The Guild Secret (The Dark Ability Book 6) (7 page)

“So, you actually did it?” Jonas asked. “Evaelyn… She is gone?”

“She’s gone. She tried to side with Venass. I couldn’t let her do that.”

Shael and Firell watched Jonas, as if trying to decide what to do with him. Rsiran had the sense that they had allowed him to lead because of the threat of the Forgotten. With that threat gone, what leverage did Jonas really have over them? He was only a man with the ability to Slide.

“What of the others?” Jonas asked. He didn’t try to fight against the knives that floated around him. He didn’t even try to move anywhere, maybe having given up on trying to get away.

“As I’ve said, the others are gone. The guild has helped those they have been able to find as much as they can, but there are those outside the guild, those who had no interest in aligning with the guild…”

Jonas stared at the knives floating in front of him. “If they are gone, then there is no choice but to side with Venass.” He glanced at Shael who only frowned.

“Venass will do nothing but try to destroy you and those you care about.”

“The Elvraeth have seen to it that we have no other options.”

“You can return to Elaeavn.”

Jonas shook his head. “Return to what? The penalty for returning is clear. If they discover that we’ve returned—”

“You can Slide. You’ve never attempted to return?”

He shook his head. “Sliding is dangerous. Venass can pull us out of our Slides, and there are different concerns when it comes to the Elvraeth, but no less worrisome. At least with Venass, we have the chance to live.”

“I’ve seen the chance that Venass offers. That’s no sort of life.”

“Life?” Shael asked. “What kind of life do he be havin’ the way it is? Venass might no’ be any better than the others, but they don’ have a plan to kill them for existing.”

Rsiran felt troubled. The Forgotten had been his enemy, but then, had it been all of the Forgotten or only those who had sided with Venass? Was there any way that he could work with the scattered Forgotten?

He
pulled
the knives back to him and stuffed them into his pocket. “Don’t come after me,” he said, “and stay away from Venass. If I find you working with them, I won’t have any mercy.”

“You leavin’ us be, after all that we done?”

“Venass is my enemy. Don’t join them.” With that, he Slid back to Elaeavn.

T
he inside
of the Barth carried less of the vibrant and lively air that he’d found in the tavern where he’d discovered Firell. A lutist played near the hearth, the mournful sound a slow and quiet layer atop the soft murmuring of voices within the tavern. Nothing like he’d found in Asador. There, all the voices seemed to jumble over each other, piling on until he could hear nothing but noise. There was a certain protection to it, in the anonymity and the fact that they couldn’t be easily overheard. Not in the Wretched Barth. The tavern might be busier than it had been when Lianna ran it, but it still wasn’t like what he’d found in Asador.

Brusus made his way through the tavern, stopping and speaking to people at each table, smiling and laughing with them, so much more at peace than he had been before he took it over. Alyse popped out of the kitchen briefly, only to rush back in for another order. Savory smells drifted out through the kitchen door and then faded.

Haern sat with Jessa at their usual table. This late in the night, it wasn’t hard for them to claim it. But with the increased business, it had become more difficult to keep others from getting to it first. Brusus usually managed to keep those poachers away with a steely glare.

“You’ve been gone a while,” Haern noted.

He told them of visiting Asador, and of finding Firell, carefully wording the news about having come across Shael so that it wouldn’t anger Jessa. She watched him, an unreadable expression on her face. He hadn’t been in any real danger with Shael—not this time.

“I think we could use them to help us with Venass,” Rsiran said.

“Do you think that Shael and Firell will suddenly see the light and offer to help?” Jessa said. “Think about what they were willing to do the last time. They sacrificed our friendship, and for what? How much was it worth to them?”

“Firell had other reasons than wanting to hurt us. You know that his daughter—”

“His daughter then, but why now? What would keep him working with Shael if he had already been hurt by him?” Jessa leaned forward and rapped her hand on the table. “I don’t think they’re the right help. Not for what you need to do.”

“What needs to be done?” Brusus asked, stopping at their table and lowering his voice. “Hopefully not anything that puts you back in Thyr. I heard about what you did there.”

“I didn’t do anything in Thyr.”

“No? The way I hear it, you could have gotten yourself killed. Some new weapon that Venass has taken to using. He tell you about this?” Brusus asked Jessa.

“He told me.”

