Springwar (60 page)

Scarcely daring to breathe, Avall unshrouded the sword. An exchange of looks with Merryn, a brief “Luck,” murmured by both parties, and he took the hilt in his hand.

The gem nestled comfortably into his palm, like an old friend. But it wasn’t yet activated. A deep breath, and he squeezed the gilded bronze a certain way. And felt the merest prickle of pain as the catch in the gem-shroud released. With it came the wash of blood, and another rush, at once more familiar and more strange, as the gem’s power coursed into his blood. And did
not
find the King it expected, and … hesitated, before determining that Avall was both one in blood to its proper master, and had a bond of affection with him.

But something else was happening, too. Power was flowing into him from … another place. No, not so much flowing, as … waiting. He moved the sword, and felt more things move than the blade and his body. It was as if that
motion drew not only on his own blood, nerve, muscle, and bone, but also reached somewhere else, that was
like
his mind but not his mind, and tapped something there as well. And as he knew that when his brain demanded, his body would react a certain way, so he knew that when another part of it demanded, the sword would respond in kind.

And more than the sword.

He swung it once, and air parted in the expected swish.

That was all.

But then he swung it again—and swung with that
other
part as well.

Lightning flashed, crackling across the pell men he’d made his target. The air smelled of storms, and Avall felt an outflow of energy that left him weak and staggering. Nevertheless, he swung again—to the same effect—only then realizing that working with the gems altered one’s time sense, and that Merryn might not have seen much at all.

But the pell men … Smoking stumps showed where they’d stood. And the stones behind them were smashed and tumbled.

A deep breath, and he stepped forward. Struck an intact pell directly.

And felt no resistance whatever as the sword clove neatly through, though even then the air crackled and stank.

A final swing—at nothing. But this time he was observing himself.

Once more power exploded from the tip of the sword. Power he could feel pouring into parts of him that were like nerves and blood vessels but not those things, and then flowing onward into the sword, where it was refined and focused, and then flashed out again.

But that required a balance. And that balance he could not quite find. It was as though his mind were standing on a log that was rolling back and forth. He could control it, but it took effort. It needed other logs to brace it. Two other logs, in fact.

Or two other gems.

Gynn was the King of Balance. And when the helm and the shield were complete, balance should be achieved.

And then, abruptly, he sat down, for all strength had left his legs.

He retained the sword, however, while Merryn moved toward him—slowly at first, then more rapidly. He shivered, and when she sat down beside him and took him into her arms, he could tell she was shivering as well.

But the look on her face was unmitigated joy.

“It works,” he gasped. “But it needs the other gems to complete it. It’s very much Gynn’s sword.” And then—he couldn’t help it—he was laughing. Giddy with relief that what had been so abstract as to be unfathomable had suddenly become real.
He’d done it! Had made a … magic sword. A sword of Power. A sword to end all swords
.

A magnificent creation, built off Strynn’s masterwork.

Merryn studied him seriously. “I was going to ask to try that thing myself, but that might be a mistake, since I’ve never properly bonded with one of those things. But …” She paused, then grinned abruptly. “It
does
work, Avall. And you—and Strynn—may have made the most wonderful thing ever.”

Avall was beyond exhaustion, yet found energy to wink at her. “I don’t know about that,” he teased. “There’s still the shield and the helm.”

Merryn rose abruptly, hauling him up with her. “What?” he gasped again.

“We shouldn’t stay here. People will have heard all that noise, and this is still supposed to be a secret. Besides, we have to tell Eellon.”

“Eellon …” Avall murmured, through a shiver. “Right.”

In spite of weariness, they started for the Steward’s quarters at a run.

And met Bingg where a staircase terminated in an arcaded corridor. Happy as they were—consumed with the flush of joy—it took them a moment to notice that the boy was in tears. “Bingg—What?” Avall breathed. And then Bingg had flung himself into Avall’s arms, and all they could hear was sobbing.

“Bingg—” From Merryn.

“Eellon,” Avall breathed. “It has to be.” Slowly, carefully,
he slid to his knees, gently easing Bingg away, so that he could hold the boy by the shoulders and still look him in the face. “Bingg, what’s happened?”

