The Protector's War Read Online Free PDF Page A

begin in earnest!
    More Varangians crowded through the shattered door, bearing axes and the spike-blade-hook menace of a guisarme on its six-foot shaft. There was a moment of silence as the three Englishmen stared at their foes—silence save for the moaning of the wounded man crawling out the door among his comrade’s feet—and then it began. An ax swung at Nigel; he stepped into the stroke, sloping his shield to glance the battering impact away at an angle, stabbing around it at a face.
    Steel rang on metal, thudded against wood; breath sounded harsh as men stamped and shoved and thrust through the great candlelit drawing room. Over it a roar of battle cries:
    â€œKonung Karl! Konung Karl!”
    â€œA Loring! A Loring!”
    â€œSt. George for England!”
    â€œEttu skit Engelendingur!”
    Hordle’s wild-bull bellow joined the cries as his heavy sword cracked into the shaft of an ax and through it and into a face: “Die, you sodding SID bastard! ”
    Then the guisarme hooked over the edge of his shield, hauling him forward and off-balance, leaving him open to the wielder’s partner. The Varangian poised his ax to kill, but an arrow went by, close enough to brush the fletching against Sir Nigel’s neck. It buried itself in the Varangian’s face, slanting past his nose and coming out the angle of his jaw, breaking most of the teeth on that side of his face in the process. Nigel killed the man behind the guisarme by reflex, a swift twisting thrust to the neck, then turned his head to see someone kneeling in the window with his bow in his hands. He recognized the narrow dark face: Mick Badding, from his old SAS company.
    â€œGet out! The horses are here and the SIDs are coming round!” the man shouted.
    Seconds later the last two Varangians were out of the room, dragging a third between them by the arms. They’d left two dead behind them, and chances were they’d be back soon enough. Or they’d simply hold the corridor and then come around to cut off the rescue party outside the window.
    â€œTime to depart indeed,” Sir Nigel said. “Maude, if you’ll go first—”
    He looked around, then made a small choked sound. The sword fell from his hand, clattering on the floor. Maude Loring was lying there herself, clutching at her side. Nigel and Alleyne went to their knees on either side of her, looking incredulously at the wound in her side. From the broad slit that her fingers tried to hold closed, Nigel guessed that the point of the short sword had gone in under her floating rib. Judging from the amount of blood that flowed through those fingers and spread a stain on the carpet, skill or chance had wrenched the knife-edged weapon around in the wound, cutting into her kidney or several of the great veins.
    Father and son shared a single appalled look. Both knew from experience precisely what that particular injury meant: death, not long delayed. A pre-Change trauma unit might have been able to keep her alive, if she were in it now. All the surgeons in the Changed world couldn’t save her, with a miracle thrown in.
    â€œMaude…” he croaked, unbelieving.
    Her face had been clenched against the scream that would distract him from the life-and-death focus of combat. Now it relaxed, and the hand against her side did too. He clamped the wound with his own, but the blood tide was ebbing even as he did. Her eyes moved from his face to Alleyne’s; she tried to say something, then shuddered and went still.
    â€œMaude…”
    Time ceased to move. Words went by, without meaning until a voice shouted in his ear: “Sir! Colonel, there’s no time. We have to move now. ”
    That seemed to start his mind working again, after a fashion. Men have died to free you. Your son’s here—Maude’s son. You have to move now. He reached out and shook the younger man across from him by the side of his helmet until the armor