Aurian

2 The Swordswoman

Forral had never guessed that taking care of a child would prove to be such hard work. He moved into the storeroom that led off the kitchen, and two or three happy days passed while Aurian helped him clear a living space amidst tools, seeds, sacks of grain and garden produce, round white cheeses, wrinkled apples, pots of honey, and bottled fruit that Eilin had laid aside for winter. The resulting accommodation was cramped and spartan, but it was enough for a soldier’s needs, and Forral had no objection to the mixed aromas of good food in his bedroom. The swordsman also took the time to board up Aurian’s broken window until it could be repaired properly. When she complained that it made the room too dark he looked at her sternly. “It’s your own fault. You broke it, remember?” Aurian’s jaw dropped.

After that the battles of will occurred almost daily. Aurian had been allowed to run wild all her life, and though it wrenched Forral’s heart to be firm with her, he knew it had to be done, for her own good. They fell out first over the matter of baths. Aurian refused point-blank, protesting that she bathed in the lake in summer. Wasn’t that enough? Forral handed her the soap and towel. “Very well,” he said. “Go and bathe in the lake, then.”

Aurian stared out of the window, stfide-eyed with disbelief. Thick snow covered the ground and the deep, dark waters were rimmed with a broad band of ice. “But—” she protested.

“Go on, get moving. You’re smelling the place up,” he added callously.

Aurian’s lip trembled, then the Magefolk stubbornness took over. She set her jaw and scowled. “Right!” she snapped and stamped out, slamming the door behind her.

The obstinate little wretch had called his bluff! Forral, horrified, ran after her. The lake was deep around the island, and in weather this cold, he placed no trust in the old tale that it was impossible to drown a Mage. He reached the bottom of the garden just in time to see Aurian jump into the freezing water.

With a curse, the swordsman leapt forward and grabbed a handful of her hair before she could flounder away from the bank. When he fished her out, she was already blue. He wrapped her in his cloak and carried her inside, dumping her straight into the steaming tub that he had placed in front of the stove. “There,” he said, as her shivering subsided in the hot water. “Isn’t that better than the lake?” Aurian glared at him. “If you don’t like it, I can always take you back out there,” he suggested.

After a moment the child dropped her eyes. “Perhaps it’s not so bad after all,” she said.

Forral smiled, and produced a little wooden boat rhar he had made for her to play with.

Fortunately, once she got used to the idea, Aurian became so addicted to hot baths that his chief problem lay in getting her out of them. Persuading her to comb her hair was less easy, however. Her long, thick, glowing red curls were snarled with years’ worth of tangles. The first time, it took Forral a terrible hour to get the mess sorted out while he held the struggling, shrieking child down. At last he threw down the comb, filled with guilt. Gods, I’d rather fight a dozen warriors, he thought, taking the sobbing little girl into his arms.

“You hurt me!” she accused him,

“I’m sorry, love. I know I did. But that was only because it had been left for so long. When you do it every day—”

“I’d rather die!” Aurian shouted.

“What a pity.” Forral sighed. “You look so beautiful now,” Aurian’s head came up sharply. “Me? Beautiful? Like the princess in your story?”

Forral looked into her face. The childish roundness had been leaving Aurian’s face in the past few months—Eilin had been right. She would have her father’s hawkish looks, angular and high-cheekboned, with the same fierce aquiline nose. “You’re the most beautiful girl I’ve ever seen,” he told her sincerely. “It would be a shame if a handsome prince came by and didn’t like you because you hadn’t combed your hair.”

“I don’t want a stupid prince,” Aurian declared firmly. “I’m going to marry you.”

The swordsman froze. This was a complication that he hadn’t considered. “Don’t you think I’m a bit old for you?” he said lamely.

“How old are you?”

“Thirty.”

“That’s not old.” Aurian shrugged. “You said my father was ninety-six when he married my mother.”

Forral was lost for a reply. She was too young to understand the fundamental difference between Mortal and Magefolk.

“Don’t you want to marry me?” Aurian looked hurt. “You just said I was beautiful.”

“You are,” he reassured her, “and I would love to marry you. But you’re not old enough yet. We’ll talk about it again when you grow up.”

“Promise?”

“Promise.” Hating himself, he added, “But only if you comb your hair. I can’t marry someone who looks like a hedge.”

Aurian sighed, “Oh, all right, then.”

To Portal’s relief, Eilin taught her daughter to braid the unruly mane. That solved the problem of most of the tangles, and Aurian began to take a delight in looking after her hair, although the speculative looks she cast his way as she did so gave the swordsman some cause for alarm. He knew how stubborn she could be, once she got an idea into her head.

