Vito had no business thinking he could make a difference against a man like that, but Zaccaria was still on his feet, and that was reason enough to try.
He ran straight toward him.
The Varangian drove Zaccaria backward down the street one crushing blow at a time. There wasn’t room to answer, and there wasn’t time to dodge more than once before another strike came.
A fur-trimmed mantle hung over his mail, dark with travel and hard use, and his beard was braided into two thick ropes that fell past his collar, each tied off with a tarnished silver ring. The Norseman normally fought like a thunderstorm, all fury and noise, yet this man fought like a craftsman that thought over every swing, spending no more strength than the next blow asked of him.
That was somehow worse.
The axe swept across in a short, tidy cut.
Zaccaria’s sword jumped from his hand and went spinning over the stones with a clink no louder than a dropped coin. Before he could get a curse out, the Varangian’s free hand closed around his throat and lifted him clear off the ground as easily as he picked up a jug off a shelf.
"Zaccaria!"
Vito’s shout only served to remind him how much ground he still had left to cover.
Zaccaria clawed at the hand around his throat, boots kicking uselessly a foot above the stones. He drove a knee into the Norseman’s side, hammered at the wrist with both fists, found no weakness at all. The Varangian held him as easily as another man might have held a squirming child, his expression no more troubled than if he were waiting for bread to finish baking.
Then, Orso burst through the smoke at a dead run.
"Drop him, you overgrown wardrobe!"
He threw everything he had into the mace, and it crashed into the Varangian’s ribs with a crack that ought to have finished the business on the spot.
The man staggered.
"Óðinn!"
The word tore out of him before he could catch it, while his fingers sprang open around Zaccaria’s throat. The axe escaped his hand and pummeled into the ground.
Somehow, he stayed on his feet.
Zaccaria hit the ground in a heap and lay there coughing, one hand locked around his own throat, dragging in air like he had just climbed out of deep water.
The Norseman looked at Orso.
Then he planted his feet again as though nothing worth mentioning had happened.
Orso never got the chance to swing the mace a second time, as the Varangian stepped straight inside his range, caught the haft in one hand before the blow had any weight, and suddenly the two of them were chest to chest, boots scraping over broken stone.
The large Venetian planted his feet and bore down with all his weight, trying to wrench the mace free before the giant could steal it from him. The two of them strained over the haft, boots grinding broken stone into the street, shoulders crashing together hard enough to rattle mail.
For the briefest instant it looked as though sheer stubbornness might hold the Varangian where he stood.
It didn’t.
The Norseman dipped a shoulder beneath Orso’s ribs, turned through his hips, and threw him clean away.
Orso flew through the air like a bull hurled from its feet, and came down flat on his back with a crash that seemed to drive the very breath out of the street. The thunderous noise washed through the lane, heavy enough that Vito felt it under his boots, while Orso’s body bounced once before it stopped in a groaning heap.
He stayed down longer than anybody liked.
The Varangian stooped without haste, plucked his axe from where it had fallen, and started to walk after Orso, flexing the hand that had just held a grown man in the air.
Pellegrino was already cutting in from the left.
Vito came from the right.
Neither of them was there quite yet.
The Varangian’s eyes never left Orso, ready to finish what the throw had started.
That was the chance Vito had been racing toward ever since this fight began.
Pellegrino buried his sword beneath the man’s ribs from one side.
Vito met it from the other, ramming his own blade in high with every ounce of strength his battered body could still muster.
"Ma va’."
He muttered through clenched teeth as he shoved with every ounce of strength his battered body could still muster.
"You’re making this harder than it ought to be."
The Norseman’s body jerked so violently it nearly tore the swords from their hands. A gush of dark blood spilled from his lips as his back arched between the blades, and for one foolish little moment they were the only things keeping him standing.
Then the strength went out of him all at once.
He hit the stones with such weight Vito almost fell down together.
Nobody spoke for a moment.
Orso pushed himself onto one elbow, spat out what was either blood or the last scrap of his dignity, and glared at the body as though it had committed a personal insult.
By the time Vito reached him, Zaccaria was standing again, with one hand still rubbing at his throat, and every breath promised a bruise suspiciously like a man’s fingers.
