01 - The Tainted Sword

by D. J. Heinrich - (ebook by Undead)

  The man cast an indignant glance toward Jo. “That doesn’t work with Ariac,” he said in rebuke. Jo grimaced and bit her lip. Obviously Flinn knew the trick.

  Flinn coaxed the bird-lion once more, this time pulling on the feathers surrounding one tender ear opening. Ariac stood immediately. The griffon’s lion feet nervously scratched the mud and ice of By water’s only road, and his front claws reluctantly closed upon the leather balls. Flinn leaped into the saddle. He reached forward, tore the muzzle off, and grabbed the mule’s lead rein all in one smooth motion.

  He turned to Jo and nodded once, curtly. “My thanks, girl.”

  “The name’s Jo—” The rest of her name went unspoken. The man of legend had turned his animals around without a second glance.

  Dejected, Jo sat down on the bench outside Baildon’s Mercantile. Flinn’s tall form slowly disappeared down the street. Sighing, Jo nibbled a little more from her loaf, looked at the remaining half, and then prudently packed it away in her bag. She looked down the muddy road once more, listening to horses break pockets of ice to find the water below.

  Well, Johauna, she thought, what’s it to be? You have one meal—maybe two if you stretch it. Is it back to Specularum? Her thoughts grew grim at that prospect, and she shook her head. No, no, that won’t do. You set out to do something, and it’s time you did it. And it’s no use to stay here and drum up work, either. No. On to the Castle of the Three Suns. Flinn the Mighty seems to be heading in that general direction. Perhaps he will answer some questions if you catch him.

  Jo slung her bag across her shoulder and proceeded down Bywater’s only street. Opposite the mercantile stood a livery, with a narrow inn on one side and a blacksmith’s shop on the other. The smith looked up from the draft horse he was shoeing as Johauna went by. He nodded cordially, his hands holding a tong and a hammer. Not a bad little village, Jo thought, remembering the farrier’s kindness last night in letting her sleep inside his shop in return for a little cleaning.

  Next she passed ten or so houses, each with identical thatched roofs and limed walls. Near the edge of the village stood a stone-walled church dedicated to the worship of any Immortal. Jo was tempted to stop and pray, but Odin would understand if she pressed on after Flinn. Odin would be the first to follow his dreams rather than pray about them.

  Sharp rocks and jags of ice poked Johauna’s feet through the shoes she wore, and she slowed her pace a little. She came to a stop altogether at the outskirts of the village, where a red and purple tavern proclaimed itself the Will-o’-the-Wisp. In front of the tavern, a smartly armored elf maiden was cautiously approaching her hippogriff, trying to calm the steed.

  Jo had handled such creatures before at the hostler’s. This particular hippogriff was of excellent conformation and unusual coloration. Jo stepped forward, her eyes locked on the creature. The feathers of its forequarters glistened whitely in the midmorning sun. Just behind the forelegs, the feathers slowly transformed into a thick coat of roan hair. The merging of feather and hair produced a wide, solid band of fiber, which served as a protective blanket under the saddle and rider.

  Suddenly a hand clamped on Jo’s shoulder. Jo reached for the tail at her belt, a low growl instantly on her lips. But the tail was in her bag, and she landed flat on her back in the icy mud.

  “It was you! You!” The surly, puffy-eyed youth straddled her, slapping her face hard. “What magic did you pull, coward? I’ll show you!”

  Jo had learned a thing or two about brawling during her years in Specularum. She crossed one arm over her face to protect it, then punched the youth’s loins. The boy screamed and scrambled off Jo. He doubled over in pain and lay in the mud, tears in his eyes and curses on his breath. Jo stood up, brushing the cold mud off her clothes.

  “That’s hardly fair fighting, miss,” came a lilting, melodic voice. Startled, Jo turned around to see the warrior elf astride her hippogriff Sunlight glinted off her silvery armor, pale white hair, and violet eyes. On her polished breastplate lay an amulet radiating a faint green aura. The maid saluted Jo with a mailed hand and smiled serenely.

  Jo found it impossible not to smile in return. She had always loved the elven race, thinking it by far the loveliest to inhabit her world. Specularum catered primarily to humans, but a few elves had crossed her path before. She counted herself lucky anytime they actually spoke to her.

