William Goldman The Princess Br

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the boulders were surrounding them. Inigo suddenly threw his body against a
nearby rock, rebounded off it with stunning force, lunging with incredible
speed.
First blood was his.
He had pinked the man in black, grazed him only, along the left wrist. A
scratch was all.
But it was bleeding.
Immediately the man in black hurried his retreat, getting his position away
from the boulders, getting out into the open of the plateau. Inigo followed,
not bothering to try to check the other man's flight; there would always be
time for that later.
Then the man in black launched his greatest assault. It came with no warning
and the speed and strength of it were terrifying. His blade flashed in the
light again and again, and at first, Inigo was only too delighted to retreat.
He was not entirely familiar with the style of the attack; it was mostly
McBone, but there were snatches of Capo Ferro thrown in, and he continued
moving backward while he concentrated on the enemy, figuring the best way to
stop the assault.
The man in black kept advancing, and Inigo was aware that behind him now he
was coming closer and closer to the edge of the Cliffs, but that could not
have concerned him less. The important thing was to outthink the enemy, find
his weakness, let him have his moment of exultation.
Suddenly, as the Cliffs came ever nearer, Inigo realized the fault in the
attack that was flashing at him; a simple Thibault maneuver would destroy it
entirely, but he didn't want to give it away so soon. Let the other man have
the triumph a moment longer; life allowed so few.
The Cliffs were very close behind him now.
Inigo continued to retreat; the man in black continued advancing.
Then Inigo countered with the Thibault.
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And the man in black blocked it.
He blocked it!
Inigo repeated the Thibault move and again it didn't work. He switched to Capo
Ferro, he tried Bonetti, he went to Fabris; in desperation he began a move
used only twice, by
Sainct.
Nothing worked!
The man in black kept attacking.
And the Cliffs were almost there.
Inigo never panicked never came close. But he decided some things very
quickly, because there was no time for long consultations, and what he decided
was that although the man in black was slow in reacting to moves behind trees,
and not much good at all amidst boulders, when movement was restricted, yet
out in the open, where there was space, he was a terror. A left-handed
black-masked terror. "You are most excellent," he said. His rear foot was at
the cliff edge. He could retreat no more.
"Thank you," the man in black replied. "I have worked very hard to become so."
"You are better than I am," Inigo admitted.
"So it seems. But if that is true, then why are you smiling?"
"Because," Inigo answered, "I know something you don't know."
"And what is that?" asked the man in black.
"I'm not left-handed," Inigo replied, and with those words, he all but threw
the six-fingered sword into his right hand, and the tide of battle turned.
The man in black retreated before the slashing of the great sword. He tried to
side-step, tried to parry, tried to somehow escape the doom that was now
inevitable. But there was no way. He could block fifty thrusts; the
fifty-first flicked through, and now his left arm was bleeding. He could
thwart thirty ripostes, but not the thirty-first, and now his shoulder bled.
The wounds were not yet grave, but they kept on coming as they dodged across
the stones, and then the man in black found himself amidst the trees and that
was bad for him, so he all but fled before Inigo's onslaught, and then he was
in the open again, but Inigo kept coming, nothing could stop him, and then the
man in black was back among the boulders, and that was even worse for him than
the trees and he shouted out in frustration and practically ran to where there
was open space again.
But there was no dealing with the wizard, and slowly, again, the deadly Cliffs
became a factor in the fight, only now it was the man in black who was being
forced to doom. He was brave, and he was strong, and the cuts did not make him
beg for mercy, and he showed no fear behind his black mask. "You are amazing,"
he cried, as Inigo increased the already blinding speed of the blade.
"Thank you. It has not come without effort."
The death moment was at hand now. Again and again Inigo thrust forward, and
again and again the man in black managed to ward off the attacks, but each
time it was harder, and the strength in Inigo's wrists was endless and he only
thrust the more fiercely and soon the man in black grew weak. "You cannot tell [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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