As Rutger fought his way through the crowd toward Ashiq Temür, he eyed the man’s cudgel warily. The simplest weapons were often times the most effective, and Rutger knew all too well that a solid blow from the big Mongol’s weapon would shatter bone and pulp his flesh. Maks’s crushed face was the only reminder he needed of the weapon’s power. As he broke through the mob, he saw that the cudgel was more than a shaped piece of hardwood. Beneath the blood spatter and gore clinging to it, he could see the glint of metal. Heavy and slow, he thought, I must be quick.
He swung his sword, and Ashiq Temür saw him coming and raised his club to block Rutger’s attack. Their weapons clashed, and Rutger’s blade bit into the wood of the cudgel. The Mongol commander grinned, showing a mouthful of crooked teeth, as he twisted his arm down. Rutger couldn’t get his blade free in time, and his arms were yanked to his left. Ashiq Temür stepped closer, movement that wasn’t very smart if he was planning on hitting Rutger with his cudgel, but Rutger knew the big man had other plans in mind. He wanted to grapple.
Rutger stepped in too. He let go of his sword with his left hand, made a fist, and drove forward with all his might. Unlike the Mongol, his hand was covered with steel plates, and his armored fist struck Ashiq Temür square in the nose. The Mongol’s head snapped back and a bright flower of blood burst across his face.
Rutger wasn’t sure who screamed louder—he or the Mongol. Even with the protection of his gauntlets, something snapped inside his hand when he hit Ashiq Temür’s face.
Rutger felt his sword come free of the cudgel, and he darted to Ashiq Temür’s left. He slid behind the Mongol’s back and raised his blade so that he could grip the steel with his damaged left hand. Even though his grip felt imperfect—one of his fingers was not cooperating as it should—he yanked the sword toward him, slamming the blade against his enemy’s throat. He twisted his hips violently.
On a smaller man the technique would have slit the man’s throat and most likely snapped his neck, but Rutger felt the blade rasp off metal and leather. Ashiq Temür was wearing neck protection and all he had done was attach himself to the bigger man’s back like an enraged monkey.
Ashiq Temür dropped his weight and rotated his hips, and Rutger tried to hang on as he was wrenched around like a rag doll. The big Mongol flexed his shoulders, broadening his back, and his left elbow snapped back, driving into the aged quartermaster’s gut.
Rutger knew the elbow was coming. He released his grip on his blade, taking the Mongol’s strike against his chest. It knocked him back, and as Ashiq Temür whirled around, Rutger turned the stagger into a roll and the roll into a retreat. The ground shook as the cudgel hammered into the spot where he had been standing a moment earlier.
His spine popping, Rutger came up in a crouch. His chest was tight—not from the Mongol’s blow, but from his overworked lungs—and his left hand burned as if he had been squeezing hot coals. He stayed low, his sword resting on the ground in front of him as he struggled to catch his breath.
Ashiq Temür towered over Rutger as he raised his massive cudgel for another ground-shaking blow. His mouth yawned open, braying a wordless battle cry, and the skull-shattering club arced down, eclipsing the late afternoon sun.
No, the thought flashed through Rutger’s head, I will not die today.
He was fighting with Andreas’s longsword. He would not let the weapon be lost on the battlefield. He would not let Andreas who had fallen before, or Maks or any of the other Shield-Brethren who had fallen today, go unremembered. He would not falter.
Rutger surged to his right, sweeping Andreas’s longsword up into the path of Ashiq Temür’s descending swing. He felt the blade strike flesh, jarring his hands. Shards of pain blasted through his left wrist and up his arm. The cudgel hit the ground and bounced to his left. Ashiq Temür stared, shock and surprise crumbling the corners of his wide-open mouth. Rutger wasted no time, and snapped his sword up, the tip of his blade slicing just above the leather collar wrapped around Ashiq Temür’s neck. The Mongol commander groaned, a jet of dark blood spurting from his throat, and when he raised his arms to try and stop the flow his eyes widened.
Rutger’s first cut had severed both of his arms, just above the wrist.
Ashiq Temür collapsed, sprawling on ground slippery with his blood. He died, open eyes staring at his severed hands, still clutching the heavy club.