“At least you’re not hiding it from her. That’s good.” Brusus pulled a stool over and sat as Rsiran repeated to him who he had discovered in Asador. At the mention of Shael, his eyes became drawn. With mention of Firell, and the fact that they were working together again, Brusus became visibly agitated. “You can’t think to use them, Rsiran. I know that you want help facing Venass.”

“I think we need help.”

“I don’t deny that, but after what Shael and Firell did… and using them… that’s a dangerous thing, man. Especially with that grandfather of yours so close to the city.”

Jessa looked over at Brusus, shooting him a glare that could burn through steel.

“Where is my grandfather?” Rsiran asked.

Brusus raised his hands and stood, taking a step away from the table. “Ah, maybe that was a mistake to say anything.”

“No. Where is he? What have you heard?”

“Only that he’s been seen in Eban. And Cort before that.”

Rsiran frowned. Both were cities he’d been to, but had found no other evidence of Venass. They came across a few of them, but never in enough numbers to create problems. That had made it relatively easy for him to go with Valn and with Sarah as they tried to clear out the others of Venass.

Or had they?

He glanced at Jessa. She had been awfully willing to allow him to go with Valn and Sarah, more so than he would have expected from her. Did she know that he wouldn’t find anything?

She met his gaze unflinching. “Did you know this?” he asked.

“You’ve been running around the countryside with Valn and Sarah. I think it’s clear what you intend.”

“I need to stop Venass,” he said.

“You? Only you?”

Rsiran shook his head. “You know what I mean. We’re trying to do something more. That means that we have to find what Venass might be intending, and we have to go after them wherever they might be hiding.”

“You’re after Danis because of what he did to your family,” Jessa said.

“Yes.”

She stared at him but didn’t say anything more.

Rsiran turned to Brusus. “Where is he?”

“Rsiran—”

“Don’t. Where is my grandfather? I find him, and we can end this.”

“Can you?” Jessa asked softly. “If you find him, are you sure you can truly end all of this? You’re the one who told me about Josun, and the fact that he’s after you again. Now you find Shael and Firell and… and it’s like we’re back where we started.”

“We’re nowhere close to where we started. This time, we know their plan. We’re in a position of strength.”

“Strength? How do you suppose?” Jessa asked.

“Because we don’t have to hide. I’m the guildlord now—”

“You haven’t been with the guild long enough to have that title mean anything,” Jessa said.

“I may not, but I work with the guilds. And I’m going to keep working with them.”

“And then what?” Brusus asked. “What do you intend to do next? Now that you’re legitimate, you don’t have to hide. You’re the guildlord, and we know that means you rule over the Smith Guild, but that don’t mean you control all the guilds. Damn, Rsiran, you still haven’t even met with the council. What happens when you do?”

“You know about that?” he asked Brusus.

“I heard Ephram talking to Della one night. He thought he was being secretive about it, but it’s clear they want you to meet with them. I get the sense that it’s important that you do. Do they make the final decision about whether you remain guildlord?”

Rsiran didn’t think so. The meeting was more a formality than anything else, but it made him nervous. He’d spent months trying to hide his presence from the guilds and from the Elvraeth, and now he was expected to go to them, and show them who he was and maybe even what he could do.

“They’re not going to care for you,” Haern said softly.

Rsiran shrugged. “Does it matter? I don’t care for them, either. Think of what they did to Brusus. Were it not for the Elvraeth council, he would have been able to grow up in the palace, and wouldn’t have to hide himself from anyone, wouldn’t have to fear that they would learn about what he could do.”

“I’ve come to terms with it,” Brusus said. “You should, too.”

“Then there’s how little they did when the city was under attack. They couldn’t even be bothered to come out of the palace when Venass was in the city, actively destroying buildings and trying to take down the guilds. It’s almost like they don’t care about what happens outside of the palace.”

“They don’t,” Brusus said. “They never did, but that doesn’t matter, either. It can’t matter.”

“So you think I should just meet with the council and pretend that nothing has happened? That I should let them move on as though there was never an attack on the city?”

“You’re the guildlord, you have to decide what you do with the council,” Brusus said. “I think you have to be careful about how you do it. There are ways that you can approach them that are safer than others.”

