Best Served Cold

He had always loved triumphant rhetoric too, but time was a factor. So he turned for the shadowy passageway and hurried down it. A dozen cramped strides and he was already breathing hard again. A dozen more and he thought he caught the faintest glimmer of daylight up the tunnel. He knelt down, chewing at his lip. He was far from sure how fast the trail would burn once it was lit.

“Good thing I always loved to gamble…” He carefully began to unscrew the broken cage around the lamp. It was stuck.

“Shit.” He strained at it, fingers slipping, but it must have got bent when he clubbed Sesaria. “Bastard thing!” He shifted his grip, growled as he twisted with all his force. The top popped off suddenly, he fumbled both halves, the lamp dropped, he tried to catch it, missed, it hit the floor, bounced, guttered and went out, sinking the passageway into inky darkness.

“Fucking… shit!” His only option was to retrace his steps and get one of the lamps from the end of the tunnel. He took a few steps, one hand stretched out in front of him, fishing in the black. A beam caught him right in the face, snapped his head back, mouth buzzing, salty with blood. “Gah!”

He saw light, shook his throbbing head, strained into the darkness. Lamplight, catching the grain of the props, the stones and roots in the walls, making the snaking trail of powder glisten. Lamplight, and unless he had completely lost his bearings, it was coming from where he had left Sesaria.

Bringing his sword seemed suddenly to have been a stroke of genius. He slid it gently from its sheath with a reassuring ring of metal, had to work his elbow this way and that in the narrow space to get it pointing forwards, accidentally stuck the ceiling with the point and caused a long rivulet of soil to pour gently down onto his bald patch. All the while the light crept closer.

Sesaria appeared around the bend, lamp in one big fist, a line of blood creeping down his forehead. They faced one other for a moment, Cosca crouching, Sesaria bent double.

“Why?” grunted the big man.

“Because I make a point of never letting a man betray me twice.”

“I thought you were all business.”

“Men change.”

“You killed Andiche.”

“Best moment of the last ten years.”

Sesaria shook his head, as much puzzled as angry and in pain. “Murcatto was the one took your chair, not us!”

“Entirely different matter. Women can betray me as often as they please.”

“You always did have a blind spot for that mad bitch.”

“I’m an incurable romantic. Or maybe I just never liked you.”

Sesaria slid a heavy knife out in his free hand. “You should’ve stabbed me back there.”

“I’m glad I didn’t. Now I get to use another clever line.”

“Don’t suppose you’d consider putting that sword away and fighting knife to knife?”

Cosca gave a cackle. “You’re the one who likes things fair. I tried to kill you by clubbing you from behind then blowing you up, remember? Stabbing you with a sword will give me no sleepless nights.” And he lunged.

In such a confined space, being a big man was a profound disadvantage. Sesaria almost entirely filled the narrow tunnel, which made him, fortunately, more or less impossible to miss. He managed to steer the clumsy jab away with his knife, but it still pricked him in the shoulder. Cosca pulled back for another thrust, squawked as he caught his knuckles on the earth wall. Sesaria swung his heavy lamp at him and Cosca flopped away, slipped and went over on one knee. The big man scrambled forwards, raising the knife. His fist scraped on the ceiling, bringing down a shower of earth, his knife thudded deep into a beam above. He mouthed some curse in Kantic, wincing as he struggled to drag the blade free. Cosca righted himself and made another clumsy lunge. Sesaria’s eyes bulged as the point punctured his shirt and slid smoothly through his chest.

“There!” Cosca snarled in his face. “Do you get… my point?”

Sesaria lurched forwards, groaning bloody drool, face locked in a desperate grimace, the blade sliding inexorably through him until the hilt got tangled with his sticky shirt. He seized hold of Cosca and toppled over, bearing him down on his back, the pommel of the sword digging savagely into his stomach and driving all his breath out in a creaking, “Oooooooof.”

Sesaria curled back his lips to show red teeth. “You call… that… a clever line?” He smashed his lamp down into the trail of powder beside Cosca’s face. Glass shattered, flame leaped up, there was a fizzling pop as the powder caught, the heat of it near to burning Cosca’s cheek. He struggled with Sesaria’s great limp body, struggled to untwist his fingers from the gilded basketwork of his sword, desperately tried to wrestle the big corpse sideways. His nose was full of the acrid reek of Gurkish sugar, snapping sparks moving off slowly down the passage.