The Last of the Renshai

by Mickey Zucker Reichert

  Mitrian sat, overwhelmed by conflicting emotions. She bent and reclaimed the amber gems from the floor. “I’ll bring it tomorrow.”

  The wolf emitted a strange, laughing whine.

  “No need,” said Shadimar. “I can get it.”

  CHAPTER 6

  The Demon in the Gems

  Mitrian awakened with a start. Pale pink dawn light filtered through her bedroom window, washing over the shelf and sparkling from the brass fittings of her clothing chest. A dream. It was all a dream. She lay still, sorting reality from fantasy. The excursion to the ruins of Myrcidë seemed to meld and tangle with the events of the previous day, and Mitrian was having difficulty carving the two apart. It was so vivid.

  Golden reflections danced on the door, wound through with shifting line-shadows as wind ruffled the pattern of the trees outside her window. Yellow, not blue. Mitrian stiffened, certain what she would find. Her gaze swept from the door across the room to the chest along the wall to the shelf beneath the window centered on the wall and to the left of her headboard. Sure enough, the sapphire was gone. In its place sat the two gems Shadimar had given her in the ruins.

  It was real. Mitrian sank back to the bed. Now what do I do? Shadimar had seemed kindly, but why should an enemy trying to influence her seem otherwise? He is the Eastern Wizard. Easterners are enemies of the West. Yet Mitrian’s own logic defeated her. If he wanted to trap me, why would he admit such a thing? Had he claimed to be the Western Wizard, I would never have caught the lie. He could even have just used his name. Now Mitrian frowned. Yesterday, she would have denied the existence of Wizards; now, having dreamed of one, she lay in her bed hypothesizing more. Shadimar had claimed to be a friend, a protector of the Westlands’ peoples, yet, at times, he seemed to be manipulating or hiding facts. And he said things Mitrian did not like. He claimed I’d kill a friend. Mitrian chewed her lower lip, wondering which friend the Wizard meant. The train of thought made her feel morbid. Does it matter? If I knew, would I weigh that friend’s life against the price of a sword and adventure ?

  Disturbed by the direction of her thoughts, Mitrian consoled herself with another. Shadimar amended, saying the killing of a friend might not happen. I’ll just need to be careful. Still, many things confused and excited her. The Wizard claimed to have had dealings with Rache and my father. When they return, I’ll have to ask some guarded questions about the Wizard and the child Shadimar called a prince. Mitrian sat up with a smile, aware Santagithi had become accustomed to her begging odd stories, Rache to questions she dared not ask her father. And Mitrian recalled one thing more. Shadimar said his magic would only provide a sword worthy of adventure. The simple crafting of the weapon won’t cause anything without the act of defiance he mentioned.

  Mitrian climbed out of bed, crossed her room, and reached for the yellow gems. She paused, hand outstretched and not quite touching the stones, recalling the images of battle that had swum through her mind in the Wizard’s ruins. Mitrian had not seen Rache so exuberant since his accident, yet his joy had seemed cruel, horrifyingly misplaced amid the mangled corpses of his companions. He had often spoken of the glory and honor of vanquishing foes or of the raw courage of those killed in the fray, but Mitrian’s glimpse of battle had shown her only crude, desperate strokes, painful wounds, and gory deaths. Mitrian stood, frozen, and Shadimar’s mocking voice seemed to fill her mind: “What does a girl understand of war?”

  Angered anew by Shadimar’s scorn, Mitrian seized the gems. They pressed into the skin of her palm, but the war scenes did not recur. What did I expect? Shadimar’s not here to guide their magic. Mitrian clutched more tightly, now more curious than afraid. The picture of Rache and his archers engaged in battle had looked dramatic enough, the knowledge of Rache’s senses had added reality to the image, but his strategy, war passion, and excitement had touched her with far more strength and depth. It had seemed more as if the emotions had radiated from a nearer source, the so-called “demon of the gems,” though the mood had fit Rache’s actions perfectly. As if the “demon” knew Rache. Mitrian considered, recalling that the Eastern general had also been named a demon. How? And what exactly is a “demon?” Mitrian had heard the term used as everything from a friendly gibe to any phenomenon men could not explain.

