“What violent man!” exclaimed Drogva even as Kamaric’s spearmen put up the shield wall, pointing their spears at the tall-legged horses. His protest wouldn’t have been made any more ineffectively had that wall been made entirely of stone. For since childhood every boy and girl of the land had known his people as little more than warriors dressed in the innocent’s blood, and this foul reputation no amount of courtly words could ever wash off.

Now the knight retreated behind his frontline and the women shuffled further back.

Esme advanced, away from them and Cordelia. “Back,” she said to her companion. “Your foresight erred, Cordelia. This dusk shall be dyed in blood.”

But Cordelia frowned. “It does not seem to me they are inclined.” And indeed the horsemen under the black banner had not stirred even then, their gazes all but spent dispassionately at Kamaric’s shuffling horsemen and crying women. Their leader stood rooted where Kamaric had deserted him as though in disbelief still that a battle would soon commence.

“That man is shrewd,” Cordelia said dubiously. “He would never have come with so few men if he had anticipated an unavoidable battle.”

“That you cannot tell!” Esme said, lifting her gaze to the cliff, “How many more...”

Just then Drogva sharply interrupted the chaotic movements. He hailed with a roar to catch all of their attention. “My lord!” cried he, “What violent temper is this? Will you not hear a man out? I expected more of a civil lord than this!”

Sir Kamaric lifted his visor, spat, “What’s more to say, barbarian? You refused to come in peace under my jurisdiction. What other outcome should there be but war?

“Am I judged without a trial? Without justice? What is your jurisdiction but contempt for an outsider?”

“Justice you shall have. In my castle.”

“Did not I say I would come willing enough if not for a duty? What’s more, your accusation has naught to do with my men, for you conferred the responsibility of a punished deed upon their commander, yet eagerly you will shed their blood ere a trial is made!”

“If truly you love your men so, put you down your arms at once and all shall be spared to go freely.” The knight growled.

“Nay,” the barbarian swept his hand, darkening his visage. “I demand a trial! Right now. Right here. A holmgang!” he bellowed.

The knight stared at him. And at last Cordelia glimpsed the barbarian true’s intention. Quickly she drew her cloak up to hide the thrust out fork tongue.

“A judicial duel,” said the knight, “you say?”

“However your people call it, I demand it. Your best warrior against mine. Or will you fight yourself, marquess? If so, yours truly shall honor you in combat!”

The knight grumbled, and checked his men-at-arms, of whom some had blanched at the prospect of fighting a barbarian or even his trained chosen. Few among them were cowards, and yet all men of the land had heard bloody tales of the northern raiders since childhood.

None of them knew of the man’s clubfoot. Though they assumed the barbarian was a match for the knight.

“I shall not,” at last the knight said, and turned to his men, “Who of ye will fight?”

Noble-born lords and knights apparently seldom duel lowborns in person, unless, at least in Kamaric’s case, he is galled by a stubborn peasant girl into one out of pity.

For another moment allowed to consider, some of them might have volunteered for the honor of combat and soldiery pride, this Cordelia did not doubt. But already Esme had dismounted, now marched at once to Sir Kamaric and thrust the butt of her spear on the earth before him. Unscreened by the long locks she had bunched up, the girl’s face flushed with excitement, though her eyes were the cold green of conviction solidified.

“I beg the honor, sir, for recognition as your warrior.”

Kamaric seemed pleased enough by her promptness. It would have badly reflected on him had his men all cringed from the duel. Still, he gave the perfunctory caution, “Are you certain, unproven warrior? The opportunity to prove yourself shall come soon enough, so long as you follow my band. And sure you understand, warrior, that though a sanctioned duel is only to the first blood, little enough one may do to scruple in the heat of combat.”

“Yes, my lord,” she said at once, picking up her spear without even a moment of pretension that she had given his caution a thought.

“Very well,” he nodded. And to Drogva he said, “Find you the combatant and rules to your satisfaction, barbarian? Knowing your people, I trust you would not scorn fighting a woman.”

Drogva gave a courtly nod, “Nor would aught in possession of an eye for talents.” Then turning, he barked a name, “Fidele!”

One of his horsemen dismounted. Like Esme, he planted his spear on the ground. Then wordlessly and grimly he moved to the front of the formation, awaiting further order. Little enough there were to be marked under his three-horned helmet. He was solidly built, and though leaner, appeared far more nimble than his clubfooted captain. Whereas the rest of the horsemen from both sides shielded themselves with iron-rimmed wooden boards, the man sported a slab of solid metal, which shifted heavily and unwieldy in his burly right hand. Nor did he brandish a longsword as the rest, but for a personal weapon he carried an axe wrought entirely from shaft to blade as one piece of metal.

