Sword Play

by Clayton Emery

  “Flayed …” croaked Candlemas. He felt flayed now.

  “And just to be fair, you decide the test! I’ll stay out of it.”

  Despite dire warnings and his own pain, Candlemas was intrigued. But one thought intruded that had bothered him for weeks. “No, wait, wait. There’s a flaw in the argument, and I should have seen it when we made this bet. To win, you need the barbarian to die. And if we keep piling on tribulations, he will die. Then you’ll have won. But for me to win, he must survive, which he won’t if we keep—keep—Put that damned thing down!”

  “But, dear, it makes things grow.” She’d been toying with the bulb of fertilizer again. Now she squirted juice amidst the hanging fronds of a plant that looked like dead snakes wrenched inside out, as if she were giving them a loving kiss. “But I understand your dilemma, and that’s why I’ve turned the contest over to you. Surely, if you control all the tests, and you’re fair, your hero will win. Then you can braid a whip from whatever you like and get whichever slave you like, no matter how strong, to beat me until I’m a heap of hash. Now wouldn’t that be fun?”

  Candlemas groaned, but had to admit the idea gave him great pleasure. He tried to detect flaws in her new arguments, new tricks, but it was hard to think in this steamy den and through the fog of pain. Finally he snarled, “Agreed! And I hope you suffer as keenly as I have!”

  “Me, too,” came the prim answer. “It will serve me right.”

  Stumbling, brushing aside slithering greenery, Candlemas lurched down the long rows of plants toward the cool black-and-white halls. He tried not to think about what could go wrong. And its consequence.

  * * * * *

  Sunbright lay wrapped on a bower of spruce boughs under the tatters of a blanket and heaps of pine needles. The sun was just setting, its beams slanting long through the forest. His bed lay against a rock wall, and a merry but tiny fire banked with rocks reflected heat from the wall and kept him warm on both sides. He’d had a good day, killing a young brown bear in a deadfall, and he’d eaten his weight, almost, in bear fat and liver and steak. The skin would make him a new jerkin, for his goatskin one had long since been sliced into rawhide strips. And the jawbone he might fashion into a club, or at least sink the teeth into a wooden branch to make a jagged edge weapon such as the orcs carried.

  Once more, as he did each night, the young man sent up prayers to Chauntea and Garagos and Shar, and marveled that he was still alive. He wasn’t sure how he’d managed it, other than by simply waking up every morning and refusing to die. From the high icy pass five months back, he’d crawled into the deepest parts of the forest and set about surviving. At first he could only crawl, and ate grubs and crayfish and frogs and snakes and tree bark and ground nuts. Eventually he could stand and lurch from tree to tree, and had strung rawhide snares across rabbit tracks and eaten well. Gaining strength, he’d ambushed deer from rocky heights, hunted sleepy bears settling for winter, reached into hollow trees to strangle raccoons, and done a thousand other things too reckless to ponder. Then had come the snows, and he’d dug into a cave and piled up rocks to seal the entrance, and had hunkered down hugging himself and whiled away long, dark days whispering stories from the elder times.

  The raven had helped. It had scouted from the treetops, located game, warned of approaching orcs, found water and food. Without the raven, he would have died the first week. Though there were times the bird was gone for days, and though it never said why it helped him, Sunbright accepted its help as one of life’s mysteries.

  He had shaved a new bow and strung it with his own braided hair, fletched three ash arrows with turkey feathers, beaten deer hides to stiff leather, and kept his sword polished bright. Oddly, he’d gained weight, had filled out in the chest and legs and arms. Sometimes he’d used simple healing spells on himself, but since they sapped a user’s life-force, that was counterproductive. As a result, he bore scars on his forehead and hands from his battle with the remorhaz, and still ached in one shoulder, but overall he was healthier than he’d ever been.

  He was tougher too. Before, young and headstrong, he’d thought he was formidable. Now he’d proven it by surviving what would have killed lesser men. And with this toughness of the body came a toughness of the spirit. No more would he boast of his strength and abilities, like a squeaky-voiced boy. He knew he was a warrior, and it showed, and that was enough.

