An Armory of Swords

The Sword of Aren-Nath

Thomas Saberhagen

Aron felt the bite of the gray air in the openness where he perched. Head thrown back, he watched the gray clouds of the sky. They shifted and slid like silt heavy in the delta of the river of the gods. In a minute his head got light and he had to take his gaze downward for a moment to regain his balance. He locked his arms tighter about the Temple Icon and held to his spot. The Temple was the highest point of the town, and he sat upon the highest point of the Temple. But it was hard to feel too superior with the dark hill looking down. To his left the Grade rose steeply to the foot of the forest, where a mass of fat immovable trunks stood together in the fringes of a silent crowd of which no man could say he had seen the other side. But looking to the right and beneath him, Aron could see far. The soft earth fell gently downwards. Far down its side were only the gullies and rivulets made by the autumn rain. But closer up to where he perched he could see how the sparse walls of Aren-Nath were rooted in soft clay.

Thick splinters were starting to dig into the skin of his arm. He unclasped his hands for a moment to push back his hair and kicked his foot one last time along the wall below. Then he scrambled down awkwardly and stuck his feet tentatively back into the mud of the town.

When he came to the edge of the Templeyard, a black bird swooped down from the heights of forest. He followed its slow path downward through the town. A bell gave three plaintive cries, as if annoyed for being hit, and he heard the distant clamor of his friends bursting out of the Schoolroom. He was supposed to be with them.

As he walked he looked over the squat brick wall of the Templeyard and saw the bald head and upraised hands of Takani the Sage. When townsmen came to the Temple with furrowed brows, it was no god they sought, but the friendship and counsel of this short man.

But today the faces that greeted him were small and smooth. From the Master’s Stump, Takani told stories that no child of the town soon forgot. The Stump itself held a special meaning for each of them. It was the only sign that a tree had ever grown so far down the Grade, and the reason and time of its cutting remained mysterious.

Aron approached the garden and climbed up onto a bench so he could peek up over the wall. The buildings and the short quiet children who were gathered loosely about cast strange shadows in the faint daylight.

“…but the peril of the town aroused in his Sword the fury of the gods, and the Sword sang keenly, and Vassal Yordenko tightened his grip; and the Sword led his strokes into the creature’s spongy flesh; and the pieces of flesh flew out of the fray and burnt the flesh of the earth…”

Takani’s open, limp hands circled the air, drawing in his audience. His sparkling eyes glanced quickly at Aron, and he incorporated a beckon into the gestures of the song. But as Aron turned to come to the garden gate, the boys of the town swept through the street behind him and pulled him in their wake.

They ran so fast he knew that there was something they ran to see. He ran fast behind them, but couldn’t catch up. He watched their tiny, mud-covered bodies slipping and tumbling their ways Earthward. Those in back were not looking where they were going, but turning and shouting to one another as they ran.

Aron’s friend Klin led the pack, his head fixed forward in determination. Klin was always their leader, setting them into willful motion with a few quick threats or a few kind words. Klin would stand up to the meanest adults in the town and play tricks on anyone, even sometimes Takani.

Behind Klin and to one side easily loped the Tall Boy, unconcerned and never slipping.

As the pack came into the Town Square, Klin slid to a stop and held out his arms, keeping the others behind him. Then he anxiously strode ahead.

A black riding-beast draped with a strangely rich red-and-gold cloth stood neighing quietly to itself outside the Vassal’s quarters. Renky the Idiot, who served as the Vassal’s stableboy, was leading two smaller black beasts up beside it. Then from the small doorway, Grumo the Mason and Torstein the Wheelwright emerged. Their strong workers’ hands awkwardly clasped pikes, and feathery, rusted helmets were perched atop their simple heads. They were acting as the Vassal’s personal guard. Klin took a step towards them, but Torstein let him know with a worried glance that they had all better stay back.

They stood, shuffling their feet.

Yordenko the Vassal stepped from his door and surveyed the Square, then turned and ushered out a lean, dark man in a green tunic-the Baron himself. A stirring of excitement went through the boys at the sight of the rapier at his side. Some of their fathers kept ancient heirloom weapons sealed beneath wedding gowns and pewter in family chests. The Vassal had taken his Sword on occasion from its wrappings and shown it to each of them, letting them trace their fingers along the cold steel Blade, the white emblem of its hilt, a crenelated wall. But seldom would a man be seen in town who had reason to carry such weapons at his side.

The Baron’s lip was twisted with arrogance and with each step his heel twisted into the mud of the town, as if to grind some bit of foul food underfoot. He was flanked by two men of his guard, also armed, who looked strong but slouched carelessly as if this were their day off. The boys in the back of the group exchanged awed whispers. Vassal Yordenko cast a sidewise glance at the boys, and from the anguished expression on his face it looked like he knew there might be some trouble.

Klin pelted the Baron in the back of the head with a pebble. Some of the boys giggled a little but most were too frightened. There was a sliding of metal. The Baron had spun about and held his sword in the air ready to strike. Yordenko cringed to one side and the men of the Baron’s Guard reached for their weapons. The Baron, seeing nothing but the pack of boys, sneered, then sheathed his rapier and leapt onto his riding-beast. The mount kicked wildly beneath his harsh mastery but in a moment submitted. Frightened, it carried him downward from the Square, its rear legs buckling as it slipped through puddles. The two men of the Baron’s Guard mounted their beasts more clumsily and followed quickly.

Klin broke out laughing and the older boys started poking him and laughing also once the Baron was gone. The younger boys were in awe, some of them turning to friends and whispering anxiously, C’mon, let’s go home now….

Yordenko did not so much as look at any of them. Aron thought he looked very tired and knew that it was very strange that the Vassal did not even come to reprimand them. Yordenko’s face was drawn in resignation as Aron had never seen it before. His green eyes moist and empty, the Vassal retired to his quarters.

“You shouldn’t have done that, Klin-I think something’s really wrong….” Aron said quietly, looking after the Vassal.

“Are you gonna start telling me when to throw rocks now? Uh?”