  A presence curled through Mitrian’s thoughts, then eased in so gently she scarcely noticed it. Until the visions came. A man lay, shivering beneath a rumpled pile of blankets. Though young, skin sagged around his features revealing gaunt cheeks and pale, hollowed eyes. Greasy, blond hair hung, sweat-plastered to his forehead. A cough rattled, wet and suffocating, in his chest, though it cleared none of the fluid from his lungs. A sense of desperation radiated from the figure, a certainty of death, a weakness, and a fear.

  Drawn into the image, Mitrian did not think to recoil from it. As she watched, another stranger flitted into the picture, a white-haired man appearing more ancient than Shadimar, yet with all the vitality the dying blond lacked. The bedridden one wheezed, “Wizard, I’ve helped you. Is there nothing you can do for me?” He used a Northern tongue Mitrian did not know; she did not question how she understood him.

  “Nothing,” the Wizard said, though whether in repetition or as a reply, Mitrian could not tell.

  “I’m not asking for life,” the blond managed. “Just an honorable death, a chance at Valhalla. Please. . . .” His voice trailed off, and several moments passed in silence until he could continue. “Just enough strength to stand.” The rest came to Mitrian as a thought. Just enough to stagger out the door and attack one of the other Renshai. If I challenge, they’ll give me the death in battle I desire.

  The Wizard did not move. “It’s too late,” he said.

  The blond struggled in his final moments. Coldness seeped into him, and he shivered so hard, his entire body convulsed. His vision disappeared. Hel’s ice. Hel’s darkness. “Please,” he gasped. “Please, you owe me. I can’t go to Hel. Not now. Can you do something?” It was a plea. Numbness spiraled through the dying man’s mind, and Mitrian felt herself surrendering, too. So easy to give in. So hard to fight.

  “Yes.” The Wizard sat on the edge of the bed, though the Renshai could not feel his presence. “There is something I can do. But it’s only a substitute for dying, only another tomb. Time to muse, too long. It will keep you from Hel for now, but it will not stop you thinking of it.”

  I’ll take it. The blond did not speak aloud, but the Wizard seemed to understand. He drew a gem from his pocket, a yellow sapphire or a topaz. A few guttural words, these beyond Mitrian’s comprehension, and the scene exploded to yellow. Mitrian shielded her eyes, forgetting the image came from inside her, and fire snapped through her mind’s eye, the flaming gold of the stone. A crack echoed, the terminal sound of a tree before it falls, then the image reformed. The body lay still, its spirit stripped away. The topaz had broken into the two perfect pieces that now sat, squeezed into the creases of Mitrian’s hand. The presence faded from Mitrian’s mind.

  Mitrian opened her fingers, staring at the gems cradled in her palm, too confused to be afraid. These stones hold a human soul by magic? Is that what a demon is? Or was that just the term Shadimar used because he had no other way to describe it? The possibilities sent Mitrian’s mind whirling. Am I awake even now? Speculation seemed futile, so she discarded it. The question is, dare I contain someone’s soul in the hilt of a sword? The answer came so quickly, Mitrian wondered whether she or the “demon” in the gems initiated it. Vicarious glory. A chance for a warrior to fight again, if only in another’s hands. A Northern warrior. No wonder he knows Rache so well.

  Having made the decision to craft the sword, Mitrian let ideas swirl through her mind as she dressed. The prospect seemed impossible and immense. One day, a simple townswoman with an interest in swordcraft, the next acquaintance to a Wizard and a demon. Over one night, the world had changed, yet Mitrian felt no different. She drew solace from her sameness. Whatever the Wizard offered, he had apparently kept his
promise to let her make her own decisions and determine her own life.

  Mitrian stepped into the corridor and headed toward the outer door. As she passed the kitchen, she could hear her mother humming and the sounds of dishes rattling. Mitrian hesitated, the domesticity so real, so comforting, yet so wrong for her. She tried to imagine herself preparing meals for Listar, but the vision would not come. Instead, her mind crafted pictures of swords capering in moonlight, wolf howls, and the bittersweet triumph of war. Keeping the gems clamped against her fingers, she headed out into the deepening dawn.

