The Shamer's Signet

by Lene Kaaberbøl

  I saw him smile faintly, and I knew he thought he had me now. The next blow would be the last one. I even knew which one he’d choose—not a slash I might be able to parry, but a lunge, straight for the heart. Three times he had used that move, and three times I had leaped back out of reach. Now I could back no farther.

  The blade I was watching thrust at me like a spear. I dropped to my haunches and felt the steel brush the top of my head. And as it was still dawning on Ivain that he had not killed me after all, I straightened my legs and butted him in the midriff with every ounce of strength I possessed.

  “Huff!”

  All breath was knocked out of him and he tumbled back, sitting down abruptly. His sword went flying off to one side.

  It was my turn now. He was the beast, the beast brought to slaughter. I raised my sword to slice at his neck.

  And I couldn’t. His eyes rested on me still, not quite so cold now, and I knew he was afraid. Right now he was a human being, a living, breathing man. And if I swung my sword, in a minute he would be nothing. Dead. A body without life.

  I lowered my sword. I felt like crying. My mother had nearly died because of this man, I had come here to kill him, and now that I had the chance… Was I to be like Nico, a weakling who lacked the guts to strike when the moment came? So that Ivain, like Drakan, could live on and do harm to more people? No. He deserved to die. I raised my sword once more and swung it in a sweeping arc, straight for his neck.

  Iron hit steel. Ivain’s sword was once more in his hand. But he was still crouched on the ground, the moment was still mine. I struck once more, with all the strength I had.

  Claaang. A weird, cracked sound, not at all the usual crisp ring of blade against blade. The sword was suddenly lighter in my hand. And as I raised it for one more stroke, I saw why: the blade had broken off, a hand’s breadth below the hilt.

  I no longer had a sword.

  Ivain slowly got to his feet. There was a big angry red bruise on his chest where I had butted him, and his breathing still sounded strained. But he had a blade, and I didn’t. He looked at me in a measuring fashion.

  “Well, lad,” he said, “time for you to say ye’re sorry.”

  I just stared at him.

  “Ye called me a traitor. Accused me of hurtin’ a woman. Take it back now.”

  I couldn’t.

  “Take it back.” He raised his sword.

  I shook my head. I wanted to close my eyes, but didn’t. Then he swung the blade.

  He hit me on the shoulder, so hard that I tumbled to my knees, and the hilt of my broken sword dropped to the flagstones with a clang. I looked down. Callan says that if a blade is sharp enough, you won’t know that you have lost an arm until you see it lying on the ground next to you. There was no arm. Not even a bit of blood. Slowly I realized that Ivain had hit me with the flat of the blade, not the edge. I looked up at him. His eyes were as cold now as they had ever been.

  “Take it back,” he repeated.

  I looked at him in silence. Then I shook my head once more.

  This time he went for the other shoulder. The arm became numb all over, and I couldn’t raise it to save my life. But still he used the flat.

  “Admit that ye lied.”

  “I did not lie!” I said angrily. And his sword went whistling through the air once more, this time hitting me in the back so that I was knocked sprawling.

  That was how it went. I didn’t understand why he was so intent on making me “swallow my damn lies.” Maybe so that no one would later be able to accuse him. But I couldn’t do it. I could not say the words. He could kill me if he wanted to, but I’d be damned if I was going to let him walk away from the Ring a free and “innocent” man because of me. So the blows kept coming. He mostly went for my shoulders, but my back and my legs suffered too. Once, he hit me on the side of the head so that everything went black for a moment, and blood started to trickle down my cheek. I fell, and fell again. Usually he let me get halfway to my feet before hitting me once more. Finally, I just crouched there on my hands and knees, utterly unable to stand up one more time.

  He set his foot against my shoulder and pushed, flipping me onto my back. He stood over me, one foot on either side of my body, and there was a strange look of desperation on his face as he set the point of his blade against my throat.

  “D’ye want to die, boy? Bein’ this stubborn can kill a man!”

  There was blood in my mouth, and I could no longer see very well. I didn’t have one or two places that hurt; the whole of my body was one big pounding pain.

