The Book of Swords

by Gardner Dozois (ed)

  Aumbraj thoughtfully tugged his nose, then pointed a conclusive finger at Baldemar. “It did not want you to take it to this Fallowbrain who sent you,” he said, “but I think we have to deduce that it didn’t mind your touch.”

  Baldemar turned back to the sea. “I am confused,” he said.

  “As you ought to be. You’re probably not used to thinking of yourself as a man of destiny.”

  “Indeed, I am not.”

  “Well, you’d better get used to it. Once it makes up its mind, the Sword can be quite adamant.”

  Aumbraj went on to describe the Sword’s history and attributes. Forged on some other Plane of existence, its exact circumstances of origin were now completely forgotten. On the Plane where it was created, it probably had some other shape and function altogether. But here on the Third Plane, it presented as an invincible weapon. Yet it was more than that. It had the inclination sometimes to single out “persons of interest”—that was the Sword’s own term—and assist them to become grand figures of the age.

  “Its own term?” Baldemar said. “It speaks?”

  “When it cares to,” said the wizard. “But to continue, persons possessed of overweening ambition will seek out the Sword and grasp its hilt. Most of them meet with a swift and decisive end of all their dreams. It is not a forgiving entity and hates to be harassed. But, occasionally, it picks out some seeming nonentity and raises him to heights of glory. Some have taken that as a sign the Sword possesses a sense of humor.”

  “Amazing,” said Baldemar.

  “You have never heard of any of this?”

  “My education was largely informal and centered on acquiring practical skills.”

  “Hmm,” said the thaumaturge and spent some time studying Baldemar, after which he said, “You don’t show any signs of being a candidate for glory, but then again, you might be one of those seeming nonentities.”

  Baldemar did not know whether to be insulted or pleased. Situations involving thaumaturges and magical weapons were often hard to read.

  “Well, we’ll just have to see,” Aumbraj said.

  —

  The sun had set long before they crossed the southern downs and the forest of Ilixtrey. Soon the lights of Vanderoy showed themselves, strung atop a long ridge and its lower slopes. Baldemar offered to direct Aumbraj to the building where the Sword resided, but the wizard waved the proposal away.

  “I can find it,” he said. “To one of my abilities, it emits the equivalent of a blinding light and an earsplitting noise.” He made a small sound of contempt, and added, “Your employer, the Great Fullbean, probably managed to catch a faint glow and a fading whisper.”

  They crossed the city wall and began to spiral down toward the rooftop Baldemar remembered so well. “I suppose,” he said, “that’s not really a building at all.”

  “Of course, it is,” said Aumbraj. “But it is an edifice unremarked by even its neighbors, who pass by daily with never a thought as to what lies within. Even the city’s tax collectors will overlook it.”

  “The Sword’s doing?” the man said.

  “As I said, it prefers not to be harassed.”

  The roof was in darkness but as they descended closer, Baldemar saw motion on its flat surface. “Look,” he said.

  The wizard peered, then made a gesture and muttered something. Immediately, the top of the building was bathed in bright light, revealing that someone was bent over the trapdoor, tugging at it with both hands.

  “Oh, my,” said Aumbraj. “Truly a skimpwit of the first water.”

  The figure looked up, shading its eyes against the light, and Baldemar saw that the skimpwit was Thelerion, clad in the Greaves of Indefatigability, the Breastplate of Fortitude, and the Helmet of Sagacity. The Shield Impenetrable lay on the rooftop beside him, but now he snatched it up and slipped an arm through it while his other hand produced a wand tipped with a large, faceted emerald.

  Baldemar knew that wand well. He flinched in anticipation. But Aumbraj said, “Oh, really!” and made a shooing gesture with the backs of his fingers. The Shield glowed briefly as it was thrust back against Thelerion, who stumbled backward and ended up on his rump.

  Aumbraj had the imps bring the platform to a gentle landing. He opened the gate in the balustrade and stepped down onto the rooftop. Baldemar followed, being careful to keep the southern thaumaturge between him and his employer.

  But not careful enough, because now Thelerion laboriously rose to his feet, leaning on the Shield, and his gaze locked on his missing henchman. His unappetizing features twisted in rage.

