Chapter 8 #7
My fingers closed around the hilt of the sword. It wouldn’t move. He was standing on it.
“What the fuck do you think you’re doing here?” he said.
“I’m here to stop you, Kel,” I said. “You can’t just charge around the place killing people, not here in Choris. This isn’t home. You can’t just do what you like.”
“Says who?”
“Me,” I said. “This isn’t the Mesoge. This is civilisation, what’s left of it. And I won’t have you spoiling it, like you spoil everything else.”
“You going to stop me, then?”
At which moment, I guess the moon must have come out, because a shaft of moonlight slanted in through a window I hadn’t realised was there, and lit up the corridor a sort of cobwebby grey.
It was, in fact, a typical Mesoge moment, because in all the old stories there’s always a bit where the moon comes out and the hero gazes into the walker’s cold, dead eyes.
“Yes,” I said. “If you want to carry on playing your games, you’re going to have to kill me first. And there’s something stopping you doing that. Isn’t there?”
“Fuck you.”
I needed him to move his feet: not far, just enough so I could free the sword.
After that, I’d be on my own, except that I knew the stories by heart.
Sighvat the Peacock overcame his walker by goading it into rushing at him, then holding out his magic sword so that the walker impaled himself on the point; Sighvat wasn’t strong enough to drive a sword through the monster’s hide, but the monster was.
Same as boar-hunting, where you use the enemy’s own strength and impetus to destroy him, or so I read in a book somewhere.
“I wonder what it can be,” I went on. “It’s not because I’m your brother, and it’s not because you like me, because you don’t. You always did hate me, Kel, and you know why? Because I’m smart and you’re not.”
Nothing. He didn’t move. He should’ve lunged forward to smash me, or at the very least sworn at me, but he just stood there, looking at me.
“I’m smart,” I repeated, “and you’re just plain stupid. You always were stupid, Kel, thick as a brick, thick as two short planks. Dad used to say, what did I do to deserve a moron for a son?”
“He never said that.”
“Yes he did. How can any son of mine be so stupid, he used to say. He’s so stupid, I wish he’d never been born, or he’d died when he was a baby. He used to say that all the time.”
“You’re lying.”
“It’s funny, he used to say, I don’t remember him ever being dropped on his head when he was a little kid. But he must’ve been, or how come he turned out such an idiot? He used to say that to Mom, and it always made her laugh.”
“Liar.”
“No, I’m not. Oh, we all used to laugh at you, the moment your back was turned.
Dad, Mom, Einar, Gisli, the neighbours, we all thought you were a great joke, because you’re so dumb.
Didn’t you know that, Kel? You’d have to be pretty dumb not to realise we were all laughing at you, all the time. But there you go. Proves my point.”
“I’ll get you for that.”
“Go on, then.”
“I’ll kill your girl.”
Talking of stupidity. A trait that runs in the family, apparently.
And the truth of the matter was, Kotkel wasn’t stupid.
Not the sharpest arrow in the quiver, maybe, but in some ways he was really quite smart.
Like, for instance, the moment you betrayed some slight vulnerability, he’d be on it like a snake.
I suddenly realised I couldn’t think what to say.
But I also knew I had to say something, because silence would be an admission that he’d hit the mark in the gold.
“That’s just the sort of chickenshit I’d expect from you, Kel,” I said.
“You don’t dare kill me, so you beat up on a girl instead.
Why don’t you dare kill me, Kel? Somebody’s got you well trained, I can see that.
Good dog. Sit. Beg. And if you’re really good, you can have a bit of chicken skin. ”
He moved. Not forward to attack, but back.
I didn’t analyse it at the time, being preoccupied with other things, but I think he was putting distance between us; to keep himself from lashing out, or simply because I was making myself too loathsome to be close to.
No matter. I dragged the sword out from under his foot and rose to my feet, sliding my back up against the wall.
Great tactics. He’d rush me, but he couldn’t push the wall out of the way.
I’d probably break both my wrists, holding on to the sword hilt while he impaled himself on it, but his onset and the wall between them would get the job done –
He was looking at me. Pure contempt.
