Edward Bolme - Bound by Iron

Then the hobgoblin locked eyes with him.

Damn my height! thought Rophis. He turned, shielded his face as best he could, and grabbed one of the guards nearest him. “Destroy the evidence!” he ordered. “Now!”

He turned and began pushing his way through the audience, hoping that he could effect his escape before panic seized the crowd-or at least before the Aundairians captured him.

Pomindras moved swiftly through the passageways beneath the audience’s seating, heading around the curve of the arena for the fighters’ exit. He muttered to himself, wondering why Rophis would want to contract a bugbear when they were as unreliable as a goblin and as smelly as a Karrnathi zombie.

Thus preoccupied, he did not notice that someone was waiting for him as he entered one of the open areas that dotted the outside of the arena.

Four, still clad in the last fading vestiges of the illusory bugbear trappings, stepped out and swung his battle-axe at Pomindras, aiming squarely at the ebon shield that covered his back, intending to cleave it in two-and, with the same powerful blow, Pomindras’ spine.

Somehow the impact was dramatically off; The blow rocked Pomindras’s shield and sent him tumbling, yet at the same time it cracked the haft of Four’s weapon, and the shield remained unmarred.

Pomindras turned his fall into a roll and came up quickly. He grabbed the hilt of his sword and slung the scabbard to the side, baring the blade. Alarm and confusion held his face for just a moment, until he saw Four and Cimozjen. “You,” he said, looking at Cimozjen. “Alive? How?”

He turned his gaze to Four and narrowed his eyes. “A glamer? You infiltrated us!” He backed up toward the hallway behind him, looking to narrow the area he had to defend. “That whole fight was mocked? That was a piece of work. I thought he really stabbed you to death.”

“In truth, he almost did,” said Cimozjen. “I prayed for healing as he withdrew the blade. That’s why he had to kill me with my knife instead of his axe. We needed his body to block your view of it. I used the same trick to spare Tholog a few days ago.”

Pomindras shucked his shield around and gripped it. It wasn’t as maneuverable as it would have been if he’d had it properly strapped, but it was more serviceable than nothing. “Too clever by half,” he said, “but you’re still not getting out of here alive.” He started backing quickly down the hallway.

Cimozjen chased after him. Four remained where he was, inspecting the odd angle at which his weapon had cracked.

Pomindras backpedaled, then turned to run.

“Coward,” said Cimozjen. “I’ll gladly see you dead with your sole wound to the back.”

Pomindras sneered. “Bravely spoken for someone with armor,” he said.

“I have naught but a staff for a shield,” said Cimozjen. “You’re well rested and perhaps ten years younger than I, yet you show the courage of a pock-marked adolescent and the honor of a febrile kobold. You attacked me in the streets with five others, yet fled the field ere your sword tasted the air. Go. Run. Get help. We’ll see whether the dawn still bears tales of honor for the ring fighter called the Black Shield. That is you, correct? Or are you just his shield boy?”

“I had to flee earlier, because you had me outnumbered. Damn cowardly thugs.” Pomindras gave a lopsided smile. “But in this hallway, there’s just room enough for you and me. Unless you’re going to make your pet warforged to do your work for you.”

Cimozjen called back, saying “Four, Pomindras is mine. Cover my back.”

“There is something you should know,” said Four. “My axe cracked the wrong way. I have no explanation for it.”

“It’ll have to wait until later, Four,” said Cimozjen. “I have someone here who wants to kill me, and I’d rather not indulge him.”

Pomindras worked his arm into his shield straps. “I thought I’d missed the pleasure of killing you, but you’ve just made it all the sweeter.” He dropped into a combat stance.

Cimozjen gave the Rekkenmark salute then readied himself, metal-shod staff angled backward and sword leveled for a thrust.

Pomindras took a low, wide stance and closed on Cimozjen crabwise. Seeing this, Cimozjen considered trying to wear the man down. A series of powerful overhand strikes on the shield would stress the knee, slowing him and forcing him to change his stance. Unfortunately, it would also take time and make a lot of noise, both of which would increase the chance of reinforcements coming. Instead, Cimozjen thought to go straight for the kill. With a low feint at the leg combined with a sweeping upward follow-through, Cimozjen could draw his attention low, and possibly also draw his shield down. A surprise cut to the head with the inside edge could be telling, especially since Pomindras wore no helmet.

Pomindras jumped forward, swinging his shield in front of him to conceal his attack, then yanked it aside and thrust with his sword. The attack was low, to Cimozjen’s surprise. He was caught raising his sword to parry, and was unable to reverse his momentum. Pomindras’s lunge caught Cimozjen in the joint of his hip. The blade hit hard, and with a flash of sparks several links of Cimozjen’s chain mail shattered and flew about the corridor. The blade bit into Cimozjen’s skin and scraped painfully across his hip bone.

Cimozjen gasped in pain as the sundered links skittered across the flagstone floor. His brow furrowed. “An enchanted blade?”

Pomindras chuckled.

Cimozjen took to the attack, executing his planned chop at the leading leg. Partway through the swing he rolled his wrist and changed the angle of attack upward, leading with the inside edge of the sword, aiming for Pomindras’s ear. But either Cimozjen was too old and slow, or Pomindras had seen the trick many times in the arena, because he ducked out of the way and raised his shield.

Cimozjen saw an actinic flash, felt a jarring bolt flash through his body, thumping painfully at his forearm and his knees. He felt the point of his sword dig into something, and he nearly lost his grip.

But there’d been no crash of metal.

Cimozjen stepped back, shaken and unnerved, his sword held out defensively. Pomindras slapped his shield upward at Cimozjen’s weapon. As soon as the gold rim of his shield contacted Cimozjen’s arm, another flash and charge of numbness blasted through him. Between the shock and the impact, he lost his grip on his sword, and he saw it fall from his fingers.

It didn’t slide across the boss of Pomindras’s shield. Rather it fell in, quickly becoming obscured by shadow and vanishing from sight altogether.

“Oops,” said Pomindras in amusement.

And as his foe moved the shield to the side, Cimozjen finally understood what made the shield so impenetrably black. It was a ring of gold-colored metal … encircling nothing .

Cimozjen retreated a few steps, shook his hand to restore feeling, and gripped his staff tightly, the bottom end toward Pomindras, the upper end held behind his ear. He slid his right hand to find the proper place.

Seeing Cimozjen disarmed gave Pomindras new confidence. He closed quickly, circling his sword in a taunting sort of manner. “Now I rip apart your chain mail piece by piece, Karrn.” He lunged, a lightning move that slipped past Cimozjen’s parry, carved a terrible slice into his arm, and sheared half of his chain sleeve away.

Sundered links of chain tinkled down the hall.

“And if you think your little stick is going to stop me-”

Cimozjen surged forward, raising the staff for an overhand swat. Pomindras raised his shield. Then with his thumb Cimozjen flipped a tiny switch embedded in the staff and a long, thin blade speared out of one metal-shod end, shattering the small piece of clay that camouflaged the hole. Instead of continuing his overhand attack, Cimozjen put his weight into plunging the spear downward, driving it completely through Pomindras’s foot just forward of the ankle.