Zendegi

‘Okay, pesaram.’ Jack laughed to cover his nervousness; he had no way of knowing if he’d tested Javeed’s patience by pushing the same line a hundred times before. ‘Well, at least I can tell Princess Tahmineh I gave you some advice.’

Martin could make out their enemy now, as his armour glinted in the morning sun. He urged his mount forward; the thought of the coming confrontation turned his stomach, but a boy who had never seen a real act of bloodshed would not be so squeamish.

The two adversaries came to a halt within shouting distance. The Persian soldier was tall and solidly built; in real life Martin would have given him a very wide berth, with or without the presence of lances. The man’s beard was flecked with grey; he had survived a few decades as a warrior.

‘I am Hejir!’ the Persian called out to him. ‘I serve Kavus, Lord of the World. Tell me your loyalty and your intentions.’

Martin smothered his conciliatory instincts and followed the script. ‘I am Sohrab, loyal to my own proud lineage, and I’ve come to take the crown from that fool.’

Hejir recoiled in disgust. ‘I can still smell the milk of your mother on your breath! Turn back, or she’ll be washing your body in her tears.’

‘Can it be true that you’ve heard nothing of the glory of Sohrab? No man who had would dare to face me alone!’

‘Kavus will have your head as my tribute,’ Hejir replied. ‘Your body I will bury here in the dirt.’

Jack had caught up; Martin turned and motioned to him to stay back.

Martin called out, ‘Surrender now, and I’ll spare your life. Cling to stubborn pride, and I’ll give no quarter.’

Hejir raised his lance. ‘Return to Turan while you still have the breath for idle boasting. It is no shame for a child to flee from a warrior.’

Martin leant forward and commanded his horse to charge.

The desert streaked past him jerkily, like something shot on a hand-held camera, but the signals from his motionless, horizontal body turned the whole thing into a strange, smooth swoop, as if he were an eagle descending down the face of a cliff. Hejir was charging too, flying up to meet him. As they approached, Martin fumbled with his lance; his gloves made it tangible but he had no reliable sense of the geometry of the encounter. Hejir struck him squarely in the chest; Martin’s weapon didn’t even make contact.

As they separated, Martin looked down; his armour was dented, but there was no other damage, and he had not so much as shifted in his saddle. Hejir looked formidable to Martin’s eyes, but baby-faced Sohrab was a giant, too heavy to be dislodged by the force of any ordinary blow.

Martin brought his horse around. He could see Jack approaching in the distance. Hejir was circling back towards him; his lance had snapped, but he’d drawn his sword. Martin would have leant over and vomited if there’d been any way to get the stuff out of his throat, but he had to appear suitably exhilarated for Jack’s sake. He was a high-spirited boy with a stick for a sword: Javeed with his shampoo-bottle missiles, six years on. He thought of Javeed’s face after Kavus’s flying pavilion had gone into a spin. That was the look he wanted: a pure, innocent thrill.

Hejir was closing with frightening speed, already gripping his sword with both hands. Martin contemplated throwing the fight, simply letting himself be knocked down and injured; that in itself would be a test for Jack to witness, and other tests could follow in later battles. But he didn’t have time for the luxury of slowly building up his nerve. He raised his lance and focused all his attention on the impending encounter. Hejir was committed to coming close enough to strike a blow, but their weapons were no longer evenly matched, and their bodies never had been.

The lance struck Hejir and threw him from his horse. Martin wheeled around and saw the Persian soldier flat on his back, his sword far away in the dust. Martin dropped the lance and dismounted, unsheathing his own sword and striding towards his enemy. As Hejir rose to his knees Martin swung at him like a child playing with a plastic toy; the gloves did their best to imbue the steel with a sense of real weight, of real consequence, but the task was beyond them.

Hejir twisted to avoid the blow, but this was the end game: he was disarmed, and the giant loomed over him. He bowed his head.

‘I am bettered,’ he said. ‘I beg for your mercy.’

Martin said, ‘I told you, no quarter.’ He swung the weightless sword again; his gloves shuddered as he parted Hejir’s head from his body. Blood gushed richly from the dead man’s neck, spilling onto Martin’s legs and feet. He stared down at the corpse, dazed and sickened but clinging to one certainty: he had to be prepared for Javeed to do something like this. Everyone who cared for him had to be prepared.

‘You worthless piece of shit!’