Immortal Swordslinger 2 Read online

  There was an element of truth in the king’s words. Horix had the air of a man who defined himself by what he could control, and that would explain his attempts to establish himself at the expense of the Qihin Clan. The Guildmaster’s prejudice against Wilds also rang true in Beqai’s words. On the other hand, it didn’t tell me what had actually brought them into conflict, or what had triggered the trouble tearing apart the Diamond Coast.

  “Well, isn’t he marvelous,” Nydarth said inside my head. “Truly the greatest scholar that I’ve ever seen.”

  “He’s not bad,” I thought back. “Kind and welcoming, at least.”

  “He’s a senile old coot. It’s just a shame that so few people can tell the difference between deep observations and the ramblings of a fading mind. I’d hate to endure a conversation between Tolin and this distracted fish.”

  The comparison with Tolin brought things into sharp perspective. Tolin’s pronouncements, though occasionally cryptic, always proved to be on the ball. He had helped me to make sense of this world and to find a way to channel the power within it. The old lo Pashat was sharp as a tack and his thoughts clear and specific. Beqai, on the other hand, rambled around a point of critical importance. His focus struck me as vast as the ocean itself. It was clear that the Qihin King had given his life over to meditation and not the practical business of swords, politics, and power.

  “Why do you think the water monsters attacked the city, Your Majesty?” I asked. “So many at once strikes me as a coordinated attack.”

  Beqai stared into his tea for a full minute. I almost thought that I had lost him to meditation again, but he raised his eyes to mine. A sad smile of resignation crossed his face, as if the old squid was a parent who’d caught their child in mischief and now had to deal with the consequences.

  “Some shirk their responsibilities,” he said. “A guard may simply have forgotten to close a gate.”

  I stared at him in bafflement. How could a king overlook the safety of his people? It was the responsibility of the guard to protect their city from an attack, particularly if their people lived on the edge of a Vigorous Zone. Was the old king so disconnected from reality that he couldn’t see the monsters as a serious threat?

  “Isn’t it unusual though?” I asked. “So many monsters descending on the city at once? Surely a single gate left open couldn’t bring such a multitude?”

  Beqai held out the plate of biscuits for me while he considered the question. I took one to calm my snarling stomach. Their salty taste was growing on me.

  “Unusual, yes,” Beqai said. “Perhaps, just perhaps, an intention lies behind it.”

  “Could someone have led the monsters into the city?” I asked quickly.

  “Perhaps. But why would anyone do that?”

  I’d hoped he would answer that question and not ask me a question in return. I considered the events that had unfolded in this hall, and an answer sprang to mind. The most dangerous of the water monsters—the vampiric anglers—had made a line straight for this place, despite the easier targets in the city below.

  “The best question to ask,” I said, “is the question of who has the most to profit from your death and the fate of Qihin City.”

  “Death comes to all, young disciple. It is simply a matter of time and place. I welcome my time when it comes as a time to dwell within the depths. But, to answer your question with another, who could possibly wish for my early demise?”

  The open innocence of the question was staggering given everything we’d discussed and what Kumi had said before. The Resplendent Tears had the most to gain from chaos and destruction in Qihin City if they truly saw the Wilds as dangerous. But if I’d learned one thing from our conversation so far, it was that directness wasn’t the best way to handle King Beqai.

  “I’ll leave that for you to consider, your Majesty,” I said. “If I may offer a suggestion, ensure that your gates are firmly closed and routinely inspected from this day forth. I believe trouble is brewing.”

  “I’ll be sure to think on it,” Beqai chuckled. “I enjoyed our chat, Ethan Murphy lo Pashat. Be sure to return.”

  I sheathed the Sundered Heart Sword, bowed to the king, and walked out of the hall. I needed to get away from him and clear my head.

