Keaf struggled to his knees, each movement an agony as his impaled hand flexed, and he curled his fingers around the hilt of the Sword.
“I must help him,” Jarmon said. As he dropped his guard, Dellawynn moved to strike.
“No!” Keaf cried as he yanked upward. His shout froze Dellawynn and Kaye, but not Jarmon. The Templar threw his weapon down and rushed to Keaf’s side as the Sword came free. Keaf started to collapse, but Jarmon’s strong arm caught him.
“My liege!” Jarmon cried as he pulled off his glove and tore out the cloth lining. “I have been a fool!” He reached for Keaf’s wounded hand and pressed the cloth against the flow of blood. Another wave of pain made Keaf nearly faint.
Kaye and Dellawynn recovered from their shock and leapt to help. Kaye stripped off his woolen vest to drape over Keaf’s shoulders, and Dellawynn added her scarf to the temporary bandage.
“I’ll get help,” Dellawynn said. She started toward the inn, but Kaye stopped her.
“This way,” he said, motioning down the main street. “Lara is the village midwife. She knows medicines.”
As they hurried off, Jarmon slipped out of his heavy coat, exposing the bloodstain at his shoulder. He draped the wrap over Keaf, and its lingering warmth eased a little of Keaf’s misery. Tears welled in his eyes, and he turned away from the Templar.
Nothing had turned out right with the Sword of Fealty. Three people were hurt, and Keaf felt more alone than ever before. If he kept the Sword, he wouldn’t be able to trust anyone not under its power, and he could never afford friendship. His one dream would remain forever out of reach.
He turned to face Jarmon. “Why did you do this to me?”
Jarmon bowed his head in shame. “I was blind to your greatness, Master Keaf. I hope you can forgive me.”
“But this,” Keaf said, lifting the Sword with his good hand. “What about this?”
“In my heart,” Jarmon said as he tapped his fist on his chest, “I believe it is a bad thing. You would be better off without it. Then people could see your true noble nature without magical deceit.”
Keaf shook his head. Jarmon was as spellbound as the rest, but there was a truth in his words that the Templar could not see. The truth was that the Sword enslaved its owner as surely as it enchanted those around him. “For my own good.”
“Yes,” Jarmon said. “I have seen what it does to those who wield it.”
“Servant Wend?”
“Servant Wend, Lord March. He was an unfortunate man, ordinary where you are extraordinary, and that magic blade brought him to ruin.”
Keaf felt a shiver, not from the cold. Lord March! His land holdings were well known even in Palmora, and he conferred with kings and emperors. Such a man might have been able to rule the world with the Mindsword in his hands. Yet he now lay in an unmarked grave.
“Bury it before it harms you,” Jarmon pleaded. “Bury it demon’s deep where no one will dig.”
Keaf heard footsteps on the road, and he forced himself to sit up straight. “Please, go home,” he said quietly to Jarmon. “I release you from any service to me.”
Out of the darkness, Dellawynn, Kaye, and old Lara arrived with clean cloths and a doctor’s satchel. Kaye’s hand had been bandaged, but Dellawynn’s leg still seeped blood.
Lara muttered with each step. “I don’t see why I couldn’t fix your leg.... And that hand needs more than a wrap of linen.... Cold night to be out trapping wolves....” She saw Keaf, and her eyes grew wide for a moment before she returned to her interior dialogue. “Cold night for a lord to be out.... Need a warm hearth and strong brandy....”
She passed by Keaf on her way to the inn. Jarmon helped him to his feet. Inside, Ganton appeared in his long nightshirt, and he was mortified to see Keaf hurt. He offered drink and food and had his servants stoke the fire as Lara began her work. The old woman fussed over Keaf, crabbing to herself about kings and nobles and why hadn’t anyone told her it was Keaf. She tended Dellawynn and Kaye next, and came back to fuss over Keaf some more. He finally insisted that he was all right, and she left, still muttering.
A stiff drink of brandy loosened some of the knots, and Keaf sent Ganton and the servants back to bed. Ganton offered anything from his considerable stores, and Keaf silenced him by ordering a repayment to everyone who had used their supplies over the last two days. After a dozen more assurances that they had done everything they could to make him comfortable, the staff retired.
