Larner couldn't have been more surprised when I took his hand off.
I had reacted instinctively and so had he. My instinct just had a better result than his.
At the end of the hall I had opened the door and stepped through without pause, my reactions on a hair trigger. Larner had his hands full, a plate of bacon and eggs in one hand and a jug of beer in the other. He'd dropped the plate as I swung at him and instinctively raised his arm to ward off the blow, crying out in surprise as he did so. By pure chance the edge of the sword had struck his wrist and neatly taken off his hand. A glint of azure flashed from the stone he no longer, strictly speaking, wore. I ran him through, feeling partly guilty and partly angry with myself for feeling that way. He was my enemy and had no right to my sympathy.
Engrossed in the ugly task of snatching the blade free of his gut, trying not to be too aware of his face as I did it, I was still aware of a shout of alarm. I didn't imagine I would go unnoticed and so was not in any way surprised. I had decided not to react to the enemy, but to make them react to me. I acted on pure instinct with no rigid plan, intent on fluidity to counter their inertia.
I snatched up Larner's severed hand and ran, picking a direction at random. There were stairs so I took them. Booted feet hammered on the marble floor as two barbarians gave chase. They had cried out an alarm, but were not where I was or where I was heading. Anyone with a weapon who heard the alarm would move in the direction it had come from. But I wasn't there any more. I was on the move. If I could shake them, lose them, then I would be free to act as I wished.
I glanced at the hand I held, briefly assessing the azure stone set in a gold ring that still graced the index finger. Maybe six carats. Enough candlepower to cast the spell Jocasta had taught me with some strength. All to the good. We would see. Make no plans. Be creative.
At the top of the stairs was a landing. There were men on the stairs behind me so I didn't pause for more than a glance left and right, then dropped my sword, pulled the ring from the finger, turned, attuned it, pointed the stone and let loose with whatever it was Jocasta had given me. A great gush of boiling oil spewed from the ring and drenched their upper bodies, as though I had thrown a bucket of the stuff from the head of the stair.
Shocked and disgusted, thrilled with fear and horror at their fate, I kept enough presence of mind despite their incoherent screaming, to slip the ring on my finger, grab my sword and end their pain. It was an ugly business and I tried to hold thought at bay as their bodies slid gracelessly down the stairs. I turned my back on them and moved.