TRIG SH / SI — Chapter 3 & onwards have injury & healing scenes based on my knowledge of SH / SI.
In the end he has to come to a halt, as it's too hard to catch an easy breath. So it happens; that he becomes an easy catch himself, after the hard work of his hackworks. Still and all nothing happens in the hiatus ... save that a sanguinary spiderwork spreads across the sable surcoat of his assailant. Woozy as she is, she weaves a wild web of red onto the ground, with the blood dripping from her veins ... as she struggles in vain to stay steady on her feet. Her sword hangs down from an arm that, he can see, she finds too heavy to hold up anymore. There'll be no more hold-ups from her; not if he has his way. She's as easy to kill as an ox in a stall, as she stands ... barely stands.
For all that temptation of taking out the target, there is a doubt. Dangerous as she is, would it yet be better to despatch her or to deliver her to Sir John and reap a reward for leashing a live outlaw? Best to do both, he thinks; he's hardly ever held a life so completely in his hands as he does her's: he can strike where it suits him, do whatever damage he desires. He might hamstring her but what to do with her hands; a strike in the neck or the heart would be too hasty an end; disembowelling would truly be a shambles and paralysis of the spine took more skill than he had. He took a rasping breath, as his mind spun around, and saw the ideal, the poetic answer: a thrust through the lungs would cripple her and kill her too ... but creakingly and only after she'd been seen by Sir John. Energised; he engaged his stance and stood squarely before the staggering girl, determined to do her the kindness of a clean stroke.
It's a cruel joke; that very next stroke. It strikes into his kidney, digs deep in his vitals — the girl curling around his back and upwards: to slash him under the arm, over the back and across his jaw. He'd played the dotard on her and now she's done the same to him; not being as badly injured as she'd made out. She's made the most of his hawk-strike too; playing it out, in reverse, upon him. Enraged; he stabs his sword outwards and downwards, as she darts around him ... a cramped and crazy gesture that'll do due service for a dagger but scarcely suits the long-stroke of a sword. Sure enough, it escapes from his grip; by the time she's brought her ballet of blood to a close and come around to face him again he is weaponless, helpless and hopeless.
It would be his finish but for the fluke and fortune of war ... for the forepart of his sword stands half-buried to the hilt under the girl's ribs. « Oh » is all she says, as she takes in what has happened. His desperate daggering has done better than ever it deserved to. Warrior that he is, he knows that this is the wound that wins the battle. Whatever about any ploys and pretences this has got past all her defences; in a defeat that would bring any wight down. He sees the battle-light burn bright in her eye and sorrows for her; that she can't see that all she can do is surrender.