“Fidele, man,” the barbarian said cheerily, “Our Knight Marquess here seems to worry you may scruple from fighting a little girl! For my part, I do not mind, having known and had many a fierce woman in my life. And to be sure, I have chased and killed men who are more skittish than hares to belie their gender! But if my memory isn’t amiss, and I seldom doubt it, you hailed from further east of the mainland where they treat women like soft flowers. Need I fear your axe might untimely scruple and, by dreadful consequence, sentence yours truly to this lord’s dungeon for many a wasteful season?”

“You needn’t worry, sir,” said the man in an even voice, “I do as I am commanded.”

“And never had a sweeter answer been uttered to a commander's ear!” cheered the barbarian. “You heard him, Sir Knight Marquess. He shall fight your girl as eagerly as he would yourself. A fine man he is. He crossed the mainland from the east and then the great channel to this land, for what unearthly reason he would not tell. But here’s a man you can trust to follow an order into danger. Is that not something you and I both can appreciate, sir, as fellow leaders of men?”

“I do not appreciate being grouped up with you, man,” Kamaric said. “But get you on with it. I am weary of your chatter.”

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So the combatants were urged forth. But having already dismounted scarce a moment before, Cordelia rushed to Esme and seized her arm.

“What now,” the girl hissed. “Don’t tell me you don’t want me to fight!”

“Nay,” Cordelia hushed, “Fight to your heart’s content, or however you want. But that the man is one formidable foe you need not be told. Should you find yourself at a disadvantage, however, with little chances for a decisive victory, draw out the fight, and beware!”

“Why?” she looked back strangely.

“Just keep that in mind.”

And Cordelia released the girl from her grasp. Dubiously the blonde’s stare lingered upon her, then she marched away.

And now in the middle of the two warbands, the duelists greeted each other. A ring should have been formed around them as with that time Cordelia fought Kamaric in the square of Argenton. But on this occasion, both sides were wary to follow such a custom. With the threat of a treacherous turn loomed, they had elected to maintain their formations with alertness.

“Your friend seemed worried,” Fidele remarked. “You sure want to do this, girl?”

“Did not you say you fight as you are commanded?” Testing her grip on the shield and the weight of her sword, Esme countered with scorn. “Or is it the fashion of mainland men to distract their opponent with feigned concerns?”

“It is but curiosity. My axe does not err as a soldier, but that is not to say I am without human thoughts.”

“You are skilled enough to be knighted,” Esme observed. “Why settle with acting servant for these base men and base deeds? Are your human thoughts not human enough to scruple from the service of evil men?”

“You lost me at the speech of evil, girl. You are as the rest of your kind, but another self-proclaimed champion of an empty order. Now let us fight, for my curiosity is spent!”

“An accusation without an explanation.” Esme frowned. “Though it is no time for discourse, I admit.”

“On guard, I say!”

And he came like a flash of lightning, axe-bladed glinted in one downward motion. Esme at first attempted to parry it, then decided against it, whirling away to his left in the last second. The southpaw exposed himself awkwardly after that determined strike. Esme completed a full circle and slashed with the back of her sword, but the back of his axe raised back in time to bounce her strike away.

With this one exchange, the man’s fighting style had betrayed the reason behind his equipment. Being left-handed, he forced his foe to either commit to guarding or attacking. And yet no shield would ever withstand such a blow as that thunderous one, a stroke with such might and device to split in half even the sturdiest of boards. Esme did not err in trying to dodge to his left, despite exposing herself so in multiple ways to his second strike should he have also the speed to match his might and defense. And that speed, he had. Shortly after parrying her sword, his axe came down once more, as deadly as before. This time Esme stumbled backwards, having little choice but to shield herself. The axe caught the iron rim, biting through it and into the wood, but her shield yielded to its motion, instead of pulling the wielder fatally with it. For already with swift decision she had forgone the meager means of defense, abandoning her shield and thus liberated herself from the vortex of successive attack. Now she was freed and his axe was caught in the split shield. Like a leaping viper, she thrust her blade’s extreme at his laden arm.

Nor did the man now attempt to parry with his burdened side. His upper half swiveled, and with a speed belying its enormous weight, managed to block with his metal slab.

Esme’s strike had force enough behind it enough to strain the muscles of his burly arm; with a different weapon, his elbow might have buckled. This one shuddered against the solid metal then, with a loud crash, shattered into pieces.

