The Sigil Blade (17 page)

“I like that one,” Eithne said. She peered across the table at the open book with interest while he finished his milk.

Edryd, irritated by his inability to digest the material, wasn’t about to believe that Eithne could possibly have read the book, let alone understood it.  “Don’t go and spoil the ending,” he said.

Eithne’s eyes narrowed in her signature and peculiar way, in what was at this point a much overused expression of disapproval. “It isn’t a story book,” she lectured. “It doesn’t have an ending.”

“A book… with no ending?” Edryd teased, pretending to be simple.

“It says that nothing is real,” she explained, ignoring his remark and summarizing the books contents as simply as she could for Edryd’s benefit.

“I understood that much,” Edryd said. Apparently Eithne did know something about the book.

“I don’t think that’s right though,” she continued. “I know I’m real. The table is real. I’m pretty sure you’re real too.”

“I’m glad I’m not some figment of your imagination,” Edryd said with mock relief, “but I can’t say that I know how I should feel about ranking as possibly being less real than the table.” Whatever her understanding of the book, it was without any real depth. He was impressed nonetheless that she understood it at all.

“Well I have known this table for as long as I can remember,” Eithne laughed, “I’ve only known you for about a month.”

If there had been any reason to doubt it, it was becoming ever more evident that Eithne was unusually smart. Perhaps she did understand the book better than he did. He found himself laughing at her joke. Doing so lifted him out of the disgruntled mood he had been in, and made Eithne beam happily with confident satisfaction.

The moment was interrupted by a sound coming from the locked room. Edryd was startled, but Eithne ran to the door without the least hint of concern. Before Edryd could react or recover from his surprise, the door to the room swung inward, and out walked Logaeir with a foolish grin on his face. Eithne held out her arms expectantly and Logaeir grabbed her up in a big bear hug.

“You are getting too big and fat to be picked up like that,” he said as he dropped her back to the ground, pretending he had hurt his back.

Eithne kicked him as hard as she could in the shin, which wasn’t very hard, and he collapsed backward onto a bench, grabbing his leg in exaggerated distress. “That was mean and it wasn’t funny,” she said with a smile that suggested that she had thought it was at least a little bit funny. If nothing else, she had enjoyed the opportunity it had given her to kick him.

Edryd would have laughed at this spectacle, if he hadn’t wanted at that moment to kick Logaeir a good deal harder than Eithne had just done.

“Were you in there all along?” Edryd asked in amazement.

Logaeir looked around, confused by the question. “What… in the room?” he said, requesting clarification. “No, not in the room, no,” he said answering his own question, realizing that to Edryd it must have seemed like he had miraculously appeared from nowhere at all.

“Then how?” Edryd asked. “I thought that was some sort of makeshift prison.”

“Wouldn’t make much of a prison,” Logaeir laughed. “Lock someone in there and it would barely be five minutes before he found the escape hatch in the floor and was out the other end of the tunnel.”

“Why is there a tunnel?” Edryd asked, still a little confused.

“Wouldn’t be so good for the girls if they were seen letting an Ascomanni in the front door,” Logaeir responded. “When I visit, I take care to keep it a secret.”

The bolts on this side of the door made more sense now.

“You look good for a dead man,” Logaeir said. “Wasn’t sure it was true when I heard you had rejoined the living.”

Edryd’s face curled into a scowl, but he didn’t say anything. He couldn’t figure out where to begin.

“Back from the brink like that, you have more of a claim to the title of Ash Man than any of the rest of us,” Logaeir said, more to himself than to Edryd.

“I am not one of your Ash Men,” Edryd said, “even if you have thought it your privilege to make me one.”

Feeling the anger behind Edryd’s words, Logaeir turned his attention for a moment to Eithne, who stood a few feet away unobtrusively taking in every word exchanged by the two men. “Could you go up to the road and wait for Irial, she should be on her way soon,” he said to Eithne. “I need to talk privately with Master Edryd for a little while.”

