‘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.’