Sword of the Bright Lady

by M. C. Planck

  The black sword smashed into Cannan’s shoulder while the greatsword sank into Bart’s thigh. Both men shrugged off the blows, shedding little blood, and kept going. Cannan risked a blow to the head, which Bart ducked, and while he was spinning through the stroke Bart stabbed him in the back. It wasn’t a total loss, because Cannan made use of the opening once he’d spun all the way around and caught Bart across his exposed left side. The armor squealed as the blade crunched through it. The tall man made no sound. He just hit Cannan again, hacking away with his long black sword. Both men’s armor plate was rent in various places, but the bodies underneath were only scratched. The mundane metal was not as resilient as the tael-bound flesh.

  Karl had dropped his shield and taken his sword in both hands. Operating freely behind Bart, he laid into the man’s back like a sledgehammer. The sword rebounded as if he’d struck a statue.

  It was evident that Cannan was losing. Although he was doing tremendous damage to Bart, he was taking almost as much, and it was clear who was going to run out of tael first. Bart seemed unusually outraged with every blow, as if the idea that Cannan could hurt him at all was personally offensive. Perhaps he had expected to be invulnerable to the greatsword, like he was to Karl’s thin blade.

  Bart whittled away at the red-clad knight, whose costume was now flecked with the red of his own blood. Cannan fought furiously, without concern for his own imminent end, on the constant attack. Bart was damaged, but not enough. Tael still bound the dark knight’s wounds. Cannan had begun to bleed freely from the latest cut, and it was clear that he was down to mere flesh and bone. The next strike would be the last and might even be fatal. The terrible power and sharpness of the weapons could kill an ordinary man instantly.

  Karl approached again, all but forgotten by both combatants as utterly irrelevant. He raised up high for another two-handed stroke. Something was different. He had traded his sword for the katana left lying on the ground. Still glowing its bright silver shine, the light seemed to prod at Bart, who paused, confused and defensive for the first time, made hesitant by the unseen threat behind him. Cannan threw himself into one last attack, dropping exhausted to his knees to plunge the sword in Bart’s chest, a solid blow, but a foolish one, for now he was totally exposed, winded, and immobile, with no defense at all. The black blade rose, its fall and Cannan’s death inevitable.

  But the sword did not fall, the man did. A majestic tree, straight and solid, he toppled to the ground, the glowing katana embedded in his helmet like an ax blade in a log, its luminance fading back to normal after the flash when it struck. Bright-red blood pumped out of the rent in the helmet, out of the faceplate, out of the neck opening. The yellow priest rushed to his master’s side. Cannan staggered to his feet and bodily threw the man away.

  “We claim the field,” he said, panting. The blood stopped flowing and the point became moot.

  At least, that’s what they told Christopher later. He missed all of it, waking up on the bed in the chapel, in front of the fireplace. The scene seemed oddly familiar. Before he could remember why, he realized there was something wrong with his right eye.

  “I can’t see,” he said, covering his left with his hand.

  “Aye, Christopher,” Svengusta said, “there’s no surprise there. But the Vicar can fix that for you.”

  “How bad was it?”

  “We almost lost you,” the old man replied with uncharacteristic seriousness. “Had the duel lasted another minute you would be dead, bled out despite your tael. But I think there’s no brain damage, the eye can be fixed, and you’ve gotten a handsome scar out of it, so the Lord of Luck has favored you again.”

  “Brain damage?” But he stopped wondering when Karl handed him the remains of his helmet. It had been cut open like a candy wrapper.

  Bart’s men were gone, bearing their dead lord back to his own lands but leaving behind his arms and armor. Cannan and Karl had stripped the body first, under the direction of Niona’s magical detection, after she drew the tael out of the corpse’s cracked skull. Once again booty lay piled before the wooden image of the god of War. Christopher wondered if Svengusta found that as annoying as he did.

  “We did well,” grinned Cannan, battered but unbowed. “Dark has lost a rank, and we’ve gained a prize.”

  “It was not so well done,” Lalania cautioned. “To let him bleed out was graceless, when you saved your own.”

  “He would have done the same,” Cannan retorted. “And he wouldn’t have had to put up with your tongue afterward.”

  Niona sat beside her husband, smiling with unrestrained relief. “Graceless was the black knight’s acceptance of Karl’s participation. He knew his magic rendered the Goodman helpless against him.”

  “The prize is why we are all here crowding your sickbed,” Cannan said, “not a pointless argument over etiquette. I know we agreed I could keep the ransom from a duel, but that was when you weren’t fighting it. I feel honor-bound to share the reward with you now. But not unfairly, mind you.”

  “The standard arrangement seems adequate,” Karl suggested. “One share per rank, so Pater gets one-quarter and you get the rest.”

  “What about you?” Christopher demanded. “You brought the man down!”

  “I am your servant, and thus to be rewarded out of your share. I have no rank, and I cannot pretend to be entitled to a troop’s share.”

  “We’re not unmindful of the boy’s deeds,” Cannan said. “But first let us settle the matter of the ring.”

  He displayed a bright gold ring in his palm, set with small black stones all around.

