Silfast hoisted his wooden axe over his shoulder, his chest still heaving with his breaths — and suddenly Gwyn realized that this was surely a provocation on Joarr’s part. An attack. Because if the Bautul refused to admit weakness, of course a battle-captain like Silfast couldn’t risk publicly refusing a fight. Even if he’d already just fought off fifty of his own orcs, and had to be exhausted as a result.
“I ken you have yet striven much this day,” Joarr continued, just as pleasantly. “So mayhap you keep this weapon, whilst I bear none?”
Silfast’s mouth thinned, his gaze darting briefly around at his groaning, bloody orcs. Many of them intently watching this little exchange, their expressions dark, shifting, skeptical.
“Ach,” Silfast grunted, his eyes narrowing back at Joarr. “Ready yourself. Prepare to beg andbleedbefore your captain!”
Gwyn flinched at those words, her stomach twisting — but Joarr had raised a cool hand, his gaze sweeping over the orcs still sprawled and kneeling in the pit around them. “No wish to fight amidst this,” he said. “First we grant our brothers leave to go rest and heal, ach?”
Silfast’s disapproving bark was joined by several others from below, one loudly proclaiming that they’d rest when they were dead. All of which Joarr entirely ignored, his mouth pursed, his eyes cold on Silfast’s face.
“We fight to keep safe our home,” Joarr snapped. “You say this. I say this. But what if band of men now attack us, and all of Bautul isbleeding?! What then come?”
Silfast barked another reply, the words all in tangled black-tongue this time, and in return Joarr laughed, hard and brittle. “No,” he replied. “Skai fight for you,again. Ash-Kai fight. Grisk fight. They all outmatch you, again, whilst youwasteyour blood and teeth!”
You, he’d said. Surely not on purpose, not with the chorus of growls now filling the air, with Silfast’s carrying above them all. “And youagaininsult your clan!” Silfast shouted, his deep voice thundering. “You again show your ignorance and contempt. You show you do not belong among us. You show you are at heart still a Skai, with all your proud, selfish, slippery ways!”
Gwyn could see Joarr’s shoulders slightly hunching, his hand reaching up to stoke at that tooth around his neck. “Then I also show you,” he hissed back, “how a fool Bautul battle-captain shallbowbefore a lowly Skai!”
There was a collective intake of breath, as though Joarr had said something truly shocking — and then Silfast attacked. Charging directly toward Joarr, his axe swinging in a furious, devastating arc, straight for Joarr’s head —
But in a flare of movement, Joarr dodged. Easing just out of the axe-blade’s reach, his lean body bobbing on his feet, his hands loose at his sides. His mouth curling into a flat, chilly smile as he stood there, waiting, watching.
Silfast’s next strike was even faster this time, his huge form barging toward Joarr — but Joarr again dodged backwards, leaping over the crouched bodies of two fallen Bautul orcs without even looking. And before Silfast could charge again, Joarr actually nudged one of them with his foot, hissing something in black-tongue.
It must have been some kind of order, because the orc — Arne, Gwyn now saw — began hauling himself away, toward the edge of the pit. Making just slightly more room for Joarr’s shifting feet as he again leapt sideways, away from the next ferocious swing of Silfast’s axe.
“Again, you show yourself a Skai, and a coward!” Silfast hollered, with another rush forward, another deadly arc of his wooden blade. “You run and hide, when you should attack. When you should meet your foe with bravery and honour!”
Joarr seemingly ignored this, in favour of barking out another command toward another fallen orc — but Gwyn recognized that telltale intensity in his narrow eyes, the tightness on his mouth. His feet circling around Silfast, his lean form rippling as he seemed to shake it out, shift it forward —
He flew toward Silfast without warning, his hair a black blur behind him. Charging not for Silfast’s face, as Gwyn might have expected — but for his groin. His knee snapping up hard and powerful, making impact with an audible, sickening thud.
It was enough to knock Silfast back a step, straight into the space that had been occupied by Arne, only a moment before. And Silfast’s answering axe-swing only met empty air, because Joarr had once again leapt out of the way. Nudging at yet another fallen orc with his foot, and then actually ducking to drag the orc away, while also somehow avoiding the next sweep of Silfast’s blade.
Gwyn’s frantically beating heart had seemed to settle somewhat, and she belatedly sank her shaky body down onto the high stone step behind her. Realizing, distantly, that the steps were perhaps meant to be seats, intended for watching the shocking carnage below — but thankfully, in this instant, the only shock was just how impressive Joarr was at this. His attacks tight and strategic, his movements swift and effortless, his focus seemingly not even on Silfast, but on clearing the floor of fallen orcs, giving himself more room to move and dodge and strike.
Silfast’s axe hadn’t yet made one hit, and as Gwyn watched his ever-wilder swings, it occurred to her that Joarr almost seemed toanticipatethem. To know when Silfast would strike next, and from where. And from what Gwyn could see, Silfast’s attacks weren’t linear or predictable, his axe-swings flying in both directions, his movements perhaps just as swift as Joarr’s. And his breath was visibly panting now, the sweat streaking down his face, his huge body staggering as Joarr landed another vicious kick to his groin.
When Silfast caught himself again, his eyes were even narrower than before, his body poised for one more charge — but at the last possible instant, he dropped the axe. And instead, he hurled himself straight into Joarr’s waist, toppling them both to the bloody stone floor below.
Gwyn’s heart flipped, her hands clapping to her mouth, because oh gods, ohgods, there was no way Joarr could dodge now, no possible escape. Silfast was so much bigger, his bare fists driving down toward Joarr’s face, and despite Joarr’s whirling writhes and kicks, Gwyn could hear a punch landing, could hear the crunch of breaking bone —
“Not so proud now, are you, Skai?” Silfast gasped, shifting his huge body over Joarr’s, gouging his knee deep into his belly, swiping his claws at Joarr’seyes. “Shall you now weep, and beg for my mercy?”
Joarr wasn’t answering now, was only focused on avoiding the worst of Silfast’s punches, his head whipping back and forth, his feet kicking desperately but uselessly at Silfast’s back. While Silfast kept laughing as he punched, the sound carrying cruel and deep and scornful.
“You areweak,” he snarled, his spittle spraying down into Joarr’s now-bloody face. “You are defeated. You shall never make amends for your fathers’ sins, or rise to lead my clan. You ought to run back to Osada andhidefor the rest of your days, just like thecowardsyour fathers showed themselves to be!”
Gwyn’s hands were clutched over her mouth now, her wide eyes frozen on Joarr’s bloody face, on hisdefeat. And surely Silfast wouldn’t permanently injure him, or incapacitate him, but now his clawed hand had found Joarr’s thrashing neck, holding it tight to the earth. His other fist raising up, ready to slam straight down into Joarr’s face, todestroyhim —
When in an instant, Joarr’s flailing hand clutched Silfast’saxe. The axe that Silfast had previously tossed aside, and that — Gwyn blinked —Kalfrhad just kicked over toward him, from where he’d been dragging himself away on the floor. And as Silfast’s fist drove down, Joarr’s surprisingly steady hand flipped the axe right-side up, and swung the flat of it straight for the back of Silfast’s head.
It struck with a dull, decisivethunk, knocking Silfast’s head forward, scattering his punch wide. And in the choked, fraught silence, Silfast’s eyes slowly rolled back in his head — and then he slumped sideways, toward the floor, and was still.
For an instant, nothing moved or spoke — and then, suddenly, the sound of a single shout. Of Kalfr, bellowing what sounded like a cheer from the floor, his fist rising toward the stone ceiling above.
“For Bautul,” he called. “For the goddess!”
