Jeffrey Lord Blade 20 Guardians of the Coral Throne

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thunder of fast-moving horses, hundreds of them. He turned and saw what seemed
like a thousand more Riders pouring up the slope, brandishing lances and
swords and bellowing war-cries. At their head was another man in gilded armor.
But this one looked seven feet tall at least, rode a horse that seemed the
size of a small elephant, and brandished a club that looked like a young tree.
Before Blade could reach down for Tera or get his horse moving again, the
giant was on him.
Blade's sword flashed up. The club came down on it, and the steel snapped as
though it had been made of bamboo. The club rose again in a feint at Blade's
head, then swept in an arc that ended in the center of
Blade's chest.
Suddenly he had no more breath, and no more strength to hold on to the saddle
or his sword. He knew he was toppling sideways out of the saddle, knew that
the giant was charging on past with roars of laughter, knew that the ground
came up and hit him hard. Then he stopped knowing anything.
Chapter 8
Blade awoke bit by bit. His head hurt as though an anvil had fallen on it, and
most of the rest of his body hurt almost as much. He quickly discovered that
both his wrists and his ankles were tied. For the moment he was alive and
reasonably healthy. Somebody had put enough value on him to take him prisoner
rather than kill him outright.
It looked as though he was going to wind up among the Karani, whether he
wanted to or not and whether Tera came with him or not. His jaw tightened as
he thought of Tera tumbling painfully to the ground as the first man in gilded
armor rode off in a panic. That man had given him a score to settle.
Settle it he would if he had the slightest chance, even if he could only
avenge Tera instead of rescue her.
Blade writhed and twisted himself into a sitting position. He was sitting on
the edge of the forest from which the Riders had come. A long row of Scadori
prisoners stretched away on either side of him. Most
of them were still unconscious or too frightened to move. Blade saw no one he
recognized, and no sign of
Tera.
Farther out on the mountainside Blade saw a ragged square of bodies.
Black-winged scavenger birds were already circling above as the Karani
stripped the bodies. The rear guard's battle had ended as it had to. Toward
the pass Blade saw no sign of anything or anyone moving.
Several Riders were ambling back and forth in front of the Scadori prisoners,
lances resting casually on their shoulders, drinking from wine jugs as they
walked. As Blade watched, they suddenly stiffened, hooked their jugs onto
their belts, and swung their lances upright.
The man who had captured Tera and the gold-armored giant were approaching each
other along the line of prisoners, from opposite directions. Each moved in the
middle of a circle of armed Riders, tanned, scarred, cold-eyed men who looked
formidably tough.
The first man still wore his gold armor and would have looked fairly
impressive in any other company.
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He was as tanned and tough-looking as his men, and moved like a hunting
animal. But he could not quite match the impression made by the giant.
The man was not quite seven feet tall---only about six and a half, Blade
realized, but broad in proportion. He now wore a blue tunic and embroidered
black trousers, the tunic opening at the chest to reveal a good deal of fat
and even more muscle. The man was entirely bald, but the lack of lines on his
heavy-jawed face suggested someone no more than forty. The club no longer
swung in his hand, but was slung across his back.
"Ho, Pardes," the smaller man shouted. "What have you to say to me?"
The larger man smiled, but it was a smile that reminded Blade of a shark
opening its mouth to bite. The man had a full set of white teeth, and showed
them all.
"Iscaros, I have a great many things to say to you, and I hope that His Sacred
Majesty will have a great many more. Your orders were to lead your Riders to
the pass and hold it with dismounted archery. You were not to put on a pretty
show against a handful of those vermin. We could have trapped them all, but
because of you we had barely a quarter of them, and that includes what we
killed in the night's battle.
Iscaros, you are a fool, and if she herself-" The man broke off, as though he
had caught himself going on too far and too frankly. From his highpitched
voice, Blade suspected the man was a eunuch.
The man called Iscaros laughed, but it was a laugh no more friendly than
Pardes' smile. "She herself will do nothing, you prickless wonder. For I can
do something, and go on doing it, that you never have.
Besides, why should I lead my men to where they will do all the fighting and
dying and then let yours come in and snatch up all the prisoners? Consider the
woman I got by riding on in.
"Oh, I will consider her," replied the big eunuch. "I will consider how you
dropped her and no doubt dropped something in your trousers when that woman's
master rode at you. I will consider how little use you will get of her, after
the one you pant and whimper around hears of her. Oh yes, I will consider
much."
Iscaros' superficial calm cracked. "You fat no-prick, when the time comes-"
"If it comes," said Pardes in a voice suddenly ice-cold. "And it is true that
I have been a eunuch for many years. But I cannot say I have done badly.
Having no balls, there is no place my brains can flow down
into, the way yours have done."
For a moment it looked as though Iscaros was not only going to explode into
rage but into violence.
Bows swung off shoulders and swords rasped out of scabbards as both sets of
bodyguards got ready for a fight. Pardes unslung his club and rested it
lightly on one shoulder, ready to swing. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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