Also, he was having to hold back from launching a full-scale offensive maneuver, for he dared not take too aggressive a stance if that meant leaving Kelson open to attack. Right now, he wasn’t really sure who the men were after, and he couldn’t risk Kelson’s life in finding out. A glance aside told him that Duncan could not help, either.

In the corner, Duncan was having his own problems keeping abreast of the situation. Kelson’s blade was shorter and lighter than those the priest was accustomed to. As a consequence, he was fighting under a distinct handicap: with a blade too light and short against a man who surpassed him in weight, strength, reach, and years’ experience.

Not that there was anything lacking in his skill. Duncan was first and foremost a nobleman’s son, born and bred to a fine fighting tradition and tempered by many years’ experience and training, but these odds were not at all to his liking. He had only this puny blade to protect him—not even a scrap of mail shirt. People did not often raise steel against a priest.

Undaunted, he continued to press for an opening—and soon found it! For his opponent had also recognized his assumed advantage and, as a result, became lazy, returned from a thrust less quickly than he should have done.

It cost him his life. Even as he realized his mistake, Duncan’s blade darted through a weak point in the mail beneath his arm and pierced him to the heart. He crumpled to the floor with a surprised look on his face and quietly died.

Abandoning Kelson’s bloodied sword, Duncan faded back into the gloom and tried to decide which of Morgan’s two opponents to take out of the fracas—though the decision was not a difficult one. If Morgan had to parry many more blows from the man with the two-handed broadsword, a lucky blow just might connect.

Easing stealthily behind the man, Duncan extended both hands before him, palms together, then slowly drew them apart. As he did so, a small sphere of green fire hovered in the air there, then drifted unerringly toward the back of the swordsman’s head. As it touched the man’s helmet, there was a brilliant arc of green fire. The man cried out once, then collapsed to the floor in a stupor. His fall so unnerved his companion that Morgan was able to disarm the man easily and hold him at bay.

Outside the door to the apartment, all of them could hear the sounds of guardsmen arriving and pounding on the door, their shouts of dismay as they discovered the fate of the guards overpowered by the three intruders. The pounding on the door became insistent.

“Sire!” cried a new voice, cutting through the outer confusion. “Sire, are you all right? General Morgan, what’s happening? Open the door, or we’ll be forced to break it down!”