  “Ahah! Miscreant! Faithless turd! Slackarse!” He had dropped his emerald-tipped wand. Now he stooped and took it up, and said, “Receive your just punishment!”

  “I would not do that here,” said Aumbraj. “The Sword might not like it.”

  Thelerion focused on Aumbraj just long enough for outrage to expand his eyes and mouth, then all his features contracted and his gaze again bored into his lackey. “You told!” he cried. “The Sword was my great secret, and you told this…this—”

  “Aumbraj the Erudite,” said the object of his inarticulacy, “blue school, ninety-eighth degree. And I advise you to lower that thing you probably think of as a wand before something truly awful happens to you.”

  Thelerion looked from henchman to wizard, then back and forth several times. His mouth made sounds that were neither words nor incantations, and spittle appeared on his lips. Finally, he emitted a noise that came straight out of his lower throat and pointed the wand at Baldemar. He spoke a portentous syllable and the instrument’s tip glowed a baleful green. A vindictive smile spread across his lips and he opened his mouth to speak again.

  At the moment, the trapdoor behind him flew open and struck the rooftop with a heavy slam. Light shot up from a great brightness within the stairwell, and, as Thelerion turned to see, the head, neck, and then the shoulders of a young erb serenely emerged from the glowing rectangle.

  Baldemar’s employer made another wordless sound, this one expressive of surprise and horror. He pointed his wand at the beast that, continuing its rise from the stairwell, now showed its clawed hands—which clutched the Sword of Destiny.

  At this juncture, Thelerion made two decisions: one wise, one not. The wise move was to drop his wand; the unwise choice was to assume that the erb was bringing him the Sword, and that he ought to reach for it. His grasping fingers made contact with the scabbard.

  Another blast of light illuminated the rooftop, though this one entirely conformed to the shape of Thelerion the Exemplary. His person was limned by a glare so bright that his body seemed to be a black silhouette at its center.

  Then the light faded and the seeming became the reality. Where the wizard had been there now stood a figure of deepest black, dull and unreflective. It remained standing just long enough for the shape to be recognized and for its armor and shield to fall away with a clatter. Then the silhouette fell apart into granules of coarse grit that cascaded down to become a cone of stygian cinder. Scarcely had it formed a conical shape before its mass spread out under its own weight to lie as a circular mat of black sand—sand that crunched under the clawed feet of the erb as, still clutching the Sword, it stepped out of the trapdoor and approached Baldemar.

  He whirled to leap onto the flying platform only to find that it was now high above him and moving off, with Aumbraj leaning over the balustrade to observe the scene he had left. A glance to one side told Baldemar that the rope and grapnel he had left on the adjacent building were no longer there.

  He turned back and saw the beast coming on at a steady pace, the Sword now held in its paws so that the jewel-bedecked hilt offered itself to him.

  Baldemar experienced a moment of sharp mental clarity. There were two outcomes to accepting the erb’s offer: in one, he would be instantly, and probably painfully, converted into black grit, as Thelerion had been; in the other, he would rise as a man of destiny, to carve out a kingdom or an empire, and rule by
whim and fiat. The momentary appeal of the latter prospect swiftly faded as he recalled the ruler of the County of Caprasecca, Duke Albero.

  I don’t want that life, he heard his inner voice saying. He remembered his plan to find a nice house in one of the Seven Cities of the Sea and a boat to fish from.

  That option, however, did not seem to be available at this moment. But the thought of the parchment-skinned Duke brought up another possibility—a desperate gamble fit for a desperate situation.

  As the Sword’s hilt almost touched his fingers, Baldemar said, “Azzerath!”

  He was immediately enveloped in a hideous odor and yet another bright light. Between him and the erb, which had leapt back, stood the repellent form of the demon. “What can I do for you?” it said.

  Baldemar pointed and the fiend turned to regard the beast and what it held in its claws. All of its eyes focused on the Sword and a kind of ripple went through its being that the man could only interpret as an expression of delight.

  “There you are!” said the demon, reaching out and taking the Sword from the erb, which promptly fainted from terror. The fiend folded the weapon in two of its limbs, clutching it to what might have been its torso. It seemed to Baldemar that the Sword also shivered in pleasure.