  “For the last time,” he said, his voice hoarse, “take back yer lies!”

  “Burn in hell,” I muttered, and closed my eyes. I could feel the pressure of the cool steel against my throat, and I knew that this time he meant to end it. For a moment I thought of Mama and Melli and Dina and felt a strange urge to apologize. But mostly I thought of the pain, and of the fact that that, at least, would soon stop.

  “Stop that! Leave him alone, you brute!”

  My eyes snapped open, for there were only two people I knew of who could sound like that. For a moment I thought that Ivain had hit me too hard on the head, because it seemed to me that my little sister Dina was dragging on Ivain’s arm, all the while yelling at him in a voice that could skin a mule. In the middle of the Ring of Iron, too. Ivain backed from her, holding his temples as if she had hit him over the head with a fencing post. That is the effect my sister has on most people.

  “Dina…”

  She whirled, and her eyes hit me with the force of a whip.

  “And you. You idiot.”

  “Dina, leave. Get out of the Ring!”

  “So that you can let this brute kill you? No way. What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

  It sounded odd; Dina hardly ever swears.

  “You think he should just get away with it?” I said indignantly.

  “With what?”

  “Shooting Mama!”

  “What? Who?”

  What did she mean, who? “Him.” I couldn’t even raise my arm to point. “Ivain Laclan.”

  “That?” She looked at my opponent, and then back at me. “That’s not Ivain Laclan.”

  DINA

  Bad Blood

  Davin looked terrible. That great brute of a Laclan had beaten him so badly, he could barely move. Blood was streaming down one cheek, and his nose looked like a pig’s snout. His upper body was covered in swollen red welts, like the marks of a whip, only wider, and some of them were bleeding where the edge of the sword had broken through the skin. I hardly knew who made me more furious, Davin or the brute.

  “And who the hell are you?” asked the brute.

  “Dina Tonerre,” I said. “This idiot’s sister.”

  It’s not that I didn’t feel sorry for Davin. I mean, anybody could see the shape he was in. But mostly I was angry. What on earth did he think he was doing, sneaking off like that, not a word to anybody, like a thief in the middle of the night? Coming here to wave his stupid sword about and play the hero. Almost getting killed. That he was also waving his sword at the wrong man, that was really just the final touch to his perfect idiocy.

  Davin tried to sit up, but his abused arms were nearly useless. I knelt down next to him and supported him, so that he could sit more or less upright, bleeding onto my skirt.

  “Dina, leave the Ring!” he repeated. He would have pushed me away if he had been able. It seemed to be a big thing with him, that ring. I really couldn’t see why. It was just a stupid chain, anybody could step across it, and I couldn’t for the life of me understand why no one had done so. How could they let it get this far? How could they stand there watching a grown man beat a boy to within an inch of his life? I dabbed at his cheek with the edge of my apron. It was a nasty cut and would probably need stitching.

  “Medamina Tonerre,” said a white-haired old woman who had to be Helena Laclan. “Tell me why you think this is not my grandson Ivain?”

  I looke
d up at her and then at the brute. That brawny bully had nothing in common with the delicately mannered gentleman who had led us into ambush.

  “They don’t even look like each other,” I said, dabbing away.

  “Medamina, this is Ivain.”

  Surprised, I looked her in the eye for a moment. And I could see, in the instant before she looked away, that she spoke the truth. The brute who had been beating on Davin really was Ivain Laclan.

  But who then was the traitor?

  It was my turn to feel stupid. I knew he had lied to us about everything else; he had led us into ambush with a lie. Why not lie about his name?

  “Medama Laclan,” I slowly said. “Two weeks ago, a man came to my mother’s house claiming that his name was Ivain Laclan, and that the Laclan clan had need of a Shamer. My mother and I followed this man into an ambush that nearly cost her her life.”

  “And this isn’t him?” said Davin hoarsely. “Dina, you idiot! Do you realize I nearly killed him, and now you’re saying he is the wrong man?”

  “Me? Are you calling me an idiot? Did I tell you to go gallivanting across the countryside, waving that miserable piece of iron you call a sword? And it seemed to me he was doing the killing, if anybody was!”