Their eyes locked. The other boys got quiet.

Klin came up to Aron, chest out, fists balled, and stood tall to look down on him. He was about five centimeters taller. The other boys cleared out. Klin gave Aron a shove. Aron kept his gaze but did nothing. Klin advanced again and gave another shove.

“You’re just afraid of those fools. Yeah, that’s what you are, afraid!”

Aron leapt on him and began pounding with his fists.

They tumbled to the ground and the other boys started cheering. Aron took a hard punch in the cheek then pummeled Klin’s stomach. They got back to their feet and started boxing again. Klin gave Aron one quick kick in the teeth, nearly sending him into a rage. But through the blur of his teary eyes and through the pain in his mouth, which he was sure was bleeding now, Aron’s eyes met those of the silent woman of the town. She stood on the far side of the Square, bastard child clinging at her breast. Crying, Aron took Klin down, hit him twice hard in the face, then ran downwards because that was the fastest way he could go.

Aren-Nath behind him, his quick feet followed the hoof-chumed trail to where it met the base of the High Road where he would have to stop running and start climbing, climbing far back up into the fat trees amongst which his parents had built their home. He took the final turn downward, and though darkness had not yet set felt fleeting fears of bandits and hooligans. His heart would not slow, it thumped hard, then he was almost there. He could see the base of the High Road just below.

He was tumbling down the hill. Something had grabbed his leg from behind, and he was falling now, and there was another body falling and rolling through the mud with him, over him, then under him. He fought it off. It was Klin. At the bottom of the hill, Aron got himself untangled, stood, and started walking and slipping along the path again.

“C’mon, Aron,” Klin called, getting up and running to his side. Aron felt a hand clap him on the shoulder and rest there. Silently they turned up onto the High Road together. “That was a pretty good fight. You still got some blood on your chin, though. Don’t let your mom see that I did that….”

They talked. Aron said something was wrong with the Vassal, and Klin shouldn’t be messing with him right now. Klin said maybe he was right, but he had no idea what was wrong with the Vassal. “Beats me,” he said, shrugging.

Aron knew that despite his foolery, Klin had a heart greater than those of the other boys and worshiped the Vassal with all of it. But Klin’s attention was elsewhere, he had forgotten the whole issue and was telling some story about what had happened in the workshop this afternoon, how so-and-so had ripped the hammer off from the smith and so-and-so was selling it…. Aron wasn’t listening. He was wiggling his teeth gingerly, wondering if they’d stay in place. He was still angry about the fight but at the same time glad to have his friend back.

When they got up to the fork that headed back toward town, Klin stopped Aron firmly and looked him over for a moment in silence.

“Tonight…” he breathed. Then he told Aron his plan. Always before had Aron refused to go on their nighttime excursions. He didn’t like the things they did. He was afraid. But he would never let Klin tell him so again.

Aron lay in his bed that afternoon thinking about the girls in his class. There was one girl he thought about quite a bit more than the others. He had been hoping somehow he could be alone with her for a while, but then he heard one of the other boys talking about how ugly she was and he figured that he had better stay away because he didn’t want to be seen with her.

Aron’s house had only two rooms, the beds and the kitchen in one and Father’s workbench in the other. The boards creaked under the thin stuffed mattress as he shifted around and opened his eyes a little to see what Mother was doing. She was at a stool by the window testily pulling handfuls of feathers out of a dark, dead bird and stuffing them into a bag. She was still young, her face just beginning to harden. Her thin but strong shoulders and arms had once been soft. She set the limp bird down on the floor and got up to ladle herself a cup of water from the waterbarrel.

At her feet beneath the table huddled sister Cainy, three years old, quiet, blonde, and with eyes that held a deep understanding. She was carving something into the floor with Father’s pocketknife, as she occasionally would. At first the family had tried to stop her. Then they discovered it was useless. If they took the knife away she scratched with her fingers until they bled, and such a look of anguish came into her eyes that it made them worry more about not giving her the knife than giving it to her. They watched her carefully at first, but she had never hurt herself. Some of her carving was magnificent. Father would pick her up, take the knife gently from her grasp, and shake her up and down proudly. “At least we don’t have to worry about what craft she’ll choose,” he would say, smiling.

When the bird was no more than a bag of bristly skin Mother set it on the counter, then got the broom to sweep up stray feathers. With the coming of the broom, Cainy dropped the knife and sat in place. When it was upon her she got up and scrambled out the back door.

Father came in the front door, axe gripped by the neck in one strong hand, a bundle of wood locked under his other arm.

Night had long fallen. The chill had dispersed the clouds, and the moon had already had time to make most of its long progress across the sky. His stomach still felt warm with his mother’s stew. He lay perfectly still making shallow breaths and listening to every breath of his parents and every creak of the boards their bodies rested on. He waited. He heard the crickets. The chill crept in beneath him and around his covers. His stomach forgot about the stew and started rumbling.

A cold hand was on his shoulder. He sat up, startled. The back door was open to the night, but he had heard nothing. His heart was jumping, then he saw that the dark figure was Klin. He had known that all along, but the silence had startled him.

Klin raised a finger to lips which Aron was sure were smiling in the dark. He grabbed Aron by the arm, got him out of bed, and steered him toward the door. But now in the doorway was Cainy, her body tiny in the dark, her eyes looking silently up to them. Klin smiled and gave her a gentle shush, then took Aron out and closed the door with little Cainy safely inside.

The night was cold, terribly cold, but Aron thought at least he was out in it now and not trying to hide from it beneath his covers. They ran. At first Aron’s knees felt weak and his steps were unsure. The air was cold. But they were outside, they were in the forest. It was night. They couldn’t see a thing. His worries about what they were to do nagged at him only a little now, crying out to him from some region of his mind far removed from what his eyes saw and his skin felt.

