The Silver Key

by Emery Gallagher

  “Walk softy,” Charlie whispered, giving the anxious mare a nudge. Mystic took one hesitant step, then another, her eyes never leaving the pack of dogs. These were not the boisterous but lovable hunting hounds she knew at home. These dogs were wild beasts, and Charlie felt a spark of fear. She didn’t have anything to ward them off with except her sword, not a suitable weapon for the job. Perhaps if she threw some food toward them and left slowly, the dogs might not chase. Charlie began to dig blindly into her saddlebag.

  The first dog crept forward. Her nervous horse tried to run, but Charlie held her steady and continued to fumble for a piece of bread, meat, anything to toss toward the pack. The dog tilted its head back and howled. Mystic panicked and leapt forward, the dogs following closely. It was too late to stop the dogs from chasing, so Charlie let the horse run, crouching low in the saddle.

  She did her best to guide the horse without slowing down as they raced toward the treeline again. Looking between the horse’s flickering ears, she could see what was either a stream bed with a low water level or a ditch rapidly nearing. Either way, if it was deep enough, the dogs wouldn’t be able to follow, or at least would be slowed down. There wasn’t much of a choice to jump the ditch or not; it was too late to turn, and Mystic wouldn’t turn aside anyway.

  Loosening her reins, Charlie leaned forward and grabbed a handful of mane to steady herself as the mare jumped. But the horse was galloping too fast to collect herself properly and left the ground awkwardly, jumping too soon, and she had to stretch to reach the other side. Mystic landed, and Charlie heard a sharp snapping sound as the horse stumbled. The stirrup beneath her boot disappeared, causing her to fall to the left.

  For a curiously long second, she was airborne. Then the earth came rushing toward her with alarming speed from a puzzling angle. The impact of hitting the ground with such speed and force rattled every bone and muscle in her body. Her head ached fiercely, and the sun was suddenly too bright. The sound of shod hoofs on the ground faded into the distance, and Charlie closed her eyes.

  * * *

  The sun beat down furiously on her face. Somehow the heat was loud in her ears. Or maybe that was the dogs barking. Slowly, painfully, Charlie sat up, wiping the sweat from her face and squinting to correct her blurred vision. She didn’t see the dogs; they must have wandered away when they couldn’t cross the ditch. Unfortunately, she didn’t see Mystic either.

  Her head pounding, Charlie tried to stand. It took several tries before her weak legs could support her weight. Her balance was off. Slowly she took a step, then another. She wasn’t quite sure where she should go because she couldn’t remember where she was. Her skull pounded, but her head wasn’t bleeding. Her eyes blurred and watered as she stumbled through the trees. Holding her head, she bent to pick up a long strip of leather with a stirrup hanging from it and stared at it stupidly for a long moment.

  After a few minutes of wandering aimlessly looking for her horse, she sat down under a tree to rest. Sitting with her back against the tree trunk and feeling sleepy, she fingered the broken strap and tried to think. A nagging feeling kept insisting she should get up and do something, but she couldn’t seem to will herself back to her feet. She had almost drifted off to sleep when the sound of hoof beats thudded in her ears. Fighting to keep her eyes open, she remembered vaguely that she had been looking for a horse, and this one seemed to be coming closer.

  But the horse that appeared was large and black, the type a knight would use for a warhorse, the green and black tassels on his saddle blanket swaying with each brisk step. In the saddle was a man with dark, curly hair, a heraldic shield glinting at his knee. He was riding slowly, scanning the trees as if looking for something. Her eyes drifted past the black horse to the one behind him. Ah, there was Mystic, being led behind the knight’s horse. He started to ride past.

  “Wait,” Charlie protested weakly. “That’s my horse.”

  The man drew his horse up, and his eyes searched his surroundings until he saw her sitting under the tree. He considered her for a long moment. “This is your horse?” he asked, gesturing to Mystic.

  “Yes,” Charlie replied thickly. “I was looking for her.” The idea seemed obvious to her.