  “Whoa,” said the brute. “Settle down. Or would the pair of ye like to borrow the Ring for a bit? Listen, boy, does this mean I can now get ye to take back those words?”

  “I suppose so,” said Davin. And then, as if it nearly choked him: “Sorry.”

  “Well, thank God for that,” said the man. “I was afraid I’d have to fight yer sister as well. And she’s enough to scare any man!” He laughed noisily, and laughter also broke out among the onlookers. I could see Davin cringe at it, like a horse afraid of being whipped. This is the strange thing about Davin; he would rather fight, he would rather be beaten—sometimes I think he would rather die—than be laughed at.

  “Does it hurt?” I asked.

  “Dina,” he said slowly and distinctly, despite his swollen lip, “go away.” And then he closed his eyes and refused to look at me anymore.

  Helena Laclan let us borrow a room for Davin, and although my stubborn older brother claimed he was perfectly capable of walking, in the end it was Callan who carried him up the stairs.

  “We have a herbwife, but I’m afraid she’s gone to a birthing,” said Helena Laclan. She was really very helpful and courteous, considering that the Tonerre family had nearly managed to kill her grandson by mistake.

  “I can look after him myself,” I said. “My mother has taught me herbs and healing. But if I could have some rags and two buckets of water, one cold, one hot?”

  Buckets and rags arrived; but my stupid brother wouldn’t let me see to him.

  “Callan,” he begged, “get her out of here. Make her leave!”

  “I’m right here, Davin,” I said angrily. “Don’t call me ‘her.’ I’m not a cat or a cow!”

  Callan took me by the elbow, politely but firmly, and unless I wanted to use the Shamer’s Gift on him, there was nothing for it but to let him lead me into the passage outside.

  “Medamina,” he began, then gave up the rigid formality in exasperation. “Dina, I think ye’d better let the lad alone.”

  “But he is hurt!”

  Callan nodded. “Aye. He got a thorough hiding. But, Dina, the beating’s not the worst of it, not for Davin. Losin’ was worse. And havin’ his sister break into the Ring to save him like he was some little mother’s boy.”

  Why was everything I did suddenly wrong where Davin was concerned? Last year he had just been my brother. Now he had turned into some alien creature; we still spoke the same language, just about, but beyond that he made it crystal clear that I didn’t understand a thing.

  “Was I supposed to just stand there and watch Ivain beating him? He was about to kill him, Callan! What should I have done, just let him get on with it?” My voice rose, and then cracked.

  Callan slowly shook his head. “I did not say that. I’m just sayin’ it’s best if ye leave the lad alone right now. I’ll look after him.”

  Like the greater part of humanity, Callan avoided looking me in the eye. Fortunately so—it meant he wouldn’t see the tears. And I made sure I had control of my voice again before I spoke.

  “Use the hot water for cleaning the cuts. Soak the rags in cold water and use them to wrap his arms and his shoulders.” I pushed the pile of rags into his hands. “Change them as soon as they lose their chill. But keep the rest of him warm, and do not let him sleep. He has had a blow to the head and it”—my voice betrayed me and I had to swallow—“it can be dangerous if he slips from sleep to unconsciousness.”

  Callan nodded. “Not the first time I’ve cared for a lad who’s taken more of a beating than was good for him,” he said. “Never ye fear, ye can leave him to me.”

  More than was good for him? Surely no kind of beating was good for anyone. But I didn’t say so. No doubt it was just one more thing I didn’t understand.

  “I’ll go and see if I can find some plantain to put on those cuts. They’ll sting less.”

  Callan did not look too pleased. “Get one of Helena Laclan’s men to go with you,” he said. “I’d not have ye wanderin’ about on yer own.”

  I had planned to leave right way, but Helena Laclan wanted to see me.

  “Be seated, Medamina,” she said, waving a hand at a tall-backed wooden chair. “After such a tumultuous morning, I think we could both do with a hearty breakfast.”