  Mitrian ran past the wall and down the hill from Santagithi’s citadel, ignoring the tendrils that grasped at her sandals and the red flowers hanging from the vines. Mind still mired in the events of last night’s dream-journey, she traversed the familiar streets from habit. Pulling up before the blacksmith’s cottage, she found Listar and his father preparing the anvil and forges for the day’s work.

  When Mitrian arrived, Listar looked up. He passed a brief exchange with his father that Mitrian could not hear, then trotted over and drew her beyond earshot of the blacksmith. “Mitrian, what are you doing here so early?”

  “I have something for you.” Mitrian held out the pair of amber gems. “I’d like you to make the hilt of my sword as a wolf and use these for eyes.”

  Listar frowned. He glanced over his shoulder as if to ascertain his father was not eavesdropping. “You’re still serious about that?”

  Now it was Mitrian who frowned. “I thought we’d already determined that. Do I have to convince you again?”

  “No, of course not.” Despite his negative answer, Listar’s tone suggested he needed persuading. “I was just thinking I have to give my father a reason why I’m spending a week working on a sword without pay.”

  “Can’t you just tell him you’re making me a birthday present?” Mitrian imagined her mother’s help and enthusiasm on any project she might choose to make for Listar.

  “A sword for my girlfriend’s birthday? My father’ll think I’ve gone insane.”

  “Don’t tell him what you’re making,” Mitrian suggested practically. “Just say it’s a special project.”

  Listar fell silent.

  “I can pay,” Mitrian added, frightened by the prospect that the sword might never exist despite her decision. It was one thing for her to choose not to defy her father, another to never have the opportunity.

  “Pay?” Listar paled. “I wouldn’t hear of it. It’s just. . . .” He sighed. “Mitrian, please. Why can’t you tell me why you want a sword?”

  Mitrian hesitated, aware Listar had the right to know, yet not daring to take a chance her father might find out about Rache’s teachings. The last thing she wanted to do was lie, but she saw no way around it. If she gave him no explanation, Listar might put the clues together: her time with Rache, the sword. She slid closer until her shoulder touched Listar’s chest. “I just want something you’ve made. Something beautiful to stare at and remember the effort you made to craft it, just for me.” Mitrian held her breath, afraid to think she could deceive him so easily.

  But Listar believed because he wanted to. He flushed, obviously embarrassed by her attention and over forcing her to reveal such a fine and noble cause. He accepted the gems Mitrian thrust into his palm. Finally, he managed to speak. “All right. But I’m not sure I want to explain that to your father. The last thing I want to do is anger Santagithi. Would you mind if we kept this project a secret?”

  Few things could have pleased Mitrian more. She brought her excitement under control before replying. “That’s fine, Listar. Thanks.”

  “I love you,” Listar said.

  “I love you, too.” Mitrian replied from rote, wishing she could mean the sentiment as seriously as her request.

  * * *

  Though Mar Lon carried the history of the world in a hundred generations of song, it was his own insight in a shabby Eastern tavern that plagued him. He composed half a dozen ballads in as many days. Each braided chords, single string harmonies, and voice into complex, cooperative melodies designed to emphasize the beauty that could be achieved by the unity of disparate sounds. Each told a story of enemies working in concert. He sang of the wild rampage of the Renshai as they passed through the Westlands on their way home from a hundred years of banishment, and how much better the many and varied Westland peoples fared when they finally learned to league against the reavers. He pieced together tales of the Cardinal Wizards, choosing those few instances where Odin’s laws allowed them to work toward a common goal. He created fables of two godlike rivals stranded on a hostile world that forced them to act together to survive, wolf packs that used group tricks and traps to surround their prey, and a jaguar and a songbird who pooled their knowledge and divergent experiences to form a peaceful coalition that aided all animals and humans as well.

  The beauty of Mar Lon’s music held the Easterners spellbound. They set aside mugs of watered beer and handfuls of stringy poultry to listen. They laughed at the animals’ antics and dismissed the tales of Wizards, who most believed were only myths. And they applauded the grisly stories of the Renshai’s spree of slaughter across the Westlands, the world of their infidel enemies. The perfectly interwoven triads, arpeggios, and harmonics had drawn them together in a cause, the cause of defeating and enslaving the peoples of the West.