Next, Keaf looked across the tavern bench at Jarmon. “Go, now, Templar,” he said, repeating his earlier dismissal. You have duties to attend at your temple.” He smiled at Dellawynn. He would miss her, but he knew she would leave as soon as she was no longer Sword-bound, and he wanted to set her on a better course than the one she might choose herself. “And you go with him. I think you could use some time in a temple.”
“But Master Keaf...” Jarmon said as he stood.
“A temple?” Dellawynn asked.
“You will be serving me by going,” Keaf persisted. “I’m counting on both of you.”
Jarmon and Dellawynn looked injured, but neither could disobey a direct command. “As you wish,” Jarmon said.
Dellawynn slid around the table next to Keaf and kissed him harder than she might. “I will miss you, Master Keaf. She turned to Jarmon and linked her arm in his. “Temples are quite wealthy, aren’t they, Sir Jarmon?” Where she’d walked with no trouble a little earlier, she now let him ease her weight on her bad leg. Keaf hoped he wasn’t sending Jarmon’s temple too much trouble.
After they’d gone, Keaf turned to Kaye. “Thank you,” he said.
“It was nothing,” Kaye said. “I was out hunting the wolf that’s been after the wool-beasts. I saw you were in trouble, and it was my duty to help.”
Keaf held up his right hand and felt it throb. “It looks like we’re both useless for a while.”
Kaye raised his left hand. “One pair between us.” His voice was flat, but his face showed worry. A man’s hands were his living in these parts.
“Maybe we can work together,” Keaf said. “I could use your help yet tonight.”
“Anything, Master Keaf. I’m here to serve you.”
“Not service,” Keaf corrected. “I want your help working with me, not for me.”
Kaye looked beyond tired, but his Sword-driven enthusiasm still ruled. “Command me.”
Keaf shrugged. There was no stopping the power. “Jarmon made the mistake of not trusting me, but I won’t do that to you. We’re going to bury this Sword,” he said softly, lifting the blade from the bench.
“It’s a fine weapon,” Kaye said. “Why throw away such a thing?”
Keaf pushed to his feet. “Let’s head for the cemetery, and I’ll tell you all about it.”
Kaye nodded and stood. “I appreciate your confidence in me, Master Keaf.”
Keaf smiled. “We’ll be friends after tonight or not, but either way we’ll share a trust.” He slid the Sword carefully into a loop of his belt, and together he and Kaye headed out into what remained of the night.
Dragon Debt
Robert E. Vardeman
The gleaming, impossibly sharp sword slashed so close that Trav Gorman jumped back in panic. The blade swung around and the fifteen-year-old couldn’t take his eyes off its steely meter-long length. For a brief instant it split sunlight into a delicate fan of colors, then came whirring back at him. This time he forced himself to remain rigidly immobile, no matter the cost to his nerves.
The little crowd of onlookers drew in breath, as the dragon-slaying blade lightly touched the young man’s earlobe. Trav had thought it would be warm with its special Vulcan-forged magic. Instead, it was as cold as any ordinary metal blade.
“And that’s how I slew the last of the great dragons preying on my village of Hues,” Kennick Strongarm boasted loudly. The tall, muscular man twisted his wrist slightly and the god-forged Dragonslicer dropped heavily to Trav’s shoulder, as if conferring knighthood.
But such was distant from Kennick’s mind—and Trav’s. Trav’s face burned hotly with shame at showing any emotion. Kennick, to bolster his own image, seemed to do all he could to disgrace Trav, and today was the worst yet with half the village of Slake looking on. Worse than this, Trav’s sister Juliana stood just behind Kennick, laughing at her brother’s discomfort.
“You’re so brave,” Juliana said, hanging on to Kennick’s sword arm. “Tell us again. How many dragons have you slain with this marvelous weapon?”
“Eight,” Kennick said, puffing up and turning to slide the blade back into its gaudy sheath. Trav couldn’t tear his eyes from the blade. Its length was encrusted with gems the size of his thumbnail, and the silver wire-wrapped handle seemed made for Kennick’s huge grip.
