Pressed against the shoddily assembled wall boards of Arn’s shack, the hunter’s better cheek picked up an earthy paste of eroded wood. Without a nose, Arn could press his face flat against the slit in the wall. His squinted eyes saw the source of the noise that had disturbed his work. He held his breath at it happened again.
A man dressed in loincloth stood between Arn’s narrow vantage point and the beach, banging a spear against a tree-trunk. The thud echoed four times. Instead of trailing his drum with silence, the man called out. His voice clearly rang, “Wanderer! Wanderer, come out and face me!”
Arn took another breath before approaching the opening of his workshop. He grabbed a seashell from the hole-ridden leather pack in the corner and smeared dark poison onto the length of the shiny blade he’d found in the ruins. He had only ever fought with a spear, but if he was to face a man and not a beast… he wanted to know how the weapon would handle.
Only Arn’s head poked out of the doorway first. He looked both ways—he had no idea what sense of honour the Scoa tribe had. Most warriors on Razaad would prefer a public gain of reputation to a sudden knife upon exit of a doorway, but ambushes and craven attacks were not unheard of. There were no warriors hiding near his door, however, and Arn poked his sword through the opening before following it outdoors.
The man in loincloth stamped one foot down and pointed his spear toward Arn. “I’ve come to challenge you, lost one. This island is not your place.”
Arn blinked. “And who are you?”
“I am Trakak. I am the greatest warrior of my people. Our fight will be witnessed, but they will not interfere.”
Arn took a step ahead of his shack and noticed several men and women in the foliage. There were other warriors there, most of them men, and many of the women wore face paint though they were unarmed and half-naked. There were no more than ten onlookers, but they were all smeared with mud and grime, in addition to small bone piercings and paint. Arn hadn’t had time to don his own dark, war-mask.
“And if I kill you?” Arn asked, his voice clear. His words brought on a wave of hisses from the onlookers.
“You will be left in peace, for today, at least,” Trakak declared. Even his words were met with doubts from the small crowd. A woman with the intricate vine-like designs inked across her shoulder and small left breast started to speak up, but Trakak responded swiftly. “That is my sun word.” All the others fell silent.
“Very well,” Arn said, taking another step forward. He’d already killed a few men on Razaad who had claimed to be the greatest warrior of their people. This was no different. He pressed his bare toes into the mud and inhaled deeply.
Trakak lowered his posture into a deep hunch. His loin cloth barely covered his groin now, but modesty had no place in a fight. He started pacing to the left, so Arn kept the distance between them and circled to the right. His adversary’s wide eyes caught a glow falling through the wide leaves overhead—he was watching Arn, gaging his movements. Their eyes rarely met. Instead, Trakak looked at Arn’s scabbed over nostrils.
The opposing spear fluidly gashed the air and Arn barely side-stepped in time. The warrior lashed out with his fist, which Arn scrunched his neck back to avoid, and then his shimmying torso flung his spear around in a wide arc, grazing the back of Arn’s hand as he pranced back on his bare feet. Arn immediately returned the offence with two quick jabs of his strange blade, forcing Trakak to glide a few paces back. His attacks had been like his movements, sudden and silent.
Arn’s moves were pure aggression, not retained by stealth. He forced Trakak to fall back all the way to the wall of his shack, but didn’t land a single attack. The Scoa warrior leapt forward with a screech, spreading his arms wide and holding his spear to the side. Arn stumbled back, caught off-guard by the strange battle cry.
And then Trakak started to spiral again, using the distance his strange bellow had gained him to analyze Arn once more. He shifted his grip on his spear, and then shifted it again. Posturing, posing. Arn had to get far closer to land a blow with his sword, so he faked a stab to Trakak’s left side. The warrior’s reaction time was incredible. He had shifted his shoulder and lowered almost to his right knee before Arn’s feint was even complete.
Then, out of nowhere, Trakak leapt forward, his spear going for Arn’s right shoulder. The strange attack, angled across the other warrior’s torso, came so suddenly that Arn could only use his blade to knock the spear head to the side of his shoulder. But Trakak wasn’t trying to use the point—he was attacking with his spear butt. Arn’s parry only increased the force at which the spinning spear slammed into his face.
Arn opened his eyes to see torn moss and splattered blood. He rolled, as quickly as he could, and his enemy’s spear impaled the moss. The stone tip went skittering away.
Arn should have followed up the momentary opening, but he came up from his roll reeling, and tasting warm blood. The scar tissue in the center of his face had been torn. The pain choked his breath out of him. With nearly glazed eyes, he saw Trakak grab a tossed spear from the air, a replacement from his supporters. He turned to face Arn once more.
And once more, the two duelists circled one another. Arn could scarcely stand up straight, and Trakak launched his lunging assault almost immediately. This one grazed Arn’s left shoulder as the dazed hunter stumbled out of the way. He twisted his shiny sabre as he completed his poor dodge, grazing a layer of flesh from the man’s bare thigh. The sharp edge left a rough wound, but it had shaved away the flesh like a creature’s teeth instead of a rock tool. Arn had never seen such a fluid injury inflicted.
Trakak stepped back to resume his search for Arn’s openings and weaknesses, but Arn was tired of his game. He thundered forward, bare feet kicking up dirt in a charge of fury. He barely felt Trakak’s spear point, as fire coursed through his veins. He poked the shiny blade into Trakak’s bare stomach. It slid as smoothly as boiled grease, pointing through the skin and then gliding out of the warrior’s back. Arn’s bulging muscles had never done such a thing with a spear. He laughed and shoved the warrior off the blade. A red stain spread the wound was cut wider through Trakak’s muscular side.
As the Scoa warrior fell, he pulled his spear-point free of Arn’s left shoulder. The pain hit Arn as jarringly as his impact with Scoa’s cliffs had, and he collapsed to his knees, crying out wordlessly. He sucked in breath, but gagged and started coughing. Thankfully, no blood came up his throat, but he clutched his shoulder and lost his balance again. He pressed his hand into the dirt to hold himself upright.
Trakak was grunting and desperately clutching his stomach as blood bubbled into the mud all around him. His jerky movements soon grew still.
Arn sucked in breath and looked around. The tribespeople stared in horror, and a loud wail left the lungs of the woman who had tried to speak up earlier. They all regarded Arn, waiting to see what he would do. “Do you want the body?” Arn asked. He let his weight descend onto his buttocks and dragged himself away from their champion.
The woman ran forward and threw herself down on the slain warrior, covering her stomach in his blood. A few other tribespeople emerged from the tree trunks around, and a bearded man—Arn recognized him from the beach—approached the victorious warrior. “Leave Sorca,” he said. “Leave it soon.”
Arn spit to the side and lifted a hand to his mutilated face. “That’s what I’m trying to do,” he mumbled, keeping his shiny blade trained on them. While it had appeared an earthy colour before, it now seemed orange from the stain of Trakak’s blood. Arn waited until the locals dragged their fallen warrior away before tending to his wounds.