  She could see his dark eyebrows go up. “You were looking for her? Looks to me like you were sitting under a tree.”

  “I was looking for her,” Charlie insisted, irritated. “I just sat down to rest because my head’s a bit muddled.”

  The man frowned at this. Swinging down from his horse, he left both horses to stand and walked toward her, ducking under a low-hanging branch. “You said your head’s a bit muddled? Did you fall?” He knelt in front of her to peer into her face.

  “I didn’t just fall,” she replied defensively, lest he think her unskilled. “I was jumping a ditch, and she stumbled. I broke my stirrup leather.” She held the broken strap up as proof.

  He nodded in answer but continued to stare at her searchingly. Charlie couldn’t help but notice how green his eyes were, nearly matching his green tunic. He was very young for a knight, only eighteen or nineteen perhaps. His black hair was clipped just long enough to show it was curly. He distracted her from studying him further by speaking again.

  “Did you hit your head when you fell?”

  Charlie shrugged. She didn’t feel like trying to remember

  “Did everything go black after you hit the ground?” he asked.

  This time she nodded.

  He ran a hand through his curls. “You did hit your head then,” he said. “Are you seeing double?”

  She shook her head. She stood slowly, using the tree for support. After waiting for her head to stop spinning and her eyes to focus, she walked haltingly toward her horse. She couldn’t stand around and talk to this man all day. She had been going somewhere before, she was certain.

  “I don’t think you should get up if your head still hurts,” the green-eyed stranger protested, following her. He put his arm out as she stumbled, and she found herself suddenly leaning against him, her head brushing his chest. For a moment she stayed there, waiting for her equilibrium to return. His tunic was surprisingly soft against her cheek. He had one arm around her lightly to keep her from falling again. He raised his other hand to her head and began gently feeling her scalp for injuries. She winced when he touched the large bump on her head that had grown since her fall. He pulled her closer to try to examine the spot through her hair. Growing tired of this, she shrugged his arm off and continued toward her horse.

  “You should sit back down,” he said.

  “I’ll be all right,” Charlie mumbled, examining the broken strap on the saddle. She’d have to punch holes in the leather and sew the pieces back together later. For now she cut a short length of rope from the coil behind her saddle, fed it through the metal rings on the saddle and the stirrup, and tried to tie a knot. “My head’s clearing up a little now,” she told him, finally getting the rope tied. She put the broken strap in her saddle bag.

  “Are you certain?” the man asked. “I can take you back to my camp; it’s not far from here.”

  Charlie shook her head, then winced. “Thank you for finding my horse. It would have probably taken me forever. I have to get going now.”

  “Heading somewhere?” he inquired, watching her test her improvised strap.

  “Yes.” Grabbing a handful of mane, she hauled herself into the saddle and gave Mystic’s neck a pat.

  He chuckled, but his eyes were still watchful. “Well, I’ll ride with you a little ways to make sure you don’t fall off again.”

  She shook her head again. “That isn’t necessary. You probably have somewhere to go too.” If he was part of the camp she had seen, she really didn’t need him riding along.

  But he mounted his own horse and waited. “It’s part of the oath really.”

  Charlie sighed and told Mystic to walk.

  “Who are you?” he asked casually as they rode.

  “Charlie.” She didn’t see any
harm in telling him.

  “Charlie,” he replied, “is a boy’s name.”

  “It would be,” Charlie said, “if I were a boy.” Wearing a cloak and a hat covering her hair had worked on the villagers, or at least deflected their attention, but it wasn’t very effective when the hat hung from its string around her neck and her hair hung loose over her shoulders. “And who are you?”

  “Sir Griffin of Darklight, at your service,” he replied with a mocking smile and a bow. “Knight to His Majesty.” He looked at her a minute. “What, may I ask, are you doing riding across the countryside alone dressed as a boy?”

  The fog in her brain was beginning to be replaced by a growing sense of wariness, warning her not to let her guard down just because this stranger was friendly and helpful, and a bit handsome. “Because it’s a lot harder to ride across the countryside alone wearing a skirt. Catches on everything.”