They came upon Aren-Nath and slipped through its loosely bound wooden gates. The streets were black and muddy and empty. Aron could not stop looking around to see if anyone his parents knew would see him out here, away from his house at this hour. He thought he kept seeing people in the shadows, but they shrank back into darkness when he turned to look. Ahead there was one glow of light. It was the only light in the whole town at this hour. But Aron had never seen it before. He had never seen the town at this hour before. The light that shone out into the night came from the tavern.

When they came nearer, the darkness was no longer enough to stifle its eruptions of laughter and blasts of music. Outside its doors, a few figures shuffled together around the street, on the verge of collapse.

Aron glanced at Klin, then realized that his look might betray apprehension. But Klin merely nodded and gestured down an alleyway. They picked their way through its puddles in darkness and came up towards the rear of the tavern. The thin boards of its walls could not hold in its warm yellow glow or the raucous calling of its laughter and song. Aron wondered if he knew anyone who was inside, and was frightened.

Beside the tavern was the shack where the town’s dead were kept on blocks of ice until their day of cremation. Klin used a crate to climb onto the roof of this shack. From there he hoisted himself to the roof of the tavern. Aron followed, wordlessly. What else would he do? For a moment he thought about telling Klin he would just wait outside, but then decided he couldn’t. Not only did he fear standing alone in the alley, but a desire to see inside the tavern grew powerful within him and began to overpower his other concerns.

Standing on the roof of the tavern, he could see the whole town scattered like a bunch of broken pottery beneath him and rising up with solid-looking shapes to the forest above, but the only hint of the warm light of men was from beneath them. Klin was ducking into a hole in the roofing. Crouching, Aron found his way along the beam and ducked in after him.

Inside, the night was forgotten except that the feel of the lampglow told everyone that it could not possibly be daytime. The musicians completed a song, and cheers went up. Aron and Klin were in the rafters. Between thin boards and through knotholes of the ceiling they caught glimpses of rumpled hair and tables and the colors of women’s dresses. A rat scurried across the beam beside them, then disappeared into the shadows around the perimeter. Klin got down on the beam and began inching his way carefully to the other side of the room. Most of the light was streaming in from over there, and Aron knew that Klin was going to get a better look. The musicians began anew with a song featuring the flutist. Klin lay down on the beam and bent his head down to and almost through a hand-sized hole in the boards. Aron squeezed up right behind him, so Klin got up to a crouch, holding on to a rafter for support and making a little space for his friend. There was just enough room beneath Klin’s feet for Aron to slide up the beam and get a good look.

The hole was over a spot behind the bar. First Aron looked straight down the neck of the barmaid’s tight dress. One man’s laughter rolled out above the din. Then Aron saw the barmaid’s hair, the stacks of grubby glasses behind her, kegs piled carelessly against the wall. He scooted forward another few centimeters, butting up against Klin’s ankles, and turned his head to get a better look. The dust of the beam was on his face; it smelt like his mother’s old dress. The bar was wet with beer, and it seated old men stirring their soup and young men laughing and throwing back their heads and downing pints. The young ones belched and put their hands on young, dirty ladies who pushed them away, while old, toothless hags rubbed the old men’s heads. A smiling girl bounced through the room, then hopped into an older man’s lap, threw an arm about his neck, and kicked back uproariously, nearly peeling him from his stool. She swung back up onto her feet, lifted her skirt off the floor and did a little jig, dancing off into a corner where Aron could not see her but from which he heard a great deal of laughter.

There in the corner were Kruman the Carpenter and Flores, the butcher’s daughter. Feebin the Candlemaker sat at a table of quiet men, and the old hag who served as Matchmaker was being cornered by a tottering man who looked even older. An old man who sat at the bar slung his arm about his neighbor’s neck and stood, pulling his chum up in a headlock. The man cried out grotesquely at the top of his wheezing lungs, “Charlie’s leaving!”

All eyes turned to the chubby face of the man in the headlock. He smiled, and nodded. Charlie’s chum gripped the fat neck tighter and called out, “C’mon, boys!”

Aron looked up at Klin to ask what was going on. Klin rolled his eyes as if he’d seen this before. The musicians beneath them started a new song, and Aron looked through the hole again. The old man was leading the other regulars in a wheezing song, and slowly leading Charlie to the door. The music came, wheezing and staggering like its singers.

“Charlie’s gone to fill our kegs,

’Cause all that’s left is stale dregs

In the Town of Aren-Nath!

In our little Town of Aren-Nath!

Aren-Nath, Aren-Nath,

Where mud is thick,

The kids are sick,

And God’s plan gone awry…

But we still serve the Vassal’s will,

And down we our last pints of swill,

For Charlie’s on his way!

Charlie’s on his merry way!"

The song had ended and shouts rang out through the tavern.

“Long live the Vassal!”

“Long live the Vassal of Aren-Nath, and gods keep his Sword!”

“Hoorah! Hoorah!”

Charlie was pushed out into the dark and there was a short silence. There was the snort and whinny of a load-beast, and in his mind Aron could almost see the fog of its breath. Then there came a jingle, a creak, and a drunken hiyah! before the voices started their chatter again. The barmaid leaned far over the counter and gave one man a toothless smile.

Aron felt Klin’s boot kicking into his calves; he looked up from the hole. Klin gestured back the way from which they had come. Aron understood and got carefully to a crouch. He turned himself around and crept back towards the hole to the outside. He climbed out and was in night again and remembered that it was cold. The music was softer now. He found his way down the beam, onto the shed, and into the dark alley. Klin was on his heels the whole way, whispering for him to hurry it up.

They picked their way down the alley to the front of the bar. There, a tall figure stepped out of the shadows. It was rail thin. Aron knew it had to be Tall Boy.

“Did y’get it?” Klin asked hurriedly.

Tall Boy pulled a glass bottle halfway out of his coat pocket to show.

“Charlie always keeps this one beneath his seat,” Klin explained. They all shuffled back into the alley. Tall Boy knocked the cork off the bottle with the back of his hand, took a swig, then wiped his mouth on his coat sleeve and passed the bottle to Klin. Klin followed, and offered it to Aron. He refused. Klin shrugged, and Tall Boy drank deeply again.

