The Name Of The Sword (Book 4)

by J. L. Doty

  That surprised Morgin. “I’ve done everything I can to make that blade right.”

  “Oh, it’s not the blade that you got wrong. It’s your need that you misunderstand. You don’t need me to teach you how to fight with this blade. You need me to teach you how to fight against it.”

  ••••

  After Metadan departed, the scent of brimstone hung in the air. Morgin lifted the obsidian blade and looked at the runes he’d placed there: the symbol of the sunset king with crossed swords beneath it. He’d spent the better part of his life wondering at the meaning of that symbol, wondering at the name it represented. Metadan thought he knew, but he really understood only the meaning, and not the name, though the archangel thought the two were one and the same. And Morgin had come to fear that was not the case. What if he didn’t have a true name, just a meaning, a label no better than Morgin?

  He bloody well knew the label the symbol represented, and he tried to say it now. “I . . . am . . .”

  “I . . . am . . .”

  “I . . . am . . .”

  No, the Kingdom of Dreams would not allow him to claim that label as his name.

  ••••

  DaNoel drummed his fingers on his thigh as he waited, he and his men well hidden by trees, brush and boulders. Their position gave them the high ground, about twice the height of a grown man above the Penda border: a small winding creek. On the Penda side, dense forest extended to within about 50 paces of the creek. Late the previous day DaNoel and two of his men had snuck across and scouted the forest, confirming there were no easy trails among the trees within sight of the border. Lewendis and his patrol would be forced to ride within easy bow-shot.

  Off to one side movement caught his attention, one of his scouts running in a low crouch behind the Elhiyne armsmen. The man dropped to one knee beside DaNoel. “They’re coming, my lord. It shouldn’t be long now.”

  DaNoel was beginning to doubt the scout’s word when a Penda rider came into view about three hundred paces up the creek. He told the scout, “Tell the men to hold their arrows until I give the signal. And remind them that they’re not to aim anywhere near Lewendis, and only at the horses.”

  Valso had made it clear that if DaNoel didn’t take more aggressive action on the border, he might expose his treason to Olivia. He couldn’t kill Lewendis, for while the fellow was born of a minor family, he still could claim the rights of noble birth. On the other hand, Lewendis had killed DaNoel’s horse, so no one could blame him if he took payment in kind. Killing a few horses might anger the Pendas, which would get Valso off his back, but it wouldn’t start a war, so he could avoid facing Olivia’s ire.

  The scout moved down the line of archers, stopping at each for a quick word.

  One-by-one the Penda patrol rode into view, their horses ambling along at a comfortable pace. The trail by the creek forced them to ride single file, stretching them out nicely.

  DaNoel got off his knees and rose into a crouch, staying hidden behind a boulder. He waited until the Pendas were directly opposite them, then stood, raised his arm, slashed it down and shouted, “Now.”

  The Pendas looked toward his shout as his men stood, arrows already nocked. They aimed and shot. The arrows arced out over the creek and sliced into the Penda patrol. One horse collapsed beneath its rider. Another reared with an arrow in its neck, screaming, its rider desperately trying to control it. The patrol broke up into a mass of bucking horses.

  DaNoel had given his men orders to shoot only one arrow each, and not loose another without his signal. The Penda armsmen were disciplined, and with no more arrows arcing their way they quickly calmed their horses. DaNoel counted three horses down.

  Lewendis shouted, “What insanity is this, Elhiyne?”

  DaNoel shouted down to him. “I valued the animal you killed, so I’m taking payment.”

  He and his men mounted up and rode away, though it did concern him that two stray arrows had found Penda armsmen, and both men lay on the ground unmoving.

  ••••

  Morgin back-stepped as the obsidian blade hissed past his face. Metadan spun and followed with the dagger, but Morgin sidestepped that and swung his sword at Metadan’s shoulder. Metadan deflected Morgin’s steel with obsidian, and a shower of sparks blossomed where the two blades met, settling down over both of them like a rain of hot embers in the night. They disengaged and stepped back a few paces, breathing heavily.