  “It’s Dark,” Niona said. “This much I know, and I fear it.”

  “It’s powerful,” Cannan said. “This much I know, and I want it.”

  “Unfortunately,” Lalania finished, “I don’t know much about it, though it is my place to know these things. I am reasonably certain, however, that it was the source of Bart’s power and confidence. I believe that the ring shields its wearer against mundane damage.”

  Christopher was impressed. Magic rings were cool.

  “Not completely,” she continued. “But combined with his plate, it would be proof against ordinary weapons.”

  “So how did we win?” Christopher asked.

  “Because I cheated,” Cannan winked. “I had a potion that rendered my sword magical, much like your spell. I had been saving it against need, and this fight looked to need all the help it could get. That’s why he slipped past me to get to you, but if I hadn’t stopped to magic my blade, he would have never fallen. Not that I knew that at the time. I was just hoping you could last one pass against him on your own.”

  “It wasn’t cheating,” Niona protested. “You brought the potion in with you and staked it as ransom.”

  “What else did we get?” Christopher asked. He could see the knight was intent on claiming the ring for his own. He couldn’t blame him.

  Karl finished the list for Cannan. “The armor, which Bart’s man will ransom for four hundred gold. That’s low, but I don’t know that we could sell it for more. Few would wish to be mistaken for Black Bart.

  “The blade, for which they’ve offered a thousand gold. Also low, since it’s first-ranked, but it would be a significant insult not to return it.

  “And of course his tael.”

  Niona produced a large, lusciously purple marble.

  “That’s a lot of tael,” Christopher said.

  “Yes, it is,” Cannan agreed. “Twice enough to put your man here to his first rank, or enough to put you to second. If you were entitled to it all, which you are not. But I will not deny the Goodman a rank.”

  Everyone looked at Karl.

  “No,” the young veteran said. “I am not entitled to a share. I will not accept special treatment.” He could hardly accept a rank now, in any case. His and the Saint’s plan to reduce the armor expenditure of the draft depended on his status as a commoner.

  “Your madness borders on insolence, boy,” Cann
an said. “But your loyalty to your law and your lord must be excused, I suppose.”

  “What do you think I am entitled to?” Christopher asked.

  “We do not know the value of the ring,” Cannan said, “but I will concede it is high. Yet if it is as potent as we think, you’ll have even more adventurers coming to claim it from you. You are not ranked enough to wield such power. Therefore, I suggest that I take the ring, and give you the rest of the booty. The tael we will divide by standard, a quarter for your rank and three for mine.”

  Christopher wanted the ring, too, since he seemed to be getting in fights all the time. But Cannan’s argument was compelling. It would only lead to more fights.

  “The ring is Dark,” Svengusta said. “I do not know that any Bright should use it.”

  “I’m not going to marry it,” Cannan growled. “But I do not think my soul will suffer from wearing it in battle. I fail to see how much more evil can touch me when I’m busy cutting people in half. I’ve struggled with the Dark all my life, and I expect to continue.”

  “But you expect to always win,” Svengusta objected, but not loudly, because it was not his place to say such things.

  “I will ask my College about this ring, when I can,” Lalania said. “Until then I would beg you do not use it.”

  “I do not answer to the beck and call of dried-up Eastern scholars.” The knight frowned. “I am responsible for my own affiliation, and I will not tolerate any further discussion on the matter.”

  Christopher looked to Karl for assistance, and the young man nodded subtly.

  “Then it’s agreed,” Christopher told Cannan.

  “Since the advice is flowing freely,” the knight growled, “I will suggest that armor would make a fine trophy, standing over there next to your fireplace. But I wouldn’t give the sword to your stiff-necked young soldier, because I think Bart’s going to want to kill whoever has it, just on general principle.”

  “I don’t want to make more of an enemy of Bart than I have to,” Christopher said. “I’ll take his money if that will annoy him the least.”

  Cannan looked a little put off. “You could send it home for free, if you are so eager to please him.”

  “No. I don’t want him to like me that much. He might decide to visit.”

  18.

  THE SHOW MUST GO ON

  “You’ll get no more profit out of your champion, I wager,” Tom told Christopher a week later, leaping from Fingean’s wagon to unload the latest supplies. Today they had uniforms for the boys and news about Cannan.

  “He’s too eager,” Tom complained. “At first they think he’s bluffing, but then somebody tells them about Black Bart and that’s the last we see of them.”

  “Tell him to tone it down a bit, and you might get some more duels,” Fingean added helpfully.

  “Hello,” Christopher said, pointing to the right side of his face, “missing eye here. Not really interested in losing the other one right now.”

  “You should go to town and have that fixed,” Svengusta suggested. “It will only take a moment.” Yes, but it was a moment in the Vicar’s company, which he was dreading. Besides, he was fiendishly busy getting ready for his tour.