When Forral had been about Aurian’s age, Geraint had taught him to read. It was only now. thap he appreciated how he must have tried the Mage’s patience. FJiUn unearthed Geraint’s old library, and Forral tried to select the books that would appeal to a child. They were old histories mostly, filled with tales of adventure and bravado, and they proved to be the same ones with which Forral had been taught. The wound of the swordsman’s grief opened anew as he recalled his old friend’s face, bent over the page as Geraint struggled patiently to explain the mystery to the baffled youth that had been himself.

Aurian hated it. Not used to sitting still and concentrating, she considered the whole business a waste of time. She took to hiding at lesson times, and Forral came to bless his skill as a tracker. He would haul her back, Aurian protesting bitterly all the way, and she fought^him so vehemently that Forral became concerned that their relationship would be irrevocably damaged.

In the end the swordsman resorted to subterfuge, pretending to give in. “All right,” he told her with a shrug. “If it’s too difficult for you we won’t bother.” Aurian scowled at him suspiciously. She knew by now that Forral always got his way in the end. Pretending to ignore her, he brewed some tea made by Eilin from rosehips, a perfect antidote to this wintry weather. Stirring a dollop of honey into his cup, he sat back with his feet propped on the stove, opened the book of legends and began to read.

After a while, Aurian began to drift around the room, looking for something to do. The weather was much too bad to go out. Another blizzard was howling outside, and the wind rattled the frames of the thick crystal casement, Forral watched the child out of the corner of his eye. Eventually she approached him. “Can’t we play something?”

“Not now,” Forral said absently. “I’m busy.”

Aurian’s face fell. She hung around for a while, scuffling her feet. “Forral, I’m bored,” she whined.

“I’m not,” he replied smugly. “This story is much too exciting.”

Aurian stamped her foot. “I don’t believe you!” she shouted. “You’re only saying that to make me read the stupid thing!”

Forral winced. The child was too bloody quick for her own good. Thinking quickly,, he assumed an injured expression. “Would I lie? If you don’t believe me I’ll read it to you.” Looking relieved, Aurian sat down at his feet.

It really was an exciting story. Forral had chosen it for that very reason. He glanced down at the child’s rapt expression. When they reached the climax of the tale, where the brave young heroine was trapped on a mountain by savage goblins and trolls, he put the book down and yawned.

“Don’t stop,” Aurian urged him anxiously, biting her lip. “What happens next?”

Forral shrugged. “I can’t be bothered to read anymore. I think I’ll go for a nap.” Leaving the book on the chair, he went to his room, closing the door firmly on the child’s outraged protests.

The swordsman returned an hour later to find Aurian poring over the book, tears of frustration in her eyes. “It doesn’t make sense,” she wailed. “It’s just little black marks, and I’ll never find out what happened!”

Forral put his arm around her. “That’s just what I said to your father when he taught me with this book.”

Aurian’s eyes widened. “You did? What did he say?”

“Tough,” replied Forral, grinning at the stunned expression on her face. “He said that if I wanted to find out what happened, I would have to work hard and let him teach me.”

Aurian’s face grew stormy. “You tricked me! You rotten, sneaky beast\” She threw the book against the wall and ran off to her room, slamming the door.

She sulked for two days, refusing to speak to him, Eilin raised her eyebrows at the change, but forbore to comment. Forral missed Aurian’s cheerful company more than he would ever have thought possible, and began to blame himself for pushing the child too far. In the end he could bear her angry silence no longer. “I’m sorry,” he told her, “You’re absolutely right. I was rotten ant) sneaky, and I apologize. I’ll read the rest of the story if you want.”

Aurian threw her arms around him, her fece alight with her smile. “I love you, Forral.”

Forral felt his throat tighten. “I love you, too,” he said huskily. “Why don’t you go and fetch the book?”

She drew back and looked at him thoughtfully. “You really do want me to learn to read, donk ygu?”

He nodded. “It means a lot to me, Aurian, You can’t imagine how important it is.”

Aurian sighed, looking like a prisoner about to be dragged to the scaffold. “I suppose we’d better get started, then.”

It took the child a long time to grasp the rudiments of reading. Forral suspected that much of the feult lay with him, for Aurian was intelligent enough, and he knew that he lacked skill as a teacher. All he could do was substitute patience for skill and keep their lessons short, stopping before Aurian became too tired or despondent. Then he would read to her, hoping that she would be encouraged to want to read the stories for herself. Eventually it worked. By the end of the long winter, Aurian was reading everything she could lay her hands on, and Eilin had to make sure that Geraint’s spellbooks were well hidden.

