“Ah—yes. I believe so. It would only make sense, as the entire competition is designed for a fair contest between the opponents.”
She watched Lord Irawondona remove his cloak. The elf looked imposing even from across the field. “Hadrian is the only one who has any chance of winning. Name him your champion. Myron, tell Gaunt the words he needs to say.”
“They weren’t on the horn.”
“You just heard him,” Royce reminded him. “Just repeat what you heard Mawyndul? say, and quickly.”
“Oh, right. Muer wir ahran dulwyer,” Myron said.
“Degan, say it! Say it loud!”
“Muer wir—ah—ahran—ah—” Gaunt stumbled and hesitated.
“Dulwyer,” Myron whispered.
“Dulwyer!” Gaunt shouted.
The heads of the elves turned.
“Now the next line and substitute my name for Irawondona,” Hadrian said.
Myron fed him the words and Gaunt recited them. The elves looked confused for a moment, until Gaunt pointed at Hadrian. Myron gave Hadrian the next line and Arista stood shaking as she heard him recite it aloud, accepting the role of Gaunt’s champion.
“Degan,” she said, “give Hadrian the medallion back.”
“But he said—”
“I know what he said, and he’ll let you have it after the fight, but right now he needs all the help he can get. Give it to him now!” Degan tore the chain off his neck and handed it to her.
“Boys!” Hadrian shouted. “Fetch me that bundle near my blanket and the shield!”
The four boys sprinted down the slope to the camp.
“You can beat him, can’t you?” Arista asked while slipping the chain over his head. She was trembling. “You will beat him for me, won’t you? You can’t leave me like Emery and Hilfred. You know I couldn’t take that, right? You know that—you have to win.”
“For you? Anything,” he said, and kissed her hard, pulling her to him.
The boys returned and threw open the bundle, revealing the brilliant armor of Jerish Grelad. “Help me on with this,” Hadrian said, and everyone, including Degan and Myron, looked for ways to assist.
An elf appeared before them, holding one of the strange halberd weapons they had seen images of in Percepliquis. He held it out to Hadrian.
“You know how to use this?” Arista asked.
“Never touched one before.”
“Something tells me he has,” she said as across the field Lord Irawondona lifted his own halberd with both hands spread apart, holding it like a double-bladed quarterstaff. He spun it with remarkable speed such that the blades hummed.
“Yeah, I think you’re right.”
Hadrian took a breath and turned to her. Their eyes met just at the moment the sun broke over the trees and shone on their faces. Hadrian looked beautiful, glimmering in his golden armor. He appeared like an ancient god reborn onto the world of man.
The priest of Ferrol shouted something and neither needed Myron to translate.
It was time.
Arista found it hard to breathe and her legs grew weak as she watched Hadrian enter the ring of torches. He stepped to the center and waited, planting his feet in the packed snow and shifting his grip on the strange weapon.
She looked at Mawyndul? and saw he was no longer smiling; his face showed concern as Irawondona entered the ring. The blue torches flared with his passing and the elven lord strode about the space casually, confidently.
“Hadrian’s the best in the world, Arista,” Mauvin whispered to her. “Better than any Pickering, better than Braga, better than—”
“Better than an elven lord?” she asked sharply. “He’s probably played with that weapon since he was a child—some fifteen hundred years ago!”
The drums rolled and the horns blared once more in a sharply definitive sound that hurt her ears. She tried to swallow but found her throat tight. In her chest, her heart hammered, and her hands rose to her breast in an attempt to contain it.
Hadrian waited awkwardly as if uncertain whether the fight had begun. Irawondona walked around the circle of blue burning torches, spinning his spear, rolling it across his shoulders, down his arm, and around his wrist, grinning at the crowd. He threw the weapon up, where it rotated above his head, and whirled it such that it made the sound of birds in flight. He caught it again and laughed.
“How good is he?” Arista asked Mauvin. “Can you tell by the way he moves?”
“Oh, he’s good.”
“How good? You’ve fought Hadrian. Can he beat him?”
“He’s real good.”
“Stop saying that and answer the damn question!”
“I don’t know, okay?” Mauvin admitted. “I can only say that he’s really fast, faster than Hadrian, I think.”
“What about all the whirling? What can you tell from that?”
“That’s nothing, he’s just trying to intimidate.”
“Well, it’s working on me.”
Hadrian stood still, waiting.
Irawondona continued to spin the spear with his hands. “I must commend you on at least knowing how to hold the ule-da-var,” Irawondona told him.
“Yeah, but I don’t know how to do all that fancy spinning stuff,” Hadrian replied. “Does that help? Or is it just needlessly tiring your muscles?”
Irawondona closed the distance between them with brilliant speed and slashed at Hadrian. One stroke aimed down and across with the top blade and another up with the bottom blade. Hadrian dodged the first strike and parried the second with a last-minute swing.
“That was good,” Mauvin whispered. “I’d be dead right now.”
“In the first exchange?” Arista asked.
“Yeah, contrary to popular belief, sword fights don’t last long, a few minutes at best. I watched his feet and they fooled me—he’s very good.”
Irawondona jabbed—Hadrian slapped the blade aside. He jabbed again, and again; each time Hadrian caught the stroke.
“Very nice,” Irawondona said. “Now let’s see how good you really are.”
The elf slapped the shaft of his spear, causing it to hum and the blade to quiver. He jabbed again, this time too fast for Arista to see. Hadrian blocked, caught, and slapped but then Irawondona swung.
“Duck!” Mauvin shouted. “Oh no!”
Hadrian did duck, stabbing his lower blade into the snow. Irawondona’s first stroke passed over Hadrian’s head, but then the second came down. Before it landed, Hadrian pulled on his planted pole and slid himself across the snow on his knees, leaving Irawondona to strike nothing but the bare ground.
Both combatants paused, breathing hard.
“Whoa!” Mauvin said. “That was really good.”
“You don’t move like a human,” Irawondona said.
“And you fight surprisingly well for a talking brideeth.”
The reaction on Irawondona’s face was immediate. His happy grin vanished.
Arista looked to Myron.
“I don’t know that word,” the monk replied.
“I wouldn’t think you would,” Royce said. “I taught him that one.”