The Shadowsteel Forge (The Dark Ability Book 5)

by D. K. Holmberg

  “How did Jessa’s father get you out?”

  “Other than cutting out Venass’s ‘gift’?” Haern touched the scar along his cheek.

  Rsiran nodded. “He would have needed to have some Healing ability.”

  “Not many with that other than Della.”

  “Then how did he?”

  “That’s between him and me. All you need to know is there was a price, and he paid it. Because of that, I owed him.” Haern took a deep breath and punched the tree, leaving an indentation in the trunk. “With what happened to him when he was caught, and what happened to her… well, I owed her father my life and promised that I would do whatever I needed to keep her safe.”

  Rsiran circled the tree until he was standing in front of Haern, and forced the man to meet his eyes. “You’re the reason he was captured. The reason he stole.”

  Haern nodded. “Lost his hand because of me. And then his life when it got infected. Nothing I could do for him, as much as I wanted to try. So you see, Rsiran, there’s a reason why I would do anything to keep Jessa safe.”

  “Haern… you know how I feel about her. You know that I, too, will do whatever it takes to keep her safe.” That had been the reason he’d fortified his smithy, and the reason that he was willing to go after the Forgotten, and even Venass if it came to it. He would do what he needed to keep his friends, but especially Jessa, safe.

  Haern grunted. “Know that now. I wouldn’t tell you these things otherwise. That’s why you need to keep working. This business with Venass. They aren’t like the Forgotten, who play by rules you understand coming from Elaeavn. Venass, well, they make their own rules. You’ve seen some of it, but when—or if—you truly make an attempt to engage—then you’ll learn how far they will go, and you’ll have to decide how far you’re willing to go. That’s what I want you to be ready for, Rsiran. Something you can’t understand until it comes at you.”

  Rsiran nodded at Haern, wondering what he might be required to do in order to stop Venass. What might he need to do to finally keep everyone he cared about safe? How far was he willing to go?

  Chapter 7

  Rsiran sat at the Wretched Barth, staring into the mug of ale, wishing he had answers that wouldn’t come to him. Seval telling him that his grandfather had made the medallion did nothing but raise more questions. The level of detail in the medallion was the kind that Rsiran had not seen before. Even with what he’d demonstrated—mostly to himself—by creating the sjihn tree out of lorcith, he still didn’t know if he would be able to bury another shape inside of one.

  “You need to stop asking so many questions,” Brusus said. He tapped the dice he held in his hand and then shook them and, with a flick of his wrist, sent them spilling across the table. “I’m surprised the alchemists thinks they can convince the Smith Guild to legitimize you. Something like that Rsiran… damn. That is valuable in ways that we don’t even know yet.”

  Rsiran smiled. “I’m sure you could come up with ways for it to be valuable. But, from what I’ve heard, the guilds aren’t necessarily working well together. So the alchemists might not hold much sway over the smiths.”

  “Not sure that matters. Besides, if you can get legitimized in the eyes of the Smith Guild, think of what we could do!”

  “Like selling more of my work?”

  “Ah, you say that like it’s a bad thing. I seem to recall that I’ve helped you out a fair bit.”

  Rsiran looked up. “I didn’t tell you that I met a man who wanted five talens for one of my knives.”

  Brusus sent the dice skidding across the table. “Five?”

  Rsiran nodded. “In Cort.”

  He took a shaky breath and reached for the dice. “Cort isn’t really a nice place, Rsiran.”

  “Thyr isn’t really a nice place, either.”

  Brusus laughed. “Yeah, I suppose we can say that about most of the cities outside of Elaeavn. Why were you in Cort in the first place?”

  “I was following the man who attacked Alyse and ended up tracking someone I sensed Sliding while in the forest.”

  “You need to be careful. Chasing after someone and Sliding when you don’t even know where it’s taking you? Do you think he knew you were following him? Were you led there intentionally?”

