A Sword Named Truth

by Sherwood Smith

  Karhin’s lips parted, her wide blue eyes apologetic as she said contritely, “I beg pardon. I am so clumsy sometimes. Welcome, CJ, or should I say your highness?”

  “Don’t,” CJ said. “We only do that junk when I’m throne-warming for Clair.”

  “Very well, then,” Karhin said cheerily, smothering her intense curiosity as she gestured for the company to precede them.

  Puddlenose bounded up the stairs three at a time. Karhin followed the two girls, observing how Seshe moved like one trained to courtly behavior, whereas CJ thumped up, bare feet twinkling beneath her plain green skirt. Karhin loved a mystery, and here was the oddest one, in a prince who called himself Puddlenose, and who seemed glad to surrender his rank to this girl in the black vest and green skirt, who didn’t act, or dress, the least like a princess. And yet this other girl did.

  CJ was determined to be a diplomat, but she couldn’t help being on the watch for the slightest sign of snobbery or bullying. Her first glimpse of Thad was reassuring, as he was a beanpole of a boy, scrawny and knobby-kneed, with flyaway hair as bright a red as Falinneh’s. He clapped his hands together in the peace, his grin merry.

  So CJ’s mood was high as Thad led the company into a pleasant room filled with comfortably shabby furnishings that had obviously seen plenty of use, the diamond-paned windows opened wide to let in the air wafting in over budding flower boxes.

  The newcomers greeted Senrid, who sat cross-legged on the floor, and lanky Terry—King Tereneth of Erdrael Danara—lounging on the other side of a low table from Senrid. Terry was surreptitiously trying to get his bad leg comfortable, as he kept the hand with missing fingers curved protectively against his middle, mostly covered by his loose robe.

  Terry wore his brown hair long, parted on one side to hide the awful puckered scar on his otherwise pleasant face. CJ, sitting next to him, glimpsed it and quickly looked toward the window, through which she could hear the melodic rise and fall of children’s voices singing wedding songs. As long as CJ didn’t have to see any mush, she could enjoy the music.

  “Our mothers are down there, with Lisbet and Little Bee.” Thad made a gesture toward the window as he named his younger stepsiblings. “And they think we’re there, too. So we are free to talk.”

  “We even have some wedding cakes,” Karhin said, triumphantly bearing in a plate of delicious-looking pastries: custard cakes glazed with lemon, puffy tartlets, and what looked like square oatmeal cookies with ground walnuts.

  They sat in a circle with the plate in the center. CJ eyed her hosts, waiting for them to move first, Puddlenose having warned her that the Colendi tended to have elaborate customs, like not stepping on their shadows. At least the room was airy and bright, pretty framed mirrors on the walls opposite the open windows making sure there were no shadows.

  Karhin gestured to the guests to help themselves, observing Seshe’s neat manners, controlled to the fingertips as she took a single cake, contrasting with Puddlenose and CJ piling their plates. Senrid ignored the cakes, and Terry looked away, reluctant to risk making a mess, dealing one-handed with delicate pastry on fine dishes.

  Senrid, impatient with politesse, said, “Terry, I understand you want military advice.”

  Terry sent a panicked look Puddlenose’s way, and gestured with his whole hand. “It’s . . . not military, in the sense of armies. It’s our border guard.” He sent another eloquent look Puddlenose’s way.

  Puddlenose said, “Terry’s country had a lot of trouble not long ago.”

  A breathtakingly bland summary of several horrific years. “We were once three very tiny kingdoms,” Terry said. “But the older generation, well, the short of it is that they all decided to grab each other’s thrones. Assassinations. Fighting.” No, he wasn’t doing any better. Either you told it all, or nothing.

  Terry shrugged sharply, pulling his marred hand in tighter, and Senrid grimaced, wondering how long he’d endured his injury before he could get to a healer. If he even got to a healer, who ought to be able to bind fingers back to a hand by magic. Assuming the wound was fresh. And the fingers were there.

  “The Chwahir didn’t make things any better,” Puddlenose said grimly.

  “Ugh!” CJ interjected, then remembered she was to be a diplomat, and she sat back, face red.

  CJ’s outburst enabled Terry—who was intimidated to be in Colend, whose customs and manners had been dinned into him as the model for nobility—to say more normally, “The border guards were either lazy, or leading the assassinations. You used to have to be born to the right families to belong. Most of them rode around in splendid uniforms, and that was about it. But there is so much rumor about the Chwahir and trouble there, and Norsunder, and everything else, I think I need somebody to come to the guard to tell them how to train. Oh. So many of them either died or ran off, that there weren’t many left, and so I opened it to anyone. Birth rank doesn’t matter.”

  Senrid’s wariness thawed with every sentence. “So you really do want trainers, not mercenaries.”

  Terry looked hopeful. “Puddlenose says you described a training school, people our age, who learn how to have discipline, right? Your people know what to do if there’s an attack. They know how to use their weapons properly, and all that.”

  “‘All that,’ I can help you with. I even have someone in mind,” Senrid said.

  As the boys talked, Karhin noted how CJ met one’s gaze straight on, whereas Seshe’s gaze was a butterfly touch, brief then moving away lest it disturb or intrude. She sat so neatly, legs folded under her.