“I thought you said nine,” spoke up Trav’s father, Merrow Gorman. “I definitely counted nine in your tale.”
“Eight, nine, I lose count in the heat of battle. There has never been such a weapon as Dragonslicer,” Kennick said, again whipping out the blade and holding it high in the autumn sun. His dramatic gesture quelled more questions, but Trav saw only reflected glory in the blade and nothing in the wielder. “And the gods have granted its power to me!”
“Juliana,” Trav said, trying to pull attention from Kennick. “We were on our way to gather berries.”
“You go,” Merrow Gorman told his son. The man was slightly stooped from too many years of desperately hard work in fields that produced too little. His lined face, more leather than skin after the long sweltering summer, beamed with approbation for the newcomer. “Let Juliana have some time with the champion of Slake.”
“Champion!” cried Trav. He spat angrily. “He’s no champion. He’s only—”
Merrow Gorman slapped his son and sent him reeling. “Don’t speak of Kennick that way. Don’t forget that he carries one of the Twelve Swords forged by Vulcan. For that alone, he deserves your respect.”
Trav saw the fear in his father’s muddy eyes—and hope, hope that was seldom there of late. To marry his only daughter to a hero, a slayer of dragons, commanded his ambition and imagination. The opinion of a fifteen-year-old boy with no particular skill nor hope for apprenticeship mattered far less to him at the moment. And Trav had to admit the glow in Juliana’s tanned face was more than adulation.
It might be love. That rankled more than any prolonged emptiness in his belly. He was the only one who saw Kennick for what he was.
An unexpected ally hobbled up, what remained of his left leg bound in dirty rags. Wyatt leaned heavily on his crutch as he shouldered through the small crowd.
“Did I hear someone mention Dragonslicer? I know that blade!” He looked about him, but Kennick had already re-sheathed his weapon. “Let me tell you of the time—”
“Not now, Wyatt. Spin your miserable tales some other time. We want to hear Kennick,” interrupted Merrow Gorman.
“I have seen Vulcan’s blade,” protested the village story-spinner. “I—”
“Who wants to listen to made-up stories when we have a real champion to tell us what it is like fighting dragons?” Juliana’s eyes were only for the paladin in his fine clothing. She ignored Wyatt as a man who told tall tales to supplement his meager income from cleaning the muddy streets of Slake and performing other, even less desirable jobs.
“I know dragons. I have seen them. What does this one know of the biggest dragons? Nothing. Come and listen. Sit and I shall tell you of glorious lands and magical weapons and...” Kennick, after giving the old man a glance of amused contempt, had turned away. No one else paid Wyatt any attention. The old man spat, the spittle hissing as it struck the ground.
“Why can’t you see what a liar Kennick is?” Trav muttered as he, too, backed away, bumping into Wyatt and almost knocking the one-legged man into the mud. No one else heard his mumbled retort. The village of Slake was as short on dreams as Merrow Gorman, and dreams were what Kennick offered with his wild tales. Trav ran through the village, passing no great houses, no fine stores brimming with merchandise such as in Westering and other big towns. Worst of all, he passed too many deserted homes, miserable sod huts left empty by the withering sickness that had held Slake hostage for three long months.
Tears welled in the corners of Trav’s eyes as he thought of his lost mother and three brothers. He brushed the wetness away. There was work to do, and standing about lionizing a stranger who had come to Slake only a week before accomplished nothing. Trav could only wish his sister saw with clearer vision. He didn’t want her hurt. She and his father were the only family he had left.
“A braggart, that’s all he is. Well fed because foolish people listen to his stories and believe them and give him food to be lied to again!” Why was he the only one who heard the hollowness of Kennick’s tales?
Trav knew the answer and it burned inside him like a festering wound. The people needed a hero to take their minds off their dreary, dangerous lives, and even Wyatt’s wild tales had turned stale and predictable over the years. The withering fever and poor crops and the demon that had ravaged Slake a year earlier, all had broken spirits and made any diversion welcome. And Trav knew his father wanted Juliana to marry well. No man under the age of forty remaining in Slake qualified. Those unmarried were all dim, dirt poor, or crippled. A wandering paladin expertly swinging one of the Twelve Swords—the Sword of Heroes!—seemed a miraculous opportunity.