  Rsiran hadn’t come up with an answer to that. Whoever it was, he was able to Slide, and though he’d Slid to another unknown city on the way, Cort seemed to be the destination. Rsiran was certain of that. But why Cort, and why make a stop to visit a trader?

  The kitchen door opened, and Alyse came out carrying a large tray burdened with three plates and four mugs. She balanced it well. From here, Rsiran could see that the angry bruise on her cheek hadn’t fully faded. “I’m not sure Elaeavn is all that much different. We want to be, and pretend our city is better than others, but is it really?”

  Brusus shrugged. “It’s home, though. More now than it ever was before.”

  When Jessa joined them and sat next to Rsiran, he nodded. “It’s home,” he agreed.

  But even here, even in the place that he called home, he had questions and wasn’t sure that he would ever find the answers that he sought. Why had his father kept so much from him? What more did his mother know? He might have to go to her again for answers. Now that Alyse was safe, maybe he owed it to her to share that. That had been the one thing that his father had wanted as well.

  “Is she happy?” he asked Brusus as he watched his sister serving customers.

  “She’s a tough one. Likes to have things a particular way. Can’t say that she’s wrong most of the time, either. But happy? Ah, Rsiran, I’m not sure your sister will ever be happy, not with the way things went for her.”

  At least she was safe. Maybe that was enough.

  Alyse stopped at their table and set a plate in front of Rsiran. “You need to eat. Brusus tells me that you don’t get enough food. I made this one for you.”

  Rsiran set his mug of ale down. He hadn’t expected that from her. “You made it?”

  Alyse had always been a wonderful cook, but an even better baker. If this was her work, and she had been the one to make the bread and the meats, the Barth might finally have something worth eating again. After Lianna’s death, her sister had taken over the tavern, and the food had taken a turn for the worse. When Brusus purchased the Barth, he’d deemed himself the new cook, but that hadn’t resulted in a significant improvement in the quality of the food. Rsiran might eat more, but there was definitely room for improvement in the quality.

  “Thank you,” he said.

  She huffed and nodded. “Thank me after you eat.” With that, she turned away from the table and made her way back into the kitchen.

  “She’s cooking now, too,” Brusus said. “I couldn’t keep her away from the kitchen if I tried. She told me that she couldn’t stand serving food that smelled like what I made. I thought she was just being rude, but then I tasted what she offered. Damn if she wasn’t right. Of course, I wasn’t going to tell her that she was right. Don’t need another Lareth getting a big head on me.”

  “What do you mean by ‘another’?” Rsiran challenged.

  “Hey, you’re the one who went out and sought recognition from the guild. Glad you did it, but not sure that was the right play.”

  Rsiran smiled at the playful look on Brusus’s face. “This is for you,” he said. He pulled the lorcith-forged sjihn tree out from under his chair.

  It was wrapped in cloth, mostly to keep safe as he carried it. As Brusus peeled the wrapping away, his eyes went wider and wider and his hands started shaking. “What is this?”

  “This was my demonstration to Seval, who then presented it to the guild as my journeyman project,” Rsiran said.

  Rsiran’s attention was pulled away when he saw Alyse come out from the kitchen. She saw Brusus and started toward him but stopped short, a flush coming to her cheeks, and turned back toward the kitchen.

  “You made this?”

  Rsiran watched his sister’s ret
reat, considering the expression he thought he’d seen on her face. Then he turned back to Brusus, nodding his head. “It’s the best that I could do. Jessa thought that you would want it. Not sure that she was right, but…”

  “This… this is amazing.” He stared at the tree, tears welling in his eyes. “It’s almost like I can feel her with me.” Brusus swallowed and took a deep breath. “Thank you, Rsiran.”

  Brusus continued to stare at the tree, saying nothing. His hands still trembled, and he didn’t touch his ale or the dice, both surprising given that it was Brusus.

  “Maybe I was wrong about you getting a big head,” he said. “Maybe you have what you’re supposed to have.”

  Rsiran smiled. “It just seemed the right thing to make.”

