The Blade Itself

Jezal swung his leg off the bench. “Then I raise you a hundred marks or so.” He shoved his whole stack into the centre of the table. West sucked air through his teeth. A coin fell from the top of the pile, landed on its edge and rolled along the wood. It dropped to the flags beneath with the unmistakeable sound of falling money. The head of the gardener on the other side of the lawn snapped up instinctively, before he returned to his clipping of the grass.

Kaspa shoved his cards away as though they were burning his fingers and shook his head. “Damn it but I’m an oaf of a card player,” he lamented, and leaned back against the rough brown trunk of the tree.

Jezal stared straight at Lieutenant Brint, a slight smile on his face, giving nothing away. “He’s bluffing,” rumbled Jalenhorm, “don’t let him push you around, Brint.”

“Don’t do it, Lieutenant,” said West, but Jezal knew he would. He had to look as if he could afford to lose. Brint didn’t hesitate, he pushed all his own coins in with a careless flourish.

“That’s a hundred, give or take.” Brint was trying his hardest to sound masterful in front of the older officers, but his voice had a charming note of hysteria.

“Good enough,” said Jezal, “we’re all friends here. What do you have, Lieutenant?”

“I have earth.” Brint’s eyes had a slightly feverish look to them as he showed his cards to the group.

Jezal savoured the tense atmosphere. He frowned, shrugged, raised his eyebrows. He scratched his head thoughtfully. He watched Brint’s expression change as he changed his own. Hope, despair, hope, despair. At length Jezal spread his cards out on the table. “Oh look. I have suns, again.”

Brint’s face was a picture. West gave a sigh and shook his head. Jalenhorm frowned. “I was sure he was bluffing,” he said.

“How does he do it?” asked Kaspa, flicking a stray coin across the table.

Jezal shrugged. “It’s all about the players, and nothing about the cards.” He began to scoop up the heap of silver while Brint looked on, teeth gritted, face pale. The money jingled into the bag with a pleasant sound. Pleasant to Jezal, anyway. A coin dropped from the table and fell next to Brint’s boot. “You couldn’t fetch that for me could you Lieutenant?” asked Jezal, with a syrupy smile.

Brint stood up quickly, knocking into the table and making the coins and glasses jump and rattle. “I’ve things to do,” he said in a thick voice, then shouldered roughly past Jezal, barging him against the trunk of the tree, and strode off toward the edge of the courtyard. He disappeared into the officers’ quarters, head down.

“Did you see that?” Jezal was becoming ever more indignant with each passing moment. “Barging me like that, it’s damn impolite! And me his superior officer as well! I’ve a good mind to put him on report!” A chorus of disapproving sounds greeted this mention of reports. “Well, he’s a bad loser is all!”

Jalenhorm looked sternly out from beneath his brows. “You shouldn’t bite him so hard. He isn’t rich. He can’t afford to lose.”

“Well if he can’t afford to lose he shouldn’t play!” snapped Jezal, upset. “Who’s the one told him I was bluffing? You should keep your big mouth shut!”

“He’s new here,” said West, “he just wants to fit in. Weren’t you new once?”

“What are you, my father?” Jezal remembered being new with painful clarity, and the mention of it made him feel just a little ashamed.

Kaspa waved his hand. “I’ll lend him some money, don’t worry”

“He won’t take it,” said Jalenhorm.

“Well, that’s his business.” Kaspa closed his eyes and turned his face up to the sun. “Hot. Winter is truly over. Must be getting past midday.”

“Shit!” shouted Jezal, starting up and gathering his things. The gardener paused in his trimming of the lawn and looked over at them. “Why didn’t you say something, West?”

“What am I, your father?” asked the Major. Kaspa sniggered.

“Late again,” said Jalenhorm, blowing out his cheeks. “The Lord Marshal will not be happy!”

Jezal snatched up his fencing steels and ran for the far side of the lawn. Major West ambled after him. “Come on!” shouted Jezal.

“I’m right behind you, Captain,” he said. “Right behind you.”

“Jab, jab, Jezal, jab, jab!” barked Lord Marshal Varuz, whacking him on the arm with his stick.

“Ow,” yelped Jezal, and hefted the metal bar again.

“I want to see that right arm moving, Captain, darting like a snake! I want to be blinded by the speed of those hands!”

Jezal made a couple more clumsy lunges with the unwieldy lump of iron. It was utter torture. His fingers, his wrist, his forearm, his shoulder, were burning with the effort. He was soaked to the skin with sweat; it flew from his face in big drops. Marshal Varuz flicked his feeble efforts away. “Now, cut! Cut with the left!”

Jezal swung the big smith’s hammer at the old man’s head with all the strength in his left arm. He could barely lift the damn thing on a good day. Marshal Varuz stepped effortlessly aside and whacked him in the face with the stick.