Sword Singer-Sword Dancer 2 (48 page)

the circle--the sword never becomes a true jivatma?"

Kem spat out the nail. His tone was very gentle, as if he spoke to a child.

"You

may pink someone in the circle, and the sword will remain unblooded. You may even cut him severely; the sword will remain unblooded. But if you kill anyone,

anyone at all, you have quenched the sword, and the sword becomes a jivatma, with the dead man's skills and attributes; a piece of the dead man's soul."

He

shrugged. "If later you sing to key it, that soul is yours to tap... that and the Northern magic."

It seemed clear enough. So long as I could get South and sell it without having

to kill anyone, I could keep the sword a sword. And even if something came up and I did have to kill someone, I'd never, ever sing while doing it. The jivatma

would never be keyed.

I peered suspiciously at the blade. It was steel, no longer iron. With a bright,

shining skin like nothing else in the world. The edges were blunt as yet, but visible, waiting for the rest.

"Take it," Kem said.

Warily, I took it. No tongs, just the blade. It was cool from the water, but I

felt the deeper warmth, like blood running through veins. I swear, there was life in this sword. Sweating, I rang it down on the anvil. "I don't want this thing."

Kem's face didn't change. "You have made it yours."

I felt distinctly queasy. "I don't want it. It's not a sword--it's more than a

sword... have you lied to me? Is that thing already a jivatma?"

Slowly he shook his head. "It's not a jivatma yet. It's hardly begun to live...

but what life is there is yours."

I badly wanted to back away but refused to show so much. "A sword is a weapon, a

killing instrument, a tool designed to take life. Not to live on its own.

It's

simply a piece of metal--"

"And so it is," Kem agreed. "This sword is only half-made. You needn't fear it

yet."

"I don't want to fear it at all!"

He stood bathed in the dim red light of coals, and the glow from a single lantern set high in a corner. "It's too late to turn away now. It would be like

killing a child who's only begun to live."

"It's a sword--"

"--in need of a name," Kem finished quietly. "It doesn't know itself yet. It only knows what you've given it: a taste of what life is."

I felt the prickle on neck and arms. "Something's wrong," I said sharply.

"There's sorcery in the air!"

He looked at me piercingly, not even asking how I knew. Only, "Where?"

"--something wrong--"

In the distance, I heard screams. Faint, small screams, warped by water and echo.

Kem heard them, too. "The settlement!" he cried.

Forty-two

I was out of the smithy and running, heading through trees to the lakeshore, where boats bobbed on the water. The screaming was clearer now, and the squealing of frightened horses.

I was not alone for long. Kem was there, and others, pushing off in boats. I waited, looking for Del; saw only Telek.

"Where is she?" I asked.

"With Kalle." He bent to free the rope.

I blinked. "Why? It's not like Del to ignore someone's need for help."

Telek straightened, holding the rope. His gray eyes were almost feral; his tone

precisely even. "I told her not to leave the island. That if she wants to stay

with Kalle so much, she should stay with Kalle."

I shook my head. "That's not fair. No matter how you feel about her, you're still depriving Staal-Ysta and the settlement of a good sword."

"Get in the boat," Telek repeated. "There is no more time to waste."

He was right, much as I wanted to argue. I clambered into the boat, sat down, watched grimly as Telek pushed off and jumped in. He settled the oars and began

to row, heading us diagonally across the lake toward the shrieks and screams.

By the time we reached the settlement, there was nothing left to fight.

People

clustered in groups, talking about the attack. Some carried wounded into lodges

for tending. Others gathered together the bodies, preparing for funeral rites.

I

saw the marks on the bodies. I knew what had done this.

"Hounds," I told Telek on the way to the corrals.

"Beasts, I call them the hounds of hoolies--I don't know what they are. But they've followed Del and me for weeks."

His face was stark. "After they left us."

I glanced at him sharply. "These hounds? Are you certain?"