Edryd thought she would protest being sent off, but Eithne obediently left without complaint. He could not help noticing the marked contrast between the judgmental disregard he was typically subjected to, and the unreserved respect she was showing to Logaeir. He wasn’t in a competition to impress anyone, but the disparity did not make him like Logaeir any better.

“You linked my name to a group of murderous thieves,” Edryd said to Logaeir, laying out the accusation only once Eithne was well away from the cottage.

“And what name is that?” Logaeir asked rhetorically. “Aisen? When we last met you did not answer to it. You were anxious to be rid of the name. If you mean instead the title Blood Prince, I didn’t think you liked that one either. I believe you insisted your name was Edryd.”

Logaeir had a point, the accuracy of which was unassailable, but the observation was too clever by half. It justified none of what Logaeir had done, and in no sense, did it lessen the injury done to Edryd in consequence of falsely representing him as having a direct affiliation with the Ascomanni.  Logaeir’s response, with all of its sharp sardonic wit, had ratcheted the affront to a new level.

“I would be in the right if I were to beat you senseless for what you have done,” Edryd warned, thinking that what he really wanted to do was to kill this cavalier little annoyance of a man.

“Do you think that you could?” Logaeir asked.

At first Edryd thought Logaeir was making fun of him. Logaeir though, was being serious.

“Were you in a better state, no doubt you could do it, but you were dead, or nearly so until only a day ago, and I am not so easy to catch as you might think,” Logaeir continued, unaffected by the threat which had been directed towards him. “Are you capable of recovering from such a long and deep illness so quickly?” He asked, seeming to believe Edryd capable of magically healing himself.

Edryd, tired of being spoken of as if he had died, had to remind himself that it would serve no useful purpose to become more upset. Logaeir was an unusual man. Venting frustration at him was beyond pointless, and Edryd’s attempt at a threat might as well have been an unconventional compliment for all of the discomfiture that it had provoked. Edryd suspected that Logaeir’s behavior was all for effect, and was neither genuine nor random. It would be a mistake to become distracted by it.

“You are worse than Seoras,” Edryd finally said.

“Worse than Seoras?” said Logaeir, protesting the comparison. “He all but put you in the ground. I haven’t done anything that harmed you nearly so much as that.”

“Perhaps, but Seoras, as dark as he might be, did have the decency to at least show some remorse.”

“Well, he has always been flawed in that way,” Logaeir commented.

Edryd hadn’t thought he could think less of the man, but Logaeir did not seem to mind playing an indifferent villain. “You act as though you are innocent of having done anything wrong,” he said, remonstrating against the other man for his refusal to accept any responsibility for what he had done.

“I never claimed such a thing,” Logaeir said. “And let’s be fair, we all thought you were going to die. If you had met that expectation, you wouldn’t be here to experience any discomfort over the uses to which I have purposed your name and reputation. None of this would even matter.”

It was an absurd but simple logic. Bait to draw Edryd into an even more meaningless argument. Edryd did, however, have something he needed to say.

“It may not matter to you, but there may soon be a war between the Sigil Corps and the King of Nar Edor. Whether or not it is the truth, whether or not I had died, news that the Blood Prince is now commanding an army of Ascomanni is sure to provoke a response that will accelerate the conflict.”

“That will have to be your problem,” Logaeir replied casually, but appearing a little uncomfortable for the first time. “If we succeed here, we can turn our attentions to Nar Edor,” he rationalized. “We can overthrow your King.”

“If I had wanted to fight the king, I would still be in Nar Edor!” Edryd shouted.

“If it helps at all, I am serious about putting you in charge. I have big plans for the Ascomanni. I intend to transform them into something more than a simple band of marauders and thieves, and that will only happen with your involvement.”

It didn’t help. It made things worse, and Edryd was now struggling to retain any semblance of composure. “And if as your leader I command you to disband?” Edryd asked pointedly, trying to expose the lie in Logaeir’s words.

