Piers Anthony - Neq the Sword

Then Tyl spied a nomad campsite. "See--they built a fire, here, and pitched some kind of tent here, with guides around it to lead off the water from rain. The locals don't do that; they stay in square houses."

"But this is recent. Five, six days, no more. It can not be our quarry."

"True. But what would nomads be doing here? We should question them."

"Question the locals. Some would have seen the nomads pass."

Tyl nodded thoughtfully. "Strange we have heard nothing of these before."

They questioned, the locals, and learned that two nomads, a man and a woman, had passed through, traveling south.

"South?" Neq demanded. "Where did they come from?"

The people only shrugged, not knowing or caring what the barbarians did or which direction they went.

Sol and the Weaponless had gone north; these others were from the north. Their trails might have crossed.

They made a rapid excursion south again, tracing the strangers, following a course that skirted dangerously close to posted radiation zones. A large, gruff man and a rather pretty woman who kept to themselves and made swift progress. Tyl would question native villagers--a village was a kind of stationary tribe, unique to this locale--while Neq scouted the countryside for further traces.

Neq looked up one such afternoon to discover a grotesque man watching him. Huge and shaggy, hunched-backed, with grossly gnarled hands curled about home-made singlesticks, and mottled skin showing under his heavy winter coverings--the man was more like a badlands beast that a nomad. But nomad he was, and he had already assumed a stance of combat. His long arms and heavy chest suggested enormous power; he would be savage with those sticks!

Mottled skin....

"Var the Stick!" Neq cried, amazed.

The other spoke, but it sounded more like a growl. By concentrating, Neq made out the gist. "You followed me for days. Now give cause why I should not drive you off."

Neq unveiled his sword. "Cause enough here. But first you must answer my questions, for I have sought you long."

"A changeling!" Var rasped, seeing Neq's arms. "Do you know the circle?"

Neq was surprised. "You speak of the circle? You, slayer of children?"

"Never!" Var roared, coming at him. There was something wrong about his legs; though he wore boots, he did not walk like a man. A true beast in nomad outfit... it was no longer a mystery why he had killed the young girl Soli. He had probably eaten her.

Var struck at him and Neq parried, smiling grimly. He had no fear of hand-hewn weapons, and a clumsy charge was the simplest to terminate. But first he needed information.

Var was more artful than his appearance suggested. As Neq dodged aside, so did he, so that they met squarely. One stick shot toward Neq's face while the other blocked his sword. Var had met many a blade before!

So much the better. Neq's pincers also blocked defensively while his sword whistled. He struck first at the other's weapon, seeking to cut a stick in half. He preferred to disarm this monster gradually, lingeringly, not hurting him much... until after the truth was known.

"Before I down you," Var grunted, "tell me your name."

"Neq the Sword." This courtesy of identification was due even for a beast.

Var fought for a while, quite skillfully, pondering behind his overhanging brows. "I know of you," he grunted. But he showed no fear, only caution.

It was increasingly apparent that this was no warrior of the decadent post-empire ilk. Var's technique was unconventional, but he was years younger than Neq, and much larger, so that even with his considerable stoop he stood taller. He had quick brute power, and the crude-seeming sticks were more solid than they looked, blocking sword-thrusts with considerable authority. The wood tended to catch the blade, holding it instead of bouncing it back, and that was dangerous indeed. The two sticks beat a tattoo on both his metal arms, their violent force bearing him back. Had his sword not been part of him, Neq could have been disarmed early, and certainly he was giving way before the onslaught.

Yet there was a certain eloquence about Var's attack, ferocious as it was. His balance was excellent. Without pausing, the man kicked off his boots and exposed homy bare feet--and then his footing was not clumsy at all. He was astonishingly agile for his bulk, yet his motions were economical.

A master sticker, in fact. Neq had encountered only two empire stickers with power and finesse like this. One was Tyl--greater on the finesse, less on the power--and the other was Sol... whose whereabouts Var must know.

But the sticks were not like the sword, and Neq's sword was not like others. His wrist was invulnerable. Though he was not young himself, he knew of no man who could match him in fair circle combat today, other than Tyl. Var might hold him off for some time, but Var had to tire, to make mistakes, to overreach himself. The real strength of a sticker lay in his endurance under stress and his continuing judgment. There was where Neq had him: experience.

Neq fended off the blows and maneuvered for a clean opening himself. This was difficult, for Var danced about on his hooves and ducked his shaggy head sometimes almost to the ground--without ever exposing it.

"You are skilled, man of metal hands," Var muttered. "As befits a chief under the Master."

Neq eased his fencing, spying an opportunity to leam something. If Var were attempting to lull him by conversation, he would fail. "You are skilled too. I heard the Weaponless trained you himself."

"The Master is dead," Var said, relaxing his attack.

Neq let the pace slow, but remained vigilant. Var's companion might be near, ready to pounce treacherously during the double distraction of battle and dialogue. What kind of woman would mate with this kind of man, if not a beast-woman? "You could not have slain the Weaponless."

"Not in the circle," Var said grimly.

Neq stiffened. In that moment the sticker could have scored, had he been alert. Then the sparring resumed. "Sol of All Weapons followed you. You could not have slain him either."

"Not with the sticks."

This time Neq stiffened deliberately, proffering a seeming opening. Still Var did not strike. He was either too clever or too stupid. "You admit you killed them treacherously?"

"The radiation."

That blotched skin of his! Neq remembered now--there had been a story that the beast-boy could feel radiation, avoiding lethal concentrations himself while leading others into some badlands trap. So it was true, and Var had doomed both his friend and his enemy by luring them through an unmarked radiation pocket! Now he dared to return with his bitch, thinking his crime unknown or forgotten.

So Neq's sources of information were gone. But there was one more thing to know. "Soli--the child of Helicon--"

Var actually smiled. "Soli exists no more."

Neq could hardly speak. "The radiation?" he whispered with biting irony.

But this question Var avoided, as though some lode of buried guilt had finally been tapped. "We have no quarrel. I will show you Vara."

Then the opening came, and Neq's sword struck true.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Tyl returned at dusk, with a companion. "Neq! Neq! Look what I found in the village!"

Neq looked up from the caim he had been fashioning. As the two approached he saw that the stranger was a woman. "I'm so glad to find you!" she exclaimed.

Neq stared. It was a crazy woman! She wore the typical skirt and blouse despite the cold, and her long dark hair was bound the crazy way. And she was lovely.

"Miss Smith," he murmured, reminded achingly of his love though there was little actual, physical similarity between the two women. This one was neat to the point of precision, as Miss Smith had been; she was beautiful in that fragile manner; and she was incongruous in the wilderness. That was the connection. Intelligent, literate, innocent. His heart felt as though a dagger had nudged it.