Of course, he knew the story of Sighvat the Peacock too. Maybe he wasn’t as dumb as all that, and maybe I wasn’t so smart. “You’re a real piece of shit,” he said to me. “You know that?”
“I’d kind of gathered,” I said. The sword was too heavy to keep outstretched for very long. I lowered it. “Go home, Kel,” I said. “You don’t belong here.”
“Fuck you.”
“I belong here,” I said; “you don’t. How are they making you do this? Come on, you can tell me. I’m your brother.”
I didn’t know he could be so quick. He darted forward and slapped the sword out of my hand. I heard it clatter on the stone floor, and he was blocking out all the moonlight from the window. I felt his fingers, all five of them, close round my head.
“Nobody’s making me do anything,” he said.
“Liar.”
“Was it true? Dad and Mom laughing at me?”
“No, of course not. I made it up.”
I wasn’t sure he believed me. “Fuck you,” he said. “Why’d you want to say a thing like that?”
“To piss you off, Kel. You always were so easy to get a rise out of.”
He was holding my life in his hand, between the tips of his fingers. “I ought to kill you for that.”
“Then why don’t you?”
I couldn’t see his eyes, because he was between me and the light. “You’re pathetic,” he said. “You’re a real piece of shit.”
More than an element of truth in that. “Who’s making you do this?” I said. “Tell me. I can help.”
With a flick of his wrist he sent me flying. I hit a wall. I realised I was lying on top of the sword. Small world. “You can’t help me,” he said. “You’re nobody.”
“What happened to you, Kel? How did you die?”
“Fuck off.”
“Who killed you?”
He didn’t know what to do with his hands. He waved them in the air, like a man trying to restrain two large dogs. “What do you care? You never gave a shit about any of us.”
“Was it Dad?”
“No.” He was shouting.
“He killed you, didn’t he? His own son.”
He punched a hole in the wall. Solid stone, imperial masonry. A direct hit from a trebuchet couldn’t do that. “Shut up, will you? Just shut the fuck up.”
“Sorry, Kel, but I need you to tell me. Who’s doing all this? How are they doing it? It shouldn’t be possible. If you tell me, I can fix it. You don’t want to be here, I can see that. You don’t want to be doing this. I can help you.”
He lunged at me, amazingly fast. By the time I’d grabbed the hilt of the sword, he had his hand round my head and was holding me up, so my feet were off the ground.
“I don’t want your fucking help,” he roared in my face, and I noticed the lack of breath.
Kel’s breath always smelled bad when I was a kid.
When he breathed in my face it made me want to wash it off with ashes and water.
But no smell, because no breath. “You never helped anybody in your whole life.”
I could feel my skull flex under his fingers. Now that’s a weird sensation. “Go on,” I said, “do it. Maybe it’ll make you feel better.”
He dropped me. I landed badly, folded my ankle over and flopped in a heap at his feet, like a shirt he’d just taken off and dumped on the floor. I had the sword in my hand. I didn’t know if he’d noticed it or not.
“You’re an arsehole,” he said, “you know that? Why can’t you just leave me alone?”
He was standing with his weight on his left leg, which was what, two feet away from me.
In the books I’ve read, there’s this thing called the centre of percussion, which is the place on a sword blade that delivers the maximum force; Svangerd calls it the sweet spot, which is much the same thing.
If I took a swing at his knee from where I was kneeling, the sweet spot would catch him just above the kneecap.
I’d be able to put my whole body behind the cut, and as I think I may have mentioned, I’m no weakling, not physically at least. It was what Sighvat would’ve done, and Angantyr the Strong and Bothvar Biarki.
The hell with it, I thought, and put the sword down on the ground.
I guess I couldn’t bear the look on his face, when I swung at him and it bounced off.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “Look, I don’t like you and you don’t like me. But we’re brothers, and someone’s playing stupid games with our family. That’s not right. Is it?”
“Fuck all you can do about it.”
“That’s where you’re wrong,” I said. “I can fix it. I can make it stop. All you have to do is tell me. Who’s doing it? How are they doing it? That’s all I need to know.”
