Shadow's Edge (nat-2) (15 page)

“I was out the other night and some hoodlums were coming to hurt her. Before, I would have killed them. Instead, I scared them.”

She looked uncertain why he was telling her this now. “Well, that’s great. You see? Violence doesn’t solve—”

“Honey, one of them was the Shinga. I made a vengeful man
wet
himself in front of his subordinates. Violence was the only solution. That girl’s in deeper trouble now than before I helped her.” He swore under his breath. “Why’d you even you take me in there? We don’t even have enough to buy Uly a birthday present. How would we afford those?”

“I’m sorry, all right?” Elene said. “I just wanted to see what it was like.”

“It’s the sword, isn’t it? You still want me to sell the sword.”

“Quit it! I haven’t said anything about the sword. I’m sorry. I thought you might be interested. I’m not asking you to buy me anything.” She wasn’t looking at him now, and she certainly wasn’t holding his hand. Well, that was better than tears. Wasn’t it?

He walked beside her for a while as she pretended to browse through the open air shops, picking up produce, examining cloth, looking at dolls they couldn’t afford.

“So,” he said finally. “Since we’re already fighting …”

She turned and looked up at him, not laughing. “I don’t want to talk about sex, Kylar.”

He raised his hands in mock surrender. Still trying to be funny. Still failing.

“Kylar, do you remember how it feels to kill?”

He didn’t have to think back that far. It was triumphant, the terrible pleasure of mastery, followed by desolation, a sick hollowness in his chest, knowing that even a hardened criminal might have changed and now would never have that chance. Did she understand part of him loved it?

“Honey, we all only have so much time and so many gifts. You have more gifts than most, and I know you want to do good. I know you’re passionate about that, and I love that about you. But look what happens when you try to save the world with a sword. Your master tried, and look what a bitter, sad old man he became. I don’t want see that happen to you. I know that after the wealth you had and the things you did that being an apothecary seems like a small ambition. It’s not small, Kylar. It’s huge. You can do so much more good for the world by being a good father, and a good husband, and a healer, than you ever could by being a killer. Do you think it’s a mistake the God has given you an ability to heal? That’s the divine economy. He is willing to cover over what we’ve destroyed with new and beautiful things.

“Like us. Who’d have imagined that you and I could get safely off the streets and find each other again? Who would have imagined we could adopt Uly? She’s got a chance now—after being born to an assassin and a madam. Only the God could do that, Kylar. I know you don’t believe in him yet, but his hand is at work here. He’s given us this chance, and I want to hold onto it. Stay with me. Leave that life. You weren’t happy there. Why would you want to go back?”

“I don’t,” he said. But it was only half true. Elene came into his arms, but even as he held her, he knew he was false.

I
n the early afternoon heat, Kylar paused outside a shop in the nobles’ district. He stepped into an alley and thirty seconds later thought that he was wearing a fair facsimile of Baron Kirof’s face. He wished he’d thought to change into a nicer tunic. Of course, after the fire, he only had one other tunic, and it was worse than this one. It was probably possible to wear illusory clothes like his illusory face, but that was too much for Kylar to juggle—he imagined trying to make an illusory robe flap realistically as he moved and quickly decided his own clothes would do. He tucked the box under his arm and headed inside.

Grand Master Haylin’s shop was a huge, squat square. The inside was well-lit and more richly appointed than any smithy Kylar had ever seen. Row on row of armor lined the walls, and rack on rack of weapons sat before them. It was clean, too, and hardly smoky—Grand Master Haylin must have figured out a clever flue system, because the sales area and the work area weren’t separated. Kylar saw one of the under-armorers helping a noble pick out the ore that would become his sword. Another noble watched as apprentices hammered on steel that would become his cuirass. The customers were funneled through the work area, confined to special blue rugs so they didn’t get in the way of the apprentices and journeymen. It was a good gimmick, and doubtless worth its weight in gold. Though whether the nobles were paying for great weapons and armor or just an experience, Kylar wasn’t sure.

The racks of weapons and armor here by the door were nothing special, doubtless the work of the under-armorers and journeymen. But that wasn’t what he was looking for. Kylar looked to the back and finally saw the man himself.

Grand Master Haylin was mostly bald, with a fringe of gray hair around a knobby pate. He was lean and stooped and appeared to be near-sighted, though of course he had the muscular shoulders and arms of a much younger man. His leather apron was pitted and stained from work, and he was guiding an apprentice’s hand, showing the boy the correct angle to strike the metal. Kylar headed toward him.

“Excuse me? Hello, my lord, how may I help you?” a smiling young man said, intercepting him. He was a little too smiley.

“I need to speak with the Grand Master,” Kylar said, the sinking feeling in his stomach telling him that Haylin was going to prove to be much farther away than just across the shop.

“I’m afraid he’s working, but I’d be happy to help you with whatever you require.” Smiley’s brief glance down at Kylar’s clothes told him he didn’t expect this to be important. Just what Kylar needed: some bureaucratic
lut
.

Kylar looked over Smiley’s shoulder and gaped. It was an expression he’d never tried with Baron Kirof’s face, but it must have been acceptable, because Smiley turned to see what was wrong.

Kylar went invisible. He felt like a bad child when Smiley turned around and saw no one there.

“What the …?” Smiley said. He rubbed his eyes. “Hey,” he said to a coworker behind the counter, “did you just see me talking to a fat red-bearded guy?”

The man behind the counter shook his head. “You seein’ things again, Wood?”

Smiley shook his head and walked back toward the counter, cursing under his breath.

Kylar walked through the shop, invisible. Dodging scurrying apprentices, he came to stand by Grand Master Haylin’s elbow. The man was inspecting a dozen of his under-armorer’s swords that were laid out on a table for his approval.

“The third one wasn’t properly fired,” Kylar said, appearing behind the smith. “There’s a weakness right just above the hilt. And the next one’s poorly tempered.”

Grand Master Haylin turned and looked at Kylar’s feet—two paces outside the blue carpet, then he looked at the weak sword. He tossed it into an empty red crate. “Werner,” Haylin said to a young man who was swearing at an apprentice. “That’s the third reject this month. One more and you’re done.”

Werner blanched. He immediately left off cursing the apprentice.

“As for this,” Grand Master Haylin said to Kylar, gesturing to the poorly tempered sword. “You know what happens when you scatter diamonds in front of chickens?”

“Tough poultry?”

“Valuable gizzards. It’s a waste, son. This is for an army order. For two hundred fifty queens for a hundred swords, some peasant sword swinger can spend more time with a whetstone. You know your swords, but I’m a busy man. What do you want?”

“Five minutes. Privately. It’ll be worth your time.”

The Grand Master raised an eyebrow but acquiesced. He led Kylar up the stairs to a special room. As they passed Smiley, the young man said, “You can’t—you can’t—”

Grand Master Haylin cocked an eyebrow at the young man. Smiley’s greasy smile withered. “Don’t mind that,” Haylin said. “That’s my fifth son. Bit of a throw-off, huh?”

Kylar didn’t know what that meant, but he nodded. “I’d toss him in the reject crate.”

Haylin laughed. “Wish I could do the same with his mother. My third wife is the answer to all the first two’s prayers.”

The special room was obviously used as infrequently as possible. A fine walnut table with several chairs occupied the center, but most of the room was given to display cases. Fine swords and expensive suits of armor filled the room like an elite guard. Kylar looked at them closely. Several were the Grand Master’s work: master pieces to demonstrate what he was capable of, but others were old, in a variety of styles and periods of armament, show pieces. Perfect.

“You’re down to three minutes,” Haylin said, squinting at Kylar.

“I’m a man of special talents,” Kylar said, sitting across from the man.

The Grand Master arched an eyebrow again. He did have terrifically expressive eyebrows.

Kylar ran his fingers through his red hair and changed it to dirty blond. He passed his hand over his face and his nose grew sharper, longer. He scrubbed his face as if washing it, and the beard disappeared to reveal lightly pockmarked cheeks and sharp eyes. Of course, it was all show. He didn’t have to touch his face—but this man seemed to appreciate demonstrations.

Grand Master Haylin’s face went dead white and his jaw dropped. He blinked rapidly and his voice came out as a croak. He cleared his throat. “Master Starfire? Gaelan Starfire?”

“You know me?” Kylar asked, stunned. Gaelan Starfire was the hero of a dozen bard’s tales. But the face Kylar was wearing was Durzo Blint’s.

“I was—I was just a boy when you came to my grandfather’s shop. You said—you said you might come back long after we’d given up on you. Oh, sir! My grandfather said it might be in my father’s time or mine, but we never believed him.”

Disoriented, Kylar tried to think. Durzo was Gaelan Starfire? Kylar knew that Durzo hadn’t been known by the same name for seven hundred years, of course. But
Gaelan Starfire?
That name hadn’t even been mentioned among all the others that Aristarchos had claimed for his master.

It sent a pang of grief through Kylar. He hadn’t known, and some smith in Caernarvon had. How little he knew the man who’d raised him, the man who’d died for him. Durzo had turned bitter by the time Kylar had known him. Who had he been when he’d been Gaelan Starfire, fifty years ago? Kylar suspected that he could have been friends with that man.

“We’ve kept it secret, I swear,” Grand Master Haylin said. Kylar was still disoriented. This man, who was old enough to be his grandfather, who was at the height of his fame, was treating Kylar like—like he was an immortal, nearly a god. “What can I do for you, my lord?”

“I don’t, I don’t …” Kylar said. “Please, don’t treat me differently because of your grandfather. I just wanted you to take me seriously; I didn’t think you’d remember that. I didn’t even remember you. You’ve changed quite a bit.” He smirked to seal the lie.

“And you haven’t changed at all,” Haylin said, stunned. “Um, all right,” he said, his eyebrows waggling up and down in quick succession as he tried to pull himself together. “Um. Well. What are you looking for?”

“I’m looking to sell a sword.” Kylar drew Retribution off his back and laid it on the table.

Haylin picked up the big sword appreciatively in his thick, callused hands, then immediately set it down. He stared at the hilt, blinking. He ran his fingers over it, his eyes wide. “You never drop this sword, do you?” he said.

Kylar shrugged. Of course he didn’t.

Still looking like he wasn’t sure he was awake, the Grand Master spit on his palm and grabbed the sword again.

“What’d you—”

A drop of moisture wicked off the hilt onto the table. Grand Master Haylin released the sword and opened his palm. It was completely dry. He gave a little cry, but he couldn’t take his eyes off the sword. He leaned closer and closer until his nose was almost against it. He turned the blade to look at it on edge.

“By the gods,” he said. “It’s true.”

“What?” Kylar said.

“The coal matrices. They’re perfect. I’d bet my right arm every last one has four links, don’t they? The blade’s a perfect diamond, my lord. So thin you can barely see it, but unbreakable. Most diamonds can be sheared with another diamond, because they’re never perfect, but if there are no flaws anywhere—this blade is indestructible, and not just the blade, the hilt, too. But my lord, if this is …I thought your sword was black.”

Kylar touched the blade and let the ka’kari whoosh out of his skin to cover it. The word MERCY inscribed in the blade was covered with JUSTICE in ka’kari black.

Grand Master Haylin looked pained. “Oh my lord…. My grandfather told us…. I never understood. I feel blind, yet I’m almost happy for my blindness.”

“What are you talking about?”

“I don’t have the Talent, Lord Starfire. I can’t begin to see how amazing this blade is. My grandfather could, and he said it haunted him all his days. He knew what Talent had gone into this blade, he could see it, but he could never equal it. He said it made the work of his own hands look cheap and tawdry—and he was famous for his work. But I never thought to see Retribution with my own eyes. My lord, you can’t sell this.”

