by Ann Marston
Light and shadow, day and night. My sword and his. Flashing, flaring, and I was lost in the intricacies of the dance. Clash and clang of steel against tempered steel. Fire and searing heat from my blade; darkness and foetid chill from his.
How we danced, the blade and I. Lost in the complex movements, the precise rituals of the dance. Back and forth under the glowing sky. Slicing, parrying. Slash and riposte. Cut and carve. Whistling blades flashing—mine singing, his howling.
We danced, the General and I. Death in his face. Murder in my heart. Back and forth, we battled each other. Muscles shrieking in protest, weariness building inexorably, the sword heavy in my hands. His face drawn into lines of strain.
I saw the opening I sought so desperately. A sudden, slight uncertainty in his stance, a hesitancy in his guard. I leaped forward, taut with purpose.
I swung the sword in a short, backhand sweep. The glowing blade flicked under his guard and into the muscles of his belly, spilling his intestines around him in a bloody pile. The black sword spun off into the dark at the edge our circle. Shock and astonishment widened his eyes as he dropped to his knees.
“My son—will kill—your son,” he gasped, then fell to his side, glazed and empty eyes looking through me, beyond me to eternity.
I stood leaning on my sword, gasping for breath, sweat running in streams down my face, my shirt soaked, the waistband of my breeks sodden with it. I reached up with a hand that might have been made of lead and wiped the stinging moisture from my eyes.
The General lay crumpled on the grass. As I watched, a dark mist rose from him and slowly dissipated in the clean air of the circle. His body withered and shrivelled until it was little more than a husk, frail enough for the gentle breeze to shred and fray.
Something moved beyond the circle. I straightened slowly to meet the opponent who stood just outside the circle, cloaked in shadow, a darkness of his own making swirling around him. He was younger than the General, his features less firmly shaped. The dark aura of power that surrounded him was thinner, more tenuous.
“That is mine,” he said, his voice a rustling whisper in the mist surrounding him. He pointed at the black sword resting in the grass an arm’s-span beyond the General’s clawed fingers.
Still breathing unevenly, I raised my sword and moved to stand between him and the black sword.
“Then come and claim it. But you’ll have to go through me.” I stepped back, inviting him into the circle with me.
He stepped forward, barely onto the grass. The mist parted around his face, revealing features familiar, yet foreign. He glanced at the black sword, then back at me.
“You cannot touch it,” he said. “Remember how it burned you when you tried to take it from my father?”
“I don’t want it,” I said.
“Then you have no objection if I take it?”
I grinned, baring my teeth at him. “Come and try.”
He held up both empty hands. “I have no weapon.”
“But I do.”
I sensed rather than saw him tense himself to dive for the sword. I lifted my sword and slammed the brightly glowing blade down on the obsidian sword. The glaring explosion nearly blinded and deafened me. The black sword shattered under my blade. Numbing shock travelled up my arms and into my chest, smashing the breath out of me.
My opponent howled with rage and scrambled away from the dark splinters on the grass, a long fragment embedded in the flesh of his palm. He rolled back to the edge of the circle and staggered to his feet, cradling his injured hand to his chest.
“It was mine,” he shouted. “Curse you! It was mine.”
I lowered my sword and rubbed my tingling arms. My sword still sang a high, clear note of triumph. I had no breath to reply. I merely watched him as I stood, sucking in deep, gasping gulps of air.
The dark mist swirled around him again, and I thought it might be thinner, more tenuous, now. He looked at me, black eyes glittering with rage.
“You have won for now,” he said quietly.
“I have gained time,” I said.
He gave me a small, mocking bow. “Put it to good use,” he said. “You should have killed me, too, when you could.” He stepped back out of the circle and vanished into the whorling mist.
***
I came back to myself, panting and gasping for breath, standing in the room of the merchant’s house. The body of the General lay at my feet, his blood staining the carpet in a wide, black pool. Fingers like talons reached for the hilt of a sword that was not there.
I lowered my sword, and fell to my knees, exhausted. The boy Horbad came slowly from the hearth to stand before me. The hard, dark aura of latent power shimmered around his head. He stood before me, trembling, cradling an injured hand to his chest.
“My father is dead,” he cried, his voice shrill and piercing. “You killed my father.”
I looked at him. He would grow to be the mortal enemy of my son. But he was only a child. A five-year-old boy. The sword in my hands twitched, but I could not bring myself to lift it and remove that childish head from the small shoulders. Keylan would have to learn to deal with him, for I could not.
I looked into the small, immature Maeduni face. It wavered, began to change, until another face lay superimposed above it. An adult face. The face he would wear when he was grown. He laughed as he saw my recognition.
