Элейн Каннингем - Silver Shadows

The man thrust in again, high, with a quick, stabbing movement. Foxfire parried again, this time more surely. For several minutes they fought, the blows ringing harder and coming faster.

But the loss of blood was beginning to take a toll on the elf. His vision swam, and the human’s sword darted in over his guard to cut a deep line across his chest. Foxfire lunged at his opponent; Bunlap danced back, and the elf fell facedown onto the ground.

The expected killing stroke did not come. A heavy, iron-shod boot stamped hard on the elf’s lower back, sending waves of agony shimmering along every nerve. Dimly Foxfire felt the man’s sword cutting deep and burning lines upon his skin. Apparently Bunlap intended to mark the elf as he himself had been marked. He took his time, cutting his signature with painstaking care and a sadistic pleasure as tangible to the fading elf as his own pain.

Suddenly Foxfire heard a startled oath. The heavy boot that pinned him to the ground was gone.

The elf lifted his head, shook away the haze of pain and blood. To his astonishment, Arilyn stood between him and the human, an elven sword held in a two-handed grip.

“You again,” Bunlap said in a low, ominous voice. “Get out of my way. This elf is mine.”

“I think not,” the elf woman said coolly. She met the mercenary’s first vicious stroke and parried it with a circular sweep that sent his sword arm out wide.

Bunlap stepped in close and delivered a bare-knuckled punch to the elf’s beautiful face. She reeled back, shaking her head as if to clear her vision. Then she ducked as he brought his sword whistling down and across. It was a near miss. A thick lock of her wavy sapphire hair fell to the ground.

The elf woman straightened to her full height and got her moonblade back out in front of her. She lunged, turned the lunge into a feint, and then lunged again, the moves coming so close together that Bunlap was forced to retreat.

He responded by landing a brutal kick to Foxfire’s ribs.

The beautiful face of his elven opponent darkened with outrage. She slammed her sword into its ancient sheath and leaped forward, her hands reaching for Bunlap’s wrist.

The attack was unexpected. Surprising, too, was the female’s next move. Holding fast to the man’s sword arm, she pivoted so that her back was pressed against him. Then she leaned forward at the waist, yanking down hard on his arm as she did so. Bunlap somersaulted over her and landed heavily on his back. His sword clattered to the ground.

Growling like an enraged bear, Bunlap rolled onto his stomach and seized the elf woman’s ankles. With a quick jerk, he pulled both feet out from under her.

With elven agility she twisted and managed to get her hands under her as she fell. This broke her fall somewhat, but did nothing to free her from the vengeful human’s grasp.

Bunlap rose to his knees. With a quick, vicious movement, he twisted the elf woman so that she slammed down onto her back. He jerked her toward him and then fell forward to pin her body to the ground.

He was a large man, well over six feet tall, and his heavy-muscled bulk weighed closer to three hundred pounds than two. No female, no matter what her skills in battle, could free herself from such bonds.

Bunlap propped himself up on one elbow. With his free hand, he struck the woman across the face again and again. He took his time, leaving livid red welts on the pale skin but never hitting with enough force to break bones. This was vengeance of another sort, and one best taken slowly.

At first the elf woman struggled beneath him, her hands pushing at his chest. Gradually, the fight went out of her and her eyes—odd, gold-flecked blue eyes—became distant and unfocused. Bunlap had seen such things happen before. Terror did odd things to women. Such withdrawal was not all that unusual. And so he did not wonder when her lips began to move in a soft elven chant, or notice that her hands, which had fallen limply to her sides, moved in slight, subtle gestures. Arcane gestures.

Bunlap noticed none of this. His thirst for vengeance had given way to a darker emotion. He tore aside the elf woman’s outer tunic, grimacing as he gathered up in both fists the fluid, silvery mesh of the elven chain mail that lay beneath.

It was at that moment that the elf woman finished her chant. Eldritch energy poured from her, and the metal of her sword and her armor glowed with white heat. Bunlap screamed with agony and rage as the waves of power jolted through him, yet try though he might he could not release his grip on the deadly elven mail.

He was not aware of the moment when the killing surge stopped, nor did he know how the elf woman managed to get out from under him. When he came to, he was on his knees, his blackened hands held before him like the claws of a charred bird.

“Arm yourself,” the elf woman said in a low, musical voice. “If you’ve any honor, stand and fight.”

Bunlap looked up into the eyes of the elf woman and at the point of her sword. Both glowed with angry, arcane blue fire. He found he had no desire to fight. “With these?” he demanded as he held up his ruined hands. “How can you speak of honor?”

“I give you the opportunity to die on your feet with your sword in your hands,” she said. “It is more than you deserve. Refuse, and I will cut you down where you grovel.”

The utter contempt in her tone stirred the proud man into action. He seized his sword, accepted the searing pain of contact, and rolled to his feet.

Bunlap was a hardened mercenary. He’d killed his first man at the age of thirteen and since then had won his living by the sword. But in his nearly forty years of constant fighting, never had he faced a swordmaster to match the one before him.

Cold, grim, inexorable, the elf woman worked his sword down with each stroke and parry and thrust. Finally she forced the point of his blade to the ground. With a quick move of her booted foot, she stomped on the blade and tore it from his blasted hand.

Holding his gaze, she ran him through the heart.

All this Foxfire witnessed as if he were watching through smoked glass. He could not move, could do nothing to stop his enemy from harming the elf woman he loved above all others. Unreal, too, were the moon elf’s ministrations when she turned and stooped beside him.

Gentle hands helped Foxfire to sit against a tree, probed his bruised ribs and pronounced them whole, bound his wounds, and held a water flask as he drank. When at last the haze of pain began to dim, the elf woman took his face between her hands and turned it toward her.

With a start of wonder, Foxfire realized that this was not Arilyn at all, but someone like enough to her to be a twin. Only the hair—the rare color of spun sapphires—and the slightly more angular lines of her face, distinguished her from her half-elven descendent.

“For all you have done for my daughter, I thank you,” the elf woman said in a voice like wind and music. “You have shown Arilyn that she possesses an elven soul. Tell her that her mother is proud. Tell her she and I will be together again, in service to the People for as long as we are needed, and in Arvandor when our task is completed. Tell her this! I would speak to her myself,” the elf said with obvious longing, “but to come to her again would hasten our reunion, and that I must not do. Arilyn is needed by the People. You will tell her these things?”

Foxfire nodded, and the beautiful moon elf dissipated like mist at highsun.

Fear filled the green elf’s heart; once before he had seen the shadow warriors disappear during battle, after the fall of the moonblade’s mistress. He struggled to his feet and staggered toward the glowing light that heralded Arilyn’s sword.

The moonblade lay on the blood-soaked earth, its arcane blue fire dimming rapidly. Its wielder had fallen nearby. Oddly enough, Ferret knelt beside the fallen warrior, cradling her raven head in an oddly protective gesture. Around them stood a circle of exulting warriors: green elves, both Elmanesse and Suldusk, centaurs, fauns, lythari, even a battered and broadly grinning dwarf.