“Well, it doesn’t come in black,” Kylar said lightly, sucking the ka’kari back into his hand. “If that knocks a bit off the price.”

“My lord, you don’t understand. Even if I could give you what this is worth—even if I could somehow fix a price on it—I could never—it’s worth more than I’ll make in my whole life. Even if I could buy it, I could never sell it; it’s too valuable. Maybe one or two collectors in the world have the wealth and the appreciation to buy such a sword. Even then, my lord, this isn’t a sword that belongs on display, it belongs in the hand of a hero. It belongs in your hand. Look, a hilt that won’t slip from your hand even if it’s bloody or wet. The moisture slides right off. It’s not just brilliant, it’s practical. That’s not a showpiece. It’s art. It’s killing art. Like you.” He threw his hands up and slumped in his chair, as if exhausted just by the sight of Retribution. “Though my grandfather did say the inscription was in Hyrillic—oh my.”

The MERCY on the blade shifted before their eyes, into a language Kylar couldn’t read. He was stunned. It had never done that before.

A snake wriggled in his stomach and strangled his guts, a snake of losing something whose value he couldn’t even calculate. It was the same feeling he felt as he thought of his dead master, a man whose worth he had barely known.

“Nonetheless,” he said, his throat tight. “I must sell it.” If he kept it, he would kill again. He had no doubt of it. In his hand, it was pitiless justice. He had to sell it, if he was to stay true to Elene. As long as he held onto the sword, he held onto his old life.

“My lord, do you need money? I’ll give you whatever you want.”

The small, mean part of Kylar considered it. Surely this man could spare more than enough money for what Kylar needed. “No, I, I need to sell it. It’s …it has to do with a woman.”

“You’re selling an artifact worth a kingdom so you can be with a woman? You’re immortal! Even the longest marriage will end in a tiny fraction of your life!”

Kylar grimaced. “That’s right.”

“You’re not just selling this sword, are you? You’re giving it up. You’re giving up the way of the sword.”

Looking at the tabletop, Kylar nodded.

“She must be some woman.”

“She is,” Kylar said. “What can you give me for it?”

“It depends on how soon you need it.”

Kylar didn’t know if he could keep his courage up. He knew what he was about to say would probably cost him thousands, but losing Elene would cost more. He’d never really cared about being rich anyway. “Just whatever you can get me before I leave.”

“Before you leave the city?”

“Before I leave the shop.” Kylar swallowed, but that damn lump wouldn’t disappear.

The Grand Master opened his mouth to protest, but he could see Kylar’s mind was made up. “Thirty-one thousand queens,” he said. “Maybe a few hundred more, depending on what sales we’ve done today. Six thousand in gold, the rest in promissory notes redeemable at most money changers, though for that sum, you’d have to hit half the money changers in the city. You’ll have to go to the Blue Giant directly if you want to change it all.”

Kylar goggled at the sum. It would be enough buy a house, repay Aunt Mea, start a shop with a huge inventory, buy an entire wardrobe for Elene, and still put some away, in addition to buying a pair of the finest wedding rings money could buy. And the man was protesting it wasn’t nearly enough?

~A good price for your birthright, huh?~

The thought almost took the wind out of Kylar. He stood abruptly. “Done,” he said. He walked to the door and grabbed it.

“Um …my lord,” Grand Master Haylin said. He gestured to his own face.

“Oh.” Kylar concentrated and his features fattened and his hair reddened again.

Within five minutes, a still-stunned Smiley had helped load a chest of sovereigns—worth twenty queens each—and watched as his father put a thick wad of promissory notes on top of that. It totaled 31,400 queens. The chest wasn’t large, but it weighed as much as two large men. The Grand Master called for a horse, but Kylar asked if they would put two broad leather straps on it instead. Journeymen and apprentices stopped to watch, but Kylar didn’t care. Smirking, Haylin attached them himself.