‘Pick someone else,’ she said.
I smiled. So while they might be committed to his cause, they weren’t necessarily happy with everything he was doing.
Quil must have caught my expression. ‘You’re an idiot, Falcio. He’ll turn the snow red with your blood before this is done.’
‘See? I knew you still cared.’
‘Fine,’ the Magdan said. ‘Ran, you’re my second.’
Ran was also one of the original twelve, but unlike Quillata, he’d sort of hated me from the start. So the Magdan had gone from the bold choice to the safest one. He’s not completely certain of their loyalties and he can’t risk embarrassing himself twice.
I felt a small surge of hope, if only because I was finally thinking clearly again.
‘Choose your own second, Falcio,’ the Magdan asked. He sounded considerably less amused.
I was tempted to ask Quil, if only because it would be funny, but I knew she’d refuse. So would anyone else with a lick of sense in them – if any of them were still on my side, agreeing to be my second would just reveal them to the Magdan. So I did what I always do in these situations. I went to Kest.
‘Hey,’ I said.
‘Hey?’
‘Are you busy right now?’
‘Not especially, why?’
‘Well, I was thinking of kicking the Magdan’s arse all over this mountain, then challenging the rest of those turncoat bastards one by one until they surrender so, you know, I’m going to need a second.’
‘What will you do if you win?’
I glanced over at them. ‘Probably take all their coats from them and start a really big bonfire.’ I turned back to Kest. ‘Unless you think that’s a bad idea?’
‘It’s a terrible idea. So is challenging Morn. Falcio, look at his face. He’s absolutely convinced he can win.’
I wiped the snow off my rapier and drew the second one. I don’t always fight with both since that’s got its disadvantages, but the Magdan had a great big fucking glaive. I’d need all the steel I could get between me and my opponent. I looked back at him. ‘He does look rather confident. Why do you suppose that is?’
‘I don’t know. That’s what worries me.’
I smiled as I turned to go. ‘How bad can it be? I once beat you, remember?’
Kest didn’t have a reply for that one, but as I entered the circle, the Magdan said, ‘You know the one question every Greatcoat used to ask themselves, Falcio?’
‘“How did I ever get tricked into accepting this horrible job?”’
A few of them laughed at that.
‘No,’ he said, bringing his glaive up into a high guard, ‘we all used to wonder how in the world you could possibly have beaten Kest.’
I brought my own blades up into a staggered guard, one blade high, the other low. I started to say, ‘You know, it’s kind of a funny st—’ just as someone else shouted, ‘Begin!’
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
The Duellist’s Deception
‘Begin!’ the King shouted.
He always yelled far more loudly than was appropriate in these situations. Sure, he was a brilliant and visionary monarch who’d read more books than anyone alive and could speak any number of languages, but as a referee in a fencing match, he was a rank amateur.
Kest winced as he brought his sword into a high side guard, the blade held horizontal at the height of his right shoulder. ‘I really wish he wouldn’t do that.’
‘He just gets excited,’ I said. Just before the last word came out of my mouth I lunged, my right rapier aiming at his chest. Just as he went to parry it, I thrust my left one at his thigh.
Damn, he’s fast, I thought as I watched my left-hand rapier go spinning through the air and out of the duelling circle. ‘Did you want to go and get it?’ he asked politely.
‘No, I’ll stick with the one,’ I said, delivering a whip-cut towards his right cheek that was a feint so that I could actually flip the point over his head to go for the left. That didn’t work either, of course.
‘You don’t seem to be taking this very seriously,’ Kest observed, delivering a rapid series of fluid cuts that flowed in and out of each other, forcing me to back up almost to the edge of the circle.
I could already hear coins changing hands as close on a hundred other Greatcoats watching began paying off their bets. I didn’t take this early prediction of my demise personally – frankly, I was surprised anyone had bet on me in the first place.
Kest was wrong, though: I was taking this fight seriously. The moment the King had announced he was going to hold a competition to decide who would be the First Cantor, I knew it had to be me. Don’t ask me why – I’m not normally particularly competitive, let alone all that confident in my abilities, especially compared to the other Greatcoats. More importantly, I knew better than anyone that there wasn’t a person alive who could beat Kest in a fight.
The rest of the Greatcoats knew it, too. So did the King.
So he’d called this competition, and I had to win.
You see, Tristia’s never been short of powerful men armed with deadly weapons. We’ve never had a problem determining who’s got the biggest army or who’s most willing to unleash it on their neighbour. But how can you expect laws to be followed in a country where the strongest man always wins? If a legal dispute can come down to a single fight – and it almost always comes down to a fight – then what kind of justice could we ever hope to achieve?
That was why King Paelis had decreed this idiotic contest to determine the First Cantor. The question wasn’t who was the best fighter; it was who could win regardless of whether they were the best or not. Some day, in one lousy Duchy or another, we were going to find ourselves outmatched. On that day, would we be forced to concede and let the laws fall by the wayside? Or would we find a way to win? It was a fundamental test of whether the very idea of the Greatcoats made any sense. How do you bring the rule of law back to a country where the most fundamental equation of justice amounts to the fact that even those who are right will always be overwhelmed by those of greater might?
