dead weight.”
“Good words,” said Javal.
The worst part, Jarrod knew, was going to be the first week or so. He was immensely physically fit, but he was not a horseman. There was going to be a hellish period coming up shortly, he was certain; probably starting once they made camp tonight.
Jarrod straightened up in the saddle and braced himself for trial by ordeal.
“So, we’re off to castle duty?” Jarrod cleaned his nails with the tip of his knife as Sir Javal gnawed the knuckle off a rabbit bone and spat it into the coals.
“Allegedly,” the knight answered. “At Albar’s. He hates having the Order of the Stallion around. We make him nervous.”
“How so?”
“There’s much going on in Highriver. Gavrian emissaries coming and going. Lots of spies. Even a few knights, I hear, have turned their loyalties. That’s why I chose Highriver.”
“Great.”
“The last two knights of the Stallion stationed there met with grisly ends. The unfortunate Sir Rinan, last assigned to Highriver? Fell on a pitchfork. Three times.”