Rsiran couldn’t believe what Brusus was doing and telling him. It seemed like he was trying to get him to fear the Elvraeth. After everything they had all been through, Brusus should be the one who wanted to see that the Elvraeth understood exactly what they had to do, and what still needed done. Brusus should be the one who wanted to get revenge for what he had been put through. Had he changed so much?

“I think we should talk about something else,” Rsiran said. “Like where you heard I could find my grandfather.”

Brusus looked over at Jessa and then Haern. “There’s nothing that you can do to find him, Rsiran.”

“I have to find them. Venass is hunting me, Brusus. They aren’t going to stop, not until one of us is done.”

“But there are too many of them.”

“I’ll do what I have to do,” Rsiran said. He stood, frustration forcing him to his feet. “And that means finding my grandfather and Josun so that I can keep us—all of us—safe.”

Jessa reached for him as he stood, trying to latch onto his arm before he Slid, but he disappeared before she could.

R
siran
pushed
two knives away from him in his smithy, leaving them hovering in the air. He held them like that for a moment, and then spun them in place, tipping one end around as he practiced control. With lorcith, such control would be easy, but these were heartstone knives.

Bluish light glowed from the metal, bright even in the daylight—the metal’s potential. At least, that was what the alchemists believed. He wasn’t sure he agreed. It wasn’t potential so much as it was something about the metal itself.

It was bad enough that Ephram and the guilds still treated the Elvraeth like something to fear, but now with his friends doing it as well? He needed to get away, to have a chance to clear his mind. That was why he’d come to his smithy.

A scuffling of steps behind him, and he spun,
pulling
the knives back to him and slipping them into his pocket. Luca stood watching, his eyes wide with an interested hunger, lingering on the pocket where Rsiran had put them away. The boy hadn’t gained much weight in the time he’d spent with Rsiran, but he had managed to lose most of the wild-eyed insanity in his eyes. There were times when it returned, when it seemed that in spite of everything Luca had gained, he still hadn’t managed to forget, or even distance his mind from what had happened to him in Ilphaesn.

“Will I be able to learn that?” he asked.

Rsiran patted the knives in his pocket. “I don’t know. There haven’t been smiths willing to listen to lorcith in generations. So only the Great Watcher knows what will happen.”

“And the Seers.”

Rsiran nodded carefully. “And the Seers.” There had been a time when he’d thought that the only Seers he would encounter would be the Elvraeth, and in Elaeavn. Learning how Venass used the metal to augment the ability of their Seers, making them more capable than any found within Elaeavn, reminded him how little he really knew.

“Have you finished what I asked of you?” It was something he’d asked of him days before that gave Luca a chance to work unimpeded.

Luca turned to the forge, where the coals glowed brightly, the pleasant heat raising a healthy sweat along their skin. “I did what you asked, but I’m not sure that it turned out like it should.”

“Show me.”

Luca lifted a piece of metal off the anvil that Rsiran hadn’t seen when he returned. Immediately, Rsiran could feel what he’d been trying to create with it, recognizing the way the metal must have called to him. It formed a bowl, the lorcith layered in a way that left it with a pattern to the metal. Rudimentary, but an important stage in learning how to become a smith.

“That’s really good,” Rsiran told him. He took the bowl and ran his fingers along the edge,
pushing
the still-soft metal as he did. It smoothed some of the harder lines and gave the bowl more of the shape it wanted.

“It’s nothing like what you make.” He motioned toward the bench where Rsiran’s latest forgings rested. There were dozens, each forged with a combination of his hammer and his ability to
push
on the metal. In that, he had become something other than a traditional blacksmith. Now, his creations were found throughout the city, and often displayed openly. That was something he would never have thought possible, but then, he would never have thought it possible that he’d be welcomed to the Smith Guild, either.

“I’ve held a hammer for much longer than you. You’ve been at this for all of a few months. I think what you’ve accomplished is impressive.” He handed the bowl back. “Besides, when I learned, I wasn’t allowed to use lorcith.”

Luca’s eyes widened. “How did you manage to learn if you weren’t allowed to listen to the song?”

He smiled. “You learn the basics. How to heat the metal. Where to use the hammer. When to return it to heat and when to quench it. There are smiths who never learn to listen to the song who can make amazing forgings.”

“I don’t know that I would want to learn without listening to it. The song… It changes as I hammer. There’s something so… so
right
about it.”