  Griffin frowned at her, rubbing a hand along his clean-shaven jaw thoughtfully. “Are you running away from home?”

  Charlie shook her head. “No. I have every intention of returning there quite soon, not that it’s any business of yours. How much longer are you going to ride with me?”

  “Does your head still hurt?”

  “Yes, rather. But I’m not confused anymore.”

  “Any nausea, blurred vision, balance problems?”

  “None.”

  He smiled. “Then I’ll be on my way. No more jumping ditches.” He bowed to her from the saddle before turning his horse.

  “I won’t. And thank you,” Charlie replied, watching him ride away north.

  * * *

  Immediately after the Shalan knight had left her, Charlie continued straight forward, occasionally looking over her shoulder to make sure he wasn’t following her. Her head still throbbed, and she found it increasingly difficult to keep on course as her attention wandered. She decided to stop early for the night and rest before she got herself quite lost. When she woke the next morning, a certain sense of horror at how injudicious she had been cut through her lingering befuddlement. She should have changed directions, hidden her trail, done something to make certain she couldn’t be tracked down. The knight might have gone to tell his camp about her; he might have followed her even though she hadn’t seen him.

  Panicked, she tried to make up for yesterday’s mistakes by hiding her campsite and riding a circuitous and frankly nonsensical route, checking behind her all the while. Eventually it occurred to her that Sir Griffin of Darklight had no reason for any further concern about her, nor did any of his compatriots, unless a girl on her own was a significant worry for them. Gradually she calmed down and began to realign her trajectory with her destination. When no one caught up with her the next day, she began to relax again.

  Once back on course, it only took her another day to reach the first spot on her map, the weapons-forge Jordana had been noted to visit. Charlie had studied the short list of destinations night after night sitting by the fire, trying to make sense of it. She tried to draw connections between such dissimilar places as a weapons-forge, a shrine, and the side of a mountain to discern the purpose of the other woman’s trip, but the list of places didn’t help her form any idea. She mused that actually seeing the locations might present a more cohesive picture of the journey, but then again, maybe Jordana was just going places she liked to go, no serious driving force involved at all.

  The weapons-forge was in a larger city than the seaside town that had been her only interaction with the natives so far, and she found the bustle and noise of the city unsettling after the quiet stillness of the woods. She had hoped that she would find this time a bit easier, but she still felt overwhelmed and a little bewildered as she passed underneath the city gate and into the crowd. Charlie reminded herself that she had already successfully done this once and nothing bad had happened, and here in this more crowded place, she was less likely to attract attention anyway. She concentrated on her purpose to steel herself as she asked the least intimidating city guardsman she saw where the famous weapons-forge might be.

  He turned out to be quite a garrulous fellow and supplied her with lengthy detailed directions, which she thanked him for profusely and promptly forgot half of. She wandered in the direction he had sent her, slowly becoming more accustomed to the commotion. Pedestrians parted way for her horse, and as long as she kept a careful eye on where she was going, she could look around her at the shops and food stalls that made up the market area. She expected to attract a lot of looks, but few people looked at her longer than it took to move out of her way, and even then their gaze was focused in the region of her horse’s chest instead of her own face. After a few streets, the little shops and businesses began to give way to larger public buildings and a few nicer inns. Charlie turned in the direction the guardsman had pointed and meandered toward what looked like a more industrial, trained craft area of the city.

  Livestock pens and the sound of ringing metal confirmed that she was on the right path. She rode past a pottery, a tailor’s shop with several smartly-dressed apprentices loitering outside, and a glassblower’s shop. She continued toward the clanging noise but found herself outside a small smithy. Confused she wandered about for a while before working up the courage to ask a man passing by where the famous weapons shop might be. Looking at her quite askance, he gave her a series of rights and lefts that when she followed them, landed her back in front of the low-roofed, humble little smithy.

