At last he swung himself out of bed, tottered to the window and flung the casement wide. The night air poured in, crisp and cold enough even at the end of winter to make his lungs blaze. He hung there, drinking in great gulps, looking at the Iceglow and thinking how peaceful to be out there, cool and sterile, free from the tortures of the body—and yet, somehow, he would yearn for them still. Then below him he heard the soft boom of the hall door shutting, and the crunch of boots on flagstones. Startled, he looked down and saw the Mastersmith walk out across the yard toward the main gate. It was late at night, everybody must be asleep—except, of course, him. Alv bit his lip; could the smith have had second thoughts and be going after Louhi and Kara, to get back the armring? Surely not—but…
A spirit of deviltry seized Alv. He had already taken one risk and got away with it. He flung on his clothes, grabbed cloak and boots and went padding barefoot down the worn stone stairs, paused an instant to don his boots on the warm hearthstone in the hall, and cautiously unlatched the front door.
The clatter and creak of latch and hinges sounded deafening against the silence of the night, but nobody stirred in response. The front gate was securely fastened, but he had learned the lore of locks from this one's maker, and it was fastened from the outside only. He moved through it like a ghost, the gate stirred, and then he was looking down at a trail of footprints in the deep snow. He hesitated a moment, then ran softly and lightly along their track, carefully placing his feet in the actual prints so no second track would show. At every rise or hummock he would hunch down against cover to spy out his way ahead. And that was as well, else he would not have heard the voices in the gully beyond. He crept to the edge, peered over— and froze.
The Mastersmith was there, but not alone. Gathered around him on the snow was a semicircle of shadows, shapeless things—but with voices, low, dark and guttural. The tallest of them was a head or so shorter than the smith, and he stood stiff and dignified above the jabbering group. Their voices rose suddenly as if in fury, but when the Mastersmith snapped out one or two words, no more, in a clear commanding tone they fell silent at once. Then the Mastersmith turned as if to walk away, and Alv pulled his head back sharply. If the Mastersmith was going back to the house he would have to be there first. He turned and went sprinting back to the gate, and breathed easily only when it was locked behind him. Now his mind had something else to whirl over, as he padded carefully across the courtyard. What were those shadow-creatures, were they real, alive, or some kind of sinister snow-spirit? They looked like no people he had ever heard of. He crept into the hall and risked a moment at the low fire, imagining himself become a master mage whose works could call dark spirits in the night to fulfill his slightest wish, to compel any girl he desired. And was it such a wild hope? Soon he would be a journeyman, maybe a master while yet young. Then he wouldn't need to lie awake at night— not alone, anyhow. Any girl he desired—but then there would be Kara. For surely he would find her before anything, and her he would not compel.
He sighed, turned away—and knocked over the settle with a resounding echoing crash. Guiltily he scooped it up, waiting for doors to be flung open and angry shouts; should he bolt for the stairs or try to brazen it out? Either way would look suspicious, would very soon reach the Mastersmith's ears—and what then? He would at least suspect.
But there were no doors opening, no shouts, and he was almost aggrieved at the silence. Had everyone else vanished too? He peered into the kitchen. Ernan's thin snore came undisturbed from his little room beyond. Alv glided across to the storeroom, and heard Roc's loud snorts; he even seemed to grumble in his sleep. Alv touched his shoulder, found no response, shook and finally pinched him. Roc snorted more loudly, but did not awaken. Greatly daring, Alv applied the same tests to Ernan, who also did not stir. Then, afraid of the Mastersmith's returning, he tiptoed back upstairs—and then past his room, up to In-gar's. A light burned there, but there was no answer when he knocked. He found the journeyman flat out on his bed, with a book over his face and a lamp stinking and guttering beside him. Sleep had evidently struck him while he read, and could not be shaken off him. Alv blew out the lamp, and stole away, shaken, to his own bed. The whole household lay under some spell of sleep, and he could guess why—to cloak its master's nightgoings. Perhaps he did it often, and Alv had either succumbed to it, or slept naturally as he normally did. But tonight…
Tonight the turmoil in his mind had kept him awake. Or had it unleashed something, some force in him that could resist the Mastersmith's enchantment? Then surely he was a mage born! In the promise of that, in images of sensual delight, he found release and finally sleep. But the last vision in his mind was his first sight of Kara's face.
