P. Power - Knight of the Realm

These people were mainly commoners from in town, unshielded and without training of note at all in fighting. No one walked around armed in Warden. No one but him. Even the guards here only carried little wooden clubs. They’d never needed more.

Not until that day.

No explosions took place this time, thank god. No nanos spread into the air either. Tor backpedaled, the assassins focusing on him alone it seemed so far. Good. They weren't hurting him, broken hand aside. Now if people would just get away he could start fighting in earnest and make this stop. He did trigger his Not-flyer and pulled the weapon he kept at his side all the time now, or at least bedside. He even took it into the shower with him.

It was white stone and glowing multicolored sigils, looking kind of pretty and festive he thought. He had to do it with his left hand, broken or not, but now he could focus a little, which meant that he could manage. It hurt, but he'd dealt with worse. As he got the men to follow him onto the dance floor one tried to blind him with an intense light, like Smythe had. It poured into the ground, running like water, flowing around him in damp looking brilliance towards the only direction that he'd deemed really safe for such things. It was a ruby red cascade, the beam coming in hot and leaving that way, making the grass smoke, but dancing over his skin, a quarter inch away, leaving him untouched.

Pretty.

The men looked identical to Dorgal Sorvee's friend from school and no doubt Maria Ward's lover, Laval. Which all things considered was about as stupid a name as could have been come up with. Laval the Larval? Moronic. The killer, one of them, switched aim and tried for Bonita instead. Obviously they were friends, so killing her would distract him, right?

That made sense. If you were amoral, evil and had no sense of ethical behavior or honor at all. Perfect for a super-killer clone Tor guessed. It had no more effect on her than it had him.

“Nita! Run away! Go. They want me for some reason… Possibly my fashion sense? Since nothing else seems reasonable at all. Everyone go!” Even with a shield on, they'd probably kill him eventually. Like the Royal Guard, they didn't seem to stop, and were both hard to kill and fast. A lot faster than he was, possible faster than was strictly human. Tor was bobbing around at over forty miles an hour and they were side stepping him as if it were a child's game. Apparently they'd noticed how well that technique had worked before, and learned.

Even though they weren't there at the time? However that worked, they didn't let him hit them no matter how hard he tried.

Without saying anything, without a sound that Tor noticed, all four men suddenly turned and sprinted towards the main table, everyone else had fled, except for Countess Ward and the three Larvals with her. For a split second, a time so fast that he nearly missed it, Tor wondered if she was the one attacking them all, in one of those stupidly over complex plans nobles made up, because massive amounts of sex and parties weren't enough to really keep them busy. As a rule, the royals all needed to get some hobbies, or at least useful jobs to kill time. It would be safer all around.

They held her with not one, but two knives to her throat, pointed to take out the veins and arteries on the sides of her neck with a twitch. A sudden move from either of the Larval would kill her. When he stopped and focused on the scene, just as the others surrounded her with their bodies, facing outward. Tor could see her fear.

He could feel it. It poured from her field in powerful waves.

So, it wasn't her plan then? Good. It would have been embarrassing to have helped her just to have it be another mistake.

Pointing the weapon, he waited for them, one of them at least, to speak. Eerily, they spoke as a group. Multiple voices in perfect time. Did they think as one too? Tor reached out to see, and almost passed out from the sickening shock of it. Their minds, their fields, were alien, so different from what he knew that he almost couldn't understand what they were. Then again, he didn't have to, did he?

“Put the weapon down and surrender your life and we'll let your woman go.”

Oh.

Was that all they wanted?

And they thought he was with Maria freaking Ward? Brilliant of them.

Different or not, he knew what they all thought then and said it out loud so everyone else could hear, those not smart enough, or too brave, to get out of there while he and Maria bought them time.

“And then you'll kill us all. Right, we get the idea, you're assassins, it's what you do. No promise of safe passage will win any of us free. It's run or fight and fighting means death without our weapons and shields. Got it. Any other ideas? I won’t throw away lives just to try and save a single person you plan to kill anyway.”

The one with the knife on the young Countess’s delicate neck sliced her enough to make her whimper.

“You.” They almost sang the word. It was creepy. They were creepy.

“We let these others go and kill you. They leave now and our sweet little kitten-flower goes unharmed. If not, we kill her.”

Tilting his head Tor asked something that he'd wondered before. It was mainly to buy time, but that was such an odd phrase, probably Austran he realized. They were, so why not?

“Kitten-flower? What does that even mean anyway? Is it Austran for something?”

“Cunt.” They all said definitively.

Maria winced.

Yeah, it was pretty rude. Her lover had been calling her a cunt the whole time? Eek. Well, that relationship had already ended at least. It would have been worse if she'd still been seeing the guy, right?

“Alright, how about this. You see the glow around me, you know what it means? Or are your spies that bad…” They didn't get he wasn't with their captive after all, he might have to explain a few things.

“Truth.”

“Good. So I'm not lying, you'll see it instantly if I try. Let her go now, let everyone else leave here and I'll meet you in battle. Alone. Just me against all of you.”

“No. Humbling, but your shield and weapons make it too likely you'll defeat us or escape. Meet us without your shield or weapons, with no magic devices to aid you, then we'll agree to your terms. We'll kill you, but your friends will have a chance to escape. Your love here goes free and lives to die another day. Last offer. Take it or we kill her now.” Only one spoke this time, one with a knife to her neck. He sliced her again, missing the veins on her neck, but only just barely.

“Agreed. You have my word. We'll have our little duel here then. Me against you. All of you. No one will interfere if it's a duel. That's the law after all.” The glow stayed steady. From the side Trice yelled at him and Sara whimpered.

“Tor no! They'll kill you…” It came out hoarse and harsh, like she'd been screaming.

If so he hadn't noticed.

“Do you think I don't know that? Everybody dies. One life isn't worth more than many. Ever. No matter who's it is. When they let Maria go, take her and get everyone away as fast and far as you can before they come for you. Trice, promise me, you'll take the shield and weapons I give you and get everyone to safety. Marvin? They're going to hand Maria to you now, collect her please and get her away. I don't disarm until everyone is safe, then I hand the one armed girl my stuff and she flies away, then we fight. Acceptable?”

“That'll do.” The creepoids said in unison, sounding pleasant about the whole thing suddenly. Conversational.

It was the eyes that freaked him out most, that and the killing people thing, but he'd never liked any of the Larvals. Just a personal bias probably. Maria thought their eyes were pretty, hadn't she said that? Maybe it was a girl thing?