  I had found a place in this world, and that place was very different from the one I’d had back on Earth. I’d been a covert operative, snuck in and out of places, and fixed problems through discreet action behind the scenes. Now, I was the man front and center in a series of crises, trying to talk a faltering king into tending to his kingdom and investigating the reason behind a battle against a monstrous army as it invaded a city.

  “I’ve seen your world,” Nydarth said inside my head. “It’s not all that different from this one.”

  “You mean apart from the technology, the lack of magic, and the absence of monsters?” I replied.

  “People are people, whatever is going on around them,” she said. “Fighting for power and ideals, looking for someone to show them the way.”

  “Perhaps you can help me find my way now,” I said. “What can you tell me about this city and the Vigorous Zones here?”

  “Qihin City is very rich in Vigor,” Nydarth said. “Vigor is harvested from the lands all around. The impressive power of the Resplendent Tears Guild is sourced from the same nexus of energy.”

  “So, they should be equal in power.”

  “Only if they are accessing as much of that power as each other and using it in the same way. Different methods require different resources. From what you’ve seen of the factions, do you think that is true?”

  I pictured the proud Guildmaster Horix and the calmly reflective King Beqai. No, they weren’t using the region’s resources in the same way.

  “Humor me for a minute. Supposing the guild is actually behind the attack, how do you turn an army of monsters to carrying out your goals?” ” I asked.

  “Labu was right in one thing,” she said. “If they farm the Vigorous Zones heavily, Augmenters are likely to unbalance the scales.”

  “And that would cause the attack?”

  “It would encourage the aggression of the sea beasts. A gate left open to a city would cause territorial beasts to range out further in order to expand their hunting grounds.”

  An idea struck me. “And lures could help. I didn’t see any around the city, but if they had lures like we used to draw monsters out from the Ember Cavern. . .”

  “Ah, so you aren’t simply a man of good looks. There appears to be a brain inside that skull of yours.”

  I chuckled at Nydarth’s teasing as I stepped off the last of the stairs and emerged into the courtyard of the royal palace.

  The bodies had been removed and the water cleared of blood. The statue Vesma had toppled leaned against a wall while the concrete of its new base dried in the afternoon sun. But that wasn’t what caught my attention.

  Labu stood in the courtyard, flanked by a male and female Qihin warrior. They displayed their Wild marks openly, with holes cut in their tunics to reveal the strange patterns on their backs. The woman wore a serrated sword on her belt, and the man carried a trident. The fins on either side of their necks flared as I approached, and I figured neither of them were happy to see me.

  I was surprised to see the prince because it hadn’t felt like much time had passed while I’d been with the king, but it had probably been almost 12 hours.

  “Prince Labu,” I said as I remembered to bow my head. I wasn’t especially fond of such customs, but given how much of a hair-trigger Labu seemed to be, it was best to follow them. “An honor to see you again. I hope your trip to the guild house was productive.”

  “Enough of your posturing,” Labu said. “You disgraced me in front of my father. Honor must be restored.”

  I shrugged. “What do you have in mind?”

  “You will fight me.”

  I rolled my eyes. “I saved you from one beating earlier. Are you really so excited to get another
one so soon?

  “We’ll see who takes the beating when I face you in a fair fight.”

  “Is that why you brought these two?” I pointed at his friends. “A fair fight?”

  “I don’t need help to gut you, outsider!” Labu snarled as the fins on his head rose. “They’re just here as witnesses.”

  “Fine.” I unbuckled my sword belt. “How do you want to do this? Practice swords? Magical mayhem? Good old fashioned fisticuffs?”

  “We will duel in the traditional Qihin style. No magic. No enhancements. Just our skill with weapons.”

  “So, what, first to three hits? Or are we going full tilt, beat the other guy into submission?”

  “There is only one outcome that can satisfy honor. We will fight to the death.”

  I opened my mouth, closed it, opened it again. “You’re kidding. Your city was just attacked by monsters, the clan lands are being torn apart by a feud with the guild, and now, you want us to spill each other’s blood? Don’t you think that there’s been enough death already?”