  Brusus stared at it for a little while longer and then stood and carried it to the hearth at the back of the room. There he set it on the mantel and stared a few moments longer. When he turned back, he had a resolute expression in his eyes as he returned to the table. “We need to honor her memory.”

  “I thought that was what you were doing by running her tavern.”

  “That doesn’t honor her. That carries on her work, but it’s not the same.” He grabbed the dice and shook them, staring at them as they came up Watcher’s Eyes. “I’ve been trying to figure out what I need to be doing. Running the tavern is all well and good, and I like the legitimacy of being allowed to run it, but I feel like I’m missing something.”

  “Like breaking into somewhere?” Jessa suggested.

  Brusus smiled. “Maybe that’s all there is.”

  “I think there’s something more,” Rsiran said. He made a point of not meeting Jessa’s eyes; he hadn’t really spoken to her much about his thoughts after meeting with Seval. She would understand—he knew that she would—but he felt much like Brusus had been feeling. There had to be something more than what he was doing. He hadn’t realized that until meeting with Seval, and realizing how much he wanted the recognition of the guild. He’d managed to tell himself that it didn’t matter, that he was able to deal with the fact that he would always have an unsanctioned guild, but he wasn’t sure that was true anymore.

  But first, he had to find stability. Until he knew that whatever contingent of the Forgotten that was left wasn’t going to come crashing in on him, and that Venass wouldn’t continue to chase him simply because of his ability, he wasn’t sure he could let his guard down to actually enjoy the recognition of the guild. But that meant he would have to do something he had been avoiding. That meant he would need to attempt to do something about both of the organizations that were after him.

  “Ah, probably. Having stopped the Forgotten doesn’t mean that Venass has given up.”

  Rsiran shook his head. The man he’d followed into the forest was likely from Venass. Which meant they were still after his family. And worse, if they risked coming into Elaeavn, it meant they weren’t afraid as they had once been. “I don’t think they have.”

  “What do you intend to do, Rsiran?” Brusus asked.

  Jessa looked from him to Brusus, before glancing up to the lorcith tree sitting on the mantle. She sighed, and Rsiran knew that she understood what he would have to do. That he couldn’t sit around and do nothing. Jessa had known him long enough to know that whenever he chose to act—and admittedly, it always put him at risk, it was to protect her, and others he loved. But his actions often put them at risk as well. That had to end. He was thankful that she didn’t try to dissuade him or claim, as she always did, that she could take care of herself. It was his presence in their lives that exposed them all to these dangers. It was his responsibility to remove the threats that remained, so they could all live in relative peace once again.

  When he didn’t answer, Brusus nodded. “Be smart, Rsiran. That’s all I ask of you. I know you’re skilled, and I know that you’re capable, but please just know that concern flows both ways.”

  Chapter 8

  Outside the tavern, Jessa took his hand. “Walk with me a ways,” she said.

  “We don’t have to walk.”

  “What, and let you Slide us? You’ve been walking all throughout the city lately. Don’t think that I haven’t noticed. I think Brusus noticed, too, but he won’t say anything. It’s almost like you’re afraid to Slide these days.”

  “I’m not afraid.”

  “Then what is it? You think you might lose your ability for some reason, so you want to learn our streets the old-fashioned way? Or you think… Great Watcher only knows, Rsiran. But I know you’re trying to prepare for something. It’s like what you do when you work with Haern. You think you’re preparing.”

  “I am preparing.”

  “I don’t think you are. I’m not sure what you’re doing, but it’s not preparing. Unless you’re willing to work with the alchemists…”

  “I don’t know if I can.”

  Jessa nodded. “Them grabbing your sister probably wasn’t the best way to convince you. But you’re preparing and biding your time for something that might never come to pass. And neither you nor anyone else, not even the alchemists, can really know what that something might be.“

  They left Sjahl Street, the wide road that ran along the Barth, and turned onto a side street. As they did, Rsiran knew where Jessa led him.

  “She’s not going to want to see us at this time of night,” Rsiran said.