  “No, it’s not fair, good warrior,” Jo said as graciously as she could. “But he deserved nothing less.” Jo glowered at the boy, who could only grimace in return.

  The elf maid laughed. “You are quite right. I saw his churlish attack.” The maid saluted once more and said, “May the Immortals favor you with good fortune. Good day.”

  “Go with joy,” Jo replied. She waved when the elf lightly tapped her steed and it leaped into the air.

  Jo turned to the youth, who was on his knees. She pointed at him with two fingers. “You!” she barked. “If you follow me any more you’ll get more of the same! Got it?” She stomped past him, splashing icy water from a mud puddle onto him.

  Jo shook her head and continued out of town, forgetting the youth completely. Her mind was intent on catching Flinn. She didn’t think he could travel fast with the griffon and the heavily laden mule, and she was confident she could catch up soon. When she did, she would find out from Flinn the Mighty himself just how to become a knight at the Castle of the Three Suns. She headed toward the foothills surrounding Bywater.

  After almost an hour’s climb, Johauna began to doubt whether she could overtake Flinn. The mountainous terrain had become dry, hard, and rocky. Although the hostler had taught her the rudiments of tracking on the rare occasions when an animal escaped, the ground yielded not even the slightest clue to follow. Even the snow had thinned away to nothing. Jagged stones bit into the soles of her feet. Twice she had slipped and fallen on loose shale, scraping her hands and knees. The second time it happened, Jo contemplated using her blink dog’s tail to make multiple jumps and cover more ground. But continuous blinking tended to make her ill, and she wasn’t at all sure which direction to proceed.

  The foothills grew steeper and harder to traverse, and the shale-strewn ground gave way to soft soil and snow. Jo soon found sign of Flinn’s passage, and she doggedly followed the trail. Ahead, thorny bushes covered the land in thick clumps. Jo lost time trying to walk around the copses rather than through them. At last, she resigned herself to following the animals’ trail, hoping they had broken through the growth so she wouldn’t have to. But the brush still clawed and bit at her.

  High noon came and went without Flinn resting the animals or setting up a midday camp. She had hoped to overtake them at lunch so she could charm her way into a bit of food. She had already eaten the last of the flattened pumpkin loaf, and she was still famished. Her thoughts drifted off to the last real meal she had eaten.

  Jo had stowed away on a river caravan heading north from Specularum. All had gone well until the day before yesterday, when the captain discovered her in the cargo hold-two hungry, cramped days into the journey. He tossed her overboard into the icy river. Cursing her ill fortune, Johauna swam to shore and hastily built a fire to dry her clothes and warm her blue skin. Afterward, she wandered into the wilderness, intent on reaching the Castle of the Three Suns, even on foot.

  She spent two hungry days walking along the wooded banks of the Castellan River. Then she smelled what was surely the world’s most delicious cooking. She stopped to investigate.

  One hundred paces from the river lay a deserted camp. In the center of the camp, a fire burned beneath a bubbling cookpot. Jo crept up behind a nearby lean-to and gazed into the pot. Pieces of chicken boiled merrily away in a thick, creamy sauce, along with vegetables and dumplings. A golden loaf of bread sat warming on a rock by the fire. Jo approached the camp warily. No one was in sight, but still she remained hidden.

  Her lips wetted in anticipation. She had never stolen before, not even when the temptation had been strong and the moment o
pportune, like when the drunken lord had accosted her and she bit off his ear instead of taking his purse. But hunger softened her scruples. She couldn’t wait for the cook to return to beg a bite, so she used her blink dog’s tail to appear by the fire. She eagerly spooned the stew onto the waiting plate and tore a chunk from the loaf before blinking away.

  The meal was delicious, though she was sure that hunger had flavored it well. Briefly she wondered why someone should leave a camp so unguarded, but she gave it no further thought. Jo wolfed down the food in moments and then debated whether to return the plate and spoon. She told herself she wasn’t a true thief, licked the plate and spoon as dean as she could, and blinked back to the campfire. With any luck, the owner might not even notice the missing stew. Of course, she thought, eyeing the missing chunk of bread, she could only get so lucky.

