Guilds & Glaives

by David Farland

  He shook his head. “Not like those, lady, too soft. I need tough leather shoes, hard as boiled armor and without leaks.”

  “A practical lad.” She released her hand from his shirt and patted his arm. “Can you bear one last question?”

  “If we can walk, lady. I would like to see …” he stared at the outbuildings, imagining the beauty that might come out of odors that could make him spew. Master Skagan and his uncle would come to throw him out at any moment. “I would like to see the vats.” The drying racks, too, but he knew he could not push his luck.

  “If you can tell me what you see there.” Her blue-veined hand pointed to a corner across the way, where a flag stood in shadow, a banner he’d not spotted before and now drew him like a moth to flame. He walked, taking her with him, as close as he dared get.

  The banner teased him. As he approached it, the sun found it, and he stopped in awe with a gasp he couldn’t smother. He’d never seen anything like it, now light where he’d spotted dark. It shone strongly enough to make him throw up a hand to protect his eyes and squint. As he did, the stronger colors returned. Red as fresh blood. Blues that echoed the lady’s gown. Glints of gold and green. Muddied browns that looked as if they came from river stone, wetter and all the more glorious for it. It embodied hues that rippled down the fabric before disappearing. His jaw dropped.

  “Well, what do you see?” Her voice hammered sharply against his ear.

  “Many colors.” Before he turned back to her, the banner subsided into a warm ivory like the pages of a book scribed for a temple. He knew, because he’d seen one, once. He stammered as he told her what he thought he’d seen and watched her lips grow thinner and thinner in her age-etched face. He halted. “I saw it. I don’t lie.”

  “Never said you did.”

  His gaze searched out the flag again, which hung still and shadowy in the corner.

  Both turned on heel as the two men came seeking them. Cristane shivered. The banner behind him unfurled a little in the winter breeze and something touched him, a peculiar warmth stealing over him. He wanted to look back, to see what might touch him besides the flag, but did not dare. His uncle’s face pinched with annoyance.

  “Come away with you. This Goodman here, Master Skagan, will put you where you belong.”

  No sash dangled from Skagan’s thick hands. No look of welcome on the master’s face. Cristane drew back in spite of their words. It seemed he had not passed the trial.

  Skagan bowed in the direction of Cristane’s escort. “Lady Sea. Good day. Are you doing well?”

  “Well enough for an old lady. My tides are ebbing and the sun is lowering, as it does for us all.” She lifted a finger to Skagan. “Did you make a deal?”

  He inclined his head. “We did. He’ll be brought to rendering.”

  His uncle came forward, slapped a hand up the back of Cristane’s head, saying, “Good luck, lad. Do the job.” He scurried out of the courtyard doors, back into the hall and, Cristane felt certain, hit the street at an even faster pace.

  As his relative disappeared, Lady Sea took a step forward, putting herself between the master and Cristane.

  “Not rendering.”

  “It’s what we do with … the leavings.”

  “This one is more than blood, skin, and bones.”

  A cold chill ran from the bottom of his soles to the top of his head. The noxious smell. He knew it now, from the tallow pots at the candlemakers. From the stew pots behind dubious tavern kitchens. Flowers and roots made dyes. Sometimes animals and minerals. He knew of beetles, dried, that made the most brilliant of reds. Bone and blood? He backed up another step and that peculiar flag covered his shoulders.

  “Lady Sea, you have standing here, but I remind you that you have retired from your duties and that standing, how shall I say it, is precarious.”

  She tilted her head enough that her hair, silver and gold and snow white, tumbled down over one shoulder towards the curve of her torso. “This boy sees the pennant.”

  “Which one?”

  “This one.”

  The ruddy coloration of Master Skagan’s face fled, going chalk pale. “He—”

  “Indeed. You are finished with him. I have enough sand left in me that I can train an apprentice.” She ripped the sleeve off her gown and handed it to Cristane. “You have your sash. The shoes, we shall see about later.”