  For several minutes she stood across the road from the smithy, watching people walk up and down the street with their baskets and bags, listening to the steady and precise sound of metal-on-metal, and thinking. What had she known about the weapons-forge, and what had she assumed? All right, facts first—Jordana had visited there, it was famous, they made weapons. Assumptions—the place was large and well-trafficked. Half-closing her eyes, she studied the unassuming little building. It was rather ramshackle, having been added to and repaired with different materials over the years. The front was open to allow the heat from the fires to escape, but she could see little inside. The noise has ceased.

  Well, no use in lingering. Charlie tethered her horse to rail outside and went inside, bracing herself against the blast of heat that buffeted her face. A large man in a leather apron was watching a newly-hammered sword cool, his back slightly toward the door. He reminded her distinctly of the blacksmith who tended to the weapons of the men-at-arms at Windsong. She supposed the ruddy complexion, soot-streaked clothes, and slightly singed hair were universal trademarks of the metalworker. He looked up at her footsteps.

  “What is it today, lad—shopping or repairs?”

  “Repairs,” Charlie said instinctively. “I need a sword sharpened.”

  He looked at her appraisingly, then nodded to the open doorway on the other side of the room. “Head in there where it’s quieter. I’ll be right with ye.”

  Obediently Charlie eased her way past the worktable and went into the second room, which appeared to be the sale room for finished products. Racks and shelves of weapons and ironwork bits and pieces lined the walls, most locked firmly behind a strong bar or in a case. Some were mundane, workhorse items, but others were fantastically crafted with hilts inlaid with precious metals, gemstones, and other luxuries like mother-of-pearl. She fingered the empty hole in her sword-hilt as she looked appreciatively at the remarkable handiwork. She wondered if the man had done all of the work himself. She was touching the hilt of a sapphire-laden sword, wondering if it could possibly be what she searched for despite its length when the door opened, and the smith entered. She snatched her hand away guiltily and turned to face him.

  “What do have today then?” he asked, friendly enough and not appearing bothered by her touching the merchandise.

  Charlie drew her sword carefully and offered it to him by the hilt.

  He accepted it and held it close to his face to examine it. “Yes, that could use an edge. Come on then.” He waved her back into the workshop where the whe
tstone was. “Name’s Davos, by the way.”

  “I’m Charlie,” she said simply, pulling herself up on the stool he had waved her to.

  “Odd name for a girl,” he said absently, giving the sharpening wheel a speculative turn.

  “So people keep telling me,” she grumbled. Truthfully, as everyone who had known her her whole life had always called her “Charlie,” she hadn’t really encountered many responses to her name until recently and was rather surprised by it.

  “It doesn’t bother you, or you’d change it,” he pointed out, still looking at the sword instead of at her. “This is a very interesting piece. What used to be here?” He indicated the indentation in the hilt.

  “I don’t know—it was like that when I got it.” She hesitated. “It’s sort of an—heirloom that I inherited.”

  Davos looked up at her now, and she felt suddenly nervous under his piercing, intelligent gaze. But he only assumed a thoughtful expression again and looked away.

  Charlie made another attempt. “I wondered if it might have been made here,” she almost croaked. “A long time ago.”

  The weapon-maker rubbed at an invisible spot on the metal at the base of the hilt. “Yes, it was. It has Suri Stonecutter’s maker’s mark on it. She was an ancestor of mine.”

  “Oh,” Charlie breathed. Maybe she was in the right place if Jordana had had her sword made here! “She? It was made by a woman?” It didn’t surprise her that a woman who would found an order of exceptional and powerful women would choose a female weaponsmith to make her sword.

  “Yes.” Davos smiled now, the intensity gone from his gaze. “Suri was an excellent weaponsmith. She specialized in blades.” He seemed to give up on the sharpening wheel. Picking up a whetstone, he settled himself on a stool and began sharpening the sword with smooth, precise strokes. “Was Jordana one of your ancestors then?”

  Charlie’s breath caught in her throat. “What?”

  “You have her sword,” he said simply. “You said you inherited it. Was she one of your ancestors?” His gray eyes were looking straight through her skull again.