  Karhin made a wager with herself that Seshe even crossed her feet, one big toe over the other, the way the Colendi nobles were taught from childhood. Why was CJ the replacement princess instead of Seshe? All Puddlenose had ever said was that his cousin, a girl queen, collected runaways and adopted them.

  Puddlenose popped a last bite into his mouth, and licked his fingers. “So you’ll do it, Senrid?”

  “Forthan could use the experience.” Senrid quoted Commander Keriam. “Yes.”

  The brother and sister put their palms together in the peace gesture, heads bowing in gratitude.

  Karhin indicated the last of the cakes. “Let us celebrate harmonious agreement.”

  “You mean,” CJ said as she lunged forward to grab the chocolate one she’d been eyeing, “the alliance really works!”

  There was laughter as everyone agreed.

  CJ went on. “So we need to get more kids in. And we need a name! Something that won’t cause adults to snout in. Like our underground hideout, we never called a hideout. We called it the Junky, or Junkyard. What grownup would want to nose into a junkyard?”

  Karhin said, “Maybe you should be in charge of the names?”

  CJ wanted nothing better. “I already have a great idea. We’ll call the group Fonebone.”

  “Fonebone?” the others repeated doubtfully, and CJ chortled, loving how the silly word sounded.

  By now, CJ knew that saying It comes from a magazine called MAD, back on Earth would cause a zillion questions, beginning with What is a magazine? “In my birth language, I used words to make up an acronym, see? Federated Organization to Negate Eleveners By Organizing New Enforcement-tactics.” And at their bewildered looks, she waved her hands. “Never mind that. If nosy adults heard you talking about The Secret Organization, or the Sisterhood, or the Kids’ Guild, would they ask?”

  “Yes.” Thad put his hands together in assent. “You must understand that our mothers, in accepting the guild license, made the scribes’ vow never to become involved in politics.”

  “But we have not made these vows,” Karhin explained. “And we see the alliance as something non-political, a net for the purpose of communication, and defense against Norsunder.”

  “So our new name is Fonebone,” CJ stated, thinking privately that surely such a silly name was certain to keep bad luck
away.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Marloven Hess

  LIERE went to visit Senrid as summer ended in the south.

  Under Hibern’s tutoring, she had begun diligently studying the fundamentals of magic, but when she left Hibern, she couldn’t resist setting aside the boring basics to delve into Senrid’s magic books. He let her read anything she wanted, so, driven by her dread of Norsunder taking her by surprise, she skipped over years of stuff in search of transportation spells, and—the most frightening of all—rifts.

  Of course she was not going to try them. The first time she opened one of the books, she tightened her hands into fists, just in case simply reading a spell made it somehow happen.

  But she had to know.

  And so, on a hot, humid day, with the sounds and scents of the world going about its business carried on the heavy air, she crouched in the window seat and read that anyone who studies the fundamentals of transfer magic, however the spells are formed (‘dark’ or ‘light’) learns early that with each successive person added to a transfer there is not just a corresponding reaction, but an exponential one.

  All right. She understood that much.

  More surprising was the observation that not all space between spaces was the same, no more than the density of objects (air, water, wood, soil, rock, ice, fire) was the same. Certain places had been fairly stable, if transfers were regulated, for centuries; some cities had grown up around such places.

  The rest of the world could sustain the occasional transfer, though it was “more keenly felt” but became exponentially more volatile if more than one living being used the same space: they were more likely to come through non-living. If at all.

  That was scary.

  The shift of material objects in and out of the physical world, alive or inert, requires exactitude.

  Senrid had underlined that. She wondered how old he had been when he’d studied this stuff.

  Using dark magic to force too much material or especially too many living beings too close together through even the most reliable Destinations can instigate an explosive friction that can destroy not only that which is transferred but anything within a considerable space around.

  That was another one Senrid had underlined.

  She closed the book, walked around aimlessly, then came back to it, feeling like she was picking at an invisible scab. But she had to know. Imagination was too frightening otherwise.

  After a double transfer, the Destination needs to be cleared of magic reaction before it’s safe to use again. That’s more expense. And the reaction for those transferred is unpleasantly strong.

  Well, she’d felt the truth of that.

  Reference to a name sent her to another book that covered the history of magic. Paging along, she discovered that as soon as mages had understood how transfer magic worked, dark mages had tried to create ways to transfer armies. They found ways to use magic to rip gaps between spaces, though the edges were very dangerous. These rifts caused other mages to develop wards against their formation. The larger a rift, the more involved the wards against them. In dark magic, those wards could be deadly.

  She was working slowly down a page, her finger marking each word, when running footsteps, thumps, and boys’ shouting erupted from Senrid’s study down the hall.

  She dropped her book and sped outside, to find a couple of guards and runners gathered at the door of Senrid’s study. She was just in time to see a flurry of papers settling down as Senrid tapped out from his position flat on the floor, a big black-clad boy sitting astride him. Two others stood by, one of them hanging back, betraying uncertainty: Liere recognized Shevraeth, the Remalnan studying at the academy, whom she’d met the year previous. Liere had to look twice. Shevraeth had shot up to be quite tall, and he looked very much like the other Marlovens, except for the graceful way he used his hands.