  “I thought I’d lost you forever!” Azzerath said. “What have you been up to all this time?”

  The fiend stood still, attentively listening to whatever the Sword was telling it. Finally, it stroked the scabbard, and said, “Well, never mind. That’s all over now. We’ll go home and it will be as if none of this ever happened. I’ve got a nice, fresh Duke for us to play with.”

  It became aware of Baldemar again and the man thought he was seeing a demonic frown. “It seems,” the creature said, “that I am even more in your debt.” Its body shook like thorned jelly. “The itch is quite uncomfortable.”

  Baldemar did not hesitate. “Can you arrange for me to have,” he said, “a nice house in Golathreon, overlooking the Sundering Sea, with a sturdy boat to go fishing in? And perhaps a satchel of gold and jewels?”

  “Done,” said Azzerath. Two scrolls appeared at the man’s feet. “Those are the deed and the boat registration. “You’ll find the satchel in the library. Shall I transport you there now?”

  “No, thank you. I think the wizard will carry me.”

  But Azzerath’s attention had returned to the Sword of Destiny. “You arranged all this?” it said. “Just to find me again? What a smart little woozums you are.” It stroked the scabbard again, making cooing noises, then disappeared.

  The flying platform touched down. Aumbraj offered no apology for deserting Baldemar, who expected none. If their positions had been reversed, he would have made the same hasty exit. The wizard did enthuse about the events he had witnessed, chortling and saying, “I feel a wonderful scholarly paper coming on!”

  “It seems,” Baldemar told the wizard, stepping over the recumbent erb to where Thelerion’s ashes were scattering in the wind, “that I have acquired a few pieces of magical armor. Would you care to purchase them? For scholarly purposes, of course.”

  A brief haggle followed, concluded to both participants’ mutual satisfaction. A purse was conjured into existence and passed over. Then Baldemar helped the wizard gather the items and load them aboard the platform. Aumbraj also swept up some of the grit that had been Thelerion the Exemplary and stowed it in a brass cylinder with a tightly fitting lid.

  “You never know,” he said.

  Meanwhile, Baldemar picked up his scrolls and read the address on one of them.

  “Will you be passing near the City of Golathreon?” he asked Aumbraj.

  “I can do.”

  “I would appreciate a ride.”

  The wizard shrugged. “If you’ll fill in a few more details about your association with the demon. I mean to make the editor of Hermetic Studies clap for joy.”

  “Done,” said Baldemar.

  As they flew over the city, Aumbraj observed, in a carefully idle tone, “Even a scholarly thaumaturge can always use a good henchman.”

  “I was never a good henchman,” Baldemar said. “Could never manage the required depth of self-abnegation. I was not even a very good thief. But I think I just might make a passable fisherman.”

  ⬩  ⬩  ⬩

  Kate Elliott is the author of twenty-six fantasy and science-fiction novels, including her New York Times bestselling YA fantasy, Court of Fives (and its sequels, Poisoned Blade and Buried Heart). Her most recent epic fantasy is Black Wolves (winner of the RT Award for Best Epic Fantasy of 2015). She’s also written the alt-history Spiritwalker Trilogy (Cold Magic, Cold Fire, Cold Steel), an Afro-Celtic post-Roman gas-lamp fantasy adventure with well-dressed men, badass women, and lawyer dinosaurs. Other series include the Crossroads Trilogy, the seven-volume Crown of Stars epic fantasy, the science-fiction Novels of the Jaran, and a short-fiction collection, The Very Best of Kate Elliott. Her novels have been finalists for the Nebula, World Fantasy, and Norton awards. Under her real name of Alis A. Rasmussen, she’s written the novels The Labyrinth Gate, A Passage of Stars, Revolution’s Shore, and The Price of Ransom. Born in Iowa and raised in farm country in Oregon, she currently lives in Hawaii, where she paddles outrigger canoes for fun and exercise. You can find her on Twitter at @KateElliottSFF.

  Here she introduces us to the self-proclaimed handsome man Apollo Crow—who turns out to be a lot more, and a lot stranger, than merely someone with a pretty face.

