Kingmaker's Sword (Rune Blades of Celi)

by Ann Marston

  I grabbed my sword and took the quickest route to the street, which happened to be out the window and straight down.

  My sudden arrival, half-naked and obviously annoyed, in the middle of the fray caused a momentary flurry of consternation among the three Maeduni mercenaries currently attempting to add a blond head to their collection. Faced suddenly with a two-front battle, the Maeduni hesitated. The young swordsman used the opportunity to take a large collop out of the sword arm of one mercenary. One of the others turned obligingly into my blade. The last melted quickly into the crowd, dragging his wounded comrade with him.

  The young swordsman swung around, presumably to thank me for saving his golden locks. Then I discovered I was wrong on all counts. Swordsman—no. Swordswoman. Young, lithe, skilled and obviously deadly, but definitely not male. Not grateful, either. Golden brown eyes blazed in an odd mixture of burning rage and icy scorn. Lips I might have considered kissing under different circumstances drew back from perfect teeth in a snarl, and the greatsword in her strong, brown hands swung up to challenge me.

  “They were mine, you witless savage,” she hissed. “I need no help from a half naked barbarian to deal with scum like that.”

  It was her eyes that triggered the realization I had seen her before. It was the same woman I had seen by the docks, the woman who had come to the inn last night for the evening meal. The clothing fooled me for the moment. Gone was the opulent gown, the rich gold ornamentation in her hair. She wore trews cross-bound to the knees and boots, and a full-sleeved shirt under a short tunic. An engraved leather baldric crossed the tunic, supporting a scabbard for the sword across her back. I recognized neither the style and cut of her clothes, nor the cadence of her speech. Not Isgardian or Falian. But woman she was, Outlander or no, and she gave every indication of wanting to skewer me like a rabbit spitted over a fire. It seemed like a good time to test Cullin’s theory of distraction.

  I reached out quickly, snaked an arm around her neck and pulled her against me. I bent and kissed her, and for an instant or two, the air around us fizzed gently. The reaction startled me almost as much as it startled her. I let her go quickly before her shocked immobility could turn to anger and action.

  “Thank you, my lady,” I said in my best high Isgardian with exaggerated courtesy. “Your gratitude quite overwhelms me.”

  She hissed and spit like a Tyran mountain cat, using a language I didn’t know. The tone needed no translation. It was obviously a colourful and fanciful recitation of my parentage and lineage. I touched my forehead in a polite salute, then turned to go back to my comfortable and expensive bed in the inn.

  I sensed rather than saw the movement behind me, and spun around, crouched low, my sword held in both hands and raised to deflect the wicked arc her blade described in as it swung toward my head. She pivoted the sword in her hand just before her blade met mine with a ringing clash and metallic slither. Had the blow landed, the flat of the sword would have merely bounced off the back of my head. Painful, mayhap, but less so than having my height reduced a handspan or two by the cutting edge. Even as I realized she did not mean to kill me and checked my counter-stroke, a strange thrumming like the sound of thousands of bees quivered through the steel of my blade and up my arms. It set my teeth on edge, raised every hair on my arms and the back of my neck, and knotted the pit of my belly.

  Hellas-birthing. Magic! Again! I could feel it, and I could smell its characteristic stench in the air.

  Gods, I really hate magic.

  I almost dropped the sword as I tried to yank it back, out of contact with the other blade. Once I had it free, the strange thrumming stopped. The magic-aversion reaction faded. I raised the sword again, for defence, and stepped back to give myself room. But there was no need. The woman stood with her own blade held limply in both hands, wide eyes staring at me in shock. Eyes the same colour as good Tyran whiskey, the same colour as my own.

  “Where did you get that sword?” she whispered.

  She no longer looked as if her dearest heart’s desire was to raise a considerable and substantial knot on the back of my skull. I lowered my sword. “I stole it,” I snarled and turned away.

  She caught up to me before I had taken three steps. With surprising strength, her hand on my arm swung me around to face her again. “Where did you get that sword?” she demanded, her voice harsh with urgency. “That’s a Celae Rune Blade.”