  One day, he promised himself, he’d stride into his tribe’s camp and see his mother, older and grayer, and all his cousins and uncles and aunts, and old friends and enemies. He’d be a mighty, battle-scarred hero and would have a thousand wondrous stories to relate, but he’d tell none of them, no matter how much the people begged, would only drop veiled hints of fantastic and desperate struggles in the far reaches of the world.

  Someday …

  As he clung to life, so too did he cling to thoughts of his tribe, almost torturing himself with them. He loved his people and had been forced to flee because of Owldark’s lies. So he thought of revenge and savored the day he’d return and even the score for his father’s murder and his own banishment. He knew that time might be years away, for the strength needed to battle his enemies would be great. For now he’d continue to wander, and learn, and grow strong.

  And dream.

  They came often, these dreams, and confused the hell out of him. Pictures of himself walking black-and-white marbled halls, hearing weird noises and girls giggling and a man and woman squabbling like siblings, and smelling exotic flowers and queer spices or brimstone. There were visions of flying dragons, red against a blood-drenched sunset; white-haired women as cold as ice; talking tornadoes forming icicle-shaped holes; twisted, hellish halls like stone bowels where every step found a new and writhing surface; and glittering cities where unnatural beasts hauled brimming wagons and soldiers in seashell helmets tramped to foreign orders. And much more, even stranger than all this.

  Sometimes he wondered if the visions were real, if he could see into the future or another part of Toril. Or if some god or goddess put the dreams in his head so he might … What? Act them out? Maybe someday, when he was a great shaman, he’d be able to interpret these dreams and put them to use. Unless, of course, he’d simply slammed his head too hard against rock walls and rock-hard ice and was fast becoming an idiot.

  “Hello, the camp!”

  In an eye-blink, Sunbright was out from under his blanket and hunkered down between two spruce trees, sword ready at hand. If his winter alone had taught him one thing, it was to move rapidly when threatened.

  Yet the man who came to the camp seemed hardly a threat. He was not tall, but podgy, dressed in a simple sackcloth smock and rope belt and sandals. He was bearded and balding, well tanned except for one arm, which had strange, dead-white skin. The arm seemed whole enough, but hung as slack as a trout on a line and glowed ghostly pale by firelight, as if it weren’t real. But the man was real enough, and he seemed friendly, though worried. Under his bald pate, his forehead was etched with deep wrinkles. In his one good arm he carried a lumpy bundle wrapped in red leather.

  The chunky man came right into the firelight and squinted around, failing to see Sunbright hunkered nearby, which showed he was out of his element. Undaunted, the man set down the bundle and talked to the fire.

  “I’m a friend. My name is Chandler. I’m steward of a castle nearby, east of here. The raven sent me. He said you needed supplies, so I’ve brought some.”

  One sign of intelligence was having a great curiosity, and Sunbright’s was piqued. Warily, he rose and pushed out of the dark, cedar-fragrant trees. Chandler started when the groundling with the scowling, scarred face and long, shining sword that reflected yellow flames emerged from the shadows.

  “Your kind give nothing for free.” Sunbright kept his voice flat, neither friendly nor hostile. “What’s the price of your supplies?”

  “I wish you to do me a favor. I need information and want you to fetch it.”

  “That’s vague enough. Why
not dig up this information yourself?”

  “I can’t.” Chandler flapped his useless arm. “I can’t travel like this, and I have duties at my master’s castle. And it’s dangerous on the roads these days. I need a runner who’s capable and trustworthy. The raven mentioned you.”

  “How is it that you can speak to the raven?” Actually, Sunbright wasn’t sure why he could himself. Either it was part of the totem magic, or else the raven conversed with every stranger it met.

  “I’m a mage,” came the simple answer. “Not much of one, just a hedge wizard. I can do simple healings and conjurings. That’s why I’m a steward. Talking to animals comes in handy in my position.”

  That sounded like an unknown joke to Sunbright. All of it sounded queer, but then it was a queer world.

  “What have you brought?”

  Hiding a smile, knowing his fish was hooked, Chandler squatted with a grunt and, one-handed, untied the bundle. “Useful stuff such as warriors need. No trash.” Indeed, the contents sparkled in the firelight and set Sunbright’s mouth watering. A steel knife, iron arrowheads, copper rivets, thick needles, a waterskin on a leather strap, a new red shirt, a gray wool blanket, fishhooks, a razor, two candles, flint strikers, a blacksmith-forged file, a handful of silver and copper coins, and squares of rations in waxed paper: jerked meat, dried fruit, lard.