  His expression was a polite chagrin as everybody else in the room grinned in triumph. She knew what was going on. The ‘Norsundrians’ in the ‘city attack’ had won their way to the king!

  Liere gasped. “I told you,” she exclaimed, pointing at Senrid. “I told you!”

  At the door, the runner laughed, waving in one of the guards, who from the resemblance was a brother or cousin.

  Senrid sat up. Both he and his attacker had bloody noses.

  “I told you so, I told you.” Liere couldn’t seem to stop herself.

  Senrid grinned at the three attackers as he mopped his nose with his handkerchief. “Good job, you three.”

  He got up and started out, Liere following.

  The guard, who last year had been an academy senior, closed in on Senrid’s other side, saying defensively, “Not fair. No accident they broke through the first day Forthan is back. He knows the castle routine like no soul-sucking Norsundrian will. May as well waft ’em in by magic. We weren’t slack.”

  Senrid sighed. “But that’s the whole point. If Norsunder can cheat, they will. Still, report what happened to the guard captain. Tighter patrols are always a good idea.”

  The guard saluted, fist to chest, and loped off, leaving Senrid and Liere alone.

  She followed him to his room. “Senrid, you aren’t safe here. If they attack. I told you so.”

  “Don’t you think I know that?” he retorted, carefully fingering his nose and wincing. “All right. I’m still a target, even inside the biggest guarded city on the continent. I think we’re going to have to try Keriam’s idea, a communication system, so we have a warning and can take action . . .”

  * * *

  Chwahirsland

  Jilo never remembered walking outside the castle gates.

  He barely recognized his lungs laboring and his blood whooshing in his ears past the weird buzzing sound in his head. The buzz gradually resolved back into voices, but they were still too distorted to understand.

  The after-effects of two powerful spells counteracting one another had dropped enough people for the city-dwellers to have cautiously crept out to aid sentries they’d seen collapse on the outer wall.

  Others had fallen in the street. Jilo, who still wore his shabby flatfoot-probationer uniform, was bundled by furtive hands into a way station, where he woke up the next morning. For a time all he could do was lie there and listen to his labored breathing. Gradually he managed to get enough breath into him to widen his awareness outside himself to others on the cots.

  He overheard mumbled fragments of conversation: What happened? We think Wan-Edhe might be back, but there have been no orders. Oh, right, I should get back to duty. We will all get back to duty. (This last said in a raised voice, in case they were overheard.) But first, the mess hall has food.

  Finally it was Jilo’s empty belly, lying pinched and flat between his jutting hipbones, that got him to his feet and down an interminable hall of some twenty paces, to the nearest bench. A bowl of thin gruel, a crumbling of egg (one egg shared among four people), and some hot steeped tare-weed woke him up enough to sort out a roomful of people unsure what had happened. But something had happened. Everybody was afraid of what it might mean.

  Jilo crept back to the bunk, and fell into it.

  When he woke next, it was easier to get to the mess hall, which was half full. The subsequent meal was heartier, and he was able to keep it down without any trouble.

  The next day, he made it outside. His plan was to get out of the city, while that mighty spell slowly began to unravel the pocket Norsunder.

  He only managed to reach the garrison at the east gate, but that was just as well, as thin, sleety rain fell. Even if he’d felt well, there would be no distance gained if he had to splash through puddles and mud.

  By the following day, he felt strong enough to walk. He had his plan ready: he would be a probationary courier, which meant no one would ask for his twi, or rank, or army place. Couriers crossed the countr
y bearing messages that they were not permitted to see, so no one would ask questions, at least not about his supposed messages, especially if he was regarded as probationary. Probationers never carried anything vital.

  In this way, he figured, he’d be as good as invisible, and could learn more about the people. He didn’t have the strength to go fast, but that was all right. He wasn’t doing this to run a distance race. Sitting in mess halls listening was a better way to learn than running to see how far he could get.

  * * *

  Each day that Jilo got farther from the capital, he found himself a little stronger. He walked a little farther. When he stopped at night, he was able to study a little longer, and he remembered more of what he had learned. Meanwhile he gained the victory of being able to see a day begin, progress, and end. Counting them was still beyond him.

  By the time he’d reached the outpost halfway between the garrison at Narad and the provincial one farther along the river, he had come to the conclusion that yes, he’d been suffering magical reaction, but it was not entirely due to the spells he hoped he’d completed. The entire city was ill from the effects of Wan-Edhe’s magic.

  If he really had managed to complete the spells Mondros had taught him, then he should come back to Narad and sense a change. What would that do to the people?

  One day at a time.

  He was still trying to accustom himself to how sharp sounds were when he joined the outpost mess. No one spoke, except about orders, of course. That regulation was fifty years old. He wanted to hear talk about orders, and gain a sense of who was issuing them. Who was going to try to fill the space left by Wan-Edhe? The clearer Jilo’s head, the less he believed that he was going to succeed in his mad attempt to walk through the entire kingdom to learn what the people truly thought.