Sharpe was amazed that the Irishman could even stand. Another man would have been winded and stunned, but not him. He shook his head like a cornered boar, staggered backwards, then succeeded in straightening himself to receive Sharpe’s next blows. The officer’s right fist slammed into the big man’s belly, then his left followed.
It was like hitting teak, but the blows hurt Harper. Not enough. The Irishman grunted, then lurched forward. Sharpe ducked, hit again, then his head seemed to explode like a cannon firing as a huge fist slammed into the side of his skull. He butted his head forward and felt it smash on the other man’s face, then his arms and chest were being hugged in a great, rib-cracking embrace.
Sharpe raised his right foot and raked his heel down Harper’s shin. It must have hurt, but the grip did not lessen and Sharpe had no weapon left but his teeth. He bit the Irishman’s cheek, clamping his teeth down, tasting the blood, and the pain was enough to force Harper to release his huge embrace to hit at the officer’s head.
Sharpe was faster. He had grown up in a rookery where he had learned every trick of cheating and brutality. He punched Harper’s throat, then slammed a boot into his groin. Any other man would have been blubbing by now, shrivelling away from the pain, but Harper just seemed to shudder, then bored in again with his overwhelming strength.
“Bastard.” Sharpe hissed the word, ducked, feinted, then threw himself backwards so that he bounced off the blackened stone wall and used the momentum of his recoil to drive his bunched fists into the other man’s belly. Harper’s head came forward, and Sharpe butted again; then, through the whirl of lights that seared across his vision, he brought his fists backwards and forwards across the Irishman’s face.
Harper would not back down. He punched back, and drew blood from Sharpe’s nose and lips, then drove him reeling backwards. Sharpe slipped on snow, tripped on the floor’s rubble, and fell. He saw the massive boot coming, and twisted clear. He came up from the floor, snarling through blood, and grabbed Harper’s crossbelt. The Irishman was himself off balance now and Sharpe turned him, swung him, then let go. Harper spun away, staggered, and fell against the wall. A stone gouged blood down his left cheek.
Sharpe was hurting. His ribs were tender, his head spinning, and his face bloody. He saw the other greenjackets edging closer to where the two men fought. Their faces showed disbelief, and Sharpe knew that not one of them would intervene to help Harper. The big Irishman had been delegated to do this job, and would be left alone to finish it.
Harper spat, stared at Sharpe through a mask of blood, then heaved himself to his feet. He found his bayonet and drew it.
“Use that, you Irish bastard, and I’ll kill you.”
Harper said nothing, and there was something very terrifying in his silence.
“Bastard,” Sharpe said again. He glanced towards his new sword, but the Irishman had edged round to bar that salvation.
Harper stepped forward, coming slowly, the sword-bayonet held like a fighter’s knife. He lunged with it once, sending Sharpe to one side, then lunged again, quick and hard, hoping to catch the officer off balance.
Sharpe, expecting the second lunge, avoided it. He saw the flicker of astonishment on the big man’s face. Harper was good, he was younger than Sharpe, but he had not fought a man with Sharpe’s quickness. Nor had he been hurt so much in a long time, and the flicker of surprise turned to pain as Sharpe’s fists slapped at his eyes. Harper slashed with the bayonet, using it now to drive his attacker away, and Sharpe let the blade come at him. He felt it slice at his forearm, he ignored it, and rammed the heel of his hand forward to break the Irishman’s nose. He clawed at Harper’s eyes, trying to hook them out of his skull. The Irishman wrenched away and Sharpe pushed him off balance again. Fire seared at his arm, the fire of warm blood drawn by steel, but the pain went as Harper fell.