Righteous Anger (Okal Rel Saga #2)

5.8: Mad Gods (FINAL)

"You aren't serious?" Ranar demanded.

Di Mon finished checking his fencing shoes and straightened. He was dressed lightly, in a sleeveless green tank top and stretch pants. He would be inspected by the Demish before facing Zrenyl on the Challenge Floor. So would Zrenyl. Neither would wear any protective gear.

"Di Mon," Ranar choked out, and paused to swallow. "I — I can't believe this is happening."

"It is," Di Mon told him. He did not put on his sword belt. He would be given a sword identical to Zrenyl's by their Demish guards of honor. It was all settled and agreed to. The Demish held the stakes, as well: Di Mon's niece and the Nesak zer named Kal. Both went to the winner.

"This is no way to settle a ... a reciprocal kidnapping!" cried Ranar, clenching his hands and then hugging his arms about himself, as if he had to do that to stop himself from laying hands on Di Mon.

It was that slip sideways into anguish that touched Di Mon. He spared the Reetion, with whom he shared an impossible friendship, one last long look. He did not even think of touching him. They were probably alone, but they were on a Demish station. The stigma of being exposed as boy-sla was the very last legacy Di Mon wanted to leave behind if he had misjudged the match between himself and Zrenyl.

"Do not worry so much, Reetion," Di Mon told Ranar. "It is Zrenyl who is the fool here, for letting me manipulate him into this agreement." Di Mon smiled thinly, without pleasure. "Rising too rapidly in life can go to people's heads. Zrenyl would like to be remembered as the righteous Nesak who destroyed the Lorel-tainted Liege Monitum. But it is I, not he, who is the Old Sword. Zrenyl's a child!"

"I thought," Ranar said shakily, "that anything could happen in a duel."

Di Mon shrugged, but stayed no longer to debate the matter. Partings of this kind were best done without thinking about them too much.

***

Horth registered his father's startled look as he stepped forward. Hangst did not understand at first. Bryllit did. Horth heard her suck her breath in.

No one else breathed hard enough to be heard.

Horth stopped. With his sword gripped in his left hand, he unclasped his belt with his right and threw both belt and sheath clear. He waited. Hangst's lips parted as if he meant to say something, but he stopped. He could see the decision in Horth's face.

"Ack rel," Hangst said simply, instead, and cleared the regret off his face as he drew his sword.

They faced each other, crouching slowly into their fighting stances, but both kept their points lowered. They stared.

Horth knew his father was fiercely aggressive as a fighter, as well as technically precise, but Hangst knew that his son had become an expert at defense, largely due to his uncanny sense of body language. The other's confidence gave each of them pause.

But it was more than that. There was the finality of it. There would be no room for error in this challenge and Horth knew it must be to the death to achieve its purpose: Hangst's death, whether or not he survived himself. Whatever happened, wherever Hangst's blade went, Horth must find his father's heart.

Hangst took a deep breath, and flicked his weapon up. Horth lanced in at the same moment with a single, straight thrust to Hangst's check. Hangst instinctively drew his right hand across his body in a tight, perfect parry, and stepped back. But Hangst never felt Horth's blade connect, and still waited to parry it as Horth angled his sword a further 45 degrees backward with his wrist, jutting around Hangst's blade, and thrusting into Hangst's ribs, batting Hangst's point away from his face with his right hand.