Page 80 of The Warrior Priest
But I didn’t want to win. I wanted a confession in front of witnesses. It might be the only way to save Rhys, if he wasn’t already dead.
I removed my dagger and threw it. It missed her. I didn’t give her time to gloat, however. I rushed forward and engaged her once again in a sword fight. We didn’t stand still and parry one another’s strikes. We circled around, moved back and forth, and jumped over the other’s blade when it was slashed in a low arc. She used the tree trunk and branch to hang from, while I employed the somersaults and flips I’d perfected during training.
“Impressive,” she said after I did three backflips in a row to avoid her thrashing sword. “But you’re tiring.”
She was right. But I wasn’t the only one. Her smile and quick footwork were an act. My keen sight noticed her sword arm drop as the weight of the weapon sapped her strength. Her breathing became labored, and a bright flush colored her cheeks as beads of sweat dampened her hairline. She wouldn’t last much longer.
I ran at her, sword pointed at her chest, teeth bared in an angry last-ditch effort.
She sidestepped out of the way, kicked me in the behind, and sent me tumbling into the dust. I dropped my sword as I fell, just catching myself before I landed face down in the dirt. I hissed in pain as layers of skin on both palms scraped off.
I flipped onto my back, but it was too late to scramble away. Giselle stood above me, sword pointed at my throat. She smiled through her heaving breaths.
“I give up!” I cried. “You beat me.”
My gamble paid off. The opportunity to gloat, to be viewed as a winner in front of dozens of warriors, gave Giselle pause. She wasn’t ready to kill me. She wanted to soak in her success a little longer with an audience looking on. Ending my life would end her euphoria. “You put up a good fight, Jac, but you don’t have what it takes. Almost, but not quite.”
“By defeating me you defeat Rhys, too,” I said. “He failed to protect me.” I worried it was a little too thick, exposing my tactic, but Giselle nodded enthusiastically.
Whispers and murmurs rippled around the group of warrior priests, but Giselle didn’t seem to hear them. “I suppose I have. If you’d trusted in yourself and not relied on a man to rescue you, this outcome could have been different.”
“Is that why you want Rhys to take the blame for killing me? To thoroughly defeat him?”
The murmurs grew. Some of the warrior priests stepped toward us, but others held them back. Giselle did notice their reaction this time. The first flicker of uncertainty passed across her face. She had two choices—deny it but risk not being believed, or admit the truth and justify her actions.
She chose the latter. “I don’t want to kill you, Jac. The high priest does.Hehired me.”
The murmurs grew louder. Some of the warrior priests shouted denials and others whipped out their swords to challenge her.
“It’s true!” she shouted back, her gaze and sword point still on me. “He knew Jac was a threat to Rhys’s loyalty to the order and would remain so while she lived. He hired me to assassinate her so Rhys could continue as your master without distraction.”
“That’s a lie!” one warrior priest snarled.
“Our faith forbids taking a life unless in battle,” growled another.
“The high priest is above suspicion,” added a third.
Giselle’s lips thinned, her nostrils flared. The point of her blade bit into my neck. I smelled blood.
She could kill me before anyone could stop her. My gamble would fail. Except I remembered something she’d forgotten in the heat of the moment.
“You can prove it to them,” I urged her. “The letter.”
She removed the piece of paper she’d shown me earlier at the ruins. “The high priest wrote to me. It’s all in here.” She thrust the letter in the direction of the group of warriors.
And in so doing, she was distracted for the briefest of moments.
I batted the blade away from my throat, cutting my hand in the process. I winced but there was no time to wallow in the pain. I rolled out of the way and collected my sword then rose onto my knees just in time to parry Giselle’s blade before it removed my head from my shoulders.
My training had taught me how to fight off someone whilst on my knees and I employed every one of the moves Giselle had taught me in Upway. Just as she’d said then, my excellent memory bolstered my instincts. It meant I could predict her every move, but her experience meant she could predict mine. We moved as one, two dancers whose steps were choreographed by a masterful teacher. It was predictable for both of us.
Until it wasn’t.
When her moves started to precede mine by the barest margin, I changed course and attacked in a way she didn’t expect. I parried her sword then bent to remove the dagger hidden in my boot. The usual course of action when presented with that move was to kick the opponent in the head before they could use the knife. I wouldn’t recover from such a blow quickly enough to counterattack. I might never recover from a hard knock to the head.
But predicting that kick meant I had just enough time to leap to the side. Her boot missed my head only to slam into my shoulder. Pain exploded like a firework in my bones. I fell, landing with a cry.
Giselle fell, too, screaming as she clutched the back of her knee. Blood oozed between her fingers and dripped onto the dust.