  The next day, when she expected to reach the castle, she stumbled instead into Bywater. At the time, she considered the sidetrack to be ill fortune. Now, after meeting Fain Flinn, she believed it was fate.

  Jo sighed, her thoughts returning to the present. Absently, she looked up. With a start she saw she was out of the brushy foothills and into true forest. Spruce and pine grew in tight stands, blocking out the gray winter sun. The dead branches of the trees clawed her even more viciously than had the thorny bushes of the foothills. The undergrowth was so dense that Jo could clearly see where Flinn and his mounts had passed. Wearily she realized darkness would soon fall on these woods; she would need to overtake Flinn soon to claim pilgrim’s rights from him. She thought forlornly, I wonder if he’ll even offer me food and lodging, no matter how hard I work. She gritted her teeth and pressed on, rethinking her decision to use the blink dog’s tail. Maybe, she thought, if I just use it to go ten paces at a time—

  For the second time that day a hand came down on her shoulder. This time Jo dropped to the ground in a defensive move, prepared to roll away and onto her feet for flight. But the underbrush hemmed her in, preventing the roll. She fell in an undignified heap and stared up at her attacker—Flinn the Fallen.

  * * *

  Flinn put his hands on his hips and glared down at the girl. “Just what do you think you’re doing?” he snapped. He was surprised by the anger in his own voice, but he had dodged and evaded this girl long enough. Besides, Baildon’s insistence about hunting the dragon still rang irritatingly in his head. He was no longer a knight, yet people still expected him to act like one. They heaped insults on him, then expected his protection!

  The girl blinked her gray eyes and Flinn realized they matched the eyes of the Immortal Diulanna, as did the girl’s reddish hair. Flinn prayed to Diulanna often, for she inspired willpower and discipline. The Immortal had appeared to Flinn twice in the past, and he found the physical resemblance between Diulanna and this girl disconcerting. She blinked again, then said, “I want to talk to you, Master Flinn.” Flinn snorted. “Don’t stand on ceremony with me, girl. I am not your master.” Grudgingly he extended his hand to her lithe form and pulled her to her feet. “Stop following me and go back to where you came from.”

  She tried vainly to brush a few of the pine needles out of her clothing. “My name’s—” she began.

  “I don’t care what your name is or who you are,” Flinn interrupted brutally. “Just go back, or else I’ll tie you up here and leave you to the wolves. You’ve invaded my forest and now you want to invade my home?!” Flinn gestured to the woods surrounding them. “Leave me alone.”

  The young woman’s expression became quizzical, then thoughtful. Flinn felt an inexplicable urge to turn away under the girl’s gaze, but instead he repeated angrily, “Leave me!” Still she stared at him. Then came words that would haunt Flinn, said simply and with trust, “But you’re Flinn the Mighty. My father told me all the tales of you when I was a child. I want to become a knight in the Order of the Three Suns at the castle. You can help me become a knight like you.”

  Flinn half-turned away but kept his eyes locked on the girl’s. She had pried into his business affairs in town, followed him through the woods almost to his very doorstep, and was now idolizing him. Most damnable of all the transgressions was the last—a painful reminder of all that he had been. His eyes narrowed and his lips tightened. The longer he looked into the girl’s innocent gray eyes, the more he saw the worship there. He could almost hear the tales she had been told of him, hear the songs that had been sung of Flinn the Mighty. He could hear the story of his fight with Verdilith the great green, his single-handed defeat of two giants, his lonely sojourn to the Lost Valley of Hutaaka to recover his baron’s stolen scepter. He could see the depth of her adoration. And the more he glimpsed her absolute faith, the greater grew his anger and rage and pain.

  He slapped her.

  The blow knocked the girl off her feet. Flinn stepped over her. “Leave me be!” He strode off to where he had tethered the griffon and mule. He yanked once on Ariac’s lead rein, and the bird-lion screeched its disapproval. Flinn took no notice and began leading the mounts through the thick undergrowth.

  His way was blocked suddenly by the girl, her hand holding the tail he had noticed earlier.