  It was all I could do to remember to close my mouth. I tried not to stare back. In the eight years I’d had the sword, she was the only other person besides me to see the runes etched deeply into the blade. Runes I had no idea how to read.

  “I told you” I said. “I stole it.”

  She shook her head. “No,” she said firmly. “A Rune Blade can’t be stolen.”

  I pulled my arm away. “I stole this one,” I said. “I took it away from the man who was trying to kill me with it, then I used it to kill him, and kept it.”

  Wordlessly, she held up her own sword. The light flashed off the shining blade, the runes spilling along it sparking like the facets of gems.

  “Like calls to like,” she said quietly. “Can you see them?”

  “The runes? Yes.”

  She swore. I don’t know what she said, but it sounded like a potent oath. Then she glared at me. “How does an uncouth barbarian like you have the right to carry a Celae Rune Blade?”

  I decided I’d had quite enough of standing in the dusty street, dressed only in my kilt, talking to a woman who had a tongue like a fistful of rusty fish hooks. I turned my back on her, mustered as much dignity as a half-naked man could, and strode back into the inn.

  Cullin was waiting in my room, fully dressed and looking indecently fresh and alert. He grinned at me as I stomped in and tossed the sword on the bed.

  “I leave you by yourself for one night, and you find a fracas to leap into,” he said. “And you not even dressed decent.”

  I scowled at him as I pulled on my shirt. “I hate this city,” I said. “It’s hip deep in magic.”

  He shrugged. “We meet with Moigar today. Another pack train. Tomorrow morning, maybe.”

  “It can’t be too soon for me, ti’vati.”

  But Moigar didn’t keep his appointment with us. We waited in the tavern for two hours past the arranged meeting time. It was annoying, but not too serious. There were plenty of other brokers in the city to deal with and all of them knew our reputation. In the eight years I’d been with Cullin, we had never lost a pack animal to bandits. Cullin could name his price to any of the brokers and they would be more than happy to pay it.

  The woman entered the tavern and paused at the door to let her eyes become adjusted to the poor light. She wore her trews and tunic, the hilt of the greatsword rising above her left shoulder. I saw her before Cullin, and swore softly. I pushed my stool farther back into the shadows, hoping she wouldn’t see me. I didn’t need another round of verbal sparring. Cullin grinned at me, then moved his stool so that his shadow fell across me, too, hiding me more efficiently.

  “‘Tis a sad day when I see you hide from a woman, ti’rhonai,” he said.

  “You said it yourself,” I said sourly. “Abrasive was the right word.”

  The woman stood by the door, looking around as if seeking someone specific. A half-drunk Honandun seaman approached her, swaggering with self-assurance. He said something to her, his hand reaching for her arm in a confident gesture. She gave him a look one might normally use on an unidentified and highly offensive object sticking to the sole of one’s boot, then plucked his hand from her arm as if it were a repugnant insect. When he insisted on pressing his suit, her left hand made a swift, knife-edge movement. The seaman yelped and his eyes grew wide with pain and shock. Clutching his groin, he stumbled backwards, unable to get away from her fast enough.

  “Not a woman to take lightly,” Cullin murmured, amusement glinting in his green eyes.

  “Her tongue is more lethal than her hands,” I muttered, reaching for
the ale jug. Cullin laughed softly.

  The woman looked around again, then moved purposefully across the room. She stepped up to our table and stood there, looking down at Cullin. Me, she spared no glance, although I knew she was aware of my presence in the shadows. I hoped she could not make out my face in the dimness of the poorly lit tavern.

  “You be Cullin dav Medroch?” she asked in the Isgardian common tongue.

  Cullin gave her his best smile and leaned back in his chair. “I be.”

  “I was told you be the man who can help me.” Her words were lightly accented, her voice low but clear.

  “That would depend on what help you require,” Cullin said, still smiling.

  “I have come from Celi to seek a man,” she said. “It be urgent I find him. I have gold to pay for your services.”

  “A long journey from Celi,” Cullin said. “I trust you had a pleasant sea crossing.”

