He paused to examine one and scoff before moving closer. Bluffroll, for his part, stood, seeming to realize that on the throne he was at a disadvantage now that he had no guards to defend him.
“Who spits in the eye of the hurricane and survives? Who pokes the unicorn and is not gored? Who dances with Death and does not descend to the barrow?”
“Is it you? Is that what you’re telling me?” Bluffroll said, trying to keep his tone light, but it shook with the fear he had not managed to leash. He leaned down and plucked a massive two-handed sword from the grip of one of his fallen guards.
As Bluebeard grew closer, their disparity in height was highlighted. My husband was not a short man, but Bluffroll was nearly a head taller.
“Well,” Bluebeard said, smiling slightly and then flicking his wrists and like magic — or maybe by magic? — a pair of curving swords appeared in his hands. “It certainly is not you.”
I saw Bluffroll swallow from where I stood. And out of the corner of my eye, I saw Rolgrin twitch from on the wall. His eyes were following the pair. When I looked around to check, I saw that every set of eyes in the whole room was following them.
Bluebeard spun his swords and then tossed one and caught it with a laugh.
“I could snap my fingers and take your days, Bluffroll.”
“You can’t,” Bluffroll growled, but he didn’t sound entirely convinced.
Bluebeard’s laugh this time was rich and full as if he were deeply enjoying himself. He danced in a swirling pattern, tossing and catching swords as if this were a show and he the principle showman, not a confrontation between what had been equals.
“I don’t wear nettle and bramble and thistle for the joy of their sting,” my husband said conspiratorially. “I am your true king.”
“Coppertomb,” Bluffroll tried to say.
“Is a weak imposter. Or did you not consider that no true Bramble King would watch the Wittenhame melt and do nothing to stop it?”
“It was the old Bramble King. It melted with him,” Bluffroll said, clinging to the lie as he circled the throne, trying to keep my dancing husband in front of him. “And who cares? This mortal world is fun. I have inflicted cruelties upon this place … this Pensmoore … that would make the bravest Wittenbrand tremble.”
“I don’t doubt it,” Bluebeard said and I thought that perhaps Bluffroll took his smile as approval, but I knew that smile. Every time I saw it before was right before he took a head. As if thinking the same thing, he said, “It’s a shame I don’t collect heads anymore. I have no proper use for them now.”
Bluffroll laughed. This is all a big game, is what his posture said. We’re joking, we two, is what his laugh said. It was all a bluff, just like his name, and I knew it.
“I had planned to let you live, you know,” Bluebeard said. “Better the devil you know than the devil you don’t, and of the remaining Lords and Ladies the only other one I know well is Sparrow.”
“Your lieutenant?” Bluffroll scoffed. “Tanglecott ate her for breakfast, I heard. Better than roasted boar.”
“I’d suggest you try to tell that to the new Lady Riverbarrow, but I’m afraid that I don’t plan to let you live long enough to try it,” Bluebeard said, feinting lightly now and forcing Blufroll to extend an arm to parry. It felt like someone trying something out to see what might happen. My breath caught a little in my chest.
Bluffroll’s eyes flicked to me. “Is that not the Lady Riverbarrow?”
“Keep up,” Bluebeard barked as his blade slapped Bluffroll’s, forcing him to change his footing and lunge at Bluebeard. My husband was somewhere else when the heavy blade landed, the flat of his curved sword slapped Bluffroll’s rear. “That’s the Bramble Queen, second only to me in the rule of the Wittenhame and your sovereign.”
“That’s not how it works,” Bluffroll said, his breath growing heavy as he tried to match Bluebeard’s frenetic pace. I could barely see their blades in the air, but I could see the sweat forming on Bluffroll’s brow.
“Speak to this riddle, then, Bluffroll, last of your name.”
“Last of my name? You can’t declare that!” He sounded panicky now.
“Who speaks and it is so? Who holds the world in his breast and the fates of men and beasts between his fingertips.”
Bluffroll was much quicker this time. “You do.”
Bluebeard paused in his swordplay and leaned in to wink at him. “Yes.”
And then he was rolling away again, spinning, blades dancing in the air as if to unheard music. “And Izolda Savataz of House Northpeak, of Pensmoore, of the Mortal Lands, known heretofore as the Mad Princess, is my true bride and the Queen of Brambles and she will have your honor.”
Bluffroll shot a wild glance at me and then at the statue he had cast in bronze and his mouth opened and then shut and then his face turned hard.
“I regret nothing,” he growled. “And were I to do all this again, I would do it in exactly the same fashion.”