  “Thank you,” I said. Yesterday, Callan and I had arrived at Baur Laclan shortly before nightfall, after a hard day’s ride. We had asked around, and Callan had even told the children in the street that there would be a copper penny for the lad or lass who found us Davin. But no one we talked to had seen him, and finally we had had to give up the search until morning. A friend of Callan’s, a caravan guard he had served with, gave us a bed for the night. Very early the next morning we were awakened by a pounding on the door. On the doorstep stood a snotty-nosed urchin hardly more than six years old.

  “Gie’s the penny,” he said.

  “Why would I give ye a penny, boy?” asked Callan, grouchy at being hauled from his bed so early.

  “That Davin ye’re after? He’s in the Iron Ring with Ivain. Up at the castle. Now, gie’s the penny.”

  He got his penny, and we got busy. Breakfast had been the last thing on my mind then, and now, hours later, Helena Laclan’s newly baked bread looked very tempting.

  “Honey?” she offered. “Or cheese?”

  “Honey, please.” Oh yes, honey, please. When something bad has happened, or if I’m in a bad mood, honey tastes even better than it usually does. I don’t have quite the sweet tooth my little sister, Melli, does, but right now the rich golden honey was exactly what I needed. I gratefully bit into the honeyed bread, and for a while Helena Laclan just left me to my munching.

  “Does the food please you, Medamina?” she asked, smiling faintly.

  “Mmmmh,” I said, my mouth full. “But Medama, please call me Dina. I’m not that… comfortable with titles.”

  “Dina, then. But you will have to get used to titles. With eyes like yours, people need to show their respect. It marks a fitting distance and makes them less afraid.”

  I glanced up but did not try to catch her eye. Was she afraid? Helena Laclan, more than seventy years old and head of the powerful Laclan clan—no, she could not possibly be afraid of me. Could she?

  “Medama—”

  “If I am to call you Dina, you must call me Helena.”

  That struck me dumb. Sitting there with her white hair like a braided crown, dressed in a fine gray woolen robe with red-and-yellow borders, she did not look like the kind of person I could be on such familiar terms with. I totally forgot what I had meant to say.

  “How is your mother?” asked Helena Laclan, probably to put me at my ease again.

  “Better. But she’s still very weak.” Rose had had to stay at Baur Kensie to
help Maudi look after her. It didn’t please her. She wanted to come along with me and Callan when we realized why Davin had suddenly taken off and why he had taken that damn iron bar with him. But Davin was my brother. And sometimes, Shamer’s eyes were a better weapon than Rose’s small knife.

  “There’s a thought in my mind,” said Helena Laclan, blowing on her thyme tea. “Why, do you think, did the traitor pick Ivain’s name? Why a Laclan?”

  “Maybe he thought we would be less suspicious of a Laclan.”

  “That may be.” She sipped her tea. “But the reason could be more dangerous. What if he meant to cause bad blood between the clans?”

  The thought had not occurred to me.

  “What would Kensie have done if we had killed their Shamer?” She drew her forefinger across the steam from the teacup so that it whirled and danced like a tiny elf-maid.

  “But Callan… Davin said that Callan refused to do anything because Ivain is a Laclan and he would not meddle in Laclan matters. I suppose that was why Davin felt he had to come here on his own.” What Davin had done was stupid, I thought, but I did understand how galling it had been for him to be faced with Callan’s wall of clan pride and clan justice.

  “We have a long and bloody history, Dina,” said the head of the Laclan clan. “Back in the Time of the Feuds, not many of our men lived long enough to reach middle age. This is why the head of the clan is nearly always a woman. But all the blood that was shed during the feuds did teach us something. We have the Ring of Iron now. We have clan justice. We no longer butcher one another by the hundreds just because one man steals another man’s wife. But there are few who do not fear the return of such evil times.”

  Her gaze became distant, and I suddenly realized that she was old enough to have lived through the last of the great feuds.

  “What did he look like, this false Ivain?” she asked.

  “Dark-haired, with a tiny triangle of beard on his chin. Very… refined. He did not talk like a Highlander. But he wore a Laclan cloak, so we did not suspect him.”