He whipped up the fourteen-inch, tungsten-steel, titanium-jacketed blade. The double-edged, razor-keen metal was blued so it would have reflected nothing had any light penetrated the dense canopy of floating dust.
Le Loup Garou’s expression of homicidal fury didn’t alter at the sight of the knife. Instead, he feinted with the kukri , thrust with the stiletto. Kane parried both blades, steel clashing loudly against steel. He kicked at the Roamer’s left knee, but dirt slid beneath him and he almost fell.
He staggered, going to one knee and avoided a scything, decapitating back swing from the kukri . Kane slashed at his calves, hoping to hamstring him, but Le Loup Garou skipped backward with the agility of a wolf. His heels struck a stone, and he sat down heavily.
Kane lunged, knife held out before him. The Roamer chief launched a kick that connected solidly with his chest. Kane went with the force of the kick, threw himself to one side as a vicious follow-up swing of the kukri missed his face by a finger’s width.
Both men scrambled to their feet and stood for a moment, panting and glaring, chests heaving. Le Loup Garou stank with a strong, vile smell as human as it was animal. Neither one dared to take deep breaths, fearing the dust-saturated air would trigger coughing fits. Kane knew Grant and Brigid lurked somewhere near, concealed by the curtain of grit-laden mist. With his trans-comm broken, he could only hope they would hear and follow the sound of the struggle but wouldn’t distract him by calling his name.
He also hoped that when visibility improved, Grant would be near enough to shoot Le Loup Garou and so end the duel. The fight wasn’t a matter of honor. The bastard had brought it upon himself by ignoring Kane’s warning and refusing to withdraw when he had the chance.
Kane understood the thirst for revenge that drove the Roamer chief, but he had no sympathy for it. The man was beyond all appeals to reason or concern for his own life.
Le Loup Garou bounded to the attack again, flailing with his glittering blades. Kane parried desperately, metal clanging and rasping. One of the stiletto cuts got through his guard and sliced into his right shoulder. Fiery pain streaked down his arm.
Wrenching his body backward, he awkwardly blocked an overhead strike of the kukri . The force of the blow staggered him. As he fought to recover his balance, a large section of the rockfall collapsed beneath his weight, sliding away like a wave of earth and gravel.
Kane tried to surf it, but the dirt shifted, crumbled, and he was carried down in a head-over-heels tumble. He fell heavily on his back, and a blanket of stone-littered earth half buried him.
Coughing, blinded and nearly smothered, he struggled against the pressure of the dirt covering him from boot tips to his chest. He craned his head, desperately blinking away the kernels of grit stinging his eyes. He dug frantically with his left hand, but for every bit of dirt he scooped aside, another collapsed in its place.
Le Loup Garou leaped into view above him, standing on the crest of the pile of rubble. His weight caused more soil and stones to spill down. Kane spit and sputtered, forced to squeeze his eyes shut to keep them from filling with dirt. He swished his combat knife in menacing arcs.
He heard the man husk out a low chuckle, a savage, gloating sound. Kane thrashed wildly, trying to free himself from the suffocating, pinioning weight. Le Loup Garou snarled out his laughter and stomped on the lip of the earth slip. Dirt rivered down, heavy clods thudded onto Kane’s chest, nearly driving all the air from his lungs.
The Roamer chief no longer cared about cutting out his heart; he was intent on burying him alive. Kane tried to find the oxygen to call out for Brigid or Grant, but only a gasping rattle passed his lips.
For an instant, images of all the enemies he had either chilled or escaped flitted through his mind. The notion that a rag-assed Roamer bastard would be the one to put him underliterallywas at once grimly amusing and humiliating.