Chapter Three - The Sword
Alv awoke next morning with the first gray glimmer of dawn in his eyes, and a driving urgency in his mind. For a moment, bewildered, he could hardly remember what it was; the events of the night had turned his old world wholly upside down. Then he remembered. His second trial piece! The Mastersmith had set it. Today the work would begin.
He suddenly felt very empty and helpless, the puzzles of the night retreating before a new and immediate problem. A helm of fine mail, and in it a virtue of concealment, of change, of moving subtly and unseen … Virtues indeed! He knew something of them—how to charm a jewel setting so it tended to turn away thievish eyes, to work a sword hilt so in action its blade would blur before the eyes of an unwary opponent. But these were light powers, minor charms added to some greater work, little use if their existence was suspected. Making them strong, making them work together as the living heart of a piece—the difficulty of it loomed over him like a wall.
He panicked. He didn't have the faintest idea where to begin. And yet if he was to have any chance of ever finding Kara again, he'd have to. He slumped down despondently. It seemed monstrously unfair, a task like that— surely the Mastersmith hadn't set anything so hard to Ingar the Booklouse, Ingar of the Parchment Anvil? Then the weight lifted so suddenly he laughed aloud. Of course, the second and third pieces weren't supposed to be things an apprentice could manage on his own. They were meant to stretch him as well as test him—well, it would, this one. And now that he was able to think more clearly, he thought he could see a clue in the very form of the thing—chain mail. A whole made up of thousands of tiny, separate pieces—
"Like the elements of a living body," said the Mastersmith, and nodded. "You see clearly, as I have always said. Each link a distinct work in itself, with its own particular virtue, some of one kind, some another—weak in themselves, for it is hard to make such negative virtues strong. But joined together into a single thing with an identity of its own—then they become strong."
Alv nodded, tracing the archaic words on the great scroll spread out before them.
Eynhere elofhallns styrmer Stallans imars olnere elof…
"There is made…"he translated slowly, running his finger from word to word, "… one alone… a whole, into a whole, I mean… of power… surpassing… by many… being linked—why does it repeat 'one alone'? A copyist's mistake?"
"Hardly," said the Mastersmith sardonically, "since the copyist was I. It is a poetic form of alofer, an even more archaic term for smith—literally 'shaper.' Used here in the dative as a scholar's pun, and to heighten the assonance of the lines. I incline to think that is important in your chant-use these lines, and keep as much assonance as you can in the lines around them. You see their meaning now? 'The smith makes single things strong by combining them into a greater identity.' Remember, identity is important, the more so the greater the virtue in an object. If a portion of the helm is ill made, the whole thing fails, and you must needs begin again."
"And if it was damaged, Mastersmith?"
"That would depend on the extent and type of the damage. A few broken rings would not ruin it altogether, though they would weaken it; replace them exactly—if you can—and it will revive. But anything that destroyed its identity as a helm would sure
ly destroy its virtue altogether. So though you would not wear it as armor to ward off blows it must be made strong in metal and frame, as the pattern shows. Go as far as you can with it, ask my help at need, and when I judge you have done enough I shall complete it. But you will need to study first. There is a text on ringmail in the Sothran tongue which you may find useful, somewhere on the East wall, and various odd passages in other books. And you must read some works on the powers of concealment and the guise of forms. You will find some references on the slate below the pattern. You may study to your heart's content the first scroll of the Alhvarthen. And my own notes on the fjoth characters, added to the third chapter of the Book of Tarn. I may find you others as you plan your work. Begin now!"
The first thing Alv did was seize the large slate with its precious pattern, and scan eagerly through the references. There were many texts from East and West walls he had not so far been allowed to read, but still none from the North. He sternly repressed the cloud of disappointment that settled about him; why should he expect his master to scatter his hard-earned lore before mere apprentices? Surely the quickest way to it was to get on with the task in hand, to the utter limit of his abilities. And this he did.
