Anne murmured under her breath. Maire knew she was praying to her God, and smiled.
Thank you, Brigid.
Hello, America.
My name is Maire Riordan. My friends and I have come here to live.
So shall it be, Maire heard a voice say inside her skull— a caressing whisper like a mother’s lullaby. So shall it be.
LESLEY MCBAIN
LESLEY MCBAIN is a writer/consultant who currently lives in the South. Her short fiction can also be found in Turn the Other Chick, edited by Esther Friesner.
The inspiration for her story, “Acts of Faith,” partly comes from growing up surrounded by Scots-Irish warrior-types—both male and female—in and out of uniform. (Both her parents were naval officers; all her uncles served in various branches of the U.S. military. And then there was her god-father, the Air Force chaplain who sometimes jokingly called himself “the Mad Monk.” . . .)
The story’s inspiration also derives from her being a Jew-by-choice interested in both Jewish and Celtic history. But mainly “Acts of Faith” was drawn from knowing that warriors emerge in unexpected places and guises. Plus from a healthy dollop of a “what if . . .” reworking of history.
SWORDS THAT TALK
Brent Hartinger
THE PROBLEM WITH TALKING SWORDS, Brinn decided, was that most of the time they didn’t know when to shut the hell up.
Now, for example. Brinn was deep in the middle of a maze of narrow, echoing canyons, methodically searching for a terrifying monster. But his sword wouldn’t stop talking.
“You know how you rubbed pig fat into my blade last night?” the sword was saying. “Did I happen to mention how good that felt?”
“Yes!” Brinn whispered urgently. “You mentioned it! A lot! Now would be you please be quiet?”
Most warriors got to prove their valor by going to war. For Brinn, there was one problem: no war. Didn’t it just figure that he had been so unlucky as to have been born in a time of enduring peace?
But Brinn was sixteen years old now—well past the age when he should have proved himself a great hero. So he had had to come up with another plan: the Troll in the Labyrinth. That’s what these endless, twisting canyons were called—the Labyrinth. And somewhere within this wasteland of blackened canyon walls, there lived a vicious troll that guarded a hoard of fabulous treasure. Or so the legend went.
Brinn had come to kill the troll and claim the treasure. True, the creature hadn’t exactly attacked the village. Not lately, anyway. Maybe not ever—at least not in Brinn’s lifetime. But the threat was always there. Constantly looming. Hanging over everything.
When Brinn brought his village the horn of the Troll in the Labyrinth, they would realize just how dire their situation had been. And when he showed them the creature’s treasure, they would be downright overjoyed. After all, the village was poor. The whole kingdom was poor. People would come for miles around just for a glimpse of all the gold and jewels— and the great warrior who had claimed them for his village. No one would even remember that Brinn hadn’t had permission to borrow the talking sword known as Irontongue from the town armory.
Speaking of Irontongue, the weapon was quiet at last. But not deferential-quiet. Sulking-quiet. Brinn could tell the difference.
“Look,” Brinn said to the sword. “I’m sorry I yelled at you. But it’s important that we have the element of surprise. These canyons echo enough as it is. We can’t make any noise.”
“You want a quiet weapon?” the sword said. “You should get yourself a mace.”
Brinn stopped right there in the middle of the canyon and sighed. The sound echoed back at him like a dying gasp.
“Now what?” the sword asked.
“Nothing,” Brinn muttered. But it wasn’t nothing. The truth was, he hadn’t counted on how long it was taking to find and dispatch the Troll in the Labyrinth. He’d been searching these corridors of stone for days—and he was quickly running out of water. He’d had no idea that proving your worth as a warrior would be so hard.
Glancing at the ground, Brinn caught a glimpse of something sharp partially covered by the sand.
He bent down for a closer look. It was a sword—or part of one, anyway. He kicked it loose and saw that it was the tip of a broken—and very rusted—longsword. Where had it come from? This was the third old discarded sword he’d found in the last three days (one night, he’d even unwittingly placed his bedroll on one!). He’d also come across six arrowheads, two horseshoes, and the remnants of a very rusted helm.