  He’d paid Lalania more money, buying more publicity for his tour. Karl had been aghast at setting out a schedule so that everyone would know when and where they were for two weeks of traveling. The security risk was incredible. But that was the point: to provoke a fight with the Invisible Guild when there weren’t any villagers around to get killed by it. Karl understood the wisdom of this, even though he couldn’t stop shaking his head at the madness of handing out your marching schedule. But once he realized it was quite likely to result in fatalities, he cheered up and modified the training to include security drills, like escorting Christopher through the inn without letting anyone get within arm’s reach of him. They also posted a regular guard now, so that at any given time two of the boys were awake and on duty. And woe to the boy who forgot the day’s password.

  The next morning, bright and early on Karl time, they lined up. The boys were kitted out now, uniforms and winter gear, helmets and bedrolls. The fluted metal helms, long coats, and short spears made them look like some weird version of the Kaiser’s Imperial troopers. Christopher and Karl wore the same, although with chain mail under their coats. When Christopher pretended to pull a monocle out of his vest pocket, nobody else got the joke.

  They set off for Knockford in a column two wide, the two horsemen in the lead, the boys marching behind with their spears and the handful of crossbows Karl had borrowed. Karl had worked miracles, transforming the boys from rambunctious puppy dogs into orderly, wary young men. True, they were mostly wary of Karl and his exacting standards, but at least they were paying attention now.

  They marched into town with a reasonable semblance of martial prowess. The uniforms in particular made an impression, marking them out as a unit, in service to a single master. Christopher could feel his social class rising by the minute.

  Sadly, the improvement would not help with the next battle he had to face.

  The Vicar glared at him from across her desk.

  “My quiet town is now a hotbed of intrigue. Foreign gentry, druids, Gold-robed priests come and go, while mummers, sharpers, and con men of every description choke the streets. Your duel has spread like a taint, as every profiteer seeks to gain your magic sword.”

  “I’m sorry, my Lady,” Christopher said, “but this is not my doing. I would have put the matter of the sword to rest, if not for Faren’s orders.”

  “I’m no happier with him,” she snorted. “You might notice he hasn’t sent me any additional police, and I’ve already got half a dozen accused thieves in custody. I’m looking forward to your leaving town. I’m expecting all this to go with you. Including that drunken lout you named a champion. Get him out of here before Black Bart decides to come back for revenge. That’s an order.”

  “I will do my best, my Lady. Our agreement is over, so I think he’ll have no reason to stay.”

  “As a sign of my displeasure,” she continued, unappeased, “I’m going to charge you the normal price for restoring your sight. You did not get that injury in performance of your priestly duties, and you cannot plead poverty. Do you have any objections?”

  It was quite clear there was exactly one acceptable answer.

  “No, of course not, my Lady.” But then he had to ask, “Um . . . how much does it cost?”

  She pinched her lips in disgust. “You should already know that. You can settle with the clerk. He’s got other fees to charge you, as well. We’re not a warehouse for your business ventures.”

  “Of course, my Lady. I am more than happy to pay my fair share.”

  She sighed, finally running out of steam. “It seems I cannot remain angry at you. Although every step you take discomforts me, you do not act out of malice or stupidity.

  “I cannot fathom Krellyan’s design,” she complained, but not really to him. “The only future I see is you hanging from a noose and your chapel in flames. No, don’t explain. If Krellyan hasn’t told me, then I don’t want to know. But understand, if I show you any kindness, it is out of pity for your eventual fate. Only your imminent destruction makes the disturbances you inflict on my daily life bearable.”

  He winced involuntarily, thinking of disturbances yet to come. He was reasonably certain nobody had told her yet about the deed he held to the Old Bog.

  But she misinterpreted his flinch, responding with, “Now sit still, this won’t hurt a bit,” in the manner of all medical professionals who are about to inflict unspeakable agony on some helpless patient. She put her hand over his blind eye and cast a spell.

  It didn’t hurt, though it was quite disorienting when his eye blinked a few times and suddenly the other half of the room came into vision. He hadn’t realized how nice stereo vision was until he’d lost it.

  “Thank you,” he said.

  She handed him a mirror. They had
n’t let him look in one before, and now he could see why. He had a nasty scar from his temple to the bottom of his nose. The sword had cut absurdly deep.

  “How is it I lived through this?” he wondered aloud.

  “Because your head is harder than stone,” Rana growled. “Like all men who would be famous.”

  He was struck by her compliment, if that’s what it was. “Do you think I’ll be famous?”

  “Or dead,” she said sourly. “Those are the only options open to you. You do not have the personality to live simply in the world, accepting it for what it is.”

  “I wasn’t famous back home, where I came from,” he mused. “And no one ever expected me to be.”

  “That was there, and this is here. The seed grows differently in different soil.”

  He joined Cannan and Karl in the tavern, wondering if this was how Luke felt meeting Han Solo. Private meetings with rough and dangerous men in dark taverns, discussing violence and treasure, should have been unnerving, but instead it was uncomfortably intriguing. Maybe he’d been spending too much time in the company of excitable young men.

  “Our deal is done,” he told the knight.

  “Aye, it’s over,” Cannan agreed. “Nobody dares to challenge Black Bart’s ghost in front of your chapel.”

  “But I have another proposition, if you are interested.”

  Cannan looked at him through narrowed eyes. “You are full of propositions, priest. Do you hatch them like eggs in your funny long coat? But I have one for you.”