  Her golden brows drew together in a frown of impatience. She obviously had no time for pleasantries. “My business be important,” she said. “Do you want my gold or no? There be others I might hire.”

  Cullin studied her carefully. His smile didn’t waver but his eyes became shrewd and penetrating as he watched her. He said something to her. It sounded a little like Tyran but the vowel sounds were strangely twisted and the consonants softened. I came tantalizingly close to understanding it, but the meaning escaped me. It didn’t escape the woman, though. She took a step backwards, eyes wide in surprise.

  “So,” Cullin said. “Not Celae after all. Tyadda, then.”

  “How do you know the old tongue?” she demanded.

  Cullin held up both hands, palms up. “Look at me,” he said.

  I saw the change in her face as she looked at him carefully. She saw past the outward signs of a mere merchant train guard, and saw the man few people outside Tyra, except possibly me, ever saw. She recognized the tartan in the plaid he wore, then she saw the fine golden-yellow stripe through the blues and greens in it that marked his as belonging to the house of the Clan Laird. The gold stripe Cullin wore was narrow, indicating a younger son, but still not something to be scoffed at.

  “I see,” she said softly. She may have seen what he meant, but I failed to. I said nothing, though. She already had a low enough opinion of my intelligence and astuteness.

  “Might I sit down?” She had switched to Tyran, again accented lightly, but clearly understandable.

  Cullin reached out, snagged an empty chair with the toe of his boot and drew it across the rough plank floor to our table. The woman placed it more conveniently and sat. “I come from Skai,” she said. “It’s said the yrSkai and the Tyr were once one people centuries ago. Perhaps we are kin.”

  Cullin smiled lazily. “Mayhap,” he agreed. “Whom do you seek?”

  “A man of my country,” she said. “Kin to the Prince of Skai.”

  “His name?”

  She shook her head. “I don’t know. All I know is his mother was Ytwydda, daughter of Prince Kyffen. She disappeared on the eve of her marriage to the oldest son of the Prince of Dorian, some twenty-seven years ago. We have learned she had a son.”

  Cullin raised one eyebrow. “Tyadda Seer?” he asked.

  He had startled her again, but she nodded. “Yes. The son would be twenty-six or twenty-seven now.”

  “But you have no idea what he looks like?”

  She shook her head.

  “A difficult assignment,” Cullin said, pouring another mug of ale and offering it to her. “You don’t know his name, you don’t know what he looks like. How do you propose to recognize him when you find him, provided, of course, you do find him in the first place.”

  “I’ll know him,” she said with conviction. She frowned. “There was a young man this morning. A clansman like yourself. He carried a Celae Rune Blade.... He might know something. I’d like to know where he got that sword.”

  Cullin laughed. “You mean my son, Kian?”

  She sat up straight. “Your son?”

  I had been sitting back in the shadows, watching the woman as she spoke. Gradually, I became aware of a tingling on the back of my neck. I put my hand up to rub the uncomfortable itch, but it wouldn’t go away. There was something about the woman that made me uneasy, something besides the unpleasant prickle of magic I had felt when our swords crossed this morning, but I couldn’t put my finger on it.

  “Who sent you to me?” Cullin asked.

  “My father,” she said. “He said you had helped him once before. His name is Jorddyn ap Tiernyn—”

  “Oh, gods,” I said. “And you’re Kerridwen al Jorddyn.”

  She turned to stare at me. “How do you know my name?”

  I leaned forward into the light, the prickle on the back of my neck intensifying. “You’ve changed a lot since you were thirteen,” I said. “I trust your headache has disappeared.”

  IX

  Kerridwen al Jorddyn leaped to her feet and stared at me. “You?” she cried. “It was you who Healed me back then?”

  I sat up straighter. “Yes,” I said.

  I knew better by now than to expect gratitude, but even then, her reaction surprised me. She slapped her hand down on the table hard enough to make the ale in the mugs slosh over onto the scarred planking, placed both hands on the table and leaned forward intensely, glaring at me. “You idiot,” she said softly. “You stupid, ignorant, barbaric imbecile. Do you know what you’ve done?”