Pellegrino wiped his sword on his sleeve, wincing whenever he breathed sharply. Vito’s own shoulder reminded him he was more than a little battered every time he raised one arm.
Farther down the street, the company closed around the last of the Varangians. The Norsemen sold their lives dearly, yet numbers had finally caught up with them, and one after another they disappeared beneath a forest of Venetian spears and swords.
It left behind an odd little pause. Beyond the next street the city still howled, but in their corner of it the fighting had simply run out of men for a while, leaving only smoke, labored breathing, and the soft ring of steel being lowered.
"You call that fighting?"
Pellegrino said, still staring at Orso as though the throw had offended him personally.
"I’ve seen wine barrels come downhill with more dignity."
"I had him."
Orso dug a thumb into his ribs and looked ready to fight anybody who questioned it. "Give me one clean breath and I’d have planted that hairy ox headfirst in the harbor."
"You were the one doing the flying."
Pellegrino gave a rough snort. "I could’ve sworn you bounced."
"I did no such thing."
"Then the stones must have leapt up to greet you. They’re cracked enough for it."
Orso looked down at the street as though considering whether to argue with the ground itself.
"The street cheated."
"Naturally."
Pellegrino nodded. "A Varangian, the street, and half of Constantinople had to join forces before they could put Orso on his back."
Vito stepped over and gave Orso’s arm a firm pat, as though making certain all the pieces were still attached. "You’re fortunate the Greeks built stout streets, anything less and we’d still be digging you out."
Orso grunted with some embarrassment and brushed at his sleeve, as though that explained everything.
"It had it coming."
Pellegrino barked a laugh.
"I’m sure the masons will be relieved to hear whose fault it was."
Zaccaria let the bickering run another moment before wandering over, his voice a touch rougher than normal.
"Well," he said, rubbing at his neck, "I’ve learned something today."
"What’s that?"
"Turns out I don’t care for flying nearly as much as Orso."
Pellegrino snorted.
"Nor being carried," Zaccaria went on. "The fellow had me dangling there like a rabbit on market day. Not the sort of reputation a man works twenty years to earn."
He clapped Orso on the shoulder.
"Next time you mean to save me, try getting there before my feet leave the ground."
Toward the walls, Venetian soldiers were appearing along the battlements now, then more beside them, until the parapets seemed to overflow with numbers. The towers had changed hands as well, and from every height worth it, the Lion of San Marco was steadily claiming the city.
"It’s over."
Orso looked over the walls. "May take until dark for the last stubborn bastards to accept it, but the city’s ours."
Pellegrino sheathed his sword with an almost reverent care. "Then we’d best not stand here admiring the view. The boys will strip every decent house in Constantinople bare while we’re congratulating ourselves."
Orso snorted, "They’ll leave you the chamber pots, nobody’s desperate enough to race you for those."
Pellegrino grinned.
"I’ve never been too proud."
Zaccaria shook his head, though he was smiling despite himself. "Loot what you’re entitled to, and keep your hands off anyone who isn’t holding a weapon. I’d rather not spend tomorrow explaining why my lot forgot the difference between soldiers and butchers."
"Listen to him," Pellegrino muttered. "The man’s already rehearsing the lecture."
"That’s because one of you fools will give me reason to use it."
Vito let them keep talking without adding much. He nodded where it seemed expected and let his eyes drift back to the corpses around them.
He’d read about this day a hundred different times in another life, be in dog-eared history books or online arguments between people who cared far too much and people who cared not at all.
None of them ever mentioned how smoke stung the air, or how quickly blood turned black and sticky on cold stone, or how strange it felt to stand inside a piece of history he’d once skimmed through on a train because the Chapter looked important enough not to skip.
Back then he’d been certain he understood this century.
His attention had already wandered to the Norsemen ruined armor.
It was a fine work, expensive even. Despite being covered in blood, it still looked fit for a great lord’s hall.
Then one stubborn thought inside Vito woke right up.
Varangian Guard.
And here he was, bleeding into a gutter three streets away from anybody important enough to guard.
Vito didn’t get another step with the thought.
From somewhere beyond the smoke, came the thunder of approaching hooves. Not the scattered gallop of frightened men, but heavy cavalry riding hard together.