Forral taught Aurian many other things that winter. He told her of Nexis, queen of cities, which lay to the southwest and contained the Academy of the Magefolk, where all magical lore was studied under the rule of the Archmage Miathan. He told her of the Nexis Garrison that housed the city’s crack fighting force, and was the greatest military school in the land. Aurian learned what lay beyond her Valley—the nearby northern hills, where men lived mainly by forestry, and farming cattle and sheep; the east coast, famed for fishing; the countryside south and west, where clay for pots was dug, and people grew grain, flax, and grapes for wine that was marketed by the powerful Merchants’ Guild of Nexis, who coordinated trade between farmers and fishers, and the craftsmen of villages and towns.

They spent hours by the fire, as Aurian listened, enthralled, to Forral’s stories of mercenary life in the secretive Southern Kingdoms across the sea, with their fierce, swarthy-skinned warriors. She would sit at his feet, wide-eyed and entranced, as he spoke of ships and storms, and the mighty whales who were lords of the deep. He told her bloodcurdling tales of ancient legend, about the lost Dragonfolk—powerful Mages in their own right whose eyes flashed killing fire—or of the fearsome race of winged warriors who were said to inhabit the southern mountains. Though the swordsman was no scholar, he taught her what little history he knew, including the names and natures of the Gods themselves. The Goddesses: Iriana of the Beasts, Thara of the Fields, and Melisanda of the Healing Hands. And the Gods: Chathak, God of Fire, the special deity of warriors; Yinze of the Sky; and lonor the Wise, the God of Oceans who was called the Reaper of Souls in the pantheon of the Southern Kingdoms. Aurian marveled, and learned.

Spring that year came in a single, glorious burst that quickly erased the last traces of the terrible winter.

Trees leapt into leaf and blossom, and flowers suddenly appeared everywhere. Once again the woods around the lake became alive with birdsong. Aurian and Forral took to spending much of their time outdoors in the sunshine, searching for early greens to supplement their limited winter diet, and helping Eilin with her work of planting and extending the fertile land beyond the lake.

Now that the woods were burgeoning with life, Forral began to think of hunting. They had eaten little meat over the winter—mostly the tough, salted meat of the male kids borne by Eilin’s goats the previous year. Though the Mage had tried to disguise the strong flavor in well-seasoned soups and stews, Forral was frankly sick of the stuff. Some rabbit might go down well, he thought, or perhaps a bird—anything but bloody goat\ During his mercenary career, the swordsman had learned some skill with bow and snare, and somewhat hesitantly, he broached the subject to Eilin. Since the Earth-Mage lived at one with the land and its creatures, he half expected an angry denial. He also feared that Aurian might be upset, if one of her animal friends appeared on the supper table. This being the case, Forral was staggered by the Mage’s reply to his diffident question.

“By all means, Forral. If you want to hunt, Aurian will show you how we do it in the Valley.”

On a golden evening, Aurian led Forral through the birch grove and the deeper mixed woodland beyond, until they came to a wild grassy area dotted with clusters of gorse and bramble. The spaces between their roots were laced with a multitude of runs and holes. “This is where the rabbits mostly live,” Aurian told him softly. “They’ll soon be coming out to feed.”

Forral nodded, wondering what she planned to do. Aurian had forbidden him to bring his bow and had dismissed his snares as cruel.

“Stay quiet,” the child whispered. She stepped out from the trees, wrapping a thick piece of cloth around her wrist. Lifting her arm, she shrilled a piercing whistle. For a moment, nothing happened. Then far above, a tiny dot appeared in the vault of the sky. The speck plummeted—grew—took shape. Forral heard the rushing whisper of wind through feathers and a harsh cry. A winged form swooped to Aurian’s wrist and clung there, extending its short, streamlined wings for balance as it rubbed its proud head and cruel, curved beak caressingly along her face.

Aurian glowed with delight. “This is Swiftwing,” she said, introducing the bird. ^Af least, I call him that.” The falcon gave Forral a scornful sideways glance with its great dark eye, hissed at him through open beak, and returned to nibbling at her hair. For a moment the child lingered, eye to eye in soundless communion with the fierce bird of prey; then with a swift, upward jerk of her arm, she launched him into the sky, where he climbed in spirals to hover, fluttering, above them. Aurian drew the bemused swordsman into the shelter of the trees. “Now we wait,” she murmured.