“I wonder . . . ,” Brinn said.
“Yes?” Irontongue asked.
But before Brinn could answer, a grinding sound echoed out from the canyon up ahead.
Brinn could barely believe his eyes. The Troll in the Labyrinth! It was roughly human-like—though eight feet tall, with pale blue skin and a big gray horn jutting up from the middle of its forehead. It had yellow eyes, a massive misshapen head, warted like a gourd, and giant hands with twisted fingernails that looked like they hadn’t been trimmed in years. And hanging between its legs was—well, let’s just say it was definitely a male troll (funny how the stories never mentioned such things!).
He had made his home in the end of a box canyon, where the walls of the gorge widened into a round open area of sorts, almost like a small coliseum.
So the stories were true. The Troll in the Labyrinth did exist. And if the stories about the troll were true, the stories about the troll’s treasure also had to be true!
Crouched down at the entrance to the open canyon area, Brinn saw that the troll had gathered a large mound of boulders. It looked like he was now in the process of using the boulders to seal up the entrance to a cave on the opposite side of the canyon. The troll’s stacking of boulders was the grinding sound that Brinn had heard before.
“Well?” Irontongue whispered. “What are you waiting for?”
What was Brinn waiting for? Wasn’t this why he had come all this way—to thrash the troll? But Brinn hadn’t expected the creature to be so, um, tall.
Suddenly the troll swung around to stare right at Brinn. Somehow he had sensed Brinn was there, or maybe he had heard Irontongue’s whisperings. Either way, Brinn had been spotted. There was no turning back now.
Brinn drew Irontongue from its scabbard—a little fumbly, he hated to admit—and stepped out into the open area.
“Head of the troll?” he called.
The creature’s yellow eyes narrowed disdainfully.
“Say farewell to the body of the troll!” Brinn finished.
“Good one!” Irontongue said.
But the troll didn’t respond. Instead, his eyes widened again and got glassy, seeming to lose their focus. The creature swooned a little, then staggered to the nearest boulder, which he used as a seat.
Brinn wasn’t sure what to do. This wasn’t the reaction he’d expected.
“Prepare to lose your head!” Brinn said to the troll.
“Wait,” the sword said to Brinn. “Didn’t you just say that?”
But even as the sword was talking, the troll was swooning again. Yellow eyes quivering in their sockets, the troll swayed left, then right. He lifted a hand full of twisted fingernails up to his forehead.
Then he toppled forward into the sand. The troll made no effort to break his fall. He smacked against the ground facedown, with what had to be a very painful thud. A big cloud of dust exploded upward at the impact.
Brinn could only stare. What had just happened? This was obviously a ruse of some sort. But as the dust slowly settled, Brinn saw that the troll was sprawled across the sand like a gutted carp.
There was dead, and there was dead. That troll was dead. Not a single muscle on the creature stirred; none of his fat quivered from an intake of air.
Even so, Brinn approached cautiously, sword drawn. It could still be a trick. What did he know about trolls, anyway?
He kicked the body of the creature. It hurt his toe—a lot. It felt like he’d kicked solid s
tone.
Up close, Brinn was still in awe of the monster. And yet something didn’t seem right. The skin, for one thing. Was healthy troll skin supposed to look so washed-out? And the tone was off—way off. The flesh literally sagged. Somehow the troll managed to look both flabby and emaciated at the same time. And sixty seconds after collapsing, he already had the stench of death.
Could it be that the troll was old? Is that why he had died? Was he teetering on the edge of death when Brinn had come upon him, and had Brinn’s sudden appearance been just enough of a fright to push him over?
It didn’t matter. Brinn had vanquished the troll—hadn’t he? No one needed to know the story of what had really happened here. He could still cut off the troll’s horn and take it back to the village.
“Well, that was anticlimactic,” Irontongue said drolly.
The sword, Brinn thought. It saw what had happened; it knew the truth. Would it talk? No. Talking swords weren’t like that. They were magically bound never to betray their wielder; they were the ultimate yes-men. And each time they were picked up by a new person, their memories were wiped clean. So Irontongue’s lips were sealed, so to speak.
