David Coe: The Horsemen's Gambit

Enly tried his spin maneuver a second time, stumbled, and sprawled on the ground. Tirnya leaped forward, putting one foot on his sword and the other on his dagger, and laying the edge of her blade against his neck.

She could have won then. First blood.

A few people shouted for her to end the match, to take the crystal dagger as her own. But she didn't want to win like this. She took a step back, and then another.

"Get up," she said.

She heard someone groan in the boxes, but then people began to call her name again. "Tirnya!" they called. "Falcon!"

Enly climbed to his feet slowly, and picked up his weapons. He stared at her for a moment, his grey eyes ghostly pale in the sunlight. Then he bowed to her.

Tirnya started forward, intending to renew her assault, but Enly wasn't willing to let her gain that advantage again. He attacked as well, and for long moments they stood face-to-face, their blades lashing out, clashing loudly. And then Enly began to advance on her, forcing her back.

She tried to parry and strike, to find once more the energy she'd had when they began. But she was tired, her arms and legs heavy. Enly must have sensed her weariness, but his expression didn't change, nor did the speed of his attacks. He had been known to talk to some of his opponents. It was said that he often taunted them, hoping to provoke them into mistakes. But he had never done anything of the sort to her, nor did he now. He merely kept after her. And when she tried to spin to the side and strike over his off hand, he was ready.

Tirnya saw both attacks, the chopping blow with his sword and the thrust with his dagger. But the pivot had left her off balance; not much, but enough. She managed to parry the sword strike, but she could do nothing about the dagger as it darted out at her cheek. An instant later, she felt the sting on her flesh and the hot trickle of blood running down her face like tears.

Enly stepped back and looked at her, his brow creased, as if he had surprised himself with the assault.

"I'm sorry," he mouthed. Then he raised the dagger over his head and turned a slow circle so that all could see, stopping when he was facing her once more.

At first there was silence. No one seemed to believe that he had won. The fierce smile on the lord governor's face began to fade as he looked around the arena. After a few moments, those sitting in the boxes seemed to realize that they ought to be cheering, and they began to call out Enly's name. But His Lordship still didn't look pleased. And Tirnya heard her name being shouted as well.

She turned to face the center box.

"We have to bow," she said under her breath.

Enly turned smartly toward his father and made himself smile. They bowed in unison and then they walked their separate ways back toward the doors.

As she walked, not bothering to wipe the blood from her face, Tirnya looked up at her father. He was staring back at her, looking both proud and concerned. She smiled, and he did as well. But she felt her eyes starting to well. She'd come so close to beating him. And then she'd let him win. She shook her head. That wasn't quite how it had happened, but it felt that way.

Padar was waiting for her at the door.

"Ya had him," he said grimly.

She'd hear a lot of this in the next few days. "Yes."

"Ya did th' right thing."

"There are those who will disagree."

The old guard shrugged. "Wha' d' they know? Ya don' bloody a man when he's down, even if i' 'tis fer th' crystal blade."

Tirnya nodded, fearing that she might weep. The crystal blade! She'd come so close! "Thank you, Padar." She started to walk away.

"Captain, wait," the guard said.

She halted. He crossed to where she stood and looked at her cheek.

"I' doesn' look too bad," he said after a moment. "Probably feels worse than i' 'tis. It'll heal before ya know it."

Tirnya smiled bravely, though a tear slipped from her eye. "Right," she agreed. "Just another scar." Just another tournament; just another year.

But this time, she had come so close.

Before leaving the chambers beneath the boxes, Tirnya stopped by to see the healer who treated the wounds of all the combatants. Left to decide on her own, she would have ignored the cut on her cheek, but she knew that her father would be waiting for her outside the arena, and he would make a fuss if she left the wound untended.

The healer examined her in silence, using a warm, damp cloth to wipe away the dried blood. He then dabbed a different cloth in spirits and gently patted the cut. Tirnya winced, sucking in air through her teeth.

"It cleans the wound," the healer said, holding her chin with a firm hand. He dipped the cloth in the spirits again and dabbed at the cut a bit more.

"I know what it does," she muttered, still wincing. "That doesn't make it burn any less."

The healer put down the cloth and eyed the cut, clicking his tongue as he did. He was a heavy man, only a few years older than she, with brown curls and short, fat fingers that were more deft and gentle than she would have thought possible.

"We can leave it to heal as it is, or we can stitch it up," he said after several moments. "Either way you'll wind up with a scar. It may be less noticeable if we use the sutures."

She pointed at the scars on her chin and temple. "What do I care about one more scar?"

"Will you at least let me put a poultice on it?" he asked, though from the tone of his voice it seemed clear that he knew she'd refuse this as well.

"And have me walking around the city looking like Enly sliced off half my face? No, thank you."

The healer shook his head. "Very well, then. You can go. Try to keep it clean. If it starts to hurt more, or the skin around it turns red and fevered, get yourself to a healer. Any healer. You understand me?"

Tirnya nodded sullenly and stood, grabbing her swords and striding toward the door. Taking hold of the door handle, she paused and looked back at the man, who was clearing up his medicines, herbs, and bandages. Naturally, she was the last. No doubt he'd had a long day.

"Thank you," she said.

He looked up a smiled wanly. "You're welcome, Captain. You know," he said a moment later, stopping her as she began to open the door. "I understand that you're disappointed. Anyone would be. But there's no shame in losing the final match to the lord heir."

Surely the healer was trying to help, but his words stung more than did his spirits. She merely nodded and left the chamber.

Her father was waiting for her just outside the arena, chatting amiably with passersby and flanked by several of his men. There had been an attempt on Jenoe's life several years before-a single attacker who came at the marshal with a dirk while Jenoe was drinking in a small tavern near the river. Tirnya's father had killed the man himself and there had been no further attempts. But since then, Jenoe's captains had each assigned a man to guard the marshal in shifts, so that he always had four armed guards at his side.

There was nothing to indicate that the attacker had been anything more than a drunken soldier who sought to exact revenge for some imagined slight, but some believed that he had been sent by the lord governor, or one of his subordinates. The Onjaef and Tolm families had mistrusted each other for more than a century, and Maisaak had long been envious of Jenoe's stature among Qalsyn's soldiers and subjects.

While Tirnya was not so naive as to deny that the lord governor might well be jealous of her father, she didn't believe that Maisaak would resort to murder to rid himself of a rival. Jenoe's popularity might have bruised His Lordship's pride, but her father could hardly be considered a threat to Maisaak's power.

The Onjaef family had come to Qalsyn a century and a half before, during the darkest days of the Blood Wars between the Eandi of the eastern Southlands and the Qirsi, the white-haired sorcerers who controlled the western lands. House Onjaef held the great city of Deraqor, the family seat, where Tirnya's ancestors ruled as lord governors. They also controlled the Horn, a narrow strip of fertile land between the Thraedes and K'Sand rivers. At the time, the Horn might well have been the most valuable land still under Eandi control. But as the Fal'Borna, a clan of fierce horsemen, who were as skilled with their blades as they were with their magic, pushed eastward, the leaders of the Eandi found themselves forced to cede territory. The Blood Wars of the northern plain were among the bloodiest fought during the long, violent history of the conflicts, and in the end the Onjaefs, led by Mehp, Tirnya's grandfather four times removed, had no choice but to abandon their ancestral home. They fled eastward, into what remained of Stelpana, settling eventually in Qalsyn. And they didn't come alone.