  “Are you too cowardly to face me? Too weak without your magic and your women to protect you?”

  “Maybe I’m just too smart to get drawn into this sort of bullshit.”

  “Maybe you have no honor and feel no need to defend it.”

  That one finally stung.

  “I have as much honor as anyone here,” I said as I drew my sword. “And if this is the only way you’ll believe it, then let’s get to it. But remember; you forced my hand.”

  I knew I couldn’t kill a prince in his own city without serious punishment, but I could, at least, give him a few cuts to take him down a notch.

  Labu sneered and raised his barbed spear. “Still trying to escape. But I won’t let you shirk your debt to me.”

  He strode into the center of the courtyard, and I followed. His friends held back and watched us from the bottom of the stairs, as promised.

  We stood on a patch of dry ground amid the pools littering the courtyard. The sun shone from a cloudless sky and set a gleam over the water and the steel of our weapons. The pink coral of the statues glimmered a blood-red in the brightness of the afternoon.

  We circled each other, weapons raised, and watched for openings. I was tired from the previous fighting and my exhaustive meditation in the throne room. My muscles ached from the action, and the food I’d been given wasn’t nearly enough to make up for the lack of sleep.

  Labu, on the other hand, looked healed and well-rested. He moved swiftly and surely around me as he twirled his spear in his hands. If the events of the last 24 hours had taken a toll, then it didn’t show. Even his eyes, the same dark blue as his sister’s, gleamed with a bright and energetic light.

  Labu thrust his spear at me to test my defences. I parried, counter-attacked, and tested him in return. His movements were similar to those of Kumi’s graceful and flowing style born from the water.

  Labu easily blocked my next attack and stayed on the move. The prince circled around me and constantly spun his spear. Every so often, he feinted. The motion emerged naturally from his other movements and gave little warning of their approach. None of them were a real attack yet, just attempts to draw me out and test my capabilities.

  I stayed on the defensive, determined not to be drawn out. I didn’t have the energy to play the aggressor in this fight, and if I was honest, I wasn’t keen to injure Labu. A little humiliation would have done this guy some good, but this was his show, not mine.

  He darted in and struck assertively. I turned his spear aside, blocked a second strike that followed, and then made a low cut. My aim was to catch him in the leg and stop the fight early. He jumped over my sword and turned that movement into an attack as his spear lanced down toward my chest. I sprung back as one of the barbs of his weapon tore through my tunic. His spear whipped around as he landed, but I knocked it aside and returned to my defensive stance.

  Labu bounced on his feet as he jabbed his spear left and right. He forced me to back off one way and then the other. One of my feet slid out from under me down the shallow bank into one of the pools, and I threw my arms out to regain my balance.

  In that instant, Labu leaped forward and struck hard with his spear. I jumped back and landed in the middle of the pool as water sprayed around me. The water wasn’t deep, but it had been stirred up by my landing, and I couldn’t make out what was underfoot. It was no place to try to fight.

  He jumped to join me in the pool, and while he was still in the air, I leaped out of the way and landed unsteadily on the bank. He spun and sprang out of the water like some kind of frog, and I was reminded why it was always a bad idea to fight with a fishman in a pool. His spear lashed out, but I parried it and took another step back.

  Labu flowed across the ground around me and didn’t falter for an instant. He pressed harder with high and low spear strikes, probing for any weakness in my defences. I couldn’t afford to give him an opening, but I was starting to tire as hunger and exhaustion wore at me.

  Things didn’t look bright in my immediate future.

  “You’re just fighting defensively now?” Labu said. “You didn’t get this far by playing nice.”

  “I didn’t want to get to this place at all,” I countered as I parried another of his strikes.

  His movements kept their flow, and there was never a moment of stillness or a step that didn’t somehow fit the pattern. It was like a duel with a dancer, though one who worked with something more deadly than a quickstep.