“We’ve got one more thing to do tonight, Aron,” Klin explained. Aron looked to him in silence. “You don’t know what that is, do you?”

Aron shook his head.

Tall Boy smiled and bit his lip and took another swig, exchanging a glance with Klin.

“Tonight we’re going into Nero’s house,” Klin said flatly.

Aron’s heart began to race. Nero was a man who lived in the forest, a man whom he had never seen but about whom he had heard much. The strength in his hands could tear the limbs off a man. In his mind and in his books he held strange powers barely under control. When forest winds whispered at night, it was said, they were angry spirits, looking for Nero. The sight of his black carriage approaching on a forest path gave men sleepless nights.

To go within his house would be suicide.

Klin and Tall Boy stood drinking for a few minutes and Aron did not know what he would do. He would not leave them here, now. Perhaps somewhere ahead he could slip off the path and return home. Anxiously he watched them drink, wondering how much more they would put down. Then Tall Boy corked and chucked the bottle into the shadows and the three of them emerged from the alleyway. Together they climbed to the top of the town, scrambled over the Temple wall and set off into the forest.

Upward they hiked, and then upward more and upward a few steps further, and still Aron could not see the house ahead. Tall Boy and Klin were moving slow and kept behind him. The fat trees stood like sleepy sentries in the dark. He looked up again and could not see the house. He looked down and thought of the bargirls, bright in the yellow glow of the tavern lamps, their toothless smiles and bright bosoms in tight dresses burnt into his mind.

Turning back, he tried to watch Klin’s step, worrying that he must be terribly drunk. He didn’t know how much it might take to get a man drunk. Klin’s step seemed steady. Then Aron tripped.

“Look where you’re going!” Klin shouted noisily.

Aron brought his attention back to the path beneath him, wondering if this was the time to escape.

It started coming out of the dark up ahead, a rough form darker and larger than all the rest. Weak fringes of light danced within it. They got closer and he could see that was candlelight dancing about the fringes of windblown curtains.

On the ground floor, all windows were dark. When they came close they could tell that the house was white. In front it had a strange wooden deck, like the deck of a ship, and round white cylinders of wood reached high to the roof. On it there were dark wet shadows and whispers of ancient pain.

Evidently Klin could not hear these whispers. He pressed forward indomitably through the hedges. Aron shushed him, then picked his way painstakingly through the same bush. Suddenly he knew that he could not turn back. He did not know what would happen next, but he pressed onward, as in a dream, until the house was within his very reach. He touched it. Its side was cold. He turned and watched with horror as Klin rapped his knuckles on the strange, clear, flat glass which covered a window. Then with one swift punch Klin knocked out a pane. It tinkled to the floor inside, then all was quiet again.

“Now how do we get in?” Tall Boy whispered thickly.

He and Klin sniffed around the panes of glass. Finally Klin figured the bottom pane could be lifted so he pulled up on it for a while but it didn’t move. Then he saw the latch and reached around inside. He opened it easily and the window stayed open. Then he was inside.

Then Tall Boy was inside. Aron heard his feet crushing the glass on the floor, and it was quiet again. So he hoisted himself onto the sill, then tumbled noisily in, then remembered the glass on the floor. His hands had missed it and he had not been cut. He got up, wondering where the other boys had gone. He could see very little in the darkness. It was all wood planks, like the deck of a boat. Around the room was furniture of strange thin wood that was curved and polished. There were shelves and cabinets made of wood and strange flat glass. The floor creaked beneath his every step. Cold breaths of outside air sighed from the open window behind him. His ears were pricked for any sound.

“Klin… Tall Boy…”

There was no answer. But the whisper had been so quiet he had hardly heard it himself. Everything was dark. Then it struck him.

Somewhere in these rooms was Nero. If Aron could bring himself to listen, he might hear Nero’s breath, warm and determined, within this very hall.

There was a snap, the sharp sound of wood on wood, a young woman’s laughter, then her laughter muffled, then silence and another breath of cold wind. Aron stood frozen in mid-step at the foot of the hall, listening, wanting to go forward and look into the open doors, afraid that at any moment some figure might emerge, afraid to turn around, and afraid that as he stood there he might feel an icy hand fall upon his shoulder.

He took a step forward, listening for the sounds of the woman. A door ahead opened swiftly and a robed figure stepped into the hallway. Aron saw only its swollen feet and the powerful balled muscles of its calves, white with moonlight from an opposite room. The figure shouted and ran towards him like a flying reptile swooping for its prey. Its bald head shone white.

“Klin!” Aron cried desperately, turning and bolting from the corridor. He heard pounding bare feet behind him and an angry cry.

He rounded the corner, into a big room. Klin was up on the balcony.

“Aron! Up here! Climb up!” His face was pale and worried, his eyes intent. Aron obeyed and broke for the shelves. There were books, so many books….

Nero exploded into the room and stopped to survey it for his prey. He swung one arm up along the wall and bright light came down from a lamp suspended from the center of the ceiling.

“Come back here!” he barked, jabbing a finger at them. He marched fiercely towards them, his calves balled and fists clenched with tremendous energy. His eyes were blue, his skin dark, his head fringed with short coarse gray hairs.

Aron scrambled up the shelves, slipping with every step. Klin was at the top, screaming at him and reaching his hand down through the balusters to him. Nero was nearly within reach of Aron’s feet now. Aron looked back and their eyes met. Then he lunged for the top though he had no solid footing. Nero leapt to seize a foot. Aron got his other foot on top of the biggest book on the shelf and shoved off of it, putting everything into one surge for the top. The big book tumbled out of the shelf as he pushed, but it had given him enough height to get his arms over the railing of the balcony. Klin grabbed him. Aron looked down, fighting to get his legs to the edge of the upper level.

Nero had turned his gaze abruptly from the boys and tried but failed to catch the book. It landed on its spine then parted, falling open. Nero grasped the fringes of his hair in tight fists as if about to rip it from his small round skull. He cried out, but no longer did his eyes seek out the intruders in his house. He looked down to the book, beside his swollen feet. On its yellow page stood a picture, jagged lines of the blackest ink.