  * * *

  They hauled him to the fields. Others were already there, working; backs bent as they harvested dried bud and seeds from the frost-browned ground. Skagan tossed an empty bag at him. “This here’s the new lad. Show him the ropes.”

  Seven faces upturned to him. Hands waved, fingers tinged with earth and the dust of their gatherings. One boy put a knee to the ground and pointed to Cristane. “Here. Like this. We want these and these, but not these. Keep your hands from your eyes, nose, and mouth, cause this here is night marrow and it can make you sick if you take it in.”

  Cristane squatted by his teacher. He reached out to strip the plant indicated, filling his bag with its delicate remainders. He’d seen these bloom in the spring and summer and never thought much about them once their violet petals were gone. “What does this do?”

  “Combined with copper, the powder can make the truest of teals, popular with the ladies, aye? Better to be here in the fields than down in the trenches. Soon, a good wind will sweep through here and then our chance to harvest will be gone. Call me Salvado, if you must.”

  “Cristane.”

  His tutor nodded. “All right then, get to work.” And he took his knee from the ground, curled into a squat himself, moving quickly through the dried wildflowers. It seemed easy enough for Salvado, but Cristane found himself left with hands of powder more oft than not, and the others laughing at him.

  From the field, the gang of laborers went to a small, cheerful brooklet where they washed quickly and splashed each other mercilessly, laughing at those who could not dodge the waves in time. Cristane got the worst of it and stood shivering in thin sunlight as they marched off toward the edge of the forest.

  “Now what?”

  “Roots, and then we’re done for the day because the light is going.” Gertha, a freckled and fire-haired girl, smiled at him. “Dinner then, and bed. Early roll out tomorrow.”

  “Same thing tomorrow?”

  “Until this field is stripped, yes. Harvesting is near done for the season. We’ll have classes then and you’ll wish you were out here, fresh air and no madman Hopper droning his bookwork over you.”

  “Madman?”

  “Shush it, Gertha.” Salvado brushed past them. He threw a look at Cristane. “They’ll cane you for calling them names.”

  Gertha shrugged and ran by, tagging Salvado as she did, laughing and disappearing into the forest dimness.

  “What is in here?”

  “Woad shrubs. We need the leaves.”

  Woad he knew, for its blue, although he couldn’t be certain he’d ever seen the bush itself. By the time the light fell and they trudged back to the guildhall, his hands were raw from shredding leaves from stubborn branches and stems. He had blisters on the bottoms of his feet and his palms and Salvado told him of a salve they could get when they returned to the dorms.

  They ate. Big, steaming bowls of porridge studded with bits of jerky and dried berries and flavored with cream and a sprinkle of salted butter. He ate until he thought he would burst, let the others point him to a heap of blankets on the floor next to their cots with a promise he’d have his own cot on the morrow, collapsed, and fell into sleep.

  He dreamed of the world through its colors. Then, the universe turned as it was wont to do, and he loved it again as it revealed itself through dark hues as well as light. It would, this work, make him taller and tougher. Cristane had some doubts that height would help him—it did not seem to disqualify Lady Sea as she barely came up to his shoulder.

  He did not stir until Lady Sea woke him with a boot toe to his ribs. She put her spindly
hand over his mouth and waited until she could see him aware. Her voice, hushed and yet crystal clear, reached his ears.

  “On your feet. The tides will not hold for me any more than they will stir for you.” She dropped a set of waders on him, worn but still splendid looking, and he slipped them on. Snug they were, but the footwear part hugged the curve of his feet admirably. He knotted the ties into place and then rubbed his eyes open as he hurried after her. She carried an empty but large net bag over one shoulder and tossed a second to him.

  “We hunt tonight.” She picked up a short lance, weighed it in her hand before passing it to Cristane, taking a second one for herself. “Mind you, you aren’t to use this.” She shook the spear.

  “Then why carry it?”

  “Because you might need it.”

  “What do we hunt tonight?”

  “The scale we use to make dragon blood cloth. The flag you pointed out to me.”