After a time, the rabbits began to emerge from the bushes to feed, venturing timidly forth with their gentle, rocking gait. Forral felt Aurian’s hand clutch his arm. “Now,” she breathed. Above them, the falcon folded his wings and dropped like a stone. It seemed that it would smash into the—

The hawk’s wings flashed open at the last second. He leveled out a bare inch from the ground, hitting the rabbit in a cloud of flying fur and bowling it over and over. Skimming over the grass at fingertip height, the hawk circled back to the limp brown form that lay motionless and stunned. Talons extended, he settled on the creature and finished it with one swift blow from his beak.

Forral blinked, and remembered to breathe. The whole episode had happened almost too quickly for his brain to register. He followed Aurian as she ran out to the hawk.

“Well done,” she told the bird. “Oh, very well done!” Swiftwing hopped off the rabbit, and settled into the grass to wait. Aurian sighed as she picked up the dead creature. “Poor little thing,” she murmured, briefly stroking its fur before she stowed it in her bag.

“Doesn’t it bother you, this killing?” the swordsman asked her curiously.

“Of course.” She turned to him, her expression serious and somehow more adult than he had seen it before. “It’s very sad, Forral, but it happens. Swiftwing needs to eat, and so do his mate and babies. Rabbits are rather big for him—that’s why he often stuns them first—but he eats them, and so do we. We only take what we need, and he kills quick and clean, not like snares.” She smiled dreamily at the falcon. “And he’s so beautiful up there . . .” For a moment she was lost for words, but Forral understood, for the swift, fearless flight of the hawk had touched his own heart. “He makes me feel as though I’m up there, flying with him,” Aurian finished softly—then shook herself, and whistled Swiftwing back to her wrist, all business once more. “We’ll need to beat the bushes to bring the rabbits out again—they’re scared now,” she said. “If you thought that was good, wait till you see him with a moving target! How many rabbits did you say you wanted, anyway?”

Forral shook his head in amazement. Aurian never failed to astonish him—and this time, he had learned something from her.

The warm days passed, and soon the time came for the Mage to travel round the villages and farms that lay close to the Valley. Each spring, the Mortals in the nearby countryside welcomed her help as she used her Earth-magic to “bless” their crops and herds, ensuring a good harvest. In return, they supplied her with grain, tools, cloth, and other items that she could not grow or manufacture for herself. This time, she particularly wanted a new glass for Aurian’s window, and some poultry, for her own had all perished in the savage winter storms. The swordsman was horrified to learn that Aurian stayed alone in the Valley while Eilin was away. He was dismayed by this new evidence of the Mage’s neglect; however, both she and Aurian seemed quite happy with the arrangement.

“I don’t want to go,” the child insisted, “I’d miss Swift-wing and the animals. I’m all right here.”

“Of course she is,” Eilin agreed. “She has the wolves to guard her, and if anything should go wrong, Swiftwing or one of the other birds would soon bring me a message.”

Forral sighed, and gave it up. What a foolish, stubborn, independent pair they were. Typical Magefolk! He consoled himself that this year, at least, someone responsible would be around to keep an eye on the child.

After Eilin had set out on her own horse, a white mare that Forral had never seen before since the Mage rarely had time for riding, Forral found that there was enough work in the Valley to keep himself and Aurian very busy. Sometimes they would go hunting with Swiftwing. The goats needed milking and the fish traps that the Mage kept on the borders of the lake had to be regularly cleared and reset. Even worse, the weeds in the garden seemed to be-naaking the most of the Mage’s absence by springing up overnight. Still awed by the magnitude of the task that Eilin had undertaken, Forral felt duty bound to offer what help he could. As well as laboring in the garden, he spent a good deal of time around the tower, working to repair the worst of the winter’s ravages.

Aurian soon grew bored with it all. She would start out helping Forral with the best of intentions, but after a while she inevitably slipped away, supposedly to see her animals. But as time went by, the swordsman noticed that the child was disappearing more and more often, and began to wonder. When asked how she had spent her days, her replies were vague and evasive. Basically an honest child, she was a terrible liar. Inevitably, Forral thought of the day they had met, when he had caught her playing with fireballs in the glade.

The suspicion that she might be doing it again filled Forral with deep concern. He already knew she had inherited Eilin’s Earth-magic. She could communicate with animals, and knew the trick of making young plants thrive. That was no problem. Eilin could supervise her efforts, and there was little she could do with Earth-magic to hurt herself. But Geraint’s skill had been Fire-magic, and the control of raw energy that it required made it the most perilous of disciplines. The swordsman worried. Had the child inherited that, too? Was she one of those rare Mages whose powers encompassed all forms of magic? If so, she would be in grave danger, without proper teaching as would all who came into contact with her.