  I needed to break that rhythm to beat Labu. His fighting style depended on keeping up the flow. Without it, he would lose much of the balance and momentum that allowed him to continue attacking. But I couldn’t break that rhythm myself. I barely had enough gas in the tank to keep up my defense. I had to give him a reason to break the rhythm himself.

  I slowed my movements and made it look as if I was wearier than I was. Labu responded with faster strikes as a grin spread across his face. His confidence grew with each tired parry I made.

  I stabbed at his chest with my sword as he spun away. My move was deliberately sloppy—good enough to look convincing but not so good that it stood any chance of getting through. Labu flowed out of the way of the blow instead of parrying. The tip of his spear jammed into my left shoulder, and pain raced through me as the blade cut my flesh in a spray of blood.

  I brought the Sundered Heart Sword down with all my strength as Labu leaned in and tried to slide the barbs of his weapon into me. My sword sliced through the haft of Labu’s spear and left him clutching nothing more than a nicely carved length of stick.

  Labu stared in shock at his weapon. I ignored the pain of the barbed speartip embedded in my shoulder and hit him with a mid-air kick to the head. He fell to the ground with a thud. I landed with my two feet planted on either side of him.

  I pulled the spear blade from my shoulder with my free hand and tossed it at the feet of the prince’s friends.

  I pressed the Sundered Heart’s blade against Labu’s neck. “You wanted a fight to the death. What would you be doing right now if you were in my position?”

  Labu glowered at me, his eyes filled with hatred. “Do it.”

  I looked up at the silent spectators. “What do you think? Should I kill a prince in his own palace? Do you think King Beqai would even bat a tentacle at the death of his son?”

  Maybe that would finally wake him from his meditative slumber.

  Labu’s companions stared at me with faces of stone and folded arms. I hadn’t expected them to applaud my victory, but they weren’t about to leap to their prince’s defence either. It seemed that they took the “to the death” part of this fight seriously.

  They weren’t the only ones who caught my attention. Kegohr, Vesma, Faryn, and Kumi were standing at the gateway to the stairs that led down to the city. I hadn’t even noticed them arrive. Their eyes were fixed on me in a mixture of horror and astonishment.

  Kumi’s eyes begged me to pull away. I wondered how m
uch she’d guessed of what had happened here. Would she realize that her brother had started the fight, or would she blame me and lay responsibility for his death at my door?

  I looked down at Labu. “You still haven’t answered my question. Would you have spared my life?”

  “Finish it,” he hissed. “Free me from my dishonor.”

  He raised his head, and blood trickled out as the Sundered Heart sliced the skin of his neck.

  My hand trembled. To end this now would save me from one more potential enemy. But it would have other far-reaching consequences. Hell, if I was a different man, I might have killed Labu here and now.

  “You’re a good fighter,” I said. “I respect that. But you make some fucking stupid decisions.”

  “End it!” Labu bellowed as his eyes bulged in their sockets.

  “No.” I drew the sword back. “There’s been enough death and destruction in this palace already. I won’t add to it.”

  “Coward. Dishonorable scum.”

  “No. You’re just too blinded by pride to see things clearly.”

  I stood and offered the prince my hand to help him up. He batted it aside and rose to his feet as a petulant scowl crumpled his face.

  “Real honor isn’t found just in besting others or being bested by them,” I said. “It’s about how you live your life, how you treat the people around you, and how you conduct yourself in times of trial, whether that’s a battle, a debate, or the burden of standing for what you believe is right. A simple, childish view of honor is nothing more than a crutch.”

  Labu’s faced twitched as he struggled to keep his emotions in check. He finally nodded and turned on his heel and strode away. The prince’s companions followed him.

  My friends joined me at my side.

  “That ain’t over.” Kegohr jerked a thumb toward the gate Labu had walked through.

  I nodded my agreement. I didn’t like it. Labu was caught between his loyalties between his clan and the Resplendent Tears Guild. It was difficult to tell what part he would play as events unfolded.