  A pit opened in his stomach and his mouth fell open, without words to utter. He knew—it had been rumored—that the dye came from such a creature, that once they held a nest on the shore, but everyone knew they no longer lived, if they had ever really existed. Kings and princes and warriors came for shirts of dragon blood cloth, more valuable than gold, to wear under their armor. Wizards came for its scraps, to write upon for their tomes of magic, or so the streets whispered. “Dragon blood?”

  Lady Sea cuffed him under the chin, shutting his mouth with a snap. “Don’t gape at me like a fool. I won’t take a fool hunting with me.”

  “Yes, lady.” He wrapped his fingers tightly about the spear and managed a short bow. She went to the door and waited for him to open it.

  She led and he followed. Through the town gates, over hill and dale and down rocky coast, until they finally stood on a cliff above the shore. As he watched the phosphorescence boil off the receding waves, he calculated what might be used to duplicate the color and the desirability of the hues, for that faint and eerie green might not flatter many complexions. She paused as though knowing his thoughts.

  “We have a sight, you and I.”

  He gave her a sideways glance. Of course they did … or else they’d be blind.

  “Someday you may understand.” She pointed off the sea cliff. “There was a time,” she added finally, and quietly, “that one did not dare stand here. A drake would have plucked you from the rock and swallowed you down. In halves if not whole.”

  “Truly?”

  “Sincerely.” She held an arm up, letting her sleeve fall open, to reveal a long and jagged white scar that ran from the ball of her palm to the pit of her arm. “How do you think I got this?”

  Did she think he had grown as old as he had swaddled like a baby or coddled like an heir to an estate? He saw accidents like that every day of his life, or nearly. “I hadn’t thought about it, one way or the other.”

  “A drake caught me. Its teeth are like daggers but even its flippers and wings are sharp as razors.”

  “It attacked you?”

  “Would not you, if something invaded your nest?”

  “Surely, but—did you not have guards?”

  Lady Sea brought her sleeve back into place. “The drakes, few enough of them left now, have secreted their nests and caves. I don’t come to kill them, but to gather what they shed.”

  He caught at her words. “Like a snake. And if you did not come?”

  “The guild would turn loose its greed, its hunters, its soldiers, and not a drake would survive. Although, goddess knows, there are few enough as it is.” She nudged him. “Learn my trade and you will have all the shoes you can ever think of wearing, and fine clothes and cloaks, too. Perhaps even a horse.”

  “Could I buy my sister back?”

  She regarded him. “If she wished. She might reach for a destiny of her own. I cannot say what your sister wants.”

  Cristane thought on that. She had not wailed, but her laughter had followed him down the alley as the house had glowed from within, spilling outward. He had no idea if she would welcome his rescue or not.

  Lady Sea put a bony elbow into his side. “Finish your reverie. We have work to do this night.” She pointed her spear at the moon. “We’ve just enough light.” With that, she stepped down onto a path he could barely see, daring him to follow.

  Old or not, the lady climbed like a goat. He slipped after her more than once, and even did an ungainly somersault head over heels to land on a wind-carved boulder in front of her. She leaned down to squint at him. “Done?”

  “I hope so.” He groaned as he stood up and checked his limbs. All in one piece, near as he could tell. The boulder peeked up from a blanket of sand; Cristane had managed to hit the only rocky spot on the beach.

  Lady Sea rearranged his net over one shoulder and picked up his spear, returning it to him. “We don’t use these unless rushed.”

  “Rushed?”

  “Charged. Which it won’t do unless we threaten it.” She paused and then pointed at the surf line. “Wade in and catch me a fish.”

  “What?”

  She turned full on him. “What did you not understand?”

  “I’ve never caught a fish before.”

  She waved her hand negligently. “The surf is full of them. Watch the curl. Throw the net. Catch one.”

  Cristane sputtered. “I thought we were Dyers.”

  “We are survivors. If you wish to get through this night, catch me a fish.” And Lady Sea’s mouth closed to a thin line.