  Sunbright would have attacked an army of orcs for even a small portion of such treasure. Still, he fought to stay wary and composed. “What’s the information and when do you need it?”

  Chandler sighed, held his bad right wrist in his left hand, then sat on a nearby rock. “Do you mind? I tire easily with this wound. To answer your question, I don’t know yet. I’m waiting for news from the south before I seek news in the east, if that makes sense. My master wishes to know where best to market his excess crops. If I spend days questioning runners, I might make him a profit of two silver crowns per bushel.” Another sigh. “Will you do it? You don’t have any other plans, do you?”

  Other than simply to survive? the young man thought. No. But work for a wizard? Sunbright tried to think why not, and came up blank. Although mages were uncommon among his people—shamans who could cure ills and find game were of more use in his harsh land than muttering wizards with crocks and stinkpots—they were not considered evil, only different. Sunbright himself had “wizardry” powers, or would have if he continued to seek them and practice. And wild dreams, lately, that might be visions.

  Piling up arguments, Chandler went on, “For place, I wish you to trend east, whence come these rumors. You’ve been moving east, the raven says, albeit slowly, due to the snows and your needing to hunt.”

  Sunbright frowned. Talk of ravens blabbing his whereabouts sounded like more manipulation, such as he’d suffered from last fall. Now here came a stranger knowing much about him and offering strange pacts in return for remarkable gifts. Of course, Sunbright could merely slay this hedgehopper and take the gifts, as many in his tribe might do, but he wouldn’t. Somehow the mage knew this and, oddly, that made Sunbright trust him. And too, the lonely barbarian found it pleasant just to talk to another human being.

  And they were wonderful gifts.

  “Very well. Leave those and tell me where to go.”

  Chandler stood up, smiling, but did not offer to shake hands. “Splendid. Why don’t you salt away all these goodies and take your time, but hie to Augerbend on the River Ost. Thirteen leagues due east you’ll strike the river, then turn south. My master’s fief is not far from there. Check at the inn—there’s only one—and I’ll send word when I know more. Is that satisfactory? Good. I’ll see you there.”

  And Chandler strode from the camp without a backward glance, to be swallowed up by the forest.

  Sunbright watched him go, frowning more at himself than the stranger. If the castle was thirteen leagues distant, he wondered, four days’ travel for a healthy man, how had a tired and wounded mage come here?

  Clucking his tongue, Sunbright turned to the glittering loot. He’d reaped a fine bounty, but suspected he’d gotten a bad bargain.

  Chapter 4

  “Beg pardon, sir, but there’s someone come.”

  A page, a girl not yet ten and dressed in the requisite black-and-white uniform, had rapped on the doorframe. Her blue eyes were big as she surveyed the forbidden workshop of Master Candlemas. Though she had to admit, it didn’t look any more special than the crofter’s workshop where he made barrels and horse furniture. Except for scores of beautiful, glittering objects scattered about, it looked rather drab.

  So did Master Candlemas, as well as tired and pouchy-eyed. The wizard had instinctively slammed shut a wide, fat book at the knock. Reddish wheat was scattered over the worktable, and chaff clung to his clothes and beard. Now he snapped, “What? Company? Who?”

  “The honored delegates of the Beneficent Traders’ Guild of Dalekeva, master,” she recited.

  “What?” Candlemas seemed hard of hearing this morning. “A bunch of chintzy traders? How did they come to the castle? Did they fly?”

  “No, milord. They came by the magic portal.”

  Candlemas grimaced. What did that mean? Who’d authorized a bunch of uppity moneygrubbers to penetrate the castle magically? Was this some convoluted purse-snatching deal of Lady Polaris’s? Or some rival’s trick? Or a plea for the gods knew what? Candlemas stood thinking and staring so long the girl began to fidget. Finally he decided, “I guess I’ll have to see them. Seat them in the reception hall. I’ll come.” For the first time, he really noticed the girl, a sweet child with a black bowl haircut. Candlemas smiled tiredly. While he bore hearty lust for women both ripe and seasoned, he had a genuine affection for children, especially small, antsy girls. “What is your name, child? Were you born here in the castle?”