  Metadan said, “In just a few days you’ve improved nicely.”

  “It’s an unusual feeling when the two blades meet,” Morgin said, “And I needed to get used to the sparks.” Steel on steel rarely threw sparks, but against obsidian, each stroke was like steel striking flint.

  Near mid-morning each day Morgin heard the faint sound of pipes in the distance, which he’d learned preceded Metadan’s appearance. The Fallen One always arrived ready to exercise Morgin’s skills against the obsidian blade, and they then practiced for the rest of the morning.

  “You need to watch more closely for the off-hand blade,” Metadan said.

  “I know. That’s how Salula got me the last time.”

  Metadan eyed Morgin for a second, but didn’t ask him to elaborate. “But don’t watch it so closely it distracts you from the sword.”

  Erithnae stepped into the room and said, “My lords, the queen of the jackals plans to return in force and lay siege to Sabian. And she’ll bring with her twelve twelves of halfmen, and their leader.”

  Metadan asked, “And how do you know this?”

  She looked at Morgin and smiled. “There is a woman who haunts my soul, a mortal, and she and he love each other very much. She was there when Magwa hatched her plans.”

  Morgin asked, “Did Magwa say how large a force she’ll bring?”

  “No, but you should know that your Rhianne is a prisoner of this Valso whom you both hate. And he now knows that you are not dead, but are here living among the dreamers.”

  He thought of Kinardin, but before he uttered a word the Chamberlain swept into the room. He began an elegant bow, but Morgin interrupted it. “No, forget that. We’re going to be under attack soon. What defenses can we mount?”

  Kinardin spoke as if instructing a child. “Sabian commands the Living Forest, and the two are always prepared to mount a powerful defense. And the shadowwraiths will aid us with unflinching support. And we have mortal armsmen aplenty.”

  “That won’t do,” Morgin said. “The jackal troop that kidnapped Rhiannead was invisible to the forest and the wraiths. It may be that only the armsmen can oppose this enemy.”

  “But Your Majesty,” Kinardin said. “If the enemy comes in real force, that will not be enough.”

  “Until you acknowledge your name,” Metadan said, “the Living Forest and Sabian will be that much weaker.”

  “You’ve found a name?” Erithnae asked.

  Morgin couldn’t hide his frustration as he spoke. “I know a symbol, not a name.”

  “You must show it to me.”

  Metadan crossed the room and stopped in front of her. He lifted the obsidian blade and held it close to her face. “See for yourself. He’s adorned the damn obsidian with it.”

  Her eyes narrowed as she looked at the runes on the blade. “The sunset king! With crossed swords.”

  She looked at Morgin and said, “AethonSword.”

  Metadan nodded. “Yes. But it is not you or I who must acknowledge it.” He turned away from her, walked to Morgin and extended the hilts of the blade and dagger toward him. Morgin sheathed his sword and took the two blades, and in that instant the archangel winked out of existence, leaving behind a column of gray smoke formed in the shape of a man that slowly dissipated into the air of the room.

  Kinardin asked Morgin, “Do you know your name, my king?”

  “No,” Morgin snapped.

  Erithnae said, “This Rhianne of yours believes that you do, but your fear of it is so great you cannot acknowledge it.”

  “I don’
t know my damn name,” Morgin said. “I know that symbol, and I know what it represents, and that’s not my name.”

  Erithnae crossed the room to Morgin. She reached out and touched his cheek, ran her finger along the line of his jaw. “I believe you cannot return to your Rhianne until you find your name and acknowledge it.”

  18

  To Assault a Dream

  Late in the morning Rhianne sat on the couch in her sitting room and tried to sneak a few moments of sleep, a few moments in the Kingdom of Dreams. But as she drifted off she sensed a powerful force of nether magic. She opened her eyes and tried to flush the cobwebs of confusion from her mind. She felt it even now, a potent draw of power from the netherworld.

  She stood, crossed the room to the balcony and stepped out onto it. The castle yard below, the city in the distance, nothing seemed out of the ordinary.

