gatehouse wall. He ran until he reached the stable, until he stumbled over a
dead hawk-mask, and then he heard everything, cacophonously, that had been so
muted before: swords rasping; panoplies rattling; bodies thudding and greaved
men running; quarrels whispering bright death as they passed through the dark
press; javelins ringing as they struck helm or shield suddenly limned in lurid
fiery light.
Fire? Behind Jubal flame licked out of the stable windows and horses whistled
their death screams.
The heat was singeing. He drew his sword and turned in a fluid motion, judging
himself as he was wont to do when the crowds had been about him in applauding
tiers and he must kill to live to kill another day, and do so pleasingly.
He felt the thrill of it, the immediacy of it, the joy of the arena, and as the
pack of freed slaves came shouting, he picked out the prince’s eunuch and
reached to wrest a spear from the dead hawk-mask’s grip. He hefted it, left
handed, to cast, just as the man in leopard pelt and cuirass and a dozen
mercenaries came between him and the slaves, cutting him off from his final
refuge, the stairs to the westward wall.
Behind him, the flames seemed hotter, so that he was glad he had not stopped for
armour. He threw the spear, and it rammed home in the eunuch’s gut. The
leopard leader came forward, alone, sword tip gesturing three times, leftward.
Was it Tempus, beneath that frightful armour? Jubal raised his own blade to his
brow in acceptance, and moved to where his antagonist indicated, but the leopard