  “I’m Ysgarda, sir.” A small curtsey. “Yes. My father keeps the dovecotes.”

  “That’s good,” Candlemas sighed. “Tell him I admire him.”

  The fuddled girl departed, and Candlemas walked the length of the workshop. Beside a far table stood an upright mirror framed in polished wood. Both were dusty, the mirror blearily showing a short fat man with a shepherd’s smock and mangled arm. With more sighs, Candlemas flipped through a small book until he found a portrait of a young nobleman with a pinched mouth and nose and splendid clothes. “Can’t impress groundlings looking like a privy-mucker, I suppose. Let’s see … Quantol’s Changer.”

  A short while later, a nobleman with pinched mouth and nose and splendid clothes swept into the reception hall. It was the richest room in the highflying castle, the walls hung in doubles and triples of tapestries, the floors thick with handwoven rugs, the furniture carved and gilt, the statues and bowls and crystal sparkling on a dozen small tables worth a king’s ransom. It was a room meant to impress visitors, as were the magically augmented half-giant guards in black-and-white armor and tabards who guarded the doors with pikes whose edges crackled with electricity.

  From the nobleman’s pinched mouth came, “I am Candlemas, High Steward of Castle Delia, home to Lady Polaris, Noble of the Neth, High-born and Beloved of the Gods. What will you have?”

  The party was large, almost twenty traders in their finest long robes and brocaded sleeves and tall, gaudy hats. With them were eight bodyguards, mostly scarred and hearty warriors, both male and female, but there was also a craggy dwarf lugging a warhammer. A big-bellied man with a flowing white beard and blue and silver finery stepped forward to wheeze, “We represent the Beneficent—”

  “Yes, yes, I know who you are.” With the young, petulant disguise came a fussy, whiny voice. “Why are you here? Don’t waste my time.”

  The trader blinked and looked to his fellow delegates, who looked in turn at the ceiling. The man then abandoned his speeches and platitudes and stuttered to the point. “Good sir, we know you represent the might of Lady Polaris and all the Neth above her.” At Candlemas’s glare, he began to speak faster. “Uh, sir, as you know, Dalekeva is one of t
he Low Cities that lie on the eastern outskirts of Netheril. As such, we enjoy the love and protection of the empire.”

  Candlemas doubted that. The Netherese were so contemptuous of groundlings that Low Cities or cesspools were all the same to them.

  “We in Dalekeva work for the good of the empire, as do you, sir,” the man continued nervously, “and are privileged to trade our meager goods to the High Ones, the Netherese themselves. No army, no despicable wyrm dares come to humble Dalekeva while the High Ones protect us.”

  That was not quite true, thought Candlemas. Most armies and dragons were just smart enough to steer clear of Netheril. Robbing, raping, or gulping down peasants and horses wasn’t worth the grief the empire could muster.

  “Yet now, good sir, we find an army threatens on the horizon.”

  “Eh?” Candlemas lifted his pinched nose. His thoughts had begun to drift as he pondered the wheat rust problem again. Rumors said the rust had spread to the spring barley crop. If so, it meant famine. “What army?”

  A middle-aged woman stepped forward, cleared her throat, and caroled, “The army of the One King, sire. That’s what he calls himself. No one knows much about him, but he’s managed to pull together an army of both orcs and men. They’re cooperating, master, something unheard of.”

  Just to butterfly-brained groundlings, Candlemas thought. In his long life, he’d heard everything at least twice. But it did explain the presence of the oddly well-organized orcs in the forests and mountains below. To startle the man, he asked a question to which he’d already guessed the answer. “He flies the banner of the red splayed hand?”

  The traders gasped. The woman answered, “Y-yes, sire. This One King’s horde has overrun the city of Tinnainen, killed or enslaved the populace, and made it its headquarters. Tinnainen is only at the fringe of the empire, sire, and is not even a Low City. But it lies not twenty leagues east of us, and we are the next city in its path. The One King has sworn to unite all the land, to the sea as well as the southern deserts. We fear …”