“You killed my father,” he said. “But you didn’t kill me.” He turned and ran, stumbling across the carpet and out into the passageway.
Chest heaving, breath still rasping in my throat, I crawled across the carpet to Kerri. She lay slumped against the wall, Keylan cradled in her arms. Groggily, she looked up at me.
“You disappeared,” she muttered. “You and the General. What happened?”
“We went somewhere else,” I said. “It’s all right, sheyala.” Keylan moved sluggishly in her arms, whole and unharmed. “Are you all right?”
She nodded. “You used magic?”
I nodded. “I used the sword’s magic.”
She looked up at me, then smiled and shook her head. “You used your own magic,” she said. “The sword always responded to you.” Keylan stirred again and she stroked his forehead soothingly. He reached up and put his arms around her neck, burrowing his face into the hollow of her throat.
“Is he all right?”
“I think so,” she said. “It must have been a holding spell. As soon as you and the General vanished, it broke the spell.”
I gathered them both into my arms, my cheek tight against Kerri’s hair. “It’s time to go home,” I said.
Epilogue
Dun Eidon, ancestral home of the Prince of Skai, sat like a jewel at the head of the deep inlet where the River Eidon emptied into the sea. Built of white stone, its graceful colonnades and soaring towers glistened against the background of winter-bare trees and mountains, secure behind its tall, crenellated walls of granite. A small village nestled close to the walls, the neatly thatched roofs of the buildings golden in the sun against the layer of snow still lying thick on the ground. At the foot of the road leading down from the west gate of the palace, a stone jetty thrust out into the clear, blue water of The Ceg. Two tall-masted ships rocked gently at anchor at the end of the pier amid a cluster of small fishing boats like two swans amongst a flock of ducks.
On the side of the mountain rising above the palace, surrounded by twelve oaks hung with strands of ivy, the shrine of the Duality serenely overlooked the village and the harbour. Beyond the shrine stood a small stone circle, a dance of seven menhirs, each three times the height of a man, one for each of the gods and goddesses.
Below the palace between the village and the pier, men and boys trained with swords, spears and bows, some of them bare to the waist and sweating despite the late winter chill. The voices of the weaponsmasters rang clearly in the still air. Among the dozen or so small boys training with the Swordmaster, the bright red-gold hair of Keylan, Prince of Skai, stood out vividly in cont
rast with the dark gold or black hair of the others. At nearly five, and tall and sturdy for his age, the young prince demonstrated a marked aptitude, a grace and skill more common in older, more experienced boys.
Two men stood at the edge of the trampled snow defining the practice field, watching the boys practice. Red Kian of Skai, father and Regent to the young prince, stood taller and broader than the man beside him, his red hair glowing in the early afternoon sun. Jorddyn ap Tiernyn, Captain of the Company and Kian’s kin-father, watched the boy thoughtfully, critically appraising the prince’s skill.
“One day soon, he’ll be as proficient as you,” he said, relaxing and smiling as he watched his the child.
“As good as my uncle Cullin was,” Kian replied.
A horse and rider hurtled down the track from the palace, heedless of the slushy surface in their haste. Kian frowned at the recklessness, then stiffened as the rider brought the horse to a skidding halt only a bare metre away from the two men. The rider slid from the saddle in one smooth, skilful motion, and dropped to one knee in the snow.
“My lord Regent,” the boy said breathlessly, “I am sent to tell you the lady Kerridwen has been brought to bed early with the child and has need of you.”
Kian paled and glanced up at the palace behind him. “It’s still a fortnight ‘til Imbolc,” he said. “It’s too early--”
Jorddyn put his hand to Kian’s shoulder. “Go to her,” he said. “She’ll be all right, but best you go now.”
“I lost one wife to early childbed...”
Jorddyn smiled. “A fortnight early is not unusual for a first birth,” he said reassuringly. “Kerri herself was earlier than that, and both she and her mother came through it splendidly. Go now. I’ll bring Keylan and follow shortly.”
Kian ran for the horses tethered behind him and sprang to the saddle of his mount. He put heels to the horse’s flanks and bent low over the saddle as the horse leapt to a gallop.
***
People thronged the outer chamber of the apartment the Regent and his wife shared. Women hurried back and forth purposefully, faces set into harried and intent expressions. Kian shouldered his way through to the inner door. The midwife met him as he stepped through into the bedchamber.
“The lady Kerridwen does well,” she said briskly, anticipating his question. “And you have two fine sons.”
Kian glanced over her shoulder at the bed. Kerridwen lay with her eyes closed, a small weary smile turning up the corners of her mouth. Her hands lay folded peacefully across her flat belly. Kian looked back to the midwife.
“Two sons?” he asked, eyes widening in shock and surprise. “Two?”