  “What kind of knight are you? What right have you to hit me when all I want is to ask you a few questions?” she, shouted, her eyes flashing. She held one hand to her cheek, and he saw a faint trickle of blood at her lip. He quelled the feeling of remorse that tried to rise.

  “I am no longer a knight, girl, and you have no right to question me! Leave me be!” With that he tried to brush her aside, but she was stronger than she looked and stood her ground. She had the effrontery to put her hands on his arms to stop him.

  “But you’re a legend—you’re Flinn the Mighty!” she cried.

  He grimaced and then savagely pushed her away. The undergrowth caught her fall this time. Through clenched teeth he spat, “The man you’re looking for is dead. Dead. There is no more ‘Flinn the Mighty’.” The words were bitter on his tongue.

  Amazed, the girl stared at him. Flinn shook his head in disbelief and walked into the undergrowth, leading Ariac and Fernlover, his mule.

  Deliberately, he closed his mind to what had just transpired.

  He quelled the small voice that prompted him to turn around and ask for her forgiveness. The matter was settled. He wondered how the child could be so foolish as to search for Flinn the Mighty. His thoughts threatened to grow darker yet, and deftly he cut them off, dismissing the girl from his mind completely. The last seven years had taught him how to ward off painful thoughts.

  Flinn pushed through the brush and hurried Ariac along. The home trail lay just ahead; if he could reach it in the next hour, he would be back to the lodge by true dark. He suddenly longed for the comfort and safety of his little home, a crudely built house of logs. “Some warrior,” he muttered to himself. “I didn’t used to need a haven.” All at once he felt weary and indescribably old.

  Always before, Flinn had called a campfire his home. Whether he was on the trail of an orc troop as a knight or hunting bear as a trapper, Flinn had spent more than two decades by a fire. Now, he only wanted the safety and privacy that his own hearth could provide. That longing disturbed him. After thirty-seven winters, he was content with a lap-robe and a fire and a good pipe?

  He glanced behind him to make sure the girl wasn’t following. Nothing but dark tree branches met his gaze.

  His mind wandered back to the morning’s events. For some reason he had dreaded entering the village, even more so than usual. Flinn’s semiannual sojourns into Bywater—every spring and fall—accounted for all of his social contact. His long solitude made these contacts more painful over the years. He couldn’t help feeling a superstitious twinge at how this particular trip could have turned out, and he dreaded what the next might hold.

  As always, the children of the village had come out to taunt him. He had grown inured to their words, though, and hadn’t given them any notice. The boy with the rock had been a different matter, however. Never
before had one of the children threatened to stone him. Flinn wondered what would have happened had the girl not intervened. Then he wondered why she had. He thought about trading his furs elsewhere, but the nearest place was the castle he had once called home. Flinn snorted. He would never return to the Castle of the Three Suns again. No, Bywater had proved ideal: one day’s ride from his home, small, but with a large enough mercantile to supply most of his wants and a merchant whom Flinn trusted as much as he could. In a larger town, he might encounter someone from the order, and that he couldn’t abide.

  The mule brayed eagerly, and Flinn saw the scraggy pine that marked the clearing where his cabin stood. His thoughts turned to the business at hand. As always after having been away, he approached his camp warily. On the little crest overlooking his place he stopped, his eyes straining in the dark.

  Nothing seemed amiss. On the right stood the cabin, dark and undisturbed. On the left loomed the bam, home to Ariac and Fernlover. Along one side of the bam rested a stone cellar with heavy wooden doors, doubly barred. Flinn kept Ariac’s meat there. The smell often drew wolves at night, but the stone walls and stout wood had kept them at bay in the past. Thankfully, no wolves nosed about the camp now. A divided corral abutted the back of the stables. He sensed rather than saw that the top bar of the gate was down. “Perhaps it was the wind,” Flinn murmured.

  Something appeared next to him. “What’s wrong?”

  Flinn jumped violently, his hand reaching in reflex for his sword. He could just make out the girl’s form in the gloom. “What in Thor’s Thunder are you doing here?” he demanded angrily. He hadn’t thought of her during the last hour of the trip and was badly startled by her sudden appearance. My reflexes are rusty, he thought.

  She pointed down the hill toward the camp. “Is something wrong?”