Lord of Shadows (The Dark Artifices #2)(79)
The prince guided the masked knight to his side of the cleared space and left him there, facing Emma. He was armed with a longsword of faerie workmanship, its blade silver traced with gold, its hilt studded with gems. The edges gleamed sharp as razor blades.
A strong sword, but nothing could break Cortana. Emma's weapon would not fail her. She could only fail herself.
"You know the rules," said the King in a bored tone. "Once the battle commences, neither warrior can be helped by a friend. The fight is to the death. The victor is he or she who survives."
Emma drew Cortana. It flashed like the setting sun, just before it drowned in the sea.
There was no reaction from the knight with the painted helmet. Emma focused on his stance. He was taller than her, had greater reach. His feet were carefully planted. Despite the ridiculous helmet, he was clearly a serious fighter.
She moved her own feet into position: left foot forward, right foot back, arcing the dominant side of her body toward her opponent.
"Let it begin," said the King.
Like a racehorse bursting out of the box, the knight rushed toward Emma, sword leaping forward. Caught off guard by his speed, Emma spun out of the way of the blade. But it was a late start. She should have raised Cortana earlier. She'd been counting on the swiftness of her Sure-Strike rune, but it was no longer working. A sharp terror she hadn't known in a long time went through her as she felt the whisper of the tip of the knight's sword gliding inches from her side.
Emma remembered her father's words when she'd first been learning. Strike at your enemy, not his weapon. Most fighters went for your blade. A good fighter went for your body.
This was a good fighter. But had she expected anything else? The King had chosen him, after all. Now she just had to hope that the King had underestimated her.
Two quick turns brought her to a slightly raised hillock of grass. Maybe she could even their height difference. The grass rustled. Emma didn't need to look to know that the knight was plunging toward her again. She whirled, bringing Cortana around in a slicing arc.
He barely moved backward. The sword cut along the material of his thick leather armor, opening a wide slit. He didn't flinch, though, or seem hurt. He certainly wasn't slowed down. He lunged for Emma, and she slid into a crouch, his blade whistling over her head. He lunged again and she sprang back.
She could hear her own breath, ragged in the cool air of the forest. The faerie knight was good, and she didn't have the benefit of runes, of seraph blades-any of the armaments of a Shadowhunter. And what if she was tiring earlier? What if this dark land was sucking out even the power in her blood?
She parried a blow, leaped back, and remembered, oddly, Zara's sneering voice, Faeries fight dirty. And Mark, Faeries don't fight dirty, actually. They fight remarkably cleanly. They have a strict code of honor.
She was already bending, striking at the other knight's ankles-he leaped upward, nearly levitating, and brought his own sword down, just as she seized a handful of leaves and dirt and rose, hurling them at the gaps in the faerie warrior's mask.
He choked and stumbled back. It was only a second, but it was enough; Emma slashed at his legs, one-two, and then his torso. Blood soaked his armored chest; his legs went out from under him, and he hit the ground on his back with a crash like a felled tree.
Emma slammed her foot down on his blade, as the crowd roared. She could hear Cristina calling her name, and Julian and Mark. Heart pounding, she stood over the motionless knight. Even now, sprawled in the grass, blackened around him by his own blood, he didn't make a sound.
"Remove his helmet and end it," said the King. "That is our tradition."
Emma took a deep breath. Everything that was Shadowhunter in her revolted against this, against taking the life of someone lying weaponless at her feet.
She thought of what Julian had said to her just before the combat. Show no mercy.
The tip of Cortana clanged against the rim of the helmet. She wedged it beneath the edge and pushed.
The helmet fell away. The man lying in the grass beneath Emma was human, not faerie. His eyes were blue, his hair blond streaked with gray. His face was more familiar to Emma than her own.
Her hand fell to her side, Cortana dangling from nerveless fingers.
It was her father.
11
ON A BLACK THRONE
Kit sat on the steps of the Institute, looking out at the water.
It had been a long and uncomfortable day. Things were tenser than ever between the Centurions and the inhabitants of the Institute, though at least the Centurions didn't know why.