Nightside 11 - A Hard Days Knight

crush through sheer force of will. Until, finally, we slammed together, swords hammering against each other, driven with all our strength and all our fury. His blade didn’t shatter when Excalibur met it, but he couldn’t meet my attack either. I pressed forward, beating his sword aside with Excalibur, and he fell back, step by controlled step. I kept hammering away at him, and he kept retreating, but I couldn’t force my way past his defence. I rained blow after blow on him, and he parried and turned and let himself be driven back, on his own terms. The London Knights had trained him well. Against the most powerful sword in the world, he was holding his own. He couldn’t stand against Excalibur for long, and both of us knew it, but he only had to get lucky once.
    I did try my very best to kill him, there in that hall, but he was an amazing swordsman and a canny warrior. Excalibur made me a great fighter, but he already was one. I had power, but he had experience. I could drive him back, but I couldn’t reach him. And even as I was fighting, striking at him with all my strength and Excalibur’s speed, I still couldn’t help noticing something else. Something that quickly seemed more important than striking down one sad, embittered soul. So I stepped suddenly forward, slammed his sword aside, and shoved two extended fingers into his eyes. He cried out and fell backwards, lashing blindly back and forth with his sword, as tears streamed down his cheeks from screwed-shut eyes. He really should have worn a helmet.
    I left him staggering blindly, and went to see what was happening in the middle of the hall. Some elves tried to stop me, and Excalibur cut them down with almost contemptuous ease. Ahead of me, surrounded by protective rings of heavily armed elves, kept separate from the main battle, three elf sorcerers were killing one of their own. He stood tall and proud as they cut him to pieces, not raising one pale hand to defend himself. Golden blood flooded down his naked, mutilated body, until he couldn’t stand any more, and collapsed. The sorcerers crowded in round him as he hit the floor, tearing him limb from limb, carving him up like a side of beef. And then they took the pieces, and began to build something with them.
    By the time I hit the first protective wall, I’d worked it out. The sorcerer elves were making a hellgate out of a willing victim. A willing suicide could produce a hellgate so powerful it would be almost impossible to close. Powered by necromancy and a suicide’s will, the hellgate would suck every living thing in Castle Inconnu down into the agonies of the Pit.
    I hit the elves before me with Excalibur, and they didn’t stand a chance. Their swords shattered against my golden blade, and their spelled armour couldn’t protect them. I was moving impossibly fast now, the strength in my arms Excalibur’s strength, and nothing could stand against me. I cut the elves down and threw myself against the next protective wall. Meat cleaved and blood flew, and bodies fell to every side; and still the elves fought to stand between me and the hellgate. They knew they were going to die, and they didn’t care. They only had to hold me off long enough, and the hellgate would destroy the London Knights forever. Powerful energies were already forming, pulsing in the air. Something really bad was struggling to manifest, something cold and terrible and malignant.
    I slammed right through the elves and threw myself at the sorcerers. I cut them down with swift, vicious blows, and they died, still trying to finish their work. The thing they’d built from the dead parts of their willing victim was already glowing and steaming. I kicked the assemblage apart, stamping on bones and grinding flesh underfoot, and the last of the life went out of it.
    I looked up to find I was alone, cut off from the knights, with elves on every side. They advanced on me with glowing swords and axes, smiling awful smiles. They were wary of Excalibur, edging forward a step at a time, darting back if I brought the sword to bear on them, while others darted in. I kept circling, lashing out with my sword, looking for a way out; but everywhere I looked, cold elven eyes looked back. They had me. I could hear knights calling out to me; they’d seen what was happening, and they were coming. But they knew, and I knew; they wouldn’t get to me in time. Excalibur made me strong, but it didn’t make me invincible. It could protect me