The Dance of Time

Still many cellars away, Valentinian and Anastasius heard the fight start.

Nothing from Rajiv. Just the sound of several angry and startled men, their shouts echoing through the labyrinth.

Rajiv went to meet the first Ye-tai. That surprised him, as he'd thought it would.

When you're outmatched, get in quick. They won't expect that, the fucks.

The Ye-tai's sword came up. Rajiv raised the pick as if to match blows. The mercenary gri

At the last instant, Rajiv reversed his grip, ducked under the sword, and drove the handle of the pick into the man's groin.

Go for the shithead's dick and balls. Turn him into a squealing bitch.

The Ye-tai didn't squeal. As hard as Rajiv had driven in the end of the shaft, he didn't do anything except stare ahead, his mouth agape. He'd dropped his sword and was clutching his groin, half-stooped.

His eyes were wide as saucers, too, which was handy.

Rajiv rose from his crouch, reversed his grip again, and drove one of the pick's narrow blades into an eye. The blunt iron sank three inches into the Ye-tai's skull.

As he'd expected, he'd lost the pick. But it had all happened fast enough that he had time to dive for the spade, grab it, and come up rolling in a far corner.

He wasn't thinking at all, really, just acting. Hours and hours and hours of the Mongoose's training, that was.

You don't have time to think in a fight. If you have to think, you're a dead man.

The slumping corpse of the first Ye-tai got in the way of the second. Rajiv had pla

The third came at him, again with his sword high.

That's just stupid, some part of Rajiv's mind recorded. Dimly, there was another, wall-offed part that remembered he had once thought that way of using a sword very warrior-like. Dramatic-looking. Heroic.

But that was before hours and hours and hours of the Mongoose. A lifetime ago, it seemed now-and even a thirteen-year life is a fair span of time.

Rajiv evaded the sword strike. No flair to it, just-got out of the way.

Not much. Just enough. Miserly in everything.

A short, quick, hard jab of the spade into the side of the Ye-tai's knee was enough to throw off his backhand stroke. Rajiv evaded that one easily. He didn't try to parry the blow. The wood and iron of his spade would be no match for a steel sword.

Another quick hard jab to the same knee was enough to bring the Ye-tai down.

As he did so, Rajiv swiveled, causing the crumpling Ye-tai to impede the other.

Fuck 'em up, when you're fighting a crowd. Make 'em fall over each other.

The third Ye-tai didn't fall. But he stumbled into the kneeling body of his comrade hard enough that he had to steady himself with one hand. His other hand, holding the sword, swung out wide in an instinctive reach for balance.

Rajiv drove the edge of the spade into the wrist of the sword arm. The hand popped open. The sword fell. Blood oozed from the laceration on the wrist. It was a bad laceration, even if Rajiv hadn't managed to sever anything critical.

Go for the extremities. Always go for extremities. Hands, feet, toes, fingers. They're your closest target and the hardest for the asshole to defend.

The Ye-tai gaped at him, more in surprise than anything else.

But Rajiv ignored him, for the moment.

Don't linger, you idiot. Cut a man just enough, then cut another. Then come back and cut the first one again, if you need to. Like your mother cuts onions. Practical. Fuck all that other crap.

The second Ye-tai was squealing, in a hissing sort of way. Rajiv knew that knee injuries were excruciating. The Mongoose had told him so-and then, twice, banged up his knee in training sessions to prove it.

The Ye-tai's head was unguarded, with both his hands clutching the ruined knee. So Rajiv drove the spade at his temple.

He made his first mistake, then. The target was so tempting-so glorious, as it were-that he threw everything into the blow. He'd take off that head!

The extra time it took to position his whole body for that mighty blow was enough for the Ye-tai to bring up his hand to protect the head.

Stupid! Rajiv snarled silently at himself.

It probably didn't make any difference, of course. If the edge of the spade wasn't as sharp as a true weapon, it wasn't all that dull; and if iron wasn't steel, it was still much harder than human flesh. The strike cut off one of the man's fingers and maimed the whole hand-and still delivered a powerful blow to the skull. Moaning, the Ye-tai collapsed to the floor, half-unconscious.

Still, Rajiv was glad the Mongoose hadn't seen.

"Stupid," he heard a voice mutter.

Startled, he glanced aside. The Mongoose was there, in the entrance to the chamber. He had his sword in his hand, but it was down alongside his leg. Behind him, Rajiv could see the huge figure of Anastasius looming.

The Mongoose leaned against the stone entrance, tapping the tip of the sword against his boot. Then, nodded his head toward the last Ye-tai against the far wall.

"Finish him, boy. And don't fuck up again."

Rajiv looked at the Ye-tai. The man was paying him no attention at all. He was staring at the Mongoose, obviously frightened out of his wits.

The spade had served well enough, but there was now a sword available. The one the second Ye-tai had dropped after Rajiv smashed his knee.

No reason to waste the spade, of course. Certainly not with the Mongoose watching. Rajiv had been trained-for hours and hours and hours-to throw most anything. Even ladles. The Mongoose was a firm believer in the value of weapons used at a distance.

Rajiv would never be the Mongoose's equal with a throwing knife, of course. He was not sure even the heroes and asuras of the legends could throw a knife that well.

But he was awfully good, by now. The spade, hurled like a spear, struck the Ye-tai in the groin.

"Good!" the Mongoose grunted.

With the sword in his hand, Rajiv approached the Ye-tai. By now, of course, the man had noticed him. Half-crouched, snarling, clutching himself with his left hand while he tried to grab his dropped sword with the still-bleeding right hand.

Rajiv sliced open his scalp with a quick, flicking strike of the sword.

Don't try to split his head open, you jackass. You'll likely just get your sword stuck. And it's too easy to block and what's the fucking point anyway? Just cut him somewhere in the front of the head. Anywhere the blood'll spill into his eyes and blind him. Head wounds bleed like nothing else.

Blood poured over the Ye-tai's face. The sword he'd been bringing up went, instead, to his face, as he tried to wipe off the blood with the back of his wrist.

It never got there. Another quick, flicking sword strike struck the hand and took off the thumb. The sword, again, fell to the ground.

"Don't… fuck… it… up," the Mongoose growled.

Rajiv didn't really need the lesson. He'd learned it well enough already, this day, with that one mistake. He was sorely tempted to end it all, but not for any romantic reason. The carnage was starting to upset him. He'd never been in a real fight before-not a killing one-and he was discovering that men don't die the way chickens and lambs do when they're slaughtered.

He'd always thought they would. But they didn't. They bled the same, pretty much. But lambs-certainly chickens-never had that look of horror in their eyes as they knew they were dying.

That same, wall-offed part of Rajiv's mind thought he understood, now. The reason his father always seemed so stern. Not like his mother at all.