by Rachel Aaron
“If that’s how you see this playing out, you haven’t been paying attention,” Josef said, raising the Heart as he stepped into position. “I may not be much of a prince, but I am the best and, unless you surrender now, the last swordsman you will ever meet.”
“We’ll see about that,” Adela said, stepping into first position.
Josef looked her over. His instincts during the proving had been right. The stance Adela took now had none of the stiffness from before, and her fingers gripped her sword with a master’s assurance. But even so, even if she somehow was a master duelist, there was no way she could hope to beat the Heart of War with an infantry short sword.
He glanced down at the Heart. It was a pity to use it for a fight like this, but he didn’t have the luxury of a handicap. He needed to end this quickly and warn his mother. If he moved fast enough, he might even be able to save her. Josef gripped the Heart with both hands, sliding his feet forward across the stone. Finish it fast, he thought. Finish it now.
The Heart hummed in agreement, and they moved as one, bearing down on Adela like an iron wave. The princess’s eyes widened at his speed, but she didn’t try to dodge or spin away as she had in the Proving. Instead, she lifted her short, stocky blade and braced for the Heart’s impact. The short sword looked so pathetic before the Heart’s monstrous weight, Josef almost laughed. But Adela didn’t break her guard, even as the Heart struck her sword with the force of a mountain.
The two blades met with a scream of metal, and Josef watched in satisfaction as the short sword crumpled. He could feel the impact moving through her blade like the Heart was an extension of his own arm, but as he stepped in for the follow-through that would shatter Adela’s ribs, he realized something was wrong.
The short sword was still breaking. The metal was still folding in on itself, still crumpling like ash as it absorbed the Heart’s strike. Josef’s eyes widened. He could feel the blow spoiling even as he carried it, feel himself slowing as Adela slid backward, letting her sword break and break and break, drinking in the blow. Before the force could fade completely, Josef abandoned the strike. He swung the Heart back and turned midstep, using the last of his spoiled momentum to step out of her range, coming to a stop a few feet away with the Heart between him and Adela as he tried to figure out what had just happened.
Adela straightened with a smile and raised her sword, holding up the crumpled blade for Josef to see. Josef didn’t see how there had been enough metal in the sword to crumple as much as it had, let alone enough to absorb the enormous power of the Heart. He was still trying to make sense of it when Adela’s sword began to change. The etched words on the blade flashed with blinding light, and the crumpled blade began to straighten. The metal moved like a living thing as it pushed out of the stocky, confined shape of the short sword, growing longer, sharper, and slightly curved. The whole process took no more than a handful of seconds, and then Adela was holding a sword that looked nothing like the one she’d held a moment ago. The new blade glowed with a light of its own. It was delicate and straight now, without a single mark from the crumpled mess it had been moments before. Even the handle had changed, pushing out of the squat single hilt to a two-handed hold with a thick guard chased all around with stylized waves that seemed to dance across the glowing steel.
Josef kept his face neutral, refusing to let her see his surprise. “An awakened blade,” he said. “Are you a wizard as well as a traitor and a spy?”
“I could scarcely be a sleeper if I was a wizard,” Adela answered, swinging her newly changed sword in a whistling arc. “Wizards attract attention. To serve the Empress, we must be invisible. But this blade is not the crude, half-alert spirit you people call ‘awakened.’ Like me, it is a servant of the Empress.” She held the sword out for him. “What you see before you is one of the Hundred Conquerors, a treasure of the Empire given only to those who serve behind enemy lines.”
“Really?” Josef played along. “What’s it made of that it crumples like trash when struck? Tin?”
“Steel,” Adela said. “A mile of steel compressed into a blade by the Empress’s own hand.”
This time, Josef couldn’t hide his surprise. “A mile of steel?” he cried. “How can a mile of steel become a blade?”
“All things bow before the Empress,” Adela said. “Metal is no different. It followed her command as everything does, becoming her soldier, just as I am. The Hundred Conquerors have served thousands of soldiers in countless battles, passing from sleeper to sleeper as the Empress conquers the world. Each sword has been trained over hundreds of years to follow pressure commands so that even the spirit deaf can use it to its full potential. This blade cannot be defeated, it cannot be escaped, and, as you just saw, it cannot be broken.” Her eyes flashed with a cruel light. “Not even by the Heart of War.”