His expression was bleak. "We've said nothing, because up till now we've been safe. The beasts can't swim, so Staal-Ysta has been a haven. And they left us weeks ago, trailing other prey... we believed them gone for good." He shook his

head and frowned, looking around at the carnage. "They ignored the settlement before, watching Staal-Ysta only, as if there is something there... something that draws them. They want something specific--"

I nodded. "I think they want her sword."

It stunned him. "Her jivatma? Why? What use would hounds have for it?"

"I think they've been sent by someone." Briefly, I told him how they had dogged

our trail, herding us, driving us toward the North. And how they had responded

to Del's sword when she'd keyed it in the canyon.

When I was finished, Telek nodded. "You may be right," he agreed. "If indeed there is someone behind the hounds--someone who has sent them for whatever purpose--" He started to shake his head, then snapped it around to stare at me

in shock. "It is her sword! It must be! Because up until tonight, none have been

here at the settlement."

I frowned. "I don't understand."

He was impatient with my ignorance. "We elevated two an-ishtoya to kaidin only

three days before you and Del arrived. Their swords were not yet blooded...

they

were preparing to ride out with their sponsors to blood them in the circle; this

was their last night here. They came to spend it with their families--off the island: here." His face was intent. "But maybe it isn't just Del's sword.

Maybe

it's any jivatma at all--and that's what drew the beasts tonight."

I shook my head. "But if the swords haven't been blooded yet--"

"The magic is still in them," he snapped, distracted.

"Just not roused, not harnessed by blooding... a sorcerer, knowing jivatmas, would also know that. It wouldn't stop him from sending the beasts--if that's what he's after."

I could be as terse. "Then I suggest you find those new-made kaidin as soon as

you can. See if they're here. See if their swords are here."

Telek looked at me in dawning shock. And then he turned on his heel and ran.

We'd reached the corrals. Some of them had been broken down and emptied as the

horses panicked and ran, but others remained standing, poles and brush left intact. In one of them was the stud.

I felt the knot in my belly loosen. "So, old man, you survived... still too tough to kill."

I unlatched the gate, slipped in, slapped milling horses out of my way, let the

stud come up to me.

I scratched the stud's jaw, glad to touch him again; it gave me an unexpected peace. "They want something," I mused aloud; he flicked black-tipped ears.

"Those hounds of hoolies want something. They've been very patient, but I think

they're tired of waiting." I patted his hairy neck. "Yes, I think they'll be back... there are more jivatmas here, and one due to leave very soon."

Telek was back, and panting; his breath was white in the air. "They're gone,"

gasped, "both of them. Them and their swords."

I reached to my neck and slipped the thong over my head, handing him the ward-whistle. "Give this to someone here who is responsible. It will keep the hounds away; it's what allowed Del and me to get through. I'll need it again soon, but for now it should keep the settlement safe."

Telek frowned, looking at the whistle. "What do you intend to do?"

I tugged the stud's ears; smiled as he pulled away. "I intend to beat you in the

circle, Northerner, and then leave Staal-Ysta." I shrugged. "Maybe get in a little hunting."

There was a new respect in Telek's eyes. "You will leave with your own jivatma.

If that really is what is drawing the beasts--"

"--then I can draw them away." I smiled. "I guess you can say it's my way of making up for a dance that isn't a dance; I want to buy my deliverance somehow.

Honorably. This is one way to do it." I shrugged. "Besides, I figure it's one way of helping a lot of people I know: you, Del, Kalle... a Borderer woman and

her children... even a horse-speaker from the uplands." Again, I shrugged.

"Something to do to pass the time."

Slowly, he shook his head. "I didn't expect it of you."

"No, probably not." I grinned. "Of course, people have been misjudging me for years."

But Telek didn't laugh. He didn't even smile.

One night later, I faced Kem in the smithy. Faced him and my sword.

"It will cut water," Kem said. "Cut it cleanly, like flesh or silk, and make it

bleed; even water."

He had fit blade and hilt together, melding them into one, so that the sword was

a single unit. All was washed with silver, though steel underneath: hilts, grip,

pommel; a twisted rope of silk somehow turned into metal. Its color was moonlight and ice.