“It changes because you’re working with it. Much like there were smiths who worked without hearing the song, think of those who can hear the song, but choose to ignore it. They waste entire lives missing a part of themselves.”

“Even they can eventually learn.”

Rsiran had heard Seval enter, but more than that, he’d detected the combination of knives and the bracelet that he wore. He couldn’t
push
on metal the same way that Rsiran could, but he’d been a master smith for so many years that it didn’t matter. He could almost do more with lorcith than Rsiran, and he could definitely do more with the other metals than Rsiran.

Seval took the bowl from Luca. “Interesting work,” he commented. “I see how the patterns here merge. And the metal… the way that it’s layered…” He looked up and met Luca’s eyes. “Are you sure that you’ve only been at this for a few months?”

Luca grinned. The compliment from Seval seemed to matter more than any compliment from Rsiran. “I’m sure.”

“You’ve got a great instructor. Make sure you listen to him when he teaches. I know that I do.”

Luca looked from Seval to Rsiran and nodded vigorously. “I will.”

Seval clapped Rsiran on the shoulder and steered him away from the forge. “You didn’t come to inspect my apprentice’s work,” Rsiran said.

“No, but I probably should have. He’s already at the level of someone with a year behind him. I think you’re going to prove the guild’s faith in you even more than I could have hoped. You were the right choice for guildlord.”

Rsiran hadn’t known how far along Luca had come. He had no experience with other apprentices, and he’d had the advantage of having grown up with it, sitting by his father from his earliest days. Some apprentices didn’t pursue the career of a smith until they were much older, often in their early teens. Luca couldn’t be much older than that—and possibly younger—but he’d been troubled when Rsiran first started working with him. Years of living alone in the mines would do that. Pulling Luca from the mines had been the kindest thing he could have done, but it had been hard on the boy. The way he looked around, or held his head down when no one watched, told Rsiran that more than anything.

“If not to check on him, then why the visit?” Rsiran asked.

“Thought I might show you something. It’s about time, I think.” When Rsiran frowned, Seval only grinned wider at him. “You’ll want to see this, Rsiran.”

Rsiran glanced over at Luca. He had already chosen another lump of lorcith and held it out from him, tipping his head to the side as he studied it. Rsiran knew that he’d be listening to the metal, focusing on the song, and trying to determine what the metal was willing to become for him. He still marveled at how they were able to use lorcith so openly now, and that the supply of it was no longer constrained as it had been. There had been a time when even a small amount of lorcith was considered precious. Now it was valuable, but more for what it could be, and the way that he might sculpt it, than for its scarcity.

Seval led him outside where they stood in the narrow street leading to the smithy Rsiran had renovated, with the help of his friends—and Shael. Back then, he’d had to hide the presence of his illegal forge from the rest of the guild. But no more. Rsiran wondered how long ago the smithy—and its owner—had been a part of the guild. For a brief moment, he though about where that smith may have gone. Why he left. But he quickly turned his attention back to Seval.

“I could Slide us wherever you want,” Rsiran suggested.

Seval’s eyes widened briefly, a sign of his persistent discomfort with Sliding. Though Rsiran now knew that the guilds had never truly abandoned Sliding, there were many who were uncomfortable with it. He hadn’t realized Seval felt that way when they first met, and when Rsiran had Slid him to Ilphaesn.

“We can walk,” he said.

Seval guided them through the streets, quickly reaching Trembel Street, a wide pathway that ran from Upper Town to Lower Town. It was late in the day, and though sun shone overhead, a chill remained in the air. As they stepped away from the protection of the stout buildings hugging the sides of the city, wind gusted, carrying with it the stench of the shore. Rsiran had grown accustomed to the odors during the time that he’d now lived in Lower Town, but wasn’t sure that he would ever really be used to them.

“Where are we going?” he asked Seval.

The larger man only glanced back, an amused smile on his face as they turned up the street, heading toward Upper Town. “You’re of the guild now.”

Rsiran touched his finger to the mark he wore around his neck. Not just of the guild, but the guildlord. There were still times when he couldn’t believe it possible that he’d not only been restored to the guild, but risen to its head.

“And I appreciate that you have given me such responsibility. I will continue to do what is needed to prove myself.”