  This power had the taste of a malign and vast intelligence, with hints of Valso’s magic fluttering through it. No sorcerer could contain such power, and to do so did not demonstrate ability or strength, but rather a warp in the fabric of reality that should never be. She was reminded again of Morgin’s semi-delirious ranting about a vast chasm of power, and for the first time she truly understood what he’d meant.

  She turned away from the view of the city, determined to follow the scent of that power to its source. As usual, the Kullish guards waiting outside her suite stepped into place behind her, following her every move.

  The power permeated the castle, but following a straight line toward it only led her to one dead-end after another, and she had to retrace her steps several times. At one point she turned down a corridor and came face-to-face with Haleen. They both paused and Haleen gave her a vacant smile. “My child is coming back,” she said. “He’ll be back soon, and then you can find happiness.”

  Mad, Rhianne thought. Truly mad.

  Hoping the Mad Whore would not divert her from her search, she curtsied and said, “Lady Haleen.”

  Haleen looked down at her for a moment as she held the curtsy, then without another word stepped around her and continued down the corridor.

  Relieved, Rhianne put the women out of her mind and continued her search. The scent of the power led her to a long corridor on the third floor of the castle, at the end of which two Kulls stood guard at a set of double doors. As she approached the halfmen one of them stepped in her way and said, “His Majesty is not available.”

  That confirmed that Valso was in the room beyond. She’d never been in this part of the castle before, but the scent of that power had led her unerringly to these doors, so they must open into a workshop of some kind. In that moment the vast outpouring of power dissipated, and in a few heartbeats all that remained was a sense of corruption and malevolence.

  “Tell His Majesty I wish to see him.”

  The Kull didn’t respond, just stared at her.

  “You know full well that if you don’t at least give him the opportunity to send me on my way, he’ll be angry.”

  The Kull continued to stare for a moment, then turned and knocked on the door. Several heartbeats passed before the door creaked open and a wan and haggard Carsaris peered out. His eyes seemed recessed deeper in his skull as if he’d been stricken by some illness, and his skin appeared even more sallow than usual. He glanced over his shoulder in a guilt-ridden, surreptitious way, and it struck Rhianne that he had the look of a man who lived constantly with fear.

  Rhianne didn’t give the Kull or Carsaris a chance to speak. “I wish to see His Majesty.”

  Carsaris hesitated, then nodded and said, “I’ll ask him if he’s available.” He closed the door.

  Only an instant passed before the door flew open to reveal Valso standing there. Where Carsaris had appeared sickly, Valso seemed invigorated. “Rhianne!” he said, elbowing his way between the two Kulls. “This is a lovely surprise. It’s a real pleasure to look upon you after such hard work.”

  He took her arm and began walking down the corridor away from the door and the two Kulls. “You were drawn by the power, weren’t you, like a moth to the flame?”

  “What were you doing?” she asked.

  He looked at her and smiled. “Just sending Magwa’s army on its way.”

  Magwa’s army! That could only mean he’d just sent them to the Kingdom of Dreams to assault Sabian. But to require so much power must mean that her army was vast indeed.

  Valso said, “I’ve worked up an appetite. Let’s have some lunch.”

  Rhianne wanted to rush back to her suite, to sit down on her couch, close her eyes and try to reach Morgin in her dreams. She needed to warn him that the army he faced must be enormous. But she had approached Valso, and now she was stuck with him. She’d have to suffer through lunch, then try afterwards.

  ••••

  Kinardin organized the castle’s defenses, so Morgin had little to do other than sparring with Metadan and the obsidian blades. The Lord Chamberlain refused to believe that any power could obscure the forest’s perception of those within its bounds. But recalling how some magic had hidden the halfmen and jackal hordes from the forest and shadowwraiths, Morgin convinced him to send mortal armsmen out as scouts. Two days later several of them returned with reports of a large army approaching from the north, and Kinardin was beside himself when he heard that the forest was unaware of their presence and could do nothing to hinder them.

  “I had hoped you were wrong, Your Majesty,” he said.

  Rafaellen said, “We saw the same with the jackal troop that abducted Her Highness. This is a mortal fight we face.”