It was a creature, gaping mouth draped with saliva, digging one bare claw into the almost empty carcass of a young boy on a rock.

Klin’s hands pulled Aron up over the top. He fell hard on the floor of the balcony, then scrambled to his feet. Tall Boy led them through a window and into the night, onto the branches of a tree, and Aron jumped too soon for the ground, twisting his ankle and bruising his legs on the roots below.

Klin swung down beside him and picked him up. They were running, running, running. They did not look back once. From the house they could hear Nero’s screams, screams of wrath and loss.

“Come back here you stupid boys!” they finally heard, then they could hear no more.

Aron’s body ached everywhere and his heart was pounding out of control. He fell over a dead log in the path and collapsed on the forest floor, struggling just to breathe.

Klin and Tall Boy were crouched over him. He couldn’t think of anything but trying to get his breath. There were hands on his chest and arms. He sucked one breath in, but could not remember how to exhale. Someone hit him and the air came out. He breathed again, then again. Now his breaths were coming fast and he started to hear their voices.

“Aron, Aron, it’s okay…. Stand up! You gotta keep walking….”

He stood but felt weak. His body was shaking. The other boys helped him for a few steps, then he pushed them away and fought his way alone. They kept anxiously by his side, and he pushed them angrily away. Slowly, he regained his breath and began to hear the wind and feel the chill of the forest. He had no idea where they were, but Tall Boy was leading them somewhere. Aron just kept following.

The moon was bright and cold and round.

Aron’s house looked small when they came to it, and he thought of all the comfort that was inside. He wondered for a moment if Nero would follow them here. He wondered if Nero were somewhere amongst these trees.

The three boys squatted for a while on the hill, considering the events of the night. Aron thought the other boys might be laughing now, except that he had collapsed like that. Finally Tall Boy told them that his paw was going to get him up before dawn to skin some animals, and how his paw would probably skin him instead if he weren’t around. His gaunt form wandered off into the forest, picking up rocks and nailing trees with them.

Klin smiled. “You doing all right?”

“Yeah.”

“How’d you like it?” Klin questioned. His tone was quiet and sincere, threatening nothing for an erroneous answer.

Aron laughed a little, nervously. “Not too bad.”

“You didn’t do so bad. I’ve gotta tell you, starting off, I wasn’t so sure you’d make it. When we were coming up on the house it looked like maybe you were about to bolt for the trees or something. But you did good. Got into a hell of a lot more trouble than me or Tall Boy.”

“Have you ever gone in there before?”

“No.”

“Were you scared?”

Klin smiled to himself, kicking at a root in the forest floor.

Aron said it was probably time that he went inside. Klin asked him if he was sure, and Aron told him yes, and Klin said okay. Aron started walking down the hill to his house. He walked a little nervously because he felt like Klin was watching him.

“Aron!” Klin called out, loudly enough so that Aron would worry if it had woken his parents.

He looked back and Klin was charging down the hill towards him. He came to Aron’s side and grabbed the top of his arm tight.

“You asked me a question back there, are you gonna let me get away without an answer?” He was breathless. “Scared?” He let Aron’s arm go. “Of course I was scared. But that isn’t what matters. What matters is…”

Aron watched him silently.

“Aw, hell. Good night, Aron. Sleep tight. And be quiet getting in there! Don’t want to wake the parents!”

He laughed and nudged Aron on his way. At the bottom of the hill Aron looked back once, and Klin was standing there where they had parted, and by his posture it was clear he was smiling.

When Aron got to the door of the house and looked back again, Klin was gone.

Quietly, he slipped inside.

His mind wandered and wandered in senseless circles. He heard sounds that were not sounds and saw strange things verging on dreams. He heard a knocking, a rapping at the door, then sat up, wondering if that one could have been real. But he heard nothing more. A scream from the forest.

The only sound was the cold fingers of the wind running through the earth’s bristly hair.

He awoke to the sound of his sister’s shrill scream. He rubbed his eyes and looked around the room, now bright with morning. His sister ran in the door bawling.

“What is it, baby?” he heard Father ask.

He got out of bed.

He saw his father slipping out the front door. His head poked back in.

“Son, stay with your sister,” he commanded sternly.

Cainy stared up at him, her eyes brimming with fear. Aron stood motionless, still waking up, wondering if the night before had been anything more than strange dreams. He said nothing.

Father came back in. His face was like stone. Mother, drawn by Cainy’s cries, came running in through the back door and went straight to her.

“What is it?” she asked Father.

“It’s Klin,” he spoke without moving his lips. “It looks like something’s chewed him up.”

Cainy screamed wildly but Aron did not hear her. He stared dumbly at his father.

Father was to go out to the field with a blanket to cover the body. Then he was to hike into town to tell the Vassal and his men what Cainy had found. Mother was to stay home and watch the children.

But Aron knew that with his sister throwing tantrums he’d be able to slip away soon. Cainy ran into the kitchen and Mother gave chase. Aron slipped out the back door into the open green field. He knew which way he had to run. At the top of the first hill, he heard his mother calling his name desperately. She must have thought she had lost him.

Klin was gone. In the mystery of the midnight forest winds, Aron might have believed it. In the strange light of the tavern, or with the shards of moonlit broken glass on Nero’s floorboards, he could have felt something, he could have cried and understood that Klin was gone.

But the morning light was a cruel anesthetic.

In it the white house looked fragile, and Aron ran straight up and pounded on the door. What was inside could be no worse than what lurked in the forest. He screamed and pounded harder and kicked the door violently until his toes were all smashed up. Then it opened. A powerful fist came down, opened, and wrenched him inside.

The hand belonged to Nero. No other could be so strong. Now the sorcerer was clothed all in tight-fitting white garments and a white coat with a black ribbon tied neatly about his veinous neck. His powerful arms held Aron so tight against the wall that he could not swallow and could hardly breathe.

Piles of books were strewn everywhere.

