Page 18 of Starside

I don’t turn, I just keep going, the hairs on the back of my neck rising, anticipating being struck at any moment. Their yells are getting louder.

“They’re coming,” Kira says. And then she goes down.

Go, my mind says. Get a horse. Leave her behind.

But I think of her sister. I couldn’t save mine … Maybe Kira can save hers.

I stop. Whirl around. And my sword meets iron.

The man from the cart. His crowded teeth glint as he smiles. Kira’s screaming, a hand pressed against the back of her head, blood pouring between her fingers. That’s when I see he’s holding a thick strand of her hair. He fucking ripped it from her skull.

“Protecting someone who will surely die? That seems foolish.”

Our swords meet again, and this time his fractures. The line is like a vein running down his blade. A few more strikes, and it will shatter completely.

“So does fighting someone with greater metal,” I say, slamming my blade against his. He stumbles back. Frowns, as if not expecting I might be able to hold my own against him. His eyes narrow in fury, and then he’s lunging at me again.

But I’m ready.

A decade of Stellan’s training steadies me against the panic, and I fall into my stance. I block his next sharp blow.

He spins then lashes out in a brutal mess of strikes, like he thinks his speed will catch me off guard.

It might, if Stellan hadn’t been far faster than him. If I hadn’t done this exact practice every morning. The titanium sword is nearly weightless in my grip as I block his every advance and force him back.

The arrows have stopped, at least. The archer must assume we’re going to kill each other, and doesn’t want to waste their limited stock.

I could kill him. I know I could. But it would take time we don’t have. Not as we’re passed by swarms of challengers running toward the line of horses.

That should be me. I should turn and run.

He tries to disembowel me. My blade meets his.

Another fracture.

“Waldron,” he says. Sweat spills down his brow. He’s not looking at me. He’s looking at my titanium sword. “You … you will belong to Waldron.”

Great swords have been known to betray their wielder if they encounter someone more powerful, even in the middle of a duel, but this isn’t that kind of sword.

And Waldron isn’t proficient enough to get in even a single strike.

Our blades meet again.

This time, the fracture runs completely down his sword, nearly splitting it in two.

Without a weapon, he has no chance in the Questral. He seems to know that, because before I can strike again, he steps back. “I’ll have your blade,” he says. “Another day, I’ll have it. I’ll carve my name right into its hilt. I’ll carve it right into your corpse.” Carved names. My breath catches. A memory chokes me. By the time I shove it down, all I see is his smile, promising a heinous death, before he runs past us.

Kira is still on the ground. She’s staring at me, wide-eyed, her blood staining the dirt. “You—you saved me,” she says, a hand gripping the back of her head.

“You saved me first.”

“Yes, but … I didn’t—”

“Get up,” I say.

She does.

And we run. We run before we’re cut down by the dozens still behind us. We run until the forest ends, and then we have to climb.