  Morgin decided to take the fight to their enemy, so they organized 12 companies, each consisting of six twelves of mounted armsmen with a mix of swords, war axes, lances and bows. They planned on a simple strategy: strike swiftly at several points on the periphery of Magwa’s army, then retreat and strike again later. They were badly weakened by the fact that the shadowwraiths could not fight their enemy directly, though they could carry messages swiftly from company to company. But when Rafaellen commented in an offhand way, “It’s a shame we don’t have more men who can hide in shadows like you,” it gave Morgin an idea.

  He recalled how the wraiths had helped shield him when he fought the jackal raiding party. “Maybe we do,” he said.

  He had Kinardin summon all of his lieutenants. He’d only come to the castle some days ago, so most of them were nameless men with faces much like any clansman. He recalled his conversation with Erithnae, recalled that they were dreamers all.

  When they were assembled, Morgin summoned Soann’Daeth’Daeye with a whisper.

  My king, the wraith said, dropping to one knee before him. He noticed several of the men looked away as if they feared the wraith.

  “Rise,” Morgin said, and the wraith did so.

  Of the men who’d turned their heads, Morgin selected one who was older and asked him, “Why did you look away?”

  The fellow hesitated, then said, “I . . . ah . . . don’t rightly know. I—”

  “We fear them,” a younger man said, stepping forward. He was an average looking fellow of middle height. “We know of them, but before you came just a few days ago, I’d never seen one.”

  Several men grumbled their general agreement with the fellow. He continued, “They avoid us, hide from us, and it makes us wary of them.”

  The unknown was always a fearsome thing, but Morgin needed them working together. “What’s your name?” he asked the young man.

  “Tasmian, Your Majesty. Forgive me if I have offended you.” He lowered his eyes.

  “Nothing to forgive. Come forward. I want to try something, and you’re probably not going to like it. At least not at first.”

  As Tasmian approached, Morgin turned to the wraith. “Soann’Daeth’Daeye, please envelope me in shadow as you did in the forest when we fought the jackals.”

  The shadowwraith moved like smoke in a light breeze, and in a few heartbeats had covered Morgin completely. There were several g
asps, and some of the armsmen stood with their hands on the hilts of their swords as if they needed to come to the aid of their king.

  “I am unharmed,” Morgin said, “So there is no need to fear, and no need for swords. But I can see you quite clearly. Can you see me?”

  Tasmian said, “Almost not at all, Your Majesty.”

  “So imagine what it would be like to move like this among the natural shadows of the forest.”

  Perhaps because he was younger, Tasmian saw the implications immediately. “I could dance death among my enemies with impunity.”

  Tasmian volunteered to let Soann’Daeth’Daeye envelop him, then he helped talk other men into giving it a try. When no one dropped dead or emerged from the shadows covered with boils from some strange malady, they soon had at least a dozen men from each company teamed up with a shadowwraith.

  Morgin did not want to be a king sitting on a throne while men died for him, but when he told them he’d decided to lead one of the companies, Kinardin and several of his lieutenants threw a fit. Erithnae shut them up when she stepped forward and said, “He is the Unnamed King. We cannot fight a battle in the Kingdom of Dreams without him in the forefront.”

  “Aye,” Rafaellen added. “And he knows these jackal warriors, knows their tricks, knows how to kill ’em.”

  With Erithnae and Rafaellen’s support, his lieutenants reluctantly agreed.

  As Morgin was checking Mortiss’ harness and the provisions in her saddle bags, he saw Erithnae crossing the castle yard toward him, carefully avoiding the horse manure that dotted the grounds. She wrapped her arms around him and he pulled her tight, wishing she were Rhianne.

  “Which one was it in there?” he asked. “When these men didn’t want their king to personally lead them and ride into danger? Which one believed in me enough to see me ride to my own war, Erithnae, Rhiannead, or Rhianne?”

  She kissed him on the cheek. “I don’t know, but I think we’re all one and the same, and have been for a long time. Though the one who truly knows you the best, that would be your Rhianne. And when this is done, you must return to her, for only then can you each be whole.”