Forral thought about-ronfiding his suspicions to Eilin on her return, but found himself hesitating. Obsessed with her grief for Geraint, she would never be able to live with a child who had inherited her soulmate’s potentially destructive powers. Just when the relationship between mother and daughter was improving, she would reject Aurian, and that would be tragic. In any case, he had no proof, and there was no point in upsetting matters until he did. He would have to deal with this himself.

The next time Aurian slipped away, Forral followed her, using his tracking skills to stay out of sight. He was afraid that her friends the birds would give him away, but they were too busy feeding their voracious new broods to think of anything else. Once she was away from the tower Aurian called her pony, and Forral, cursing, had to run back to catch his horse. Now mostly idle, the beast had grown fat and frisky, and he had a hard time restraining its exuberance. When he picked up her trail again, the swordsman saw that Aurian had headed off toward the forest beyond the crater’s rim, using a roundabout route. He frowned. She was definitely hiding something. Eventually her trail led to the very clearing where they had first met. Forral, peering through the screening undergrowth, gasped.

Aurian had to concentrate very hard. Six fireballs were the most she had ever juggled at once, and she was finding it hard to keep them all in the air and under control without burning herself. Her face was damp with sweat, and she was tiring quickly. One of the glowing colored balls of flame gave a sudden swerve, heading straight for a tree, and she pulled it back under control with a wrenching effort of will, almost singeing her hair in the process. That was quite enough. With great care she snuffed the bobbing flames in midair and sat down on a fallen tree trunk, feeling exhausted but pleased with herself.

Before her ears had time to register the crashing in the undergrowth, Aurian found herself seized by the shoulders, hauled upright, and spun round to stare into Forral’s face. She gulped, her own face burning with guilt. She had never seen the big man look so angry.

“What were you doing?” he shouted at her. “Say it!” Aurian opened her mouth, but nothing came out. He shook her hard enough to rattle her teeth. “Say it!” he roared.

“P-playing with fireballs.” Aurian struggled to get the words out.

“And what did I tell you?”

“N-not to.”

“Why?”

“Because it’s very dangerous,” Aurian replied in a small voice, too scared even to cry, and shocked by this transformation from kindly friend to wrathful grown-up.

“Well, you’re about to find out how dangerous it is.” His face grim, Forral sat down on the fallen trunk, put her across his knee, and walloped her until she howled. The spanking was painful enough, but what hurt Aurian more was the fact that she was being punished by her beloved Forral. After what seemed to her to be several lifetimes, he stopped. “You deserved that,” he said harshly, over her wails. “You knew perfectly well that you were doing wrong, but you did it anyway. I thought I could trust you, Aurian. I see that I can’t.” He dumped her on the ground. Aurian buried her face in the leaf litter and sobbed her heart out. When she looked up, he had gone.

Aurian was mortified. She couldn’t believe that Forral had spanked her. He never hit her! He was supposed to be her friend! Slowly it began to dawn on her that she must truly have done a bad thing. But it was so much fun! “I won’t stop doing it,” she muttered rebelliously. “I’ll show him!” But the voice of her conscience intervened. Forral never did anything without good reason, and he had always turned out to be right. Then a new thought struck her. What if he was so angry with her that he had gone away? Aurian scrambled to her feet and called for her pony, suddenly desperate to get back. “Oh, let him be there,” she prayed. “I’ll never do it again, if only he’s there.”

She couldn’t ride. It hurt too much. Aurian scrambled off the pony and swore, then clamped a guilty hand over her mouth. Gritting her teeth, she set off to walk, wiping away the occasional tear that rolled down her cheek. Darkness fell as she trudged along. Aurian knew that nothing would harm her within the crater’s bowl, for the wild creatures were her friends. Like all Magefolk, her night vision was superb, and if she was careful there was no danger of falling down one of the hidden folds in the land. There was no chance of getting lost, either. All she had to do was head for the twinkling light that burned like a beacon on top of the tower. But apart from the time she had been lost in the snow, Aurian had never been out alone at night in the vast, empty darkness of the wasteland. She felt overwhelmed and lonely, and Forral didn’t love her anymore. . . . Aurian gulped back a sob, feeling desperately sorry for herself. It wasn’t until years later that Forral told her he had never been far from her side, shadowing her until she was safely within reach of home.

When she finally crept across the bridge toward the tower, to her relief she saw a soft light glowing in the kitchen window. Forral had come back to the tower! He hadn’t left yet, then. All the same, it took Aurian a long time to pluck up enough courage to open the door. Forral sat at the table, his head in his hands. He had not heard her enter—or maybe he was ