Nightlord: Shadows (94 page)

In other armor news, I’ve put four shifts of ladies on looms, working hard to make a tightly-woven cloth out of spider silk. The spiders have been very busy, even for spiders. I may have goofed somewhere in the spell that keeps them from being hostile toward each other. They might be working with each other, or actually trying to outdo each other; I’m not sure. Regardless, I think the spider-silk cloth will make a good material for quilted padding. If nothing else, it will make really great underwear.

I’ve also got a bunch of kids out capturing more spiders for me. If they bring me enough of them—as a team effort, to avoid fights—I’ve promised to take them for a ride around the mountain on Bronze. I’m anticipating a lot more spiders, soon. And, regardless of how many they manage, they’ll get their rides. All I said was “enough,” not a number.

Tort, meanwhile, was down on the plains, working over some of the
dazhu
with T’yl. T’yl was academically interested in the animal-to-plant age transfer I’d worked out; Tort taught it to him while working on the
dazhu
, as I’d suggested. She didn’t need to use the complicated version—the original is complicated enough!—but it was a good opportunity to show it off.

Kelvin found me as I was headed to my chambers; he had the twins in tow.

“Sire. May I speak freely?”

I paused, almost in mid-stride. This was an unusual request, and an unusual tone, for Kelvin.

“Of course. Please, come inside; we’ll talk in my chambers.”

We relocated, settled down, and Kelvin started.

“You’ve been holding out on me, Sire.”

“Uhm. About…?” I asked, cautiously. He gestured at the twins.

“These two… two… these two! I’ve been trying to train knights to be skillful warriors while you’ve had Seldar making them stronger, and I’ve been falling further and further behind. Then these two come along and beat everybody senseless anytime they go near them! They tell me you just dropped a thousand years of swordsmanship into their hands like pouring water into a cup! Why didn’t you tell me about this?”

I began to sense that he wasn’t happy. Indeed, I started to get the impression that he felt betrayed.

“Do you remember the breakfast meeting where I warned Torvil about the spell? The bit about Malana and Malena dying in twitching convulsions?”

“Yes.”

“That’s why. I’ve never done it before. They were the very first. If it worked, I was going to tell you about it. If it had problems, I was hoping to fix it. And, most of all, I was hoping that it wouldn’t hurt them—or that we could stop it and fix them if it did.” I looked at the twins. They were smiling.

“How do you two feel?” I asked.

“Seldar tells us we are fine,” one of them said. I’m going to assume it was Malana.

“He has examined us with several spells,” Malena went on.

“He can find no harm to us,” Malana continued.

“We can’t find anything wrong, either.”

“But we’re still lightning-quick.”

“And we only practice an hour a day.”

“Instead of all afternoon, like the other knights.”

“We’re getting better, too.”

“Are we going to have to practice all day again?”

I held up a hand to stop them. If I hadn’t, I might not have ever gotten in a word.

“You’ll work with Kelvin,” I told them. “You’re likely to be teachers and coaches. Kelvin will give you people who need the most help, and you’ll tutor them.” I looked at Kelvin. “Fair?”

“I will be pleased to have them,” Kelvin admitted. “But, about the spell of skill?”

“That’s trickier,” I told him. “What I did was… well… how to put this? You know how to fight with a sword, right?”

Kelvin snorted. Stupid question, but I was leading up to something.

“Okay, you know what you’re doing. Now, let’s say we wrote a book, complete with drawings and other pictures, detailing exactly how to use a sword in every possible way. We take everything you know about using a sword and put it in the book. Would it be useful?”

Kelvin looked puzzled, then thoughtful.

“I suppose it would,” he allowed. “It would not be as good as a swordmaster.”

“Naturally not. But if we had a complete novice, we could give him the book and have him memorize everything in it before he showed up in the practice cavern. Would that help?”

“Tremendously.”

“That’s basically what I did,” I told him. “I took everything I ever learned about fighting with the sword and gave it to them. That didn’t do anything for their
hands
, just for their
heads.
They know what to do, and how, but they never actually did it. Like walking along that slack rope in the training room—you can see someone do it, understand that’s what you do, but until you’ve tried it, you don’t realize just how hard it is, and you need practice.” I nodded at the twins. “They practiced until they were exhausted and blistered, and every maneuver they did wrong, they knew it before they even finished the maneuver. Am I right?”

They nodded, in unison.

“There you go, Kelvin. That’s the spell.”

“That’s brilliant!” he declared. “Sire. Excuse me.”

“No problem; carry on.”

“When can we start using it on everyone?”

“Ah. Where does this knowledge come from, Kelvin?”

“From inside… oh,” he said, realizing that I would have to cast the spell, myself, every time.

“Yeah,” I agreed. “It’s a complicated and unpleasantly difficult spell, Kelvin. I’m told that it risks madness for the caster. Any wizard competent to cast it probably doesn’t know much about swordplay. Anyone proficient enough with a sword—or any other weapon, for that matter—to make it worth the effort probably isn’t enough of a wizard to cast the spell. See the dilemma?”

“Could you not create a magic book, Sire?”

“I didn’t really put a book into… Hmm.”

“Sire?”

“Shush. I’m thinking.”

Could I build something that dropped a copy of my digested lifetimes of combat knowledge into someone else’s brain? Maybe. I’m uncomfortable with that idea, though; this spell is still too new and poorly tested. Plus, it developed some potential side effects that could easily be lethal if left unchecked. Building a magical Helmet of Instantaneous Skill that dropped a copy into someone’s brain struck me as more than a little reckless.

I suppose I could build something like a virtual-reality sparring room based on the headspace, or mental study. People could link up with Malana or Malena and get lessons at the speed of thought, which they could then go out and practice with their real bodies. That could work, but it would also stop being all that effective if and when Malana and Malena weren’t around. They’d be stuck in the role of glorified combat-data clerks.

What I needed for this was a way to put everything I knew into an artificial construct—say, a specialized golem—and have it do the combat skill imprinting, instead of using the twins. The problem is, golems aren’t really strong on that point. Bronze is capable of independent thought, of course, but that’s because she has a living spirit that animates her, rather than a set of spells that follow rules. What I needed was something more like Bronze, but designed to think on its own, sort of an A.I….

I fished out my computer core and regarded it, still thinking.

If I enchanted that computer core, made it a quasi-living thing, like building a golem, could I construct a mental aspect and transfer it in there? Could I make it the spirit of the crystal? If so… if I went back through the gate and got more computer cores, could I also make other crystals with other skills? Weaving, cooking, pottery, shipbuilding, agriculture, physics, medicine…

What effect would it have on a society where knowledge is something you can just have without effort? At least with the physical skills it still requires discipline and work before that knowledge is useful. Is it important to have the discipline necessary to obtain the knowledge in the first place? Or does having the knowledge inspire you to use it?

On the other hand, some knowledge requires discipline to
avoid
using. Knowledge is power, and power is a temptation.

“Kelvin, take Malana and Malena with you. And send someone to bother me when it’s time for dinner.”

“Ah… it’s time for dinner about now, Sire.”

“Your timing is atrocious,” I observed, and set aside the crystal. “All right. Let’s go to dinner.”

Dinner was very pleasant. I ate a great deal while watching the room, and I liked what I saw. People were… how shall I put this?
Getting along
. They were either going out of their way to be… mannerly? Courteous, in the sense of being courtly? I’m not sure what word I want. They were exercising genuine politeness and courtesy toward each other without regard to rank or station. Belted knights with squires next to them addressed their “inferiors,” such as the people on waiter duty, with words like “please,” “thank you,” and “could I trouble you,” instead of “You. Fetch.”

Was it the squires? Young boys, each sitting beside his knight, awed to be at the High Table of the King, amazed to be served—some probably amazed to find they could eat as much as they wanted—and
watching
. Did those wide, watching eyes have the same sobering effect on everyone? When someone is looking up at you, does that force you to stand taller?