“I would disregard the order,” Logaeir admitted. “The die is cast. It is too late to choose any other path. For better or worse, conflict is coming.”

Edryd was not sure what he had expected, but he would have preferred something more than a vague, yet dramatic pronouncement. There was, however, no way to undo what Logaeir had done. Logaeir’s actions had engendered in Edryd a deep resentment, but short of openly declaring his identity, there was very little Edryd could do about it.

“It seems I’ve done a great deal to advance your cause, though I didn’t intend to,” Edryd pointed out. “You could do me a service in return and find me a way off of this unpleasant little rock.”

“That wouldn’t be a good idea,” Logaeir responded, rejecting the request.

“Why?” Edryd demanded. “If I remain here, you only risk having your lies exposed.”

“There are at least two reasons,” Logaeir replied. “Friends of yours appeared one week ago, looking for their captain.”

“What do you mean?” Edryd demanded.

“Soldiers of the Sigil Corps, Oren and Ruach they said their names were, sailed out here knowing they would be captured by Ascomanni. They have demanded to see you, and I imagine that they want to take you back.”

“I have no intention of returning to Nar Edor, if that is what you are worried about,” Edryd said, perturbed by what Logaeir had just told him. These two men were ranked officers in his command. He did consider them friends, and they undoubtedly would expect him to return.

“No, that isn’t it,” Logaeir corrected, “I told them that you needed their help in training the Ascomanni for battle, but I don’t imagine they will keep at it much longer if I don’t bring them to see you.”

“And what makes you think…” Edryd began to say before stopping himself. Logaeir had uses for him yet, and those uses included recruiting his friends into the Ascomanni. The inventive thief surely wouldn’t pause before leveraging the two officers in his machinations to obtain cooperation from Edryd either. Eithne had said it earlier: the man planned several steps ahead. Edryd was going to need to think this through carefully if he wanted to extricate himself from the trap in which he was held.

At that moment the door swung open. Irial stood as straight as she could and used every bit of her diminutive height to appear commanding as she demanded an explanation. “I could hear the two of you shouting from the road. Have you no common sense?”

“It was only Edryd who was yelling,” Logaeir disputed indignantly.

Irial rolled her eyes in response to the deliberately childish response. Edryd reddened a little, realizing he had in fact been the only one who had raised his voice.

“Why is it you went and detailed all of the many wrongs I committed while he was sick?” Logaeir demanded of Irial.

Irial cast a sidelong look back in the direction of the road. She knew better than to take Logaeir seriously, but she answered anyway. “I have not spoken to him about you,” she replied.

“I told him,” Eithne volunteered apologetically, coming into view behind Irial.

Logaeir smiled and said, “It’s a small thing. I’m sure you told him nothing he couldn’t have learned in less than five minutes from just about anyone in town.”

“That’s right,” Eithne agreed, brightening considerably, and showing relief.

“And how would you know that?” Logaeir challenged. “You aren’t allowed to go into town.”

“But you just said,” Eithne complained with frustration.

Irial interrupted her sister before she and Logaeir could devolve any further into one of his pointless arguments. “Ignore him, it is well past time you were asleep,” she said to Eithne, as she firmly ushered her off to bed. Upon returning she pulled Logaeir aside. “You need to leave, now, and do it discreetly,” she said in a hushed tone.

Logaeir raised an eyebrow.

“Seoras is anxious to see Edryd now that he is awake. He wanted to accompany me on my way back,” she explained. “I convinced him that it was too soon, but he was barely persuaded. I am not certain that he won’t change his mind and show up anyway.”

Logaeir tried to appear unaffected, but all of the color had gone from his face. “Best I was on my way,” he said. “Wouldn’t help things any for you if he found me here now, would it?”

Without a farewell, other than an abbreviated and barely courteous nod in Edryd’s general direction, Logaeir departed through the room from which he had first entered, closing the door behind him. Edryd could hear, but not see, Logaeir moving a floor panel in and out of place, and then everything was quiet.