He roared and kicked me. I think he must have mostly missed, because if he’d connected fair and square, you wouldn’t be reading this. I went spinning, hit the wall with my shoulder and fell in a heap. I looked up and he was standing over me, one foot raised. One stamp. The last thing I’d ever see.
I heard another roar, but not from Kotkel. He turned his head. I couldn’t see, because he was in my light. He swung round, away from me, and past him I saw a huge shape, swollen, familiar: another walker.
They slammed into each other. The noise was unbelievable, and not like anything I’ve ever heard before or since.
You wouldn’t believe so much force could be expended in a confined space without bringing the walls and the ceiling down.
Each of them had his hands clamped round the other’s head, squeezing.
You couldn’t call it a fight. It was a race, to see who could crush the other one first.
The newcomer took his hands off Kotkel’s head and brought them up inside his arms to break his grip. Then he shoved him against the wall. It was a trick Dad used to show us, when he taught us to wrestle.
I saw Kotkel look down and grab something. I couldn’t see, but I guessed I knew what it was. I yelled, “Dad, look out,” but I was too late.
The grip of the sword was too small for Kotkel’s hand, so he threw it, like a knife.
It hit Dad in the eye socket, either pure fluke or the sweetest throw you ever saw.
Dad staggered back, and Kel sprang forward, grabbed the sword with both hands and pushed, a massive thrust, with all his strength and weight behind it.
I heard that unmistakeable sound, more a click than anything else, that you only get when a hardened and tempered blade snaps.
So much for that theory, I remember thinking; I’m ashamed of myself for that.
The sword breaking took Kel by surprise.
He staggered forward, and Dad punched him in the face, his trademark short right cross.
It made Kel stagger two steps back but it didn’t floor him.
Then they were grappling again, Dad squeezing Kel’s head, Kel pushing on the broken sword-blade, trying to force it out through the back of Dad’s skull with the heels of his hands.
I don’t know how long it would’ve gone on if Dad hadn’t caught his foot on something and stumbled.
Kotkel pulled quickly away, and Dad fell on one knee.
As he tried to get up Kel lashed out a kick at him, but Dad caught his foot in both hands and twisted it.
I expected to hear a bone snap, but I didn’t.
They charged each other and came together with a crash like a falling tree, but Kel hadn’t got his balance quite right.
He toppled backwards, grabbing at Dad to break his fall, and they both went down together.
They were next to the window. It was solid enough: massive granite jambs and mullions.
It crumpled under their combined mass like a spider’s web, and they fell out.
For a moment I thought they’d brought the whole building down, but hooray for imperial architecture. Instead, they’d left a huge hole in the wall.
It was a long way down from the third floor, but not nearly far enough. I forced myself to peer out through the hole in the wall, and I saw them, in the courtyard below, crashing into each other like two stags in the rut.
I was scared stiff that people would come running when they heard the noise and get themselves killed, but I needn’t have worried.
Nobody, not even clerics or the guard, was stupid enough to go anywhere near them, or put themselves in a place where they might be seen – except for me, of course, staring out at them framed by the hole they’d made, but I didn’t care.
Not that they were the slightest bit interested in anything but each other.
If you forced me to venture an opinion, I’d have to say that Kotkel was a tiny bit stronger, but Dad made up for it in skill and experience; after all, he taught Kotkel everything he knew about fighting, but either he’d neglected to teach him all his best moves or Kotkel’s attention had wandered at some point.
Since neither of them could hurt or harm the other it really didn’t matter terribly much.
They kept on at each other, with no slackening of pace or intensity, no fatigue or diminution of will.
Neither of them could win, neither could lose, and there was no reason at all why they shouldn’t keep it up indefinitely.
And then they stopped. I couldn’t understand why.
But Dad suddenly took his hands off Kotkel’s head, and Kotkel stopped trying to push the broken sword-blade through Dad’s skull.
They both took a long step back, looked at each other for maybe two heartbeats, then turned and strode off in opposite directions, walking fast, like they were late for dinner.