This time his preparation took not one week but four. He soaked himself in every authority he could find, till at times he had to force himself away from the books, head buzzing, and find relief in simpler tasks. Roc watched all this with cynical amusement, brought Alv the occasional meal and loudly blessed the powers that had never made him a magesmith. But for all his concentration, there were other thoughts nagging away at Alv. Some were of Kara, though those he could escape by reminding himself that this work was also his quickest way to her. But there were some, however trifling, that he could not escape, for he was reminded of them on almost every page or column of scroll he came to. Somewhere on them, often across the bottom left, he would almost always find slight chalky smudges. He wiped them off carefully, in case he was blamed for them—the Mastersmith cared for his library— and remained mildly puzzled as to their cause. He had not yet found it, however, by the time he felt ready to begin.
With the Mastersmith's wire-drawing devices he had made great coils of heavy wire in many metals, copper and gold and delicately alloyed steel. He had patterns ready to be minutely engraved round the edge of every single ring; he had characters into which the rings would be woven, in carefully balanced combinations, and patterns to be inlaid, embossed or enameled around the main frame of the helm. And for each of these he had its own chant, distinct but linked as closely as the finished rings.
First, though, he made the frame, and that was a simple enough business; it resembled the ordinary light helm worn by warriors for skirmishing or scouting, where swiftness was their best protection. One band of fine bronze circled the brow, two hoops crossed the head from front to back and sideways; between them went a stiff leather lining and over that a layer of mail rings. The rings hung down in a curtain to shield the back of the neck, and could be fastened across the throat or the lower part of the face. Then he began on the long labor of crafting the rings, engraving the lengths of steel wire and shaping them, not into plain circles but into peculiar distortions which would let them mesh easier and lie closer, to the good of both armor and virtue. These he would blend piece by minute piece into the pattern, sometimes overlaying them with smaller rings of gold and copper to highlight its lines. It was a long labor, almost another month, and when the mail was complete he held it up in the light of the forge. It was as if the waterfall had overwhelmed the chamber, for the mail reflected a great shimmering wave of light across the dark walls, and the rings rang and chuckled like water among stones. For a moment Alv thought of the hillside streams of his childhood, and felt suffocated in this shadowy, sea-sonless place. Then, shrugging, he turned to the frame, secured the mail to the leather interior, fitted these together to the frame and hammered the last bronze rivet flat with a die that stamped a binding symbol. "Well?" demanded Roc, who had been holding the die for him. "That's as much as was on the Master's pattern. What're you waiting for?"
Alv stared a doubtful moment at his creation. There seemed to be nothing inconspicuous about that glistening thing. Still… He raised it as if to put it on his head—
And the Mastersmith reached out and received it graciously. He too looked at it a moment, as if puzzled, and then quickly placed it on his head, smoothing the mail out around his neck. The rings rang more quietly; nothing else seemed to change—but then the Mastersmith reached up and fastened the mail across his face. The rings shone as brightly in the forelight, but somehow the tiny gaps between them grew harder, deeper, more black, until night seemed to seep out of the helm like thick lampblack ink. The highlights still shone, but behind them it was as if the mask itself and its wearer drew further and further back into the shadow, blurring, quietening, becoming indistinct. It was like a pond draining and drying in the darkness, leaving nothing but a few gleaming puddles. Knowing someone stood there, Alv and Roc strained their eyes and could just make him out. Otherwise he would have seemed nothing but one of the insubstantial shadows that darkness creates. In a forest, anywhere with cover, he could have walked unheard, unnoticed, as good as invisible.
Behind the young men the library door swung open. Ingar walked in, and stopped short at the sight of Alv and Roc. "Seen the master anywhere—What're you two gaping at?"
There was a sudden trill of metal, and the Mastersmith stood bareheaded before them with the helm swinging from one hand. It was Ingar's turn to stare; the younger men whooped with laughter, but Alv's faded in him as he caught a flicker of some deeper disquiet on the journeyman's heavy face.
"A pretty enough prentice piece, Ingar, do you not think so?" inquired the Mastersmith with quiet satisfaction.
"A fine work," said Ingar, equally quietly. "May I see it?" The Mastersmith looked at him a moment before handing it over. He rolled it around in his thick fingers, held the mailwork up to the light, and let out a long slow whistle. "There's more powers than one in this, if they can be tapped! Complete it, and—"
"That is what I intend to do," said the Mastersmith calmly, taking it from him. A look passed between them, one Alv caught but could not understand. "But that is beyond Alv's concerns, for the moment. Your second piece is accepted, boy, with honor. But now to your third! Rest now, and what it is you shall learn—in the morning. You also, Ingar and Roc, it is late enough. Sleep you well."
But again Alv found himself unable to sleep. His mind had grown used to racing, and without the effort of the work in hand to distract and exhaust him it kept him awake long hours into the night, worrying over everything, great or small. What would he be given to create next? Why had Ingar reacted so strangely today? Could it be jealousy, perhaps? What more could the helm do? And, as every night, he thought of Kara. Where was she now? He laughed to himself, bitterly. How wide was the world? He had lost her, failed her—
A sound of thunder shook him, and he sat bolt upright in bed. A storm? But there'd been no flash at the window. It came again, and this time he knew beyond all doubt. It was coming from below. The great hammers were at work. He sat and listened for a moment. He slipped into his tunic and went to the door. Why wasn't the house in an uproar, with that din? And yet in the intervals he could hear In-gar's snores drifting down the stairwell. So it had to be the Mastersmith again, about some secret work…
He closed his door and stood there indecisive, torn between his desire to slip down and see what was happening and his fear of having his immunity found out. There was no telling what the Mastersmith might do, then. Why risk anything now, when he was so near his goal? But the need awoke again in him that was to rule his whole life, the need to know, and step by hesitant step it forced him down the cold stairs, through the hall and down to the echoing forge below.
The door was shut, and he did not dare lift the latch; sound and movement might be noticed. He stooped to the keyhole; it was wide, and he could see right across t
he forge. There were the plunging shadows of the hammers— but even as he watched they fell silent, and he shrank back, afraid the Mastersmith was somehow aware of him. But then he heard the explosive hiss of something being plunged into the quenching trough, and a moment later the rasp of a heavy file. He dared to look again, and saw the Mastersmith clearly, at his bench now, working away at something clamped into a large vice. After a few moments he freed it, picked up something else, tried the two together and nodded calmly to himself. Then he took a hammer and what looked like a die, and began to tap in rivets. Something rang and rippled as he worked, and Alv felt a sliver of the Ice against his spine—it was the helm, the Mastersmith was completing it! And sure enough, when he had finished he held it up, just as Alv had, turning it round and round to look for any slight damage. Alv gaped. The helm now had a front to it, an eyemask that looked to be of silver steel, cast in the form of hawklike glaring eyes. These were outlined by a thick rope of twisted wires, flattened onto the metal; the hammers must have been for making that and welding it onto the mask. The Mastersmith stared at this for a moment, then lifted the helm and placed it on his head with careful ceremony, like a crown. He made no move to fasten the concealing mail. For a minute he strode back and forth, crossing and recrossing the narrow viewpoint of the keyhole; Alv could see his lips moving, but heard no sound. Then a hand swept up the mail to hide his face, the shadows seemed to deepen and he strode out of view. Alv waited for him to reappear, but he did not. The moment grew longer and longer, and Alv felt less and less safe where he was; the Mastersmith, visible or invisible, might come out of that door at any moment. At last he straightened cramped legs and tiptoed slowly and carefully back up the stairs. But when he reached the hall he froze in horror. There were footsteps on the stairs! He scuttled back into the shadows by the front door and crouched there, quivering with fright, as he saw the Mastersmith himself, still wearing the helm, but with its mask now open, come down the last few steps, walk casually across the flagstones and down the stairs Alv had just come up. The stairs which were the only way down to the forge…
The Anvil of Ice Page 7