You have to change the equation.
I knew before I walked into the duelling circle that there was no way in all hells I could hope to beat Kest today.
That’s why I’d beaten him yesterday.
*
‘Again,’ I grunted, sweat pouring down my face and burning my eyes as I stumbled back to my side of the duelling circle. We had nine of them in the old training hall, each one an exact replica of the different duelling courts in the nine Duchies, so we’d be prepared for the varying sizes and shapes.
Kest had a disapproving look on his face. ‘Falcio, I hardly see the point in—’
‘Again. Unless you’re too scared I’ll score a lucky cut on that pretty face of yours. You’ll look awfully silly walking into the duelling court tomorrow covered in bandages.’
He stared at me and I knew – I just knew – he was trying to figure out if perhaps I was losing my mind. ‘Falcio, by my count I’ve beaten you twelve matches in a row. In the last five you haven’t scored a single hit. You’ve got two cuts on your left arm and one on your right, you’re limping on your left leg and you’ve nearly run into my blade three times now.’
I wiped some of the sweat away from my brow with my shirtsleeve. It came away bloody. Evidently Kest had been too polite to mention that one. ‘Well, you haven’t impaled me yet, so I must be doing something right.’
‘You haven’t done anything right! Every time – every time! – I’ve had to hold myself back to keep from stabbing you through your stomach. You need to pay more attention to—’
‘Again,’ I said.
‘Falcio, how is any of this going to help you in the competition tomorrow? You’ll be so tired you—’
‘Again.’
He hesitated, but Kest�
��s known me for a long time and he could tell I wasn’t going to back down. We began our thirteenth match and I changed up my style, using a set of swirling forms of more use to a cutting weapon than a rapier, which is most suited to thrusting.
‘That’s a Shan style of fencing, isn’t it?’ Kest asked.
I didn’t respond; he already knew the answer and I was short of breath.
I’d never visited the Shan people, mostly because there was a small ocean between us and them and I’d never left my country before, but I’d often wondered if their culture matched their fencing style. There are as many ways of Shan fencing as there are Tristian, but what’s interesting is that they don’t parry; they don’t try to stop an attack. Instead, the Shan use either a complex, dance-like series of postures and steps to avoid the blade, or they push into the attack. In theory, it’s simple enough, in effect boiling down to always thrust on an angle that forces your opponent’s attack out of line. It’s a logical enough approach, since there’s no virtue in wasting time with a parry-riposte when the counter-attack both deflects and strikes at the same time.
In theory.
As Kest came in for a cut to my left shoulder, I brought my left-hand rapier up high and caught his blade in the rapier’s wide quillons as I rotated my hand clockwise – yes, it forced me to partially turn my back to him, but it did let me thrust before he could withdraw his own weapon. For most opponents, that would have been enough – unfortunately, Kest isn’t most opponents, and of course he’s an absolute master at hand-parries. Even without gloves on, he slapped my blade with his right hand, sending it out of line as he swiftly pulled his own back. I spun around quickly, but not fast enough to stop him from very nearly driving his war sword straight into my guts.
‘Saint Birgid-who-weeps-rivers, Falcio, you nearly ran into my blade again,’ he said.
‘Guess we’ll call it your point then.’ I brought my rapiers back into guard. ‘Again.’
‘Thirteen matches, and each time you’ve tried a different style of fencing. What are you up to, Falcio?’
I smiled, which was a mistake because I was huffing and puffing so hard that spit came out the sides of my mouth. ‘Can’t you guess?’
His eyes narrowed. ‘If you were any other opponent I’d assume you were trying to find a style that I’d have difficulty countering.’
‘Sounds like a smart enough strategy.’
‘Except you know perfectly well that there are none that would achieve that objective.’
‘Must be something else then. Ready to begin again?’
‘A moment,’ he said, stepping back as if he needed a wider view of me.
Watching Kest try to figure something out is oddly mesmerising. You don’t normally see someone look at the world with such perfect focus that he doesn’t bother to hide his own thoughts – you can practically see them drift across his forehead like clouds. I especially enjoy watching Kest when I’m absolutely certain he won’t figure it out, because Kest is congenitally incapable of believing he can’t come up with the right answer.
‘I believe I have it,’ he said.
‘Do you mind if we talk and fight at the same time?’ I asked.
‘As you wish.’ He came into guard. ‘Since you know there’s no one style with which you can beat me, it’s possible that the reason for all these bouts is you’re trying to identify a set of moves and attacks I’m less skilled at defending against, and thus construct a sort of mélange with which to defeat me tomorrow.’
I delivered what I thought was a lovely triple-lunge, shifting targets with each one, my steps short, both to keep me from extending myself too far and to trick him into backing up more than he should. It’s a style they use in the desert whilst fighting on sand, which has too much give to allow you to do long lunges.
Kest had no trouble dealing with my magnificent triple-lunge, of course.
‘This won’t work either, Falcio.’
‘No?’
He batted my blade aside and pulled the same manoeuvre on me. Even though I absolutely knew it was coming, I still didn’t manage to evade him, and he struck me three times, his touches so light he wouldn’t have dented the skin of an overripe strawberry.
