08 A Little Hatred: Book One (The Age of Madness)

‘’Cause they’re not the ones facing the Great Leveller,’ said Rikke’s father, his face chiselled from grey stone.

The only thing worse than the fear of them coming together was the terror when they did, shocking as lightning every time, Rikke flinching at every movement, arse clenching at every flash of steel. She clung to the bench as if it was the saddle of a horse she was trying to break, clung to Finree’s cold hand in her hot one so hard her wrist ached.

She knew with one twitch of a sword she might lose her lover, her home, her future. People can be so tough, survive so much hunger and cold and disappointment, take beatings you wouldn’t believe and come out stronger. But they can be so fragile, too. One sharp piece of metal is all it takes to turn a man into mud. One little stroke of bad luck. One ill-judged whisper.

Had she done this? Had she made this happen?

She gasped as Nightfall came forward, switched direction in a blink. Steel rang once, twice, Leo lashed back, but too slow and Stour slipped around it, his sword catching Leo’s leg and making him stagger.

‘No.’ A kind of shudder went through Finree, and Rikke gripped her hand harder than ever. Tried to be strong for both of them though she wasn’t halfway strong enough for herself. Tried to bare her teeth, and focus on Stour’s smirk, and turn the sucking of fear and guilt into anger. Tried to make something from it she could use.

You cannot force the Long Eye open, no more than you can order the tide to come in. But where was the harm in trying?

She planted her fists on her knees and sat forward. Refusing to blink. Glaring at the grass like she could glare through it to what might come. Willing that heat into her eye.

Might be she saw what she wanted to. The dead knew there’d been plenty o’ that going on the past few days. But for the briefest moment, she thought she saw ghosts there, in the Circle. Faint, they were, and flickering. Hints of figures. Stour and Leo, and their swords, torn apart like cobwebs on the breeze as the real men passed through them.

Rikke curled back her lips, and clenched her fists, and squeezed her jaw so hard it felt like her teeth might crack, and she stared at the Circle as if she was staring into a gale.

She made herself see.

Stour was laughing now. Giggling as if every contact was a brilliant joke.

Leo wasn’t finding it funny. He told himself he was the Young Lion. The Lord Governor of Angland. The proud son of a proud line of warriors, with glory in his grasp. But in truth, he was scarcely even trying to hit back. Barniva’s sword was getting heavier every time he swung it. He was scared if he attacked, he’d give Stour a fatal opening. But he was scared if he defended, things could only go one way.

It was getting to the point where he was just scared.

Stour jerked forward and Leo stumbled back. Just a mocking feint with the foot, a twitch of the hand, and Leo was sent scampering. Stour wasn’t only aiming to win now, but to make a show of it. To teach a lesson. To show the whole North that the Great Wolf was a man to be feared. His sword flickered past Leo’s tired guard. Stour could’ve spitted him, but he chose just to prick his stomach. Prick him then whip away again, laughing.

He was the Young Lion, but he was bleeding. Blood on his face, blood on his leg. Red streaks down his right hand, grip of Barniva’s sword sticky with it. The idea of blood watering the Circle had thrilled him when he listened to stories of the Bloody-Nine. Thrills you a lot less when it’s your own.

He was the Young Lion, but he was tiring. He panted, gasped, cold air raw in his throat, but he could never get enough breath. His knees were trembling, the snap going out of his arm. No way he could outlast Stour now. His only chance was to out-think him. Trouble was, he’d never been much of a thinker. If he had been, he might not have taken the challenge in the first place.

His eyes darted about the Circle, searching for some clue.

His friends, their shields drooping. Glaward chewing his lip. Jin tearing his beard. Antaup crestfallen. Jurand wincing as if he felt every wound himself. He caught a glimpse of his mother, stricken, pale, staring. The Dogman sat grim beside her, and Rikke, glaring into the Circle, fiddling with the ring through her nose.

Fight dirty, she’d told him. No one remembers how the fight was won, only who won it. A gritty philosophy. Words to die by.

Stour feinted and Leo fell back again, stumbled again, but this time he went down harder than he had to. He put a hand out behind as if to steady himself, tore up a handful of grass. Stour came on again, grinning, and Leo growled as he forced the snap into his legs, sprang up, throwing his grass in Stour’s face, swinging his sword at Stour’s neck.