Free Downshadow by Erik Scott de Bie

impressive. How did you hear me, I wonder?”
    “I have a guardian, to serve me at need,” Lorien said with a defiant toss of her curls.
    At first, Shadowbane thought she must be speaking of him, but then he saw it, finally, in the light shed by the mushrooms. A shadow, unattached to anything else, seemingly of a tall and broad man, flitted across the floor, moving fast toward Rath.
    Rath calmly raised a hand and spoke a word in a tongue Shadowbane did not know. Light flared from a ring he wore, bathing the room in a white glow. Lorien shielded her eyes.
    The shadow hesitated, then fled into the darkness, and Shadowbane saw it no more.
    “Simple enough,” the dwarf said. “When one is prepared.”
    Rath stepped toward Lorien, his hand on his slim sword.
    The priestess backed away, spreading her arms in front of the wounded woman.
    Shadowbane cursed. He knew revealing himself was unwise, yet he couldn’t just stand and watch. He stepped into the room, hand on his sword hilt. “Hold.”
    Lorien looked up at his appearance and her eyes widened. She gaped.
    Rath hardly looked surprised. “Ah,” he said. “Come to see if I shall fight you this time?”
    Shadowbane drew Vindicator, whose length burst into silvery white flames. “Face me or leave this place,” he said. “This lady is under my protection.”
    Rath eased his hand away from his sword hilt, but Shadowbane could see the violence in his eyes. “Very well,” said Rath. Unassumingly, he walked forward.
    Shadowbane drew back into a high guard, ready to slash down hard enough to cut Rath in two, but the dwarf just ambled toward him as though unaware of the danger. Shadowbane couldn’t help feeling a little unnerved, but instinct seized him and he struck.
    Rath stepped aside, fluid as water, seized Shadowbane’s grasp on the sword, and elbowed him in the face. The blow would have been hard enough to shatter Shadowbane’s nose and cheekbones, if not for his helm.
    Stunned, Shadowbane staggered back, empty-handed, and the dwarf admired Vindicator in his hands. The sword’s silvery glow diminished but did not go out.
    “How amusing,” Rath said, as power pulsed along the length of the sword, “that you think yourself worthy of me.”
    Shadowbane’s helmet was ringing, or maybe that was his ears.
    “Here,” said the dwarf, lifting the blade in his bare hands. “Yours, I think.”
    Not thinking, the knight groggily reached out to take it.
    Rath leaped, twisted over the sword, and kicked him once, twice, in the face. Shadowbane fell to one knee, while Vindicator clattered to the stone near Lorien.
    The dwarf barked a laugh, then turned to Lorien. “Now, woman,” he said. “We shall—”
    But Lorien had seized the sword and tossed it toward Shadowbane.
    The knight was already running forward, and he seized the blade out of the air. Rath leaped, and only his speed kept Shadowbane’s slash from taking one of his legs. The dwarf landed two paces distant
    and Shadowbane pressed, slashing and cutting high and low. Rath ducked and weaved and snaked aside, dodging each swing.
    Then Shadowbane saw irritation flash across the dwarf s face, signaling that the duel no longer amused him. The dwarf dropped low, knees bent, hands at his stomach. Shadowbane pulled Vindicator back to block.
    Putting all the force in his compact, powerful body into one blow, Rath slammed the heels of his palms into the flat of Shadowbane’s sword as rhough it were a shield. The blade slammed into Shadowbane’s chest, and the force sent him back through the air and onto one knee. As though with a great maul, the dwarf had knocked him a full dagger toss away.
    His face calm, Rath looked down at his black robe, where Vindicator had cut a single slash below his simple wool belt. He fingered the cut, frowning.
    Shadowbane coughed and levered himself up on the sword.
    “You yet stand.” Rath rose, a smile on his smooth, handsome face. “Good.”
    Calling on the power of his boots to