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Andrew gave him no time to breathe, let alone regain his balance as he once again hammered away at his brother.

This was a life or death situation, and they both understood that.

In their efforts, they were both beginning to sweat profusely, yet neither one was the least bit winded.

With the noise and the grunting, The Red Fury continued.

A small stone baptismal went over heavily, dashing holy water on their feet. The pretty carved banisters that separated it from the rest of the chapel were chopped to bits as Andrew’s sword came down, again and again, as he swung at his brother’s big body.

Alphonse would fend off a blow, dodge, and return parry with bone-shattering force.

At one point he was backed against the stone wall and ducked in the nick of time as Demon Slayer came whistling overhead.

He managed to roll out of the way and take Andrew’s legs out from under him.

A lovely tapestry on the wall had been slashed in half during this encounter.

The disadvantage of wearing armor was that it was extremely heavy and it could be cumbersome.

It wasn’t made for fast movement. Alphonse had the advantage of not wearing any and was on his feet a split second faster than his brother.

Andrew, on his knees, threw up his sword to ward off his brother’s powerful blow as Alphonse’s evil laughter rang to the rafters.

For the first time during the fight, the earl suddenly seemed to be gaining the upper hand.

Josephine didn’t think she’d taken a breath since the clash began.

Every time Andrew would strike, she would squeeze Ridge’s arm tightly until her nails began to dig into his flesh.

She watched as the men hacked away at each other, destroying anything and everything that had the sad misfortune to be in the way.

When Andrew slipped on some rushes, she shrieked. When the earl landed a good blow, she gasped. On and on, parry by parry, thrust by thrust it continued. The setting sun threw the chapel into a dusky light, making the fighting figures appear as phantom soldiers on the edge of the netherworld.

They were fighting behind the altar now, near a giant wooden statue of Christ. When their swords locked, Andrew shoved his brother hard and he flew back into the holy statue, sending it crashing into a small table and all three went crashing to the ground.

The earl rolled onto his feet, perhaps less energetically than he had done earlier.

The tides of the battle were turning against him slightly as Andrew leapt on him, his sword flashing, and the very tip of it caught Alphonse across the chest, slicing a long, deep gash.

The earl spun away, knocking over an urn that fell between them and offered the only pause in their marathon battle.

“Ah!” Alphonse breathed heavily. “You have drawn the first blood, Brother! My congratulations!”

“It will not be the last,” Andrew snarled.

Flying over the urn, he charged straight into his brother.

The men fell back with a crash of wood and armor, disintegrating two chairs that had once rested on that very spot.

The noise they made was indicative of their hatred and the rage in their blood, and it was difficult to believe the two were blood brothers.

The battle was becoming heavy now, deep into their hatred, and the crowd was completely silent in their observance of the swordplay.

Even Josephine had stopped gasping; her hands were now at her lips, folded in prayer as she begged God to spare Andrew’s life.

For all of the destruction they had caused the hall, they had done remarkably little damage to each other.

But, quickly, that changed. The earl, on the floor, brought his sword up as Andrew’s arms were raised in vengeance.

The blade found the joint between the arm protection and the breastplate, and he drove deep into the flesh near Andrew’s armpit.

Blood gushed immediately, coating the left side of Andrew’s armor like bright red paint.

The sword struck firmly in Andrew. The earl yelled triumphantly as he cruelly tore it free.

There were a few cries from witnesses in the crowd but, remarkably, not one was from Josephine.

She knew this moment would come and she was somehow prepared for it.

She had seen enough battle wounds to know, however, that the injury was serious.

It was deep from the amount of blood that seeped from it, but no major arteries were hit.

If one had been severed, he would have bled to death by now.

To Andrew, however, the wound was not only serious, it was painful as well.

The gash made it difficult to lift his left arm, yet fortunately, he was right-handed.

He estimated that it would be several minutes before he would begin to feel the blood loss, and he knew he needed to weaken his brother now before he grew weak himself.