“But he lies,” moaned Trav, going over the conflicting tales Kennick had spun. The braggart had a story-teller’s knack, all right. With each repetition the tales grew like tumors, and always so that the teller fought greater battles and triumphed more heroically.
Trav slowed his run and turned toward the chain of S-shaped lakes that gave the village its name. Half a hundred streams fed the lakes, and he had found his special place along a streamlet ignored by others in the village. Leaves were turning into a rainbow of shimmering colors, and a sharpness hung in the air from dying summer and birthing winter.
Walking along his special stream, he found the black- and red-striped berries that would supplement their meals for months after the snows came. Trav gathered slowly, picking with care, trying to forget his father and sister and Kennick and the entire village. Surrounded by the forest, he dared to imagine life being better.
Movement at the edge of his vision caused him to stop his work and whirl about. The gnarled, black-barked limbs of a walnut tree vibrated and a few dead leaves fluttered softly to the ground.
“Who’s there?” he called. Trav put down his capful of berries when he heard a distant crashing sound, as if something heavy had fallen through the leafless tree limbs. Investigating, he moved forward warily through brambles, soon reaching the edge of a small clearing, where a streamlet came wandering through to form a glade of beauty.
And amid the beauty stalked death. Not thirty meters distant, its back fortunately to Trav, its long barbed tail twitching nervously, there lumbered a dragon of such immense size that Trav turned white with fear.
Shaken, he backed away for several meters, then turned and ran. How long he ran, Trav couldn’t say, but he eventually stumbled onto the Slake-Westering Road. He knew where help lay. With legs rubbery from fear and long exertion, he rushed into his village and found Kennick sitting with Juliana beside the public watering trough.
“Dragon!” he blurted, gasping. Kennick turned, gave him a sour look and continued his witty discussion with Juliana.
Trav’s sister turned and gestured angrily at him. “Go away, Trav. You’re bothering us. I must tell Kennick of available lodging. He intends to stay in Slake!”
Trav saw Dragonslicer in its hand-tooled leather sheath leaning against the trough and started to reach for the weapon. Kennick snatched up the magical sword and laid the long blade across his lap.
“Don’t go telling stories, boy,” Kennick chided. “There aren’t any dragons in these woods. I’ve already killed them all.” He laughed and returned to romancing Juliana.
At the edge of the clearing Trav looked around warily, suspicious of the silence. The huge dragon had departed. A milky whiteness in the sluggishly flowing stream caught his eye. Trav dropped to his knees and cupped his hands, scooping at the water’s surface and coming away with dozens of small, slick-coated spheres. In the darkness, they shone with a cool opalescence that Trav had never seen before. Holding one up, he fancied he could see shadows drifting within. Opening his palm, he let one egg rest there, only to have it dance and roll about, impelled by inner magic.
Trav scooped more tiny globes from the streamlet and broke open a few. A pungent yellow-and-white fluid gushed forth.
“Dragon eggs,” he whispered. He had never seen one before, but he had heard the tales, the fearful warnings. “The she-dragon was laying eggs in the stream.” Fish were feasting on them already.
He looked at the slick of millions of dragon eggs and saw not untold misery and destruction but opportunity. Trav carefully gathered a select small handful of the eggs and went looking for a cool, wet, hidden nest.
Winter wind whined past the tumble of rocks Trav had pulled into the mouth of the cave. Small sweeps of crystalline snow blew past the rock and stopped a few feet from the nest Trav had built. Cave mice had eaten most of the eggs, but he had saved a few. Keeping them damp had been easy for the first few weeks. Small drips running down the cave walls formed puddles deep enough to cover the eggs, but Trav had worried when, after a month, the eggs began drying out in spite of his care. The shells had turned a mottled brown and hardened—and a few weeks earlier, just before the first heavy storm brought blankets of clinging wet snow, the shells began cracking.
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