Josef’s mouth twitched. After all her revelations, he shouldn’t be surprised she knew his sword. But… “If you think a mile of steel will be enough to save you from the Heart, you’ve got another thing coming.”
Adela sneered, but whatever she meant to say, she never got the chance. Josef was already flying toward her. This time, he kept both hands on the Heart’s hilt, letting the blade guide him. He could feel the Heart’s spirit moving through him, filling him until he could see the mountain behind his eyes, the great peak cutting the clouds, the deep roots holding up the world. An awakened blade was nothing. A mile of steel was nothing. The Heart of War moved with a mountain’s rage, and Josef gave himself to it, letting its strength take him over with a furious cry.
Again, Adela raised her blade to parry, but her smug look faded as the blades collided. As before, her glowing sword crumpled, the metal folding over on itself so fast it sparked, but this time, it wasn’t enough. Josef’s cry became a roar as the Heart’s power thundered through him, forcing Adela and her collapsing sword backward. They crashed together into the wall of the watchtower with an explosion that carried them through the stone and out into the air. As the blow finally left him, so did the overwhelming will of the Heart, and Josef realized he was falling. In front of him, almost lost in the enormous cloud of dust and broken stone, Adela was falling as well, her face a mask of shock and horror as the last of the Heart’s force ran through her crumpled blade to finally hit her body. As he felt the strike connect at last, Josef got one final glimpse of her face screwing up in pain before the blow sent her flying out of the dust cloud like an arrow.
Josef was still trying to see where she’d gone when he crashed into something hard and brittle. He grunted as he hit and rolled on instinct. The landing hurt far less than it should have. The echo of the Heart’s power was still crashing through him, drowning out every other sensation. He’d joined with his sword before, but never like that. The black blade had moved not with him, but through him. Its power was his power, its will, his will, and as it began to drain away, Josef felt emptier than ever. But as he lay still and fought to steady himself, the Heart’s hilt pressed against his hands, warning him that the fight was not over.
Like a man waking from a deep sleep, Josef shot up and the world returned. He was in a crater on the roof of the palace’s western wing. The watchtower, what was left of it, loomed above him. Its entire north face was gone, the stone sundered by the force of the Heart’s blow. There were great holes in the tile roofs of the stylish buildings around the castle where the blown-out chunks of the broken tower had landed, but Josef’s eyes skipped over them, looking for his target.
Adela lay in the ruins of what had been the top floor of the most prestigious bank in Osera, her body cradled by a great wave of shining steel. The metal moved as he watched, throwing off the rubble, and Josef cursed as it lifted Adela to her feet. When she was steady, the metal retreated, flowing back into the shape of the long, curved sword.
She shook her head, as though trying to clear it, and Josef started to grin. Challenge the Heart, would she? But the weakness lasted less than a second. At once, her head snapped up, her eye
s finding him instantly among the wreckage. Josef got to his feet, watching to see what she would do. Even after cutting through a mile of steel and the wall of the watchtower, the Heart’s blow had been enough to throw her far. It was a long jump from the wrecked bank where she stood to the palace roof. He planted his feet, easing the Heart in his hands as he waited to see how she would handle it, but Adela made no move to close the distance. Instead, she raised her sword, pointing the tip at Josef’s chest in challenge.
Smirking, Josef held up the Heart in answer, his mouth opening to taunt her into a wild charge.
He never got a chance. The moment he moved the Heart, the tip of Adela’s silver blade shot out. It flew like an arrow, cutting through the air with a screaming whistle. By the time Josef realized what was happening, it was nearly too late. With no time to duck, he defended the only way he could. He raised his sword and flipped it, holding the Heart’s broadside like a shield over his chest. For a split second, it looked like this would work, but then the tip of Adela’s blade flickered, and the sliver shot forked left in midair. There was no time to adjust, no time for Josef to do anything but brace himself as the sword point slipped around the Heart’s defense and stabbed through his left shoulder.
