Five Odd Honors by Jane Lindskold Read Free Book Online Page B

Heaven did not manage a complete parry.
    Yet, even as blood poured down his arm, Thundering Heaven manifested neither armor nor shield. His dark eyes glittered with mad intensity as he changed his attack. At the cost of another wound—this one to the top of his shoulder near the neck, gliding down over his back—Thundering Heaven ducked within the reach of the giau-chiz and ran to close the distance between them.
    With that move, Loyal Wind was effectively disarmed. He shouted to Proud Gamble, commanding his steed to back up. Dropping his giau-chiz, Loyal Wind drew his curved cavalry sword. The blade was heavy, edged on one side only, equally able when wielded by skilled hands to parry an attack or inflict a nasty wound.
    Thundering Heaven had taken advantage of Loyal Wind’s retreat to manifest armor for himself. Blood leaked from beneath the metal-embossed leather plates. Thundering Heaven seemed to glory in the gore, wearing it as a savage might have worn garish war paint, grinning ferociously as he advanced on Loyal Wind.
    Mounted, Loyal Wind had the advantage of height, but Thundering Heaven gained that of mobility. Moreover, Thundering Heaven’s sword was slightly longer than Loyal Wind’s, giving him the advantage of reach as well. He demonstrated this by slashing out and nicking Proud Gamble on the side of his neck.
    The charm Loyal Wind had cast upon himself before entering the field did not automatically extend to his mount. He cursed his lack of foresight. Of course, Thundering Heaven would go for the horse. He was a tiger.
    Proud Gamble screamed in pain, but he did not shy as a more usual horse would have done. In exile, Thundering Heaven had created the blade Treaty. Water Cloud had created the Rooster’s Talons. The Exile Rat had created an abacus that permitted him to calculate arcane matters as a more usual abacus sped along the calculation of wealth.
    Loyal Wind had created no such tool. Instead, in the chestnut stallion, Proud Gamble, he had created the perfect war horse, brave and calculating, infused with almost human intelligence and understanding of the fighting arts. Into Proud Gamble, Loyal Wind had fused something of himself, in addition to memories of the best and bravest horses he had known as a mounted warrior.
    When Loyal Wind had died, Proud Gamble had come with him into death. Perhaps this was because the steed was in some sense an extension of Loyal Wind. Perhaps it was because at the time of his death Loyal Wind was obsessed with himself and his own pains and gave little thought to the child heir he was leaving behind. For what ever reason, unlike Thundering Heaven who must make do with a secondary weapon, Loyal Wind augmented his abilities with the ideal weapon of his choice.
    This, then, Loyal Wind calculated, gave him an advantage over Thundering Heaven, an advantage the other could not match.
    Proud Gamble knew that if he shied or fled, this would give the enemy an advantage. He knew the weight of his iron-shod hooves and how they could crush bone, render muscle into bloody pulp. This understanding went beyond the rote training of a war horse to comprehension of the tactics involved, but even with this magical enhancement, Proud Gamble was not a human general, any more than the sword Treaty was a diplomat.
    The stallion reared, seeking both to bring his rider clear of any danger from Thundering Heaven’s sword and to bring the power of his front hooves into play. He reared, and, as the tiger seeing the soft underbelly of his prey exposed strikes, so Thundering Heaven struck.
    A tiger might have been foiled by the armor that protected some of Proud Gamble’s underbelly, but for all the glittering insanity in his eyes, Thundering Heaven had full possession of his human intellect.
    His blow did not strike harmlessly against armor, but sliced deeply, cutting through the chestnut stallion’s hide and hair, ripping through muscle and into gut. Proud Gamble screamed. Although he attempted