Seval paused and gave him a funny look. “Prove yourself? You’ve done nothing but prove yourself from the moment we finally convinced you to come back to the guild.” That wasn’t
quite
how Rsiran remembered it, but he wouldn’t argue about those details. “It’s about time the Smith Guild had a louder voice in the Hall of Guilds. I think even Ephram listens when you speak.” Seval smiled and patted Rsiran on the shoulder. “Your student improves at such a pace. I think you’ve shown yourself to be the right man for what we need, Rsiran.”

They turned onto another street, one exceedingly familiar to him. This was the street he’d grown up on, where his father’s smithy had been, and the place from which he’d been exiled and sent to the mines. Not forgotten, at least not in the same way as some, but sending him to the Ilphaesn mines had been exile enough, especially considering the fact that his father had apparently not intended for him to return.

“What is this, Seval?” Rsiran asked.

Seval stood in the middle of the street, his hands clutched over the belly that hid what had once been a muscular frame. He pointed down the street. “You see that shop?” he asked. When Rsiran nodded, he went on, “That is Boldan’s shop. And there,” he said, pointing to another smithy down the street, “is Kevan’s shop.”

“I know all of this, Seval. You seem to forget the fact that I grew up here.”

“Forget? How could I? You’re a Lareth, and
that
is the Lareth smithy.” He motioned to his father’s smithy, the paint on the sign faded, and the window dirtier than it should be. The smithy had been closed for months, reclaimed by the guild and left empty. “The rest of the guild would like you to return to your family smithy.”

It took Rsiran a moment to register what he was saying. There had been a time when he’d wanted nothing more than to take over his father’s shop. Even after he’d been banished to Ilphaesn, there had been a part of him that had thought he might be able to return, that he might one day be allowed to inherit his family’s smithy. But time had given him a different perspective, and he had made his own way. Now… now there was something
right
about the fact that he had his own shop, and that it was not near the fringe of Upper Town, but closer to Lower Town, the place he considered home.

“I have my smithy,” he told Seval.

“You have
a
smith, but that is the Lareth smithy.” Seval stopped in front of the faded sign, with Rsiran’s surname written in a flowing script. “Since Neran disappeared, the guild has held his smithy, kept it closed, but safe. But now—”

“He’ll return, Seval, and the smithy should still be his.”

Seval smiled sadly. “After all this time, and all that you’ve done to search, you think that he’ll still return? If Venass intended to release him, they would have done so by now. That they haven’t…” He shook his head. “I’m sorry, Rsiran, but I think Neran is gone. Which means this smithy—your family’s smithy—should pass to you.” He clapped Rsiran on the arm and nodded at the dusty window. “At least consider it. For the guild. This way, you’d be connected to the guild as the guildlord should be.”

“I can always Slide,” he said.

“You can. But others cannot, and when they need to reach you…”

“That’s the real issue, then,” Rsiran said.

“There is an advantage to the tunnels, Rsiran. Now that we’re all talking again, now that the guilds seem open to truly work together, something they only gave lip service to in the past, we need to keep the guildlords connected. That’s how we will defend ourselves from the next attack.”

Rsiran had sat in on one meeting of the guildlords since assuming the title, and that had been an awkward one. He was not like the other guildlords, men who had served their trade, working their way up to master in their guild before eventually getting voted into the position of guildlord. But the meeting he’d attended made it clear that there was ongoing concern about the safety of the guilds, and the safety of the city. That had been the role of the guilds he’d been most surprised by.

“I can see that you’re not convinced,” Seval said.

“It’s not only that,” he said. “The smithy—
my
smithy—is the first place that ever felt like home. If I return here, it won’t be the same.” How could he ever express to Seval discomfort he felt about his family’s smithy? It might have been in his family, but there was no longer a desire on his part to reclaim it. Better that another ran the smithy than him.

“Just… just think on it. That’s all I ask. All that any of the master smiths ask.”

It seemed like such a simple request, and with everything they faced, one that seemed almost unnecessary. The threat of Venass remained, with their connection to shadowsteel, now more dangerous than before. Other Forgotten were scattered, some who might search for a return to power. Shael and Firell again plotting. And one of the Elder Trees was gone, an issue more pressing than the rest.

More than anything, all Rsiran wanted was a chance to understand the depths of the threat shadowsteel posed. After the last Venass attack, that was the answer he needed to understand the most urgently. But how could he if he was trying to appease the guild or the other guildlords or even the Elvraeth council?