The midwife laughed. “Twins, my lord Regent. Both healthy and strong. Beautiful children.”
But Kian wasn’t listening to her. He went quickly to the bed and fell to his knees, taking Kerri’s hand in his and pressing it to his lips. She opened her eyes and smiled at him. They had no need of words with each other.
The midwife placed the babies on the bed within the circle of Kerri’s arms. Kian looked down at them in awed silence. Finally, he said, “They have no hair.”
Kerri glared at him, then laughed and shook her head in fond resignation. “Of course they do,” she said softly. She reached out and stroked first one small head, then the other. “It’s so fine you can hardly see it, that’s all. In a fortnight or two, it will thicken.”
Kian looked doubtful, but he nodded. “What will you name them?” he asked.
“I thought we might call the eldest Tiernyn, for my grandfather,” she said. “And I’d like to call the younger Donaugh.”
He smiled. “It’s a good name,” he said. “They’re both good names.”
***
A silver crescent of moon tossed amongst the clouds above the crest of the mountains as Kian stood over the cradle where his newborn sons lay sleeping. He held his sword in both hands, one hand grasping the hilt, the flat of the blade against the palm of his other hand. Kingmaker, the sword was named. He had carried it for eleven years—seven years not knowing its purpose, and for the balance of that time, waiting for it to declare its true owner.
The sword glowed with a soft, lambent gleam, and a low musical note, like bell and harp together, sang quietly in the room. Slowly he knelt and held the blade above the tiny, sleeping form of first one child, then the other. As he held it over Tiernyn, the eldest, the glow brightened and the musical note became a joyous chord.
He climbed to his feet and took the sword to the window. Slowly, he traced the line of runes on one side of the blade. Take up the Strength of Celi. He looked at the words for a long time, then turned the blade over. The runes engraved into the blade on the other side glittered in the combined light of the moon and the glow of the blade. He reached out one finger and thoughtfully traced the words—the words he had never before been able to read.
Now lay me aside.
About the Author
Ann Marston has worked as a teacher, a flight instructor, an airline pilot, airport manager and literacy coordinator, and several other odd and assorted careers in between. While maintaining this weird schedule, she has also been writing most of her adult life.
Together with her friend Barb Galler-Smith, she teaches writing fantasy at Grant McEwan University in Edmonton, and mentors up-and-coming writers in a writers’ group that grew out of the writing classes. She lives in Edmonton with her daughter and their floppy eared dog.
Books Published by Five Rivers
NON-FICTION
Al Capone: Chicago’s King of Crime, by Nate Hendley
Crystal Death: North America’s Most Dangerous Drug, by Nate Hendley
Dutch Schultz: Brazen Beer Baron of New York, by Nate Hendley
Motivate to Create: a guide for writers, by Nate Hendley
The Organic Home Garden, by Patrick Lima and John Scanlan
Elephant’s Breath & London Smoke: historic colour names, definitions & uses, Deb Salisbury, editor
Stonehouse Cooks, by Lorina Stephens
NON-FICTION COMING SOON
John Lennon: a biography, by Nate Hendley
Stephen Truscott, by Nate Hendley
Shakespeare & Readers’ Theatre: Hamlet, by John Poulson
Shakespeare & Readers’ Theatre: Romeo and Juliet, by John Poulson
Shakespeare & Readers’ Theatre: Midsummer Night’s Dream, by John Poulson
FICTION
Immunity to Strange Tales, by Susan J. Forest
Growing Up Bronx, by H.A. Hargreaves
North by 2000+, a collection of short, speculative fiction, by H.A. Hargreaves
A Subtle Thing, by Alicia Hendley
Downshift, by Matt Hughes
Kingmaker’s Sword, by Ann Marston
Mik Murdoch, Boy-Superhero, by Michell Plested
Things Falling Apart, by J.W. Schnarr
And the Angels Sang: a collection of short speculative fiction, by Lorina Stephens
From Mountains of Ice, by Lorina Stephens
Shadow Song, by Lorina Stephens
FICTION COMING SOON
88, by M.E. Fletcher
A Method to the Madness: A Guide to the Super Evil, Jeff Hite and Michell Plested, editors
Old Growth, by Matt Hughes
Stitching Butterflies, by Shermin Nahid Kruse
The Western King, by Ann Marston
Broken Blade, by Ann Marston
Cloudbearer’s Shadow, by Ann Marston
King of Shadows, by Ann Marston
Sword and Shadow, by Ann Marston
Bane’s Choice, by Ann Marston
A Still and Bitter Grave, by Ann Marston
Diamonds in Black Sand, by Ann Marston
Caliban, by Lorina Stephens
The Rose Guardian, by Lorina Stephens
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