Rital of Proof (40 page)

He tried once more just before dawn. "Green—"

"No more! I must do this for you and Arkeus. It is my duty to take care of you. I love you both and must make sure of your welfare."

"And I love you, but would never expect this of you! You cannot face that swagger in a duel—even with a half-blade! Green, you are not skilled. She has named it a duel of weaponry; what if she names the meteor-blade? You have said yourself she is very proficient in it."

"The seconds would have something to say, I imagine. Her honor would suffer irrevocably if she purposely chose a weapon that an opponent might have no expertise in. Most likely she will choose the half-blade."

Jorlan was not so sure.

"Are you good with half-blade?"

"I am a stateswoman," she answered vaguely.

He exhaled in frustration. "You won't stand a chance against her!"

Her amber eyes veiled. "Perhaps not. That is not the point to be focused on here."

Jorlan realized then that he could not talk his stubborn name-giver out of this duel. He remembered her words before they left the Dreamtree. "I only wish that I could forever remember every beautiful, loving thing exactly as you have said it to me tonight. I wish that time would never blur its edges or soften its impact."

He had told her, "You will remember all of it for it is inside you, Green, and it has become part of you. Like me."

Jorlan recognized that he could not,
would not
let Green take such a risk. The protective instinct was also male, and he embraced it.

Against her half-hearted objections, he beguiled her into letting him love her again. When she fell into an exhausted slumber, he slipped from their bed.

Donning his clothes, he went over to his wardrobe and silently opened a secret compartment on the bottom.

Slipping his meteor-blade around his waist, he concealed them within his tunic.

He was going to do what any man should have the right to do. He was going to protect his family.

Silently, he closed the door behind him.

Green's lashes flickered slightly as Jorlan strode determinedly to the door.

From beneath their shadows, amber glints flashed knowingly, then drifted shut.

It was pathetically easy to gain access to the D'anbere estate. Apparently the obnoxious She-Count did not think anyone would ever dare to violate her stronghold.

Jorlan was not surprised when he found her in her private study gleefully examining an array of weapons, obviously trying to decide what would be best to use on Green. Something that would be acceptable to the Top Slice, yet advantageous to her skills.

She had strapped on two cross-blades, testing their feel. She was a woman who liked the weight of weapons on her. Jorlan might have admired that, had she been any other woman.

The cross-blades were long, weighty weapons that were designed to be used in close hand-to-hand combat. They were a favorite instrument of the wild Southern tribes, whose women meted out justice swiftly and with no recourse.

She turned at his soft footfall, expecting to see a servant.

"I told you I did not wish to be disturbed! How dare you enter without my—?" She stopped when she recognized Jorlan. Her delicate eyebrow arched speculatively.

Then her cold eyes flared greedily with erroneous assumption. She believed that Green had sent him to pacify her. Silly Marquelle! She would have this velvet petal and still go after Green Tamryn.

Jorlan leaned against her desk and crossed his arms over his black tunic. One booted ankle indolently crossed over the other. Mimicking her, he also arched his eyebrow.

"I suppose I dare much, She-Count."

Claudine threw back her head and laughed. "Dare all you like, Jorlan. I shall find the challenge of subduing you delightful."

Unconcerned, he flicked an imaginary speck of lint off his sleeve. "Actually I had a rather different challenge in mind."

Claudine strolled over to her hameeri cabinet. Lifting a bottle of the liquor, she poured herself a small goblet. "I would offer you one, my brazen petal, but I never drink with the servants."

His lids lowered. "What a shame—for you."

Her nostrils flared. "Say what you have come to say so that we may get on with it. I realize you are going to plead for my mercy with Green and offer yourself up for her. Whatever you have to say will not change my terms. Total surrender to me. Complete compliance to my wishes."

He cocked his head to the side. "Complete compliance?"

She swirled the hameeri around in her goblet, mouth twisted into a licentious smirk.

His face bronzed in rising hatred. Who did this woman think she was? What made her think she had the right to destroy people's lives, simply to get what she wanted at any human cost?

Claudine was the worst example of their society. She had coerced his grandmother, repeatedly tried to ruin Green, and threatened his son. An entitled Lordene, spoiled by her apparent power with no conscience and no accountability.

Tonight she was going to account. To
him.

He stood away from the desk and began pacing slowly toward her. "Actually, I had something quite different in mind."

"Did you?" Her eyes blatantly devoured him as he came closer. Handsome, muscular and primed. "I'm all... ears."

Casually he lifted the edge of his tunic, letting her see the edge of the hammers on the meteor-blade. "My challenge for Green's."

The sight of a meteor-blade on him was so unorthodox that it took a few moments for his outrageous suggestion to sink in.

She snickered.

Like lightening, she was on him. Her arms seized him in a headlock. In the blink of an eye she drew a curved cross-blade from her waistband and held it to his throat.

"Foolish boy; you see how stupid such a challenge is? Already I have you subdued. I am a platinum class warrior! Leave women's matters to women. It would be a pity to waste such a prize piece on such a juvenile notion of devotion."

In a skilled maneuver, Jorlan twisted about, instantly freeing himself from her grip. Grabbing the wrist that held the blade, he quickly spun her around, capturing her in his own hold. Soon Claudine's own cross-blade was at her throat.

Her eyes widened in surprise. "Very good, Jorlan. I see your grandmother has indulged you in many ways. So you have been taught to fight, but wielding the meteor-blade is quite a different matter. Only the most skilled warriors can do it. Think twice about your challenge—you will not survive me."