  ⬩  ⬩  ⬩

  “I am a handsome man,” said Apollo Crow, fixing the emperor of Rome with a look that dared that august ruler to disagree. “If your desire is to have a woman kidnapped without alerting her confederates until it is too late to rescue her, look no further. My skills are subterfuge, tracking down people who don’t wish to be found, and an ability to lie with a straight face. I am also an exceptionally skilled swordsman.”

  The emperor set chin upon hand with thoughtful consideration, a pose suited to the stage, as he was well aware. “I was warned you always lie about something.”

  “Alas, so I do. It is a curse.” His charming smile made a witticism of the remark.

  “I am sure to a ruffian like you such a claim seems an amusing challenge. However, your situation is easy enough for a man such as me to expose. We’ll start by process of elimination. Are you truly an exceptionally skilled swordsman?”

  “I will duel any among your soldiers, or two or three at once. Bring them forth.”

  The emperor flicked up his fingers, straightening. “Will you duel me?”

  One eyebrow only Apollo Crow raised, a neat trick many an opponent had admired to their cost. “It seems dishonorable, considering your age.”

  The emperor extended his right hand. An attendant guardsman settled a steel blade into the imperial fingers. He rose, took three steps down from the dais onto the marble floor of the audience chamber, and indicated that he was ready to begin.

  Naturally Apollo Crow wore a hip-length black cape of the sort that swirls dashingly with any swift movement. He spun a full circle, the fabric floating like a whirl of shadow. When he again faced the emperor he held his blade in his right hand, as if it had appeared there by magic rather than sleight of hand.

  The emperor shifted stance, taking his sword into his left hand. Apollo Crow smiled and did the same.

  Light pouring from high-arched windows framed their shapes to dazzling effect as uniformed soldiers and gaudily robed officials admired the show.

  “What is your fee?” A probing flurry by the emperor, easily parried by Apollo Crow.

  “That depends upon the distance to be traveled and the circumstances under which I must put myself at risk.”

  They circled.

  “The woman is a beauty, so that part of the job is no risk.”

  “What one man calls beauty another may find trifling. But that you call her a beauty tells me a good deal. Is she a woman who spurned you, the very emperor of shrunken Rome?
”

  The emperor laughed. “Quite the opposite, if you must know.”

  “Or at least so you feel obliged to claim.” Crow assayed a thrust, and the emperor of all Rome and its few remaining provinces turned it aside.

  “I need affect no lies, Crow. I am hiring you to do a job and ascertaining whether you can succeed. The woman is secondary to my interest. I need her sketchbook, which she carries with her everywhere. She is herself exceptionally well guarded and her movements well concealed by her many allies.”

  The emperor feinted left, then rapidly attacked right. Apollo Crow replied with a vicious riposte.

  “Of what possible use can a sketchbook be to you? Are there compromising images that you seek to recover and burn?”

  A flurry of parries and thrust rang through the hall. Both stymied, they broke apart.

  “These are tedious attempts at provocation,” said the emperor, scarcely out of breath. “Can you manage it?”

  “It seems a simple enough job. Where do I start?”

  “My agents report there will be a secret meeting in the town of Nikaia, a gathering of criminals and malcontents who harbor revolutionary sentiments. We don’t know in which disreputable tavern it will take place. They change their meeting places every week. In any case, even if we did know, were my soldiers to appear in force, it would scare her off. Any violence done at the gathering will merely strengthen their querulous voices. So this is where you come in, Crow.”

  “Why, a seditious gathering with one foot into the empire itself! No wonder you are eager to crush this assembly before it can seed its roots into Roman soil. Yet what has a beautiful woman to do with such masculine pursuits as revolution?”

  The emperor flashed an annoyed look toward a tapestry on the wall whose bright colors and bold design depicted his famous Amazon regiment striding into battle. As with the strike of an agitated viper, he pressed a bold attack straight at the other man. The ring of their blades striking and sliding, the scuff and stamp of their feet, and the movements of their bodies as they sought each to gain the upper hand were for a time the only dance in the chamber. The emperor pressed with his greater height and weight, while Apollo Crow answered with a speed and precision that made him seem to almost float above the ground.