  Cristane turned to do as bid, thankful he at least had the waders and hoping they might be warm as well as watertight. As the sea closed about his ankles, and then his knees, the shivers crept up as well. How could a fish live in water this cold? He watched the curl of the water and, as she had said, dark forms darted through the moonlit foam.

  He threw his net out and watched it sink, empty, almost beyond his reach. Using the spear, he pulled it back. Again. And again. And then he caught the sense of it, the rhythm, the music of the tide washing up against the shore, hearing his sister Maude’s teasing voice in it as she chided him for being tone deaf. But he wasn’t, not this moment, not under this moon, its color like that of ice crystals, near transparent yet touched with silver.

  He threw the net and dragged it back, filled with not one but two squirming fish, their scales dark green and charcoal, their gills fluttering. Water surging about his thighs, he returned to Lady Sea, who nodded before walking off, leaving him no choice but to follow.

  They worked their way off the beach sands and back onto rock, stone pounded sharp and threatening against intrusion. Lady Sea motioned for silence as she moved along the cliff’s foot, avoiding tide pools which lay glistening under the moon’s eye like tiny mirrors. She headed straight for great black, knife-like cuts, where even the moonlight could not pierce, and his stomach knotted again in fear. If he followed her in, he would drown when the tide came roaring back, unless he could climb higher, sight unseen, out of reach. If a drake did not swallow him first.

  She ducked under an overhang and fumbled at the pouch at her belt, withdrawing a tiny globe that sputtered and gained illumination, a fuzzy mimic of sunlight. “We haven’t long before this will fade.”

  “It—”

  “Not magic. It absorbs sunlight and emits it later, in darkness.” She held it with her left hand, right fingers still curled tightly about the spear.

  His net slapped against him, fish fighting now and then for their freedom. Cristane felt a little as they did: out of water, afraid, struggling, wary of what might wait ahead.

  He heard a rumble, a low vibration of noise against his eardrum, and halted. Lady Sea stopped and turned a puzzled look his way. “I heard something.”

  “What?”

  “A … a rumble. Maybe a growl.”

  “Low in tone?”

  He nodded.

  Lady Sea made a face. “These old ears!” She pinched an ear lobe. “We are near then. Search the nooks and crannies as we move. That’s wh
ere our treasure will be found.” She bent and began to creep along slowly.

  Cristane blinked and followed suit, feeling foolish. Perhaps this was no lesson, but another trial to see how he followed instructions, no matter how foolish they seemed. His waders, no protection against the cold of the ocean, actually seemed to carry a little warmth in the cave. He could hear the drizzle of a long-ago tide draining through the cracks of the rock. That low vibration of something … breathing? Humming? Growling? The harsh noises of Lady Sea as she struggled with her own inhalations. It was then he realized that her heart fluttered a bit now and then, that her steps faltered, and that he could lose her even as she struggled.

  He caught her arm. “Rest.”

  “What!”

  Firmly, as he remembered his father saying to his mother years ago, “Rest. I will do the searching.”

  “You don’t even know what you look for, boy!”

  “I think I must.” He wedged the edge of his spear into the pebbled bottom of the cave, swept his hand aside and found a thing of marvelous color wedged in the barnacled rocks next to them. “It has to be this.” He held it up to her orb.

  “Ah.” She breathed softly. “It is indeed.” Lady Sea smiled then. “You do have the sight for my work. All right then. I will take a short recess, but do not roam beyond the circle of the light. You may see its scales but you have no idea how to deal with what may wait beyond.”

  Cristane stowed his find in his net, next to the still yawning fish. “You want me to feed it.”

  “Only if we meet it head on. A distraction while you retreat. Otherwise, we will simply put these at the entrance when we leave and hope it has caught our scent and know we are no enemy.”

  “It’s a beast.”

  She lifted her eyes to his. “Oh, aye. But a very smart and shrewd beast.”

  He stepped away then to continue his search and barely heard words he felt certain she did not intend him to hear. “And there may be more than one.”