With a surge of adrenalin, he attacked his brother with renewed vigor.

“He is bleeding seriously,” Thane growled to Sully. “He will grow weak if he keeps this pace.”

Sully’s piercing eyes watched Andrew’s remarkable skill, even with an injury.

He admired the man greatly, as much for his skill as for his character.

The Red Fury more than lived up to his reputation as a fair but fearsome knight, and Sully prayed that he would triumph over his evil brother.

There were too many bad knights in this world, and there were so few with Andrew’s noble soul.

But watching Andrew fight with an injury concerned him.

The Red Fury was at a slight disadvantage from the beginning because the earl was taller than Andrew, and outweighed him by about fifty pounds.

The added handicap of the wound did not help Andrew’s cause.

Sully wondered what he would do if it came down to the question of saving Andrew’s life or not.

He swore to Andrew that he would not interfere, but he wasn’t about to keep that vow, nor were the others.

The question would be when to intervene, however, and Sully wondered if they weren’t rapidly approaching that moment.

He sensed that the situation would soon be coming to an end because the combatants were beginning to tire.

They had moved out into the center of the chapel again, almost to the point where they started.

But Alphonse was coming on strong now, as if he’d gotten a second wind, smashing against Andrew and putting dents in his armor.

Andrew, however, was matching his brother blow for bone-crushing blow.

When the earl misjudged a particularly vicious swing, Andrew uppercut and caught him in the side, laying open several inches of flesh.

Between the wound in his chest and the gash in his side, Alphonse’s strength was draining.

But so was Andrew’s. Two hard strikes on Andrew’s sword caused him to step backwards, tripping over some debris on the floor, and he fell heavily on his side.

The earl, in a fit of gleeful maliciousness, brought his blade down violently on Andrew’s helm, getting in two blows before Andrew managed to bring his sword up and fend him off.

Watching this, Josephine was no longer calm. The earl’s sword on Andrew’s head sent her over the edge, and she struggled violently in Ridge’s grasp.

“Release me!” she demanded. “I must help him! Let me go!”

She put up a good fight, but Ridge held her firm. The one thing that wasn’t needed was a hysterical female running amok.

From across the room, Sully saw Josephine panic and hastened through the small crowd to reach her. He could see the fight would be ending soon and he must be with her at the conclusion.

Dazed and bleeding, Andrew managed to get to his feet and return the attack on his brother.

He was not about to let himself be hacked on again, so he concentrated on discovering a weakness in his brother’s strategy.

He had to find one and take advantage of it, for he was feeling weaker by the second.

The blows were still heavy, but slower. Sparks still sprayed as metal bit into metal, but less frequently.

Both men were bleeding and tired, yet both were fighting for their lives.

It was evident to everyone in the great hall that the end was near.

The church was almost completely dark now at the onset of night, with very little light coming in from the windows as the sun was nearly down.

A few candle banks remained upright, flickering in ghostly silence as a prelude to the coming death.

Sully finally reached Josephine, forcing her to look at him.

“Quiet, Josephine,” he whispered harshly. “Calm yourself, lest you distract Andrew. He has enough to deal with without listening to you scream.”

Josephine’s eyes snapped to him, her oldest and dearest friend. He was the one person in the world who could make everything all right, ever since she was a girl. Sully had always been there for her, making her world safe and secure. Her eyes began to well with tears.

“Oh… Sully,” she whispered. “He… he cannot…”

He brought her hands to his lips. “I know.”

“Help him, Sully!” she pleaded.

“I cannot. Not right now.”

She closed her eyes and the tears fell. “Oh, please,” she wept. “Do not refuse me.”

“I cannot,” he repeated quietly. “Not… now.”

It wasn’t time yet for him to do anything.

There was still more of the fight to be played out.

The trick would be knowing when to step in.

The sound of clashing metal made all of them look in the direction of the fighting men, with the swords coming together so violently that Josephine could almost feel the concussion herself.

The earl was saturated in his own blood, and Andrew was covered with his own, as well.