  Jessa paused and glanced back at him. “What are you talking about? Remember the first time you met her? That was much later than this.”

  “But I needed healing.”

  “I’m not sure that you don’t right now,” she said.

  Rsiran shook his head and said nothing more until they reached Della’s door. The Healer lived in a tidy house on the edge of Lower Town. Rsiran had Slid to her home—or been pulled as Della influenced his Sliding—often enough, but hadn’t been to visit since learning the connection between them.

  Before they could knock, the door swung open and Della stood in the doorway with her hair in a neat bun and a striped shawl wrapped around her shoulders. The wrinkles at the corners of her eyes had smoothed over the last few weeks, not as deep or as pronounced as they had been, but then she hadn’t been asked to Heal and save anyone in a few weeks. The last person she’d Healed had been Jessa, after the attack by the Forgotten, when Inna had nearly killed her.

  “You brought him,” Della said.

  Jessa nodded. “I told you that I would.”

  Rsiran glanced over to her. “Why do you want to see me, Della?”

  She waved them inside and started to stir three mugs of mint tea while they settled into chairs around the hearth. Every time he’d come to Della’s when he first met her had been because either he or someone he cared about was injured. Tonight, he saw her home through different eyes. There was a certain hominess to Della’s place. Even the familiar scent of the mint tea soothed him.

  Della came around her counter walking with less of a limp than he’d seen in a while. She handed them the mugs of tea and then stood with her back to the fire. “Yes, I asked Jessa to bring you to me. It has been too long since your last visit, Rsiran, and I know that the last time you were here, you learned things that you still haven’t dealt with.” She raised a hand to silence him before he could even say anything. “Don’t pretend that you have adjusted to what you’ve learned. I think I’ve come to know you well enough that I can read when you’re struggling.”

  Rsiran held the bracelets up to Della. He’d seen what happened when someone tried to Read him while he wore them.

  “I said read, not Read. I don’t need to use any ability to know how you have been struggling. You’re hiding from the guild when you should be embracing them. You should be leaning on those who can help. And you haven’t come to me, when I know that you want to.”

  “Because you’ll tell me the answers I need?”

  Della shook her head. “There are answers I can provide, but there are some you must find on your own.”

  Rs
iran took a sip of the tea. It was hot, but not too hot, and tingled on his tongue. He savored the flavor, welcoming the warmth and the way that it instantly began to soothe him, much as it always had. He took another sip and tension began to leave his shoulders, tension that he hadn’t even really been aware that he’d been carrying.

  “Why didn’t you tell me sooner?” he asked Della, unable to mask the hurt in his voice. Della had always been fair to him and had provided answers and guidance when so often he had none. So for her to keep from him the fact that she was related to him, knowing that he had suffered so much with his family, had hurt him more than he had been able to put into words.

  “Would it have mattered?”

  “You let me kill Evaelyn. She was my family.”

  Della leaned forward, close enough that he could smell the mint on her breath mixed with a bitter scent. “You’re wrong there, Rsiran. She was my family once, but even that was no longer. And she was never your family.” Della took a sharp breath. “Your family is this wonderful woman, Brusus down at the tavern, even Haern, though you struggle with admitting that you have a connection with him. They are your family, the ones that you have chosen, and who have chosen you. That is who you have an obligation to, not the blood line that thought to abandon you long before you ever met them.”

  Rsiran stared at her, unblinking. “If that is true, I should have left Alyse. And I refuse to believe that would have been the right thing to do. Regardless of what you might think, there is something to the blood connection. I refuse to believe that it is irrelevant, something easily denied.”

  Della smiled at him. “But you had a connection with Alyse before. That is why she could be redeemed. Perhaps your father and mother, too, though I do not See them clearly. But Evaelyn… Evaelyn made her choice long ago, and you had no family obligation to her, to try to help redeem her.” She sighed. “As to what I hid from you, there are many things that I have needed to keep from you, but the fact that you—that we—are related, trust that I wasn’t even certain, not until only recently.”