“He’s … not dead, I don’t think. But he was working, and we all felt a rush of cold, and—”

Avall’s heart flip-flopped, as tears of his own found him. A rush of cold. That could only mean …

“I should’ve known better,” he choked. “I keep forgetting how much that thing … draws.”

“And more from those to whom it’s connected,” Merryn added, face as grim as Avall had ever seen. “I … think it must take the easy route to minds before the hard.”

“Maybe,” Avall managed. “But Bingg … does anyone else know?”

“I left him with the healer, and went to look for you. You were all I could think of. But Lyk …”

“Is somewhere else. We’ll find him. But for now, let me be your brother. And come with me while I see to my … father.”

Bingg nodded, wiping his face on the tail of his tabard.

“It’s a coma,” the healer said flatly, as they trooped into Eellon’s quarters. It was very late, and no one was about save those who had to be, or thought they did. Avall tried to look at nothing as he stood there, feeling Merryn and Bingg easing in behind him. He did
not
look at the bed. Nor at the healer, for what he might see there and wasn’t certain he could face, if events had gone as he suspected.

“Will he recover?” Merryn asked, sounding as shaken as he, for all her cheeks were dry.

The healer shrugged. “Maybe. But he’s old and tired. He’s been pushing himself beyond reason.”

“Maybe he just needs sleep,” Avall murmured, wishing he believed what he’d said.

The healer regarded him levelly, concern softening what were hard features for a woman. “He won’t wake up. Nothing wakes him. He lives; he breathes. That’s all.”

Avall sank down in the nearest chair, locating it by feel.
He wondered if the chill in the room was real, or merely a tangible echo of what he felt in his soul.

Merryn touched his hand, lightly but firmly. “What happens now?”

Avall shrugged, aware that Bingg was rising. “I’ll … go get Veen and Krynneth,” the boy whispered.

Avall nodded absently, not daring to look at his two-father save obliquely, from across the room. Enough to see that he lay on his back with his hands atop the coverlet to either side. But even there, they could hear the rasp of his breathing.

“Bingg?” Merryn called, as Bingg reached the door.

“What?”

“Much as I hate to say it, you’d better also bring Tyrill.”

“Tyrill …?”

Avall nodded in turn. “Power has to transfer, just in case. She’s not the next oldest in the clan, but she’s the next oldest we can get hold of right now, with Half Gorge and South Gorge fallen. She’ll have to act the role. And maybe … be Steward, until we can find someone else, probably from Ferr.”

“Preedor returned five days ago,” Merryn noted.

“Then we’ll need to contact him, too,” Avall replied. “He’s the only one I’d trust who’s not too close to this thing. We’ll send Veen or Krynneth. I don’t want to leave here.”

Merryn shook her head, and took his hand, squeezing it hard. “He’s strong. He’ll make it. And we have good news to temper the bad, whatever happens.”

Avall squeezed back, and then another thought struck him, so strong he gasped.

“What?”

“Tyrill,” Avall whispered. “Suppose whatever … I did also hit Tyrill. She’s old, and physically weaker than Eellon.”

“We’ll know soon enough,” Merryn said matter-of-factly. “But she’s never linked with a gem, has she? So that should protect her some.”

Avall shivered. And then shivered again, as an even worse thought struck him. He rose abruptly, starting for the door.

“Avall—”

“Averryn!” he retorted. “I’ve linked with him before, through Strynn, when she was pregnant. I—” He crumpled into his sister’s arms. “Oh, Eight, Merry, I may have … killed my son.”

Merryn slapped him. Not hard, but enough to draw his attention. “You’d have heard by now,” she told him. “Whatever happened, happened at once. Strynn would’ve been racing Mother to the forge …”

Avall bit his lip, trying to believe what he didn’t dare, because to believe was to hope, and he wasn’t sure he could stand to see hope shattered.

“I’ll go get them,” Merryn said quietly. “I’ll have them bring Averryn here. You could use both of them and … so could I.” For the first time Avall noticed that his sister’s eyes were misty. He tended to forget that she was as close kin to Eellon as he; that they had as much history, shared as much of what passed in their clan as love.

“Go,” Avall replied. “I’ll stay here. I … need to look at him.”