  I stared at her. “What I’ve done?” I repeated blankly.

  “You dim-witted fool!” She leaned farther forward, her eyes flashing sparks. “How could you be so bloody stupid?”

  I stood and placed my own hands on the table, leaning forward to glare back at her. “Now wait just a moment,” I said, confused and angry.

  “No, you wait just a moment,” she cried. “And to make everything worse, you had to go and kiss me, too. You idiot! You feckless--”

  “Now, look—”

  She raised her fist and shook it in my face. “You look,” she said shrilly. “Didn’t you feel it when you crossed swords with me?”

  “What, the magic?” I shook my head. What was the woman trying to get at? “Yes, I felt it and I hated it.”

  “How could you be so incredibly stupid?”

  “Me, stupid?” I blinked, then jabbed my finger at her. “You were the one who tried to take my head off!”

  “Don’t you know anything?” She kept her voice low, but the intensity in it had the same effect as a shout. “By all the seven gods and goddesses, don’t you know anything at all, you cretin? Do you know what you’ve done?”

  “How could I know what I’ve done when I’m just a stupid barbarian?” I demanded. “Suppose you try explaining it to me. Words of one syllable or less. I’m only a barbaric idiot, remember.”

  She made a disgusted noise with teeth and tongue and slammed one fist down onto the table. Again, the ale sloshed.

  Cullin remained sitting back comfortably in his chair, looking back and forth between the two of us, highly entertained. “Your turn, I believe, my lady,” he said to her, smiling pleasantly.

  Kerridwen directed her glare at him for a moment, then drew a deep breath, struggling for control. “When you Healed me all those years ago,” she said, “it began a bonding. And when you kissed me, then crossed swords with me, the swords completed it. We’re bonded, you imbecile.” Her voice rose. I’ve never heard anyone scream so quietly before. “Bonded, damn you. It was never supposed to happen with anyone but—” She broke off and put both hands to her face for a moment, scrubbing them across her eyes and cheeks. When she dropped them, she seemed calmer. “Do you know what that means?”

  “No,” I replied, a little calmer myself now, too. But I couldn’t help remembering the flood of images that swept through my mind all those years ago when I had cupped the delicate temples of a thirteen-year-old child between my hands. Was that a bonding? Or was it simply part of the Healing? And that impression of the air aro
und us fizzing when I kissed her, and the thrumming sensation as our swords crossed this morning had been unlike any reaction to magic I’d ever had before. Surely not a bonding.

  She groped for the chair behind her and pulled it back to the table so she could sit on it. Without speaking, Cullin handed her a mug of ale. She took a long swallow, then looked at me, her expression bleak. “If it was a proper bond, it means our lives are woven together,” she said more quietly. “One life, two bodies, if it was proper.” She shook her head. “But you’re not Celae. I can hope it wasn’t a proper bond. Perhaps it’s not permanent.”

  The thought of being bonded to a woman like her was a bit overwhelming. She was most emphatically not what I visualized when I thought of a life mate. I wanted no more of it than she. “I certainly don’t feel bonded,” I said firmly.

  She slanted an oblique glance at me, but said nothing.

  “Are you two through shouting at each other?” Cullin asked, still amused.

  “I wasn’t shouting,” Kerridwen al Jorddyn said with cold dignity. She looked at me again. “How do you come by a Celae Rune Blade?” she asked. “Let me see it again.”

  I sat back and folded my arms on my chest. “You make a lot of demands, my lady,” I said coldly. “Do they not teach common politeness in Skai or in Celi?”

  Her lips tightened. “Please,” she said as if it hurt her mouth.

  I drew the sword from its scabbard on my back and laid it on the table. “I told you this morning.” I said. “I stole it.”

  “Rune Blade?” Cullin reached out one blunt finger and ran it down the blade across the runes. “I’ve never seen runes on the blade,” he said. He glanced quizzically at the woman, then at me. “You never mentioned runes, Kian.”

  I shrugged. “I thought it unimportant,” I said. “I can’t read them.”

  The woman shook her head. “But you can’t steal a Celae Rune Blade,” she said. “It’s not possible—”