Jorlan released her abruptly, flinging her from him.

Without taking his eyes off her, he unwrapped the meteor-blade from around his waist. Expertly, he scalloped it about his wrist, letting the hammer swing forward, bringing the rope to the perfect tautness to begin an execution of form. "Think again. It is you who will not survive, Claudine." His aqua eyes narrowed with hatred for every twisted thing she had done. "Believe it."

"No man has spilt blood on Forus for over a thousand years. Would you be the first? Do you really want to attempt to soak the ground with female blood? For if you do, you will not live long to glory in it. The Septibunal would have you executed as a deviant."

"I'm willing to take that risk."

Claudine was no fool. She recognized the skill in his handling of the weapon. Strangely, she was stimulated by the fact that she would have to conquer him to win him. Suddenly she ached to fight him.

For when she was through, she would offer him no quarter. She was sure the release of victory would be as potent as any other.

It always had been.

And after she killed the precious Jorlan,
Green
would come for her. The Marquelle would never allow such an affront to her House to pass. In the past. Green Tamryn's irksome sense of honor had always become the fatal flaw that played perfectly into her plans.

Jorlan would be a convenient diversion.

Her focus had always been Tamryn.

"Shall we?" She unlatched a door that led directly out into the gardens. Meteor-blades were rarely used indoors. Their deadly trajectories required high-speed spins. In combat, a man of Jorlan's height would require a diameter of close to twenty-six feet to properly execute many of the forms. When used in this manner, the meteor-blade duel was a lethal dance of terrifying beauty. Such battles were rare, for few had the skill to enter into such a combat. Reaction would be strictly instinctual; timing precise.

Claudine backed away from him as she began to swing her meteor-blade in the small, circular prelude motions of battle. Her steps were sure on the stone-laid terrace.

"I'll give you first strike, my brazen petal, just to show you how fair I can be." She taunted him, confident in her victory before they had even begun.
^:

"How generous of you, She-Count." Jorlan whipped the meteor-blade over his head in a wide loose arc—an unusual first move.

Yet when he slung his wrist forward, he did not catch her off guard as he had hoped. The orbs zinged through the air only to be brought up short by blades that intersected his throw.

The ropes of their weapons twined together with a shredding force.

Both duelists pulled back on their weapons, expertly untangling them before either took damage. Novitiates often lost the battle in this manner before it had even begun.

Both of them slung the meteor-blades back around and to opposite sides.

"Not bad for a beginner." Claudine sidestepped to the right, dropped to one knee and executed a perfect lateral arc. Her blade sliced in a rapid zigzag pattern directly toward him.

Jorlan immediately rolled to his left. One of the many dangers of fighting with the meteor-blade was its field of damage. Because the reach was so long, an expert bladeswoman could take down nearly anything in her path for a radius equal to more than twice her height. Of course in the heat of battle, close forms were high
strategy.

Jorlan threw his blade on a perpendicular intersect, catching hers. He sharply yanked his wrist back in the hope of wresting the weapon from her. It didn't work; she was too sharp for that. Too skilled. She quickly circled her arm and snapped her blades around his shoulder. One of them grazed his tunic, instantly slicing through the material.

The quick, initially painless slice brought an instant well of blood bubbling up through his clothing. Claudine's eyes gleamed malevolently. "I have always liked the sight of red on black. How about you?"

"I have never much cared for the combination, Lordene." Jorlan dropped to the ground to avoid her blade coming perilously close to his head. He rolled over onto his back and snapped his blade out from ground level. Claudia recognized the intricate form, called
Blanock Lifting.
She wondered how he learned it. The rope snagged one of her knees. She could only watch as it whipped around the back of her leg, slicing into the opposite ankle when he flicked his wrist to release the circumference blades.

The cut was not deep but Jorlan hoped the slick blood would make her footing unsure.

He had no qualms about killing her. As long as she lived, this woman would be a constant threat to Green and to his son.

A highly trained warrior, Claudine rapidly recovered from the hit. She almost caught him in a rebound shot.

"I have to say, Reynard, you have much more life in you than my three past name-bearers combined. What a pity your grandmother didn't honor our contract. We can still remedy that, you know."

She caught his wrist in a superb form known as the
Twine of Night.
Jorlan knew he had but an instant to save his hand. He pushed himself
into
the spin, pulled back on his meteor-blade and engaged the ropes of his own hammers.

The maneuver stopped the damage. Claudine had to retract or be in danger of losing her weapon.

"My name is Tamryn," he hissed back at her. "And ever will be! Your past name-bearers—did they not have such skill with the meteor-blades? Is that how you killed them?" Jorlan felt blood dripping down his arm inside his tunic. It would soon affect his accuracy. A meteor-blade battle was best kept short.

Claudine laughed. "Don't be so mundane. No man would ever fight a woman. No man except
you.
They were quite easy to be rid of, actually. The poor things were so surprised at the final moments. Well, what did they expect?"

"I am surprised you are admitting this." Jorlan angled himself toward the backdrop of foliage. There, his black clothing would make it harder for her to see him.

"You will not live to tell it, my petal. The last one, poor Haringer, literally begged me for his life. I pushed him into a nest of weavermouths. He screamed for hours."

A small gasp of horror came from the bush behind him. Jorlan could not take his eyes off Claudine for even an instant to see what it was.

He was too busy deflecting her rapid strikes. The form known as
Arc Storming
was a difficult one to counterbalance.