Droplets of sweat ran down Nero’s face and neck, then into his collar. He inhaled sharply through his mouth and pushed hot air back out through his nose. His eyes bulged wildly and stared at one of Aron’s eyes, then the other, then shifting back and forth each half-second as he scrutinized the creature within his grasp.

“You stupid!”

He slammed Aron against the wall once, then again, knocking the breath out of him before letting him fall to the floor. Nero walked slowly, deliberately back to his books.

“I don’t have time for this, I don’t have time for this!” he screamed suddenly.

Aron lay motionless, panting, on the floor.

“Make it go away,” he finally croaked.

“I can’t!” Nero roared back and raged toward him once again. “The beast is out! You opened the book. That means he is hungry for you!” Nero had knelt by his side and was jabbing a finger hard into Aron’s forehead with each word.

With the knowledge that he was hunted, Aron felt no greater fear, only agitation. Why Klin? Why had it not come directly for him, bursting into his house, casting his parents from their bed, picking his own body with one claw and stealing away into the night with it….

“But it’s eaten Klin!” Aron cried. He scurried from Nero to avoid his poking fingers.

Nero closed his eyes, then clenched his teeth and his fists tighter and tighter, turning his head up towards the ceiling with agonizing tension. Then he let go and opened one hand. “Yes! He will tear others limb from limb and devour them in a gulp. But it is you he will stay hungry for.” He ground his teeth. “By the power of the gods he will not stop until your flesh is inside him!”

He stepped forward and grasped Aron’s shirt, hoisting him against the wall. This time Aron raged back with all his strength, kicking and flailing his arms.

“Make it stop! Make it stop!”

The old man threw him off.

“Begone!”

Nero turned, clutching at his chest, then fell, his face contorted in pain, onto one knee. “Begone I say….” One quivering finger pointed to the door.

As Aron turned the knob and stepped outside he heard the old man sobbing quietly behind him.

The beast was in the forest and Aron could feel it smelling him. He could not go home. He did not want to know what he might find there anyway. By now Father would have given the news to the Vassal, and a party would be on its way back to the house. Soon Father would be crying with Mother because they did not know where he had gone. Mother would be sure he had been eaten. Father would try to tell her otherwise. He would stand fearless guard with the axe, watching the forest for any sign of motion, not knowing that it was the Power of the Gods with which he must contend and that the axe would be but a splinter in the side of the beast. It would eat them all. It would eat his sister.

Perhaps it had already happened. He could not go back. He held only one hope.

He had not run far on the path to town when he heard the rattling approach of a wagon around the bend. He ducked swiftly behind a tree. It did not matter who it was. He was not ready to face anyone at this time.

Guiding the load-beast was Charlie, his face broad and cheerful and sleepy. The beast picked its way along slowly and easily, pausing from time to time to sniff at roadside clover.

When the wagon came around, Aron slipped in back and crouched amongst the heavy kegs. If the beast came out of the forest now, then it came, and he was dead. He held himself motionless and waited for the load-beast to make its lazy way into town.

There was the sound of the strong hooves of riding-beasts swiftly approaching, and a strong voice hailed Charlie. It sounded like Torstein. The slow load-beast came to a stop, and Aron heard the other party ride up beside them. He peeked out a hole in the cloth wagon-cover. Father was with them.

“Eh, we got some trouble a little deeper into the forest…. See anything, Charlie?”

“N-n-no, sir….” Charlie mumbled.

“Well you better hurry on back to town as fast as you can get there. There’s something funny going on in the forest, and we’re advising everyone to come to safety. Come on, boys, let’s get on up to the house and see how Aron an’ his ma are doing! Hiyah!”

They were gone.

Charlie tapped his beast and it crept, pulling them onwards towards the town.

At last the wagon came to a stop. From the way it rocked and creaked, Aron knew that Charlie was stepping off. Peering out the hole in the cloth he could see the town wall stretching up into the distance. Charlie was swinging the gate open. His beast sputtered a little. He patted it and guided the wagon through to the other side, then came around back to close the gate. Aron ducked as low as he could amongst the kegs. Charlie put the latch carefully in place then turned, but didn’t see him. He went back to the front, the wagon creaked and rocked, and the beast pulled them laboriously through the muddy streets.

“Charlie!” an anxious voice called out. The wagon ground to a halt. “Did’ya see anyone else on the road, Charlie? Well, good. Looks like you better stay put here for the time being. Something’s up in the forest, not sure what yet…. Vassal’s orders…. I’m gonna go guard that gate right now!”

Aron leapt from the wagon.

“The Vassal? Where?” he demanded.

“Why, at his quarters,” the man he recognized as Grumo answered, bewildered. Aron sprinted. Charlie called out lethargically after him.

“Hey, wait a minute there, kid….”

The Vassal’s doorway looked small in the new, still cold sunlight, and Aron burst into the dark quarters without a knock or a wipe of his feet. The Vassal stood, his profile to Aron, his arms crossed, his gaze straight into the blank wall before him. He turned to face his visitor. His eyes widened when he saw that it was Aron who stood facing him.

“You have something to tell me?” he asked excitedly, coming forward and bending down to face Aron.

Aron said yes, but he could not find strength to begin his story. The words caught in his throat.

“How many men is it going to kill before we can kill it?” the Vassal asked, taking Aron by the collar.

“I don’t know…. How can I know…?”

“Do you know where it came from?” he pleaded, shaking Aron a little. Aron had not seen the Vassal like this.

“From Nero’s house,” he mumbled quickly. He felt himself on the verge of tears, and his throat began to hurt. “From a book at Nero’s house.”

Aron knew that it was stupid, but he expected the Vassal to ask what on earth they had been doing in Nero’s house. But the Vassal said nothing for a long moment. Then he pushed Aron aside and stepped quickly to the door. He flung it open and called to the first man he saw.

“Feebin! Quick, to the Temple! Bring Takani to me at once! Quickly! Run, Feebin, run!”

He stepped back to Aron, leaving the door wide to the Square. He bent, facing Aron, but his gaze remained fixed on a brilliantly engraved cabinet in the corner of the room.