It happened so quickly, there wasn’t even any pain. One moment he was braced, the next a length of shining steel pierced his shoulder like a spit through a roast. He could feel the metal in his muscle, slick and burning hot from the expansion. He was still staring dumbly at it when the blade began to lift. Across the expanse, Adela was raising her sword, lifting Josef up until his feet were dangling.
Now it hurt. Every centimeter she raised him sent a new bolt of pain sharp enough to make his vision go dark radiating from his shoulder. He struggled because he felt he should, but it was a futile effort. Her sword had skewered him like a speared boar. He couldn’t even slide himself off the blade. All he could do was grip the Heart as Adela lifted him farther and farther into the air like he weighed nothing.
Just when Josef was sure his arm was going to rip off, Adela flicked her wrist. The sword snapped in a mirror of the motion, slinging Josef off the end. He was dimly aware of tumbling through the air, but his real attention was on the blinding pain of the sword as it slid out of his body. The agony made him sluggish, too sluggish to do more than tuck his head as Adela’s throw sent him through one of the palace chimneys. The bricks crumbled when he hit, falling on him in a rain of broken stone as he tumbled down the slope of the palace roof until, at last, he hit one of the stone gutters and stopped.
For several moments, all he could do was lie still and try to breathe. His body was seizing up around him, his blood grinding to a halt in his veins. His right arm was a bar of pain, but even though he couldn’t feel his right hand, or form a coherent thought, Josef clung to the Heart instinctively, knowing without knowing that it was his best chance of survival.
As his mind slowly came back to the present, the first thing he heard was the soft hiss of steel as Adela’s sword shrank back to its usual shape. Groaning at the effort, Josef turned his head to see her walk to the edge of the bank’s broken roof and hold out her sword again. He sucked in a breath, bracing for another blow, but her sword was pointed down. The blade extended again with a metallic whine, and he heard the stone shatter as the tip hit the street below. Then, using her sword as a pole, Adela stepped out into the open gulf of air between the bank’s ruined roof and the palace. The sword began to fall at once, carrying her across the gap until she landed neatly on the edge of the palace roof. Her sword retracted the moment her feet were firm, returning to the long, gently curved blade as Adela advanced on Josef.
He sank to the ground, bringing the Heart up as high as he could. The wound in his shoulder burned like a hot poker, but the Heart’s strength was already washing the pain away. He probably could have stood if he’d really tried, but Josef stayed put, watching Adela as she stopped by his feet. Her braid was skewed from the impact earlier, and the wind whipped her long hair across her face as she stood over him, surveying her kill. Her sword shone with harsh light, steam rising off the blade in long tendrils as she planted the point between the tiles and leaned on it like a walking stick.
“Still alive?” she cooed.
That was when Josef struck. He pushed up with his uninjured shoulder, the Heart of War moving in a black flash as he swung straight for Adela’s neck. For a split second, he saw true panic in her eyes, and then her fingers tightened on the hilt of her sword.
The blade responded instantly. It flew out like a silver rope, loping up and back with a scream of steel to hook the Heart’s blade. Josef grunted as the Heart of War jerked in his hands. Had he been standing, he could have held the blow on course, but striking up from the ground and on one injured shoulder, he simply didn’t have the strength. Adela’s sword pulled the Heart’s trajectory off at the last second, flipping the black blade and Josef with it.
Josef cried out as he slammed into the tiled roof for the third time, rolling as he hit in a desperate effort to save his injured shoulder. He ended up on his stomach, but just as he kicked his legs under to get up, Adela’s boot landed on his neck and slammed him down again.
Adela leaned over him, panting wildly as she ground her boot down with all her weight. Josef gritted his teeth and shifted, turning his head so he could see her face. She was glaring down at him with pure, righteous fury. One hand held her sword, its flexible blade still wrapped around the Heart, but her other hand was pressed against her neck, staunching a shallow wound half an inch from her windpipe. Despite the boot grinding into his neck, Josef grinned. She wasn’t quite as fast as she liked to think.
“How are you still alive?” Adela whispered, her voice shaking with rage. “You should be bleeding to death.” Her dark eyes darted to his hands, still gripping the Heart of War with all their might. “I wonder.”
She jerked her fingers along her sword’s hilt. The flexible blade followed the motion, slinging down in a flashing arc. Josef’s eyes widened, and he dropped the Heart a second before the whipped blade would have sliced off his fingers. Adela laughed above him, but Josef had both hands free now. He reached up with his free arm, fingers closing around her boot before he threw her as hard as he could. Adela’s laughter cut off with a strangled cry as she fell, but Josef had already put her out of his mind. Every sense he had was focused on the black blade lying crooked on the tiles. He’d been separated from his sword for only a few seconds, but already the pain was threatening to knock him out. The Heart was all that mattered. If he couldn’t reach it, he was down for good. But as his fingers brushed the hilt, a flash of silver cut him off.
Adela’s sword whistled over his head, landing on the Heart with a whine of cutting metal. Josef snatched his fingers back with a curse as the flexible blade wrapped itself around the Heart like thread around a spindle, and as it wrapped, the blade began to spin, surrounding the Heart in an impenetrable cocoon of whirling steel. The moment the sword was completely covered, Adela flicked her hand like she was cracking a whip and the blade of her sword snapped off, freeing her from the tangle of whirling metal she’d woven around the Heart.
“There,” she said, smiling as the broken length of sword in her hand folded and re-formed until it was a slender, curved blade once again. “Let’s see how well you fight now, Thereson.”
Josef’s eyes flicked back to the Heart. Despite Adela seemingly snapping her blade in two, the cocoon of spinning steel around the Heart was going strong, grinding into the tile below with a whining scream. He crouched on his knees, considering his options. It didn’t take long, since there was only one. Blood soaked his arm, back, and chest, and he was starting to feel light-headed even through the pain. If he was going to do anything other than sit here and bleed to death, he needed the Heart, but there was no way through the spinning coil of Adela’s blade. Not without losing a hand, or worse.
Josef gritted his teeth with a growl of frustration. “That’s a very annoying weapon you h
ave there, Dela. Does your Empress fight all her battles so cheaply, or am I the exception?”
“The Empress fights for victory,” Adela said. “Anything else is merely the conceit of prideful swordsmen.” She tapped his shoulder with her blade, forcing him to turn and face her. “You are defeated, Prince Thereson,” she crowed, beaming down at him. “Your wound is bleeding as it should now that I’ve separated you from that hunk of iron you call a sword. Give up. As it stands, I can still save your life, but you will be dead for certain if you persist in fighting.”
“Why should I give up?” Josef said, sitting back on his heels as he pressed both palms against the hole in his shoulder in a futile attempt to hold in the blood. “You think I believe you’ll let me live? After everything you’ve admitted to me?”
“Of course,” Adela said. “With the duke dead and your mother soon to follow, you are next in line for the throne. If you die here, the succession will be broken completely.”
“What do you care about the succession?” Josef wheezed. It was getting hard to sit straight now. “I’m not about to make you queen, if that’s what you’re after.”
Adela’s lips peeled up in a sneer. “Why would I want to be queen of this pit? Osera is a savage place, even by the standards of this savage, backward continent. To be honest, I don’t think this island is worthy of the Empress’s conquest, but my lady is more forgiving than I am.”
Adela lowered her sword and leaned down, bringing her head to Josef’s level. “The people of Osera are stubborn brutes,” she whispered. “Even without a king, they will throw themselves at the Empress’s soldiers, breaking like waves on the wall of her palace ships until the sea is red with Oseran blood. But there’s no reason the Empress’s coming has to be a massacre. Think, Thereson. If you live, you will become king of Osera with the power to make your people surrender. Since you came home when your mother raised the bounty, I can’t believe you’re as indifferent to your homeland as you pretend. It’s true that nothing you do can save Osera now, but there’s still a chance you can save your people. Pledge your loyalty to the Empress, and she may be merciful.”
