Spear (Novella) by Nicola Griffith

Author:Nicola Griffith [Griffith, Nicola]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fantasy
ISBN: 9781250819321
Publisher: Tordotcom; Tom Doherty Associates
Published: 2022-04-18T16:00:00+00:00

* * *

THE SUN WAS still shining when she came down the path and closed Nimuë’s gate behind her. Despite the sunlight, Caer Leon seemed small and drab, dreary with rough wood and bare dirt. In the byre, Bony and Broc seemed surprised to see her again so soon, and she remembered, again, that time was different by the lake. She patted them, and promised them a ride and a treat later.

In the outer practice yard, on the other side of the inner fort, she heard the clash of weapons, the occasional shout and hoot of laughter. The Companions were training, half on foot, half on horse.

She leaned against the rough wood palisade by the practice spears, arms folded, and watched. How slow they seemed, how foolish in their fine leathers.

“Ho, Pretty Per!” Cei, pulling off his helm. He nodded for his sparring partner to continue with the exercise, and walked over. “Where’ve you been? No point going off sulking just because Artos is in one of his moods. He’ll come around. Meanwhile, the Eingl are massing and I need to see how you fight with others. Go get your sword.”

She looked at him, standing with his muscled legs wide, fair hair stuck to his head, in his tawdry green-and-yellow leathers and suddenly, very much, wanted to hit something. Cei would do.

She pushed herself off the wall, took one of the spears with blunted tips and twirled it in her hands. “I don’t need a sword,” she said.

Cei studied her. Then he turned and shouted over his shoulder at a compact, brown-haired man, “Llywarch! Let’s see how fast our new formation can take down this insolent puppy.”

A few of the Companions on foot stopped to watch. Llywarch beckoned and two of his men, one right-handed, the other left-handed, overlapped their round shields, with Llywarch at the centre holding a pike two-handed, pointing between the shields, and the other two with swords at either side.

“I call it the point,” Cei said. “It’s designed to—”

Peretur knocked them down in three fast sweeps: low to the legs of the man on the left of the point, or her right; when he fell, a whirl and turn and thump on the back of Llywarch’s head; then a vicious stop-thrust against the other’s shield which sent him staggering back at such speed his legs could not keep up and he tangled in the fallen pike and went down. She twirled her spear and smiled, a hard flex of muscle and bone. She would take them all, one at a time, and she would not be gentle.

One of the horsemen kneed his black forward, reached down a hand, and hauled the right-handed man to his feet. Llanza. No one said anything, but Peretur remembered these were not enemies but Companions. She gave a hand to the first man, which after a moment he took. He pulled himself up, then had to hop to the bench by the wall. Cei looked down at Llywarch, who was sitting up trying to get his helm off.

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