“If you’re sure.”

He tried to smile at her. “I am. But one thing, Merry. One thing. Tomorrow when Strynn leaves, I want her to take Averryn with her. I can’t risk him otherwise. I just can’t.”

Merryn looked as though she was about to say something and thought better of it—probably to remind him that Averryn was no blood of his. Mercifully she held her tongue. And departed.

“I’ll go, too,” said the healer. And Avall was left alone with his two-father.

He waited until their footsteps receded, until the only sounds in the room were his breathing, and Eellon’s. And then he rose slowly and crossed to Eellon’s bedside. Even so, he didn’t look full upon him, perhaps fearing that the old man’s eyes would pop open to fix Avall with an accusing stare he far too well deserved.

But they didn’t. And then Avall was beside him, and taking his hand.

He started to speak, but that was stupid, so he simply sat there, unmoving, feeling the steady pulse of Eellon’s life.

Without really meaning to, he reached out to him with his mind. Not through the gem itself, but by ways the gem provided. Unfortunately, there was nothing where he looked, no bright thoughts darting just below the surface. Whether they were gone or simply obscured, he had no way of telling. But it filled him with dread beyond reason.

This was his fault. Through nothing more than rank carelessness he’d worked the doom of the second most important man in the kingdom. Anything that fell out from here would be his fault because any decision made henceforth would lack the considered stamp of Eellon’s massive, passionate intellect. He’d cost the world something precious, and if he’d also given it something of worth in the gem, well, he wasn’t sure that was a fair trade.

But maybe it was another balance.

Why couldn’t someone else have found the gem, dammit?
The gems, he amended. Someone from Lore, for instance, who would’ve known how to exercise appropriate patience. Whose controlling clan was not so fractured by power politics. A clan that had no Avall and no Eddyn.

And then, in the solitude of Eellon’s room, with his hand still clasping the old man’s, he wept in truth.

Fortunately, he heard Tyrill approaching. And more fortunately, the old lady had never been able to manage much of a pace, so that he had time to wash his face and reclaim his original seat before the Spider Chief was ushered in—with what looked like half of Smithcraft, but was in fact merely those members of the clan lodged in the Citadel. And those with claims on Argen folk, like Strynn, Averryn, Evvion, Veen, and Krynneth.

A moment only it took the Acting Clan-Chief of Argen to assess the situation, before motioning to the healer to resume whatever efforts she could. That accomplished, she fixed everyone else with an all-inclusive stare, and uttered one terse word: “Workroom.” Whereupon they all adjourned there.

A large table stood to one side, rarely used, but Tyrill had it moved to the center of the chamber, and chairs found to range around it. “The other sept-chiefs should be here soon,” she said, “but some things need to be said beforehand that won’t be appropriate later. Bingg told me the gist of what happened, which I understand without approving. But does anyone else have any questions?”

To Avall’s surprise, it was Krynneth who responded. “Chief,” he said clearly, “we know the sword is finished, and, so I’ve heard, works. I know that Avall’s spending every free moment working on the helm. But what of the shield? Now that you’re Clan-Chief, will you have time to complete it, among your other duties?”

Tyrill looked as though she’d like to pluck out his eyes and use them for earbobs, but though she stiffened, she controlled herself.

“This is no time for anyone to feed their vanity,” she said at last. “Decisions made now cannot be remade, but may be regretted for ages. Most of you here know who I like, who I don’t, and why. That doesn’t change the fact that many of you are kin and all of you have the good of the realm in heart and mind alike. But unless someone else comes forward—yes, I’ll have too much to do to finish the shield as I’d like.”

“What about the Stewardship?” Merryn and Strynn chorused as one. “I’d think someone from Ferr,” Merryn continued, alone.

“Tryffon’s at the front,” Tyrill replied. “And while Preedor
is
back here in Tir-Eron, he has his hands full organizing the flow of men and supplies
to
the front. Eellon was running everything else, including seeing to the acquisition and manufacture of supplies and armament. I can do that, and function as Acting Clan-Chief, but it will take all the time I have.”

“So Strynn, then?” Merryn dared. “For the shield, I mean. She’s the next best functioning smith here, besides Avall, who’s already committed.”