“The treasure!” Brinn said, remembering the legend of the troll’s fabulous hoard. It had to be in the cave!
Stepping around the body of the troll, Brinn faced the entrance to the cave. The troll had already sealed it halfway up with boulders. But the rocks were large and solidly placed. Brinn sheathed his sword and easily climbed over the obstruction.
Once he was inside, it took several moments for his eyes to adjust to the dark.
Then they adjusted. And what a treasure confronted Brinn there! Golden bowls brimmed with sparkling jewels and rings, ropes of pearls, and even a crown or two. Wooden chests spilled forth with coins. Even the dust of a canyon cave couldn’t dim this treasure’s luster.
“It’s incredible!” Brinn whispered.
“It was too easy,” Irontongue said. “Quests aren’t supposed to be this easy.”
“It wasn’t that easy,” Brinn said, piqued. “I’ve been searching these canyons for days. And I have a blister on my heel you wouldn’t believe.” But the truth was, Irontongue had said aloud what Brinn was feeling inside. The quest had been pretty easy—which meant that maybe he hadn’t proved his worth as a warrior at all.
“Getting here was not an easy feat,” a voice said. “But the real test lies ahead.”
At first, Brinn thought it was the sword that had spoken. But no, this was a new voice, one from outside the cave.
Brinn whirled back toward the entrance. Standing in the middle of the open area outside the cave, on the other side of the troll’s corpse, was a man—a stout-looking warrior in full armor, with a polished shield and sword by his side. But the angle of the sun must have changed, because the glare from the man’s shield and armor made it difficult to look directly at him. And something must have kicked up the dust again, because there was a haze in the air, further obscuring the figure.
“Uh-oh,” Irontongue muttered. “I knew it was too good to be true.”
Brinn ignored the sword, staring out at the warrior in the sun. “What do you want?” Brinn called to him.
“I came about the treasure,” the man said.
The treasure! Brinn thought. Of course! Brinn wasn’t going to be able to claim it after all—at least not yet. He had a competitor now: this warrior. And from the look of things, he would not be so easy to vanquish as the dying troll.
“Go away!” Brinn shouted, and his voice reverberated inside the cave. “The troll’s treasure is mine!” But how had the warrior known about the treasure, anyway? It hadn’t been visible from outside the cave. Had he been watching from somewhere too, waiting for the troll to die?
“Oh?” said the warrior.
“It is!” Brinn said. “I have vanquished the troll!”
“I see,” said the warrior, and from the tone of his voice, Brinn knew he knew the truth. “But for the record, the treasure did not belong to the troll. He was merely guarding it.”
Brinn wasn’t going to be drawn into this game of verbal cat and mouse. Why was he even talking to the warrior, anyway? He was going to have to fight him, so he might as well get it over with. Brinn wouldn’t necessarily be slaughtered. He wondered what the odds were of the warrior having a heart attack right then and there.
Brinn drew his sword. This time, he wasn’t clumsy at all. In fact, as it slid smoothly from its sheath, the sword actually rang. That had to count for something.
“Attaboy!” Irontongue whispered. “Go get ’em!”
“The question is,” the warrior went on quietly, almost as if talking to himself, “who does the treasure belong to? That was never really clear, you see. Different people laid claim. Whole kingdoms, in fact. It changed hands many times. Many battles were waged for that fortune.”
Brinn squinted, still trying to make out the warrior. But the glint of sunlight was particularly strong off his helmet. He couldn’t make out the face at all.
“This is your last chance!” Brinn shouted, using Irontongue to underline each word. “Desist, or I shall be forced to defend my spoils!”
The warrior kept talking, as if Brinn had not spoken at all. “Many great battles,” he mused. “This area all around us, this wasteland, is the result of those wars.”
“I mean it!” Brinn said. But at the same time, he thought, What was it the warrior had said? Something about the surrounding area being a battlefield? Brinn couldn’t help but remember the remnants of weapons and armor that he had discovered over the past few days. And the black marks on the canyon walls—could they be the scorch marks of wizard and dragon fire?