“Listen,” he said. “Whatever you’ve done, whatever it is that happened last night, don’t worry. No one’s blaming you. There’s a lot of things we can do out here if that thing is still hungry. Takani can probably fix us up right away….”

He took two steps to the cabinet, seemingly oblivious of Aron’s presence. With great care he turned its latch and swung open one door then the other. Blue velvet had been tacked onto its boxy interior. This upright bed kept the Sword, swaddled in blood-colored cloth, its steel blade naked only at the point.

The Vassal caught his breath for a moment, then took the black hilt into his hand. The red cloth fell away and lay limp in the cabinet as the Sword came to life within his grasp. He held it, and it danced with incredible lightness.

“You can be sure,” the Vassal breathed to Aron, “that no harm will come to those in the town. I’ve often wondered if this day would come again, or if the Baron and his men would take this blade away first. But I have put them off, and the day has come….”

“Maybe it won’t come to the town….” Aron said, not knowing what else to say. Then he remembered that the beast was hungry for him. The beast would come. He nearly cried, looking into the Vassal’s eyes, but those cold green eyes stayed fixed on the blade before them. Unimaginable now was the resignation Aron had seen in those eyes not one day ago.

“Aron,” he said, eyes unmoving. “You stay back here in case we need anything.”

The back room was small and dark and filled by a short thick wood table and wet brown dust. There was just one small window. Aron sat, and suddenly was confined. There was nothing he could do here but play with his hands. His heart told him to rise and do something, or say something to the Vassal, but he stayed seated.

Sounds came from the other room.

“What has happened?” The words were from Takani. Aron heard no response. “So it is true?” Now he heard whispering. “Yes. Yes. Yes….”

Takani slipped quietly into Aron’s room. He shuffled hunching to the tableside, his body small and vulnerable in the dark morning.

“So…” he breathed. There was a long silence as he looked Aron over. “Your friend… I am very sorry, my child.”

Aron remembered Klin. He said nothing.

“The Vassal tells me you have met Nero also.”

Aron nodded mutely.

“For the sake of Aren-Nath, child, tell me, tell me what happened last night, and tell me the whole story.”

Aron was silent for a long moment.

“It came out of a book,” he finally choked.

“A book?”

“He heard us in his house. I was climbing over shelves of his books to get away. One book fell down to the floor and opened. I looked down. It was inside the book….”

“What? The beast?”

“Yes. The book fell open and I saw it on the page.”

“Then it is beast of magic!” Takani flew to his feet. “Vassal! Your riding-beasts! I must have them! I must reach Nero to know what manner of magic we face! If I cannot reach Nero we all are in peril!”

The Vassal stepped to the doorway, nodding slowly. Takani darted around him. The Vassal followed him out. There was whispering, an exchange.

“Send no man with me! By the power of the gods it would do no good! I must ride alone!”

“If your best men can do no good, what can we hope for, what can we hope for?” a woman’s voice which Aron had not heard before cried out.

“Our boy had no chance…” a man sobbed.

Klin’s parents were in the other room.

The Vassal stood silently, facing the wall.

“I am gone! Hold me back no longer!”

Takani fled the room.

Klin’s mother shuffled slowly to the door of Aron’s room. Her eyes were on the verge of tears.

Every able man of the town took a post about the perimeter. Some had brought axes or hoes or rusty heirloom swords forged for ancient wars long forgotten. The Vassal had told them that all these would be useless. If the beast came there would be no stopping it, and they should not even try, unless it got hold of a woman or a child. Then of course the men knew what they would do.

The townsfolk cried as they heard about what Cainy had found in the forest. There were few in the town who had not known Klin.

The men fingered their weapons nervously, resting the fighting ends in the mud and staring down thoughtfully. The older ones remembered the beast of Takani’s song and thought of their friends who had died before Yordenko’s Sword had bitten the hell-beast’s spongy flesh.

They thought of the wounds Yordenko had sustained in that battle, and remembered seeing his young body gashed and burnt, being taken by flatwagon to those who knew the mysteries of Draffut.

Then the men of the town recalled their duty and turned their gazes outward to the forest again. They did not expect it would be over quickly. They could not even know that the beast would come. Aron had told no one for what it hungered. They waited.

“Where is he?”

It was Father’s voice from the other room. Aron jumped and ran to see him, to fly into his arms. He stood tall in the doorway to the Square, his face haggard yet intent. Aron ran and grabbed him.

“But where is Mother?”

Then he saw her coming towards the door. Her strong arms carried Cainy, and the hard determination in her eyes did not soften until they met his own.

A woodsman emerging from the forest heard warning shouts from the watchful men on the town walls. The men crowded him as he came to the gate.

“I saw movement in the woods,” he told them. “That thing you’re looking for… well, it shouldn’t be hard to find….”

Not an hour had passed when the breach was made, just paces from that spot. A young man had seen some motion amongst the trunks of forest trees and called the others around to look.

“There it is! Gods!”

The young man’s father had told him to run and get the Vassal. The young man had watched his father’s gaze turn quietly back towards the vague hulking form which staggered from the trees and towards the town wall. He had seen his father fingering his ancient weapon, but the creature stood the height of two men, its body utterly unnatural, and even the young man knew that no ordinary sword could be enough. He turned and ran.

Aron heard the cries from the far side of town.

In a minute the young man was at the door panting.

“It’s here,” he gasped.

The Vassal looked up and took a step towards the young man at the door. Then he stopped himself and went to Aron.

“It’s not your fault,” he said firmly. The Sword was now on his belt. It hummed and began to sing in a high tone as keen as its edge. It jutted out behind him and bounced against his leg as he strode into the Square.

Aron’s parents said nothing. Perhaps they were awed by the Vassal and his Sword. But Aron wanted to tell them that he knew it was himself the beast was after-that if only he gave his own life right now the town would be saved. He wanted to ask them if he should do it. He wanted to tell them he had just killed the Vassal. He had taken the beast here, led it here, it could smell him, and he had brought it, brought it for the selfish hope that the Vassal could kill it with an easy thrust of his Sword-or the hope that, at least, Aron would not have to face the beast’s jaws alone, in the forest, with no one to die with him or hear him die….