I hoped so. What I want is a society that has a high regard for personal responsibility and social niceties. I think my original mistake with Karvalen was trying to start a school without much regard for the society around it. Since I didn’t change the way people thought, the culture didn’t change much. Hopefully, I’m setting a good example—and where I’m not, hopefully I can get away with a case of “Do as I say, not as I do, because I’m a monster and you aren’t.”

We’ll see.

During the meal, several musicians played, along with a couple of acrobats, a juggler, and several dancers. I mentioned the acrobat and the juggler to Kelvin; balance and hand-eye coordination are good skills, and ones we should encourage in knights. He agreed, mostly because I’m King, I think, and promised to work on it.

Seldar’s girlfriend sat alone. Well, there were people next to her and they kept trying to talk to her, but she seemed uninterested. She was a pretty little blonde and I almost expected someone to be overly persistent. But nobody made themselves a pest; there was only idle table chatting. Clearly, she missed Seldar.

That made me wonder if I was ruining anybody’s family life. The knights work hard all day at becoming more dangerous than they were the day before; does Kelvin give them adequate time off to be with their families, or to go get a family? Good question. Maybe we can set up some sort of rotation schedule so that every day some of them have the day off. Maybe Kelvin already has.

When sunset started, I excused myself. People pointedly failed to notice my temporary absence. Apparently, it’s just one of those things you don’t talk about. I appreciate that.

Afterward, someone brought me another goblet of blood and set it on the table; I put a finger on the rim before it could crawl over the lip and head for me. It’s not that it would make a mess, but it’s creepy to watch and people were still eating.

Malana and Malena got up and took the floor after a string trio finished a set. They had their light, wooden swords out and bowed in my direction before taking guard positions. Their routine—if it was a routine—was remarkably fast. It was also remarkably popular. I guess it’s kind of like hot babes with big guns; on a certain visceral level, it’s quite appealing. They danced back and forth between the firepits, spinning, striking, parrying, the long tails of their braids whipping about.

When they finally crossed guards and locked, they stopped, relaxed, stepped back, and bowed in my direction again. The cheering was considerable.

If anyone was upset at having women as knights, I couldn’t spot it. I think everyone there knew the twins were as worthy as anyone. Either that, or people were concerned enough about their
own
worthiness to give the twins the benefit of the doubt. Judge not lest ye be judged, and all that.

Then they produced a third wooden sword and laid it on the table, grinning. There was a hushed “Ooooo!” from the assembly.

I pretended to sigh and picked up the wooden weapon. What the hell. I clanked around the table to the middle of the floor, struck an
en garde
, and waited.

They reminded me of Davad, the
dama
I’d known while I was Baron Xavier’s wizard. They were fast, accurate, and surprisingly strong. They circled me, tried to keep me between them, and did their absolute best to make my breastplate ring.

For my part, there were a number of interesting things going on.

My only real goal was to avoid being hit. I could have shifted into hyperdrive, broken both of their weapons, tapped them on the head and over the heart, and wound up back in my seat before the broken weapons hit the floor. I didn’t because that wasn’t the point; they wanted to show off, and they wanted me to help. So we did. I danced around, avoiding or parrying everything, while they kept maneuvering and striking. It was actually a lot more fun than I expected. The dinner crowd loved it.

I was also starting to… well, I suppose I was starting to recognize what they were doing. It was becoming familiar, as though I’d seen it before. I also recognized in myself a desire to strike back; maneuvers appeared in my mind and hands, parry-feint-thrust, dodge-parry-parry-cut, guard-turn-parry-dodge-spin-thrust! I had to restrain myself from attacking. I wouldn’t have hurt them, of course, but the impulse for a proper reply to their attacks kept growing stronger as our mock fight went on.

Maybe I should show up for weapons drill more often. Apparently, I’ve digested a lot of information, but, like the twins and anybody else, I need to incorporate what I know into my reflexes.

For the moment, though, I decided to take a few risks, to show off a little. And if I got tagged by one or both of them, so what? It would make them look good. I tried to arrange things so I could duck under simultaneous swings, or twist out of line of simultaneous thrusts, or sweep both of their blades out of line with a single swipe of my own. Theatrical stuff you don’t see on the battlefield, but you do see in movies.