“But it was very long ago,” the warrior said. “Almost the life span of a troll.”
A troll? Brinn thought. What did that have to do with anything?
“Two vast armies.” The warrior kept on talking, softly, confidently. “Both thousands of swords strong. An army in yellow and an army in purple. Together, that made red. Again and again they clashed, and the red ran deeper still.”
Brinn ignored the warrior’s words and stomped his way to the cave’s entrance. Brinn would have to climb over the boulders again but he wasn’t about to sheathe his sword, no matter how hard that made it for him to clamber over the rocks. He would need to be ready for battle the instant he touched down on the other side.
But the warrior didn’t take advantage of Brinn’s vulnerability as he climbed. The warrior just kept talking. “There were survivors of the wars, of course,” he said. “The strongest was a troll—a mercenary for the army in purple. Some people said that he took the treasure for himself and hid it in this cave. But others said that even a troll has a conscience. And that this particular troll had grown very weary of war.”
Leaping down from the top of the stacked boulders, Brinn shouted victoriously, “Aha!” He looked up at the warrior, but the canyon dust had not yet settled—which was strange, because now Brinn could feel that there was no wind outside, or even a breeze. He could still see the man within the haze, but his face didn’t seem any clearer than before. How was it, Brinn wondered, that the dust did not block the sun’s glare?
“But now the troll is dead,” the warrior said, “and the treasure has been found again.”
“Yes!” Brinn said. “By me!” And with that, sword swinging, he charged the warrior.
A few moments later, he stumbled out from the other side of the cloud of dust. At no point had his flailing sword found the warrior’s flesh.
How was that possible? The dust was thick, but it wasn’t that thick. Brinn had run right for the man, and he had been swinging wildly. Had the warrior stepped out of the way at the last second, obscuring himself in the swirling haze?
Confused, Brinn spun around to face the cloud again. The gleaming warrior had turned to face Brinn too, but otherwise didn’t appear to have moved at all. It was almost as if Brinn had passed right through him.
“And if y
ou take that treasure back to your village,” the warrior said casually, as if Brinn had not just attacked him, “you think it will change everything?”
“Yes!” Brinn shouted angrily. “Of course it will!” His village was desperately poor. But even as he thought this, Brinn remembered that the surrounding villages were poor too. The whole kingdom was poor. And if word got out that one village had acquired a great treasure, what would stop the other villages from wanting a portion of it? But there hadn’t been war among the villages since—well, Brinn had never heard of such a war. For the most part, they were all equally poor, so what would be the point?
Sure, he thought, there might be some scuffles, some inter-village conflicts. But that was the consequence of wealth. Besides, maybe Brinn could leave some of the treasure here for a while—after he defeated the warrior, that is. It was true that his village didn’t need all of the gold and jewels. It wasn’t like his village was desperately poor. No one was starving, exactly.
“But will they believe you if you tell them there isn’t any more treasure?” the warrior asked. “Can you be sure they won’t come into the Labyrinth themselves, looking for the rest?”
Brinn knew the warrior was right. The villagers would come looking for the rest—and eventually they would find it.
Wait a minute, he thought. Brinn hadn’t said that part about not taking all of the treasure out loud. So how had the warrior known what he was thinking?
Once again, Brinn squinted at him in the haze. “How did you do that?”
“Do what?” the warrior asked, as if he really didn’t know.
“You knew what I was thinking!”
At that, the warrior did not speak. Brinn glanced over at the half-sealed entrance to the cave, and at the pile of boulders outside.
Now it was Brinn’s eyes that lost their focus. “The troll knew he was dying,” he whispered. “So he was hiding the treasure so that no one would ever find it. To make sure no one ever fought over it again.”
Again the warrior did not speak. In the blur of his own eyesight, Brinn suddenly thought he saw other figures gathered in the haze before him, glints of sharpened swords and polished armor, pennons of purple and yellow.
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