In my hand, it was an extension of myself. The balance was as pure as any I've

ever known, so fine and clean it carried me instead of the other way around.

And

it was warm in my hand, like flesh.

Del's sword, to me, was cold, but she'd said to her it was warm. I wondered if

this was the same: hoarfrost to everyone else, sunlight only to me.

"Of course," Kem said pointedly, "it isn't ready yet."

I looked at him over the blade. "What do you mean, 'isn't ready'?"

He tapped his anvil. "Lay it here. This will take only a moment."

Suspicion flared instantly. "What do you mean to do?"

"There is the Naming, yet. Right now, it's an unnamed blade. Left so, it's not

worth its Making. Here." He tapped the anvil again.

Slowly I set down the sword, oddly reluctant to take my hand from it. Then Kem

drew his knife, motioned me forward, took hold of my left hand and turned it over, palm up.

"Wait," I blurted.

"This isn't the true blooding," Kem said patiently. "I've explained all that, remember? This is part of the Naming,"

I held my silence as he nicked deeply into the fleshy part of the heel between

thumb and wrist. When blood flowed freely, he nodded, then guided the hand to the sword. Carefully he held the sword in place, then slid my hand the length of

the blade, smearing it with blood.

And again, when he turned it over. The steel shone bloody and dull, moonsilver

sheen now obscured.

He grunted, gave me a rag. "Blank." Graying brows knitted a moment. Then he heaved a weary sigh, as if I'd disappointed him. "Well, it comes of being matched with a man who doesn't believe."

I frowned down at the sword, stopping the nick in my hand with the rag.

"What's

it supposed to do?"

"Once Made, once Bound, once Blessed, there is a heart in every blade... a soul

known only to it. And it shows itself in the runes."

I recalled the alien, twisted shapes carved into Del's blade. The runes were alive to me, never the same; everchanging. But my blade was blank as blood.

"Does it have a name, now?"

Kem looked straight at me. "If it does, you'd know. Since you don't, it doesn't."

"Will it ever have a name?"

"Probably once it's blooded. Or maybe when you finally come to believe; the sword will tell you, then." He shrugged; his tone was one of delicate contempt.

"But you don't want to blood it. You don't want to believe. You'd rather leave

it unnamed, and only half alive."

I felt a twinge in my belly: guilt, resentment, acknowledgment. "So long as it

serves me in the circle, that's all I require," I told him flatly. "Down South,

skill is the only magic. We don't depend on other things."

Kem put hands on hips. "I don't care what customs are down South. This is a Northern sword." He gestured sharply. "Take it to the lake. Wash it free of blood. My work is done; from now on it's in your care, inadequate as that may be."

Not a courteous man, Kem. But then, I hadn't expected it. I was a stranger to him, and Southron, and yet I bore the rank of an-ishtoya. Accustomed to Northern

students come begging for a jivatma, my indifference to the magic was startling

as well as disturbing.

And it probably bruised his ego.

I lifted the sword yet again; yet again marveling at the silken texture of steel, the uncannily perfect balance, the life that cried out in the blade.

Singlestroke, too, had been made for me, to precise specifications, but even that noteworthy sword felt as dross to gold compared to Kem's masterwork.

As if reading me, he shook his head. "I was the Maker, yes; the rest is all from

you. The Binding, the Blessing... whatever else you choose to do. This sword will be whatever you wish it to be. It will be you, growing out of whatever things have shaped you over the years. No other may use it once it's blooded, because it will guard itself against them, turning only to you."

"If it becomes a jivatma."

Slowly, Kem shook his head. "You dishonor this sword. Southron. Pray gods it doesn't dishonor you."

Disagreements aside, he'd made a marvelous sword. Not knowing what else to do, I

asked him his price for the work, knowing full well I couldn't pay it. But he said he would take nothing; that his magic was from the gods and they repaid him

well. His life was here on Staal-Ysta; all his wants were attended to. He needed

nothing from me save respect for the weapon I carried.