  And on the seventh day, the song that Mar Lon wrote rivaled his father’s for desperation and despair.

  * * *

  For nearly a week, Listar’s hammer rose and fell on the most intricate weapon he would ever craft. When he finished, Mitrian clutched the hilt in shaking hands, warm with the pride of ownership. Had it been a crude piece of bronze, she would have felt as awed for possessing it. But this sword was a masterpiece.

  Its overlarge pommel took the shape of a wolf’s head with the promised amber eyes. In battle, it would not easily slip from hands slick with sweat or blood. Listar had etched square designs in a neat row over both sides of the blade, making it shimmer with alternating areas of dark and light. The edge looked keener than any weapon in Santagithi’s armory. It held Mitrian entranced. Listar glowed with pride and seemed reluctant to surrender the fruit of his efforts, even to the woman he loved. Thanking him, Mitrian ran home and sat in her room, studying it for most of the morning.

  At length, Mitrian sheathed the blade and slid it between her headboard and the wall. But almost as soon as she did, she was possessed of an urge to stare at it again. And so it went into the afternoon. Mitrian performed her few chores and, whenever chance took her into her room or she found a free moment, she would examine the blade again, test its balance, reacquaint her hand with the grip. Each time, she would memorize it; but on the next inspection it seemed just as strange, new, and beautiful.

  During one of Mitrian’s staring sessions, her mother’s voice wafted to her from down the corridor. “Mitrian?”

  Startled, Mitrian nearly dropped the weapon from her lap, catching it and sheathing it with a quick, guilty motion. “Mother?”

  “Nantel’s here. He said one of the townswomen spotted the war party and asked if you want to greet your father.”

  Mitrian slipped the sword back into its hiding place. Although her mother had phrased her words as a choice, Mitrian knew her mother wanted her to go. Santagithi’s wife had long ago resigned herself to the realization that her husband might not return from a foray, no matter how trivial it seemed. It would not look good for the general’s wife to stand in a frenzied huddle with the others nor to break down in front of his people. So she sent Mitrian instead.

  Aware of Nantel’s concern for his archers and Rache’s mental state and curious as to the accuracy of her dream, Mitrian would not have missed this homecoming for anything. “I’ll be right there.”

  “Hurry, dear. Don’t keep Nantel waiting. He’s got your horse all saddled and ready.”

  Mitrian laughed. Nantel knows me. Maybe I have been spending too much time at the archery range. Leaving h
er room, she closed the door behind her and trotted to the outer door. Her mother held the heavy panel open, supported with her back. She glanced up as Mitrian approached, cutting off exchanged amenities with Nantel, who stood clutching the reins of Mitrian’s mare and of a rangy bay gelding. Her mother smiled, but Mitrian read concern in the aging features. Mitrian wanted to reassure her, but she knew better. The Eastern Wizard had shown her no images of Santagithi and his swordsmen. Until the war party arrived, there was no way to know whether Santagithi would return alive.

  Nantel swung up into his saddle. “Good afternoon, lady.”

  Mitrian giggled, springing into her seat with Nantel’s power and far more grace. He had started calling her “lady” the day she came of age, and Mitrian had not yet gotten accustomed to it. “Let’s go.” She kicked her mare into a trot through the gateway, slowed to a walk to descend the vine-swarmed hill, then picked up to a canter through the streets of the village.

  Apparently, the news of the men’s return had spread quickly. The streets were filled with men, women, and children scurrying toward the eastern border of the town. Many were the wives of combatants, but others came, too, out of concern for friends or from curiosity. By the time Mitrian and Nantel tethered their mounts and joined the anxious throng at the outskirts, the lead horses of the war party had come near enough to recognize. At their head rode Santagithi, identifiable by his familiar iron breastplate. The retreating rays of sun colored his armor the somber hue of dying embers. Relief filled Mitrian at the sight of him, though he held his head low and, even from a distance, his expression looked grim.

  A child in front of Mitrian bounced excitedly. So close, the boy’s cry was decipherable amid the hubbub. “They’re here! They’re here!”