“I have to go,” he said, and broke for the door. Again he had no choice but to keep running away from his mother’s cries.

There was mud, slippery mud, and old men running.

“It’s come, it’s come, it’s over by the Schoolroom….” they cried out to him. One tried to pick him up and carry him in flight, but Aron easily broke free and ran toward the Schoolroom.

Women corralled children through the streets and away from danger. Aaron ran through them and around them.

In the distance stood the Schoolroom. Closer, to the right, the young man who had brought the news to the Vassal knelt by his father, who was fallen and bloody in the mud.

The Sword keened its constant song of fate, and below this Aron heard the earthly sounds of shouting men who waved poles and axes. Aron could see that the beast and the Vassal were about to engage.

The beast caught Aron’s scent on the wind and looked straight up at him, its mouth gaping, its hideous black eyes embedded in dark flesh at the top of its broad head. It took one shuffling step in the direction of its prey. The Vassal circled to cut it off, the delicate Sword dancing in his ready hand.

The beast regarded him for a moment before its claws swung out on long arms in an effort to cast him aside. The Vassal leapt back and the Sword lashed out, screaming, gashing deeply the hand of the beast.

Nausea seized Aron’s stomach, and he fell to the ground, trying to fight it off. The beast sensed his weakness and pressed towards where he lay with surprising speed. The Vassal rushed to cut it off. The Sword cried out and leapt in a broad arc and buried itself deep in its chest cavity. It howled, one of its claws tearing at the Vassal, gashing his side badly.

Aron came to his feet and took a step back. With a cracking of ribs, the Sword of Aren-Nath disentangled itself and swung again, then again, this time low. The legs of the beast buckled beneath it and gushed thick blood into the street. It turned to the Vassal, moaning. The Sword came down on its neck.

Nearly falling, the beast looked to Aron, its black eyes pleading, before turning to charge the Vassal and tear at the flesh of his face. It scampered over him and he crumpled beneath its claws like a rag doll. It hopped and shuffled on broken legs and the men flew from its path.

The Vassal lay motionless, the Sword still keening in his hand. Aron ran toward him, but as he approached the beast stopped its flight and grunted, panting.

“Yordenko!” Aron cried out.

The creature hopped towards the fallen body. Then the Vassal moved. He turned to his side and Aron saw that his face was covered with blood. The creature wheezed and bayed like a wounded pup. The men closed in a circle about it, and the Vassal rose with supreme effort to confront it.

With desperate strength it broke the circle, gashing two men, and stumbled up the Grade, away from the fury of the screaming blade. The Sword guided the Vassal after it, pulling his steps faster and faster in pursuit. Aron chased after them but could not keep up as they raced upwards towards the Temple in a hideous contest that neither could concede.

The beast broke into the Templeyard, the Vassal just behind it. There, it stopped to use its last strength in combat. When Aron could see over the wall, he saw them come together, two bloodied bodies colliding, both weak but compelled to combat by the power of the gods.

A claw came down and swiped the Vassal’s right breast from his body. The Sword fell to the mud. He bent and raised it in his left hand. The creature shrunk down, moaning. The blade descended, splitting its side and spilling its innards to the ground. It fell, gurgling and clawing, to the ground beside the Master’s Stump. The Vassal buried the Sword deep into its shuddering carcass, then came to his knees at its side. He laid his own body carefully down along it.

The men of the town rushed up with their axes and cautiously approached the bodies. Death was like a blanket over them both.

Mother ran a hand through his hair and hugged him for a long time. Then he told her that he wanted to go back to the Templeyard. With great and silent strength, she let him go.

He followed the road upward.

Aron looked uphill to see three men emerging from the Templeyard carrying a heavy sackcloth roll toward the ice-shed by the tavern. Here it would be kept until a pyre could be built, and hearts healed enough to do the dead man proper homage. The front man slipped once in the mud and the roll tumbled on top of him; he swore as they lifted the burden again.

As Aron drew closer he saw that the creature, wrapped in more sackcloth, had already been hoisted to a flatwagon. The vapors from its body were stinging men’s eyes and making some vomit, even though cloths were wrapped round their mouths and noses. Renky the Idiot sat on the driver’s plank, holding the reins and sobbing quietly.

“It’s on there,” a muffled voice called. Flies were beginning to swarm the flatwagon. Torstein stood up front, his face wrapped, his hand on Renky’s shoulder.

“Take it to the Wells of Fire. You remember the Wells of Fire, Renky? You just go on the road, that way, out of town….” Renky sobbed, nodding. “And push the whole thing in, then bring the load-beast back. There’s lot of good stuff to eat in the bag….”

Women had gathered around the edges of the scene and cried and held the children back.

Aron stood on the Master’s Stump. The ground was still dark with blood here, and he imagined he could still see the two bodies lying peacefully beside each other, like tired lovers at a picnic.

Takani came up behind him.

“So…” he called out. Aron turned, and both were silent. They were silent for a long while, letting the wind whisper down to them from the forest.

“Nero was gone when I got there, child,” Takani said at last, mounting the Stump. “And he had taken his books with him. There is nothing we could have done to help the poor Vassal.”

Aron imagined Nero’s house, boxy and empty like a broken milk crate in the forest daylight, its terror distant as a far-away song.

“You are… all right, my child?”

Aron nodded, swallowing.

“Takani!” a voice called and they turned to see Grumo hailing from across the street. He ran into the yard.

“The Baron has come,” he panted. “He says we have to give him the Sword. But we were gonna leave it with the Vassal’s things. Baron looks pretty angry. He’s tearing up the Quarters looking for it. What do we do?”

“Let him have it,” Takani said shortly. He stepped from the Stump and strode into the Temple without once looking at Aron.

Aron’s gaze rose high to the Temple Icon.

He did not want to scale that height again.