‘No,’ Kest said, ‘Falcio, this isn’t arrogance on my part; I’m just telling you there’s no—’
I whipped my blade in a wide arc, going for a circular cut at his temple, and just as he brought up his blade to parry, I dived forward, rolling to his right and coming up on his unguarded flank. I began a thrust that should have hit him, but he batted it away with the back of his hand even as his own sword came right at my belly, too fast for me to parry and almost too fast for him to stop in time.
‘Damn it, Falcio! You’re going to get yourself killed tomorrow—’
I waved him off. ‘I’ll be fine. I can’t very well be the First Cantor if I’m dead, can I? So I’ll just have to win.’
He stepped back and stared at me again. ‘You aren’t trying to find one style and you’re not trying to create a new one.’
‘Really? Then what am I going to all this trouble for?’
He smiled. There was some admiration there. ‘You’re using all these different forms to see if you can triangulate a vulnerability that wouldn’t show up if you used just one style. That’s very clever.’
‘Well, I don’t know what triangulation is, but I’ll accept the compliment.’
This time, I didn’t ask if he was ready; I just went at him, using all the styles we’d used, but putting pressure on his defences on the same side and at the exact height where he tended to be weakest with his parries. For a brief instant, I nearly had him – but he got out of the way. I wasn’t letting him – or me – off that easily, though, so I did a grand jeté (basically a big leap that looks rather poncy) and came over the top of his blade. He countered, and yet again beat my blade aside as he brought his own into line. Unfortunately for both of us, I’d been coming at him too fast for him to pull back in time.
‘Saints, Falcio!’
I looked down at the blood starting to trail from my belly down the line of his blade. ‘Just a scratch,’ I said – well, moaned.
‘You bloody fool!’ he said, carefully withdrawing the half-inch of steel from my side. ‘If I’d been a fraction of a second slower or you faster, you’d have impaled yourself!’
‘Sorry to inconvenience you,’ I said, grabbing for a clean cloth and pressing it to my side. ‘I’m afraid that will have to be all for today.’
‘Falcio, you can’t compete tomorrow, not like this. You’re exhausted and wounded.’
‘A few stitches and I’ll be fine by morning.’ I tried to sound insouciant, and before he could argue, I turned and headed out of the hall.
He shouted at me, ‘If it comes down to you and me, Falcio, and you know it will, presuming you don’t die of infection overnight, I’m going to beat you. I didn’t set the rules, but if the King believes the finest swordsman should be the First Cantor then that’s exactly what I’m going to be!’
It wasn’t like Kest to yell and I felt bad for upsetting him. Still . . .
I paused at the door and turned back for a moment. ‘You’re going to lose tomorrow, Kest. You may well be the greatest swordsman in the entire country, but you’re going to lose and you’ll never even know how I did it.’
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
Victory & Defeat
You would think from the number of people who have asked me over the years how I could possibly have beaten Kest in a duel that I must be blind in both eyes and perpetually drunk. It’s not that they think I’m incompetent – after all, you don’t survive as many swordfights as I have without developing something of a reputation as a fencer. It’s just that everyone is convinced that Kest is better than I am.
That part is undoubtedly true.
The thing is, I don’t rely on skil
l alone in a fight – I never have. A duellist who spends his life trying to be better than all his opponents either turns out to be a once-in-a-generation swordsman like Kest or, more likely, ends up dead by the age of twenty-five. I’m somewhat older than that, and I’ve survived because I never try to be better than my opponent. I find a way to make them defeat themselves.
When you’re fighting a Knight, for example, you use their armour against them. Some people think this means you should make them move around a lot to tire them out, but that’s a mistake – your average Knight spends hours every single day training in full armour. If they can fight for an entire day on a battlefield, they can easily outlast you in a duel. No, with Knights what you want to do is get them turning around as much as possible, constantly shifting direction: every time they have to readjust their stance, they get a little more off-balance and their muscles get a little more tense. If you can do this without them being aware, they’ll get so stiff it’s as if they’d tied themselves up in knots. Then it’s just a matter of going for one of the gaps close to the knees. Every armoured Knight’s biggest nightmare is falling onto their backs and not being able to get up in time.
With a city guardsman, you use their (perfectly reasonable) fear of someone coming up from behind – a not uncommon occurrence in the streets and alleyways they patrol. With a Dashini, you have to turn their own mind-games against them.
With Kest? Well, with Kest you run into a problem, because he doesn’t have a single weakness as a fighter. His mind is always focused, his movements always swift and sure. He doesn’t make mistakes. In the middle of a duel he thinks twice as fast as you do, he can swing a heavy war sword almost as fast as I can thrust with a rapier, and he’s trained himself to learn new techniques so quickly that he need practise a new move only a few times to get it down perfectly, and then to use it without thinking about it.
And that’s how you beat Kest.
‘You really don’t seem to be taking this very seriously,’ he said, sliding the blade of his war sword along my rapier’s and suddenly circling his point underneath, only to flip it up an instant later. My own point was driven up high and out of line, opening me up for a thrust to my belly that was so fast and light I didn’t even feel it before I heard the King shout, ‘Fourth touch to Kest!’
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