“Give that girl a sword!” one of the spearmen shouted.

“Nay!” cried Esme. “A spear! Throw a spear!”

And one did. She caught it. Fidele did not take advantage of the moment to attack. Heavily he slammed the shield caught on his axeblade on the ground, cleaving the board asunder, then stood back. “Wise choice, girl. You were well-taught, and stronger than you look.”

“I had my brother to thank for it,” she said grimly, testing the weight of the borrowed spear. It was a long thing, tossed by horsemen, measuring to the length of her body and half again.

“You planned to let go of your shield and sword from the start,” he observed. “Why took them in the first place? Passing risky to bet on a moment in battle without a weapon.”

“Who knows. Mayhap I wished to draw out the fight.”

“You speak nonsense.” He frowned.

“None of your business. On guard!”

Esme wielded the spear two-handed, betimes as a staff, at times stabbing, but mainly to force the man back from her commanded area. With the advantage of superior range, some measure of defense she could sacrifice to overwhelm his shield arm. Her footwork was light, discouraging her opponent from charging ineffectively forward. He advanced, she retreated, withdrawing and extending the spearhead just enough to keep it in range of her opponent’s vitals, and him busy guarding them while trying to enter own striking distance. The lack of a circle of spectators provided the girl ample space to maneuver this way. And soon it looked to all that it was becoming a battle of attrition.

And yet the longer the stalemate endured, the greater the tension grew and not one soul could afford to look away from the enchanting combat. For even as both sides went on a long while without showing aught sign of fatigue, the perilous moments of battle proved how close it was for a spearhead to slip through, missing flesh with a hairbreadth, or for an unpredictable obstacle in the terrain to compromise Esme’s fluid movements, threatening opportune time and space for her foe to get close.

But precariously, both sides prevailed.

“Did you see it?” Suddenly Cordelia whispered.

“The girl is skilled, the man moreso,” Mastema replied, “What of it?”

“Not that.” She narrowed her eyes. Something else. Something that had bothered her since the beginning of the duel. Was it magic?

“If it was, then no fey thing that. For I could not scent it, though I am limited to observing only through my mistress’s senses.”

“Nay, this is different.” She shifted uneasily on the Hagborn. Far from the intense dread she had experienced in the morgue and in front of the crypt, this time the sensation she had caught was far more subtle. And it was coming from Esme herself.

A loud clang echoed through the ravine as the man’s shield met Esme’s spearhead. He made use of the moment to sidestep then brought his axe down at the shaft. Esme withdrew it in time, then lunged again, threatening the man back from the little distance he had closed.

“Perhaps,” Mastema ventured, “it is holy magic. For unlike fey arts, it is native in the nature of mortals, and thus far more difficult to discern. Some call it willpower, others virtues. But it is no art against the laws of nature.”

“Such a thing would fit her true calling, at any rate,” she remarked without conviction. But even if Esme possessed a subtle holy magic, which was like to be, it was nothing to celebrate. For the change she had just discerned and which had prompted her inquiry was not its emergence or amplification, but that it was getting fainter and fainter rapidly. She could not put it into words, for so far it had not manifested in a perceptible change in Esme’s fluid movement and strikes of terrifying might. It was but a thing that nagged in the back of her head.

Even as Esme steadily stood her ground, gradually forcing Fidele back more and more, Mastema said, “She’s weakening, and not physically.”

“Perhaps there’s a condition to her power?” Cordelia ventured, shuffling uneasily on her horse. She feared this strange feeling portended more than just a duel lost. “Her holy magic or whatever? This condition is subsiding, though I know not what, and so she is weakened.”

“That einheri kept his distance.”

Cordelia nodded. It was not his interference, but something innate in Esme herself. She wondered if the blonde was consciously aware of this power, or was oblivious of it even as with her divine nature.

Just then, it happened. It was when the steady rhythm of battle was going to draw on forever, that Fidele suddenly abandoned his active defense. Trusting only to his raised shield, he launched himself into a maddened charge. A gamble. In a real battle to death, this would be an understandable move, for even if Esme managed to exploit his dropped guard, it would not be enough to stop his determined charge. And once he got in close, she would have naught to parry the mighty axe with. But this was a duel to the first blood, and she needed only to score a wound on his flesh without needing to worry about what would happen next.

Then her foot slipped. At the moment when she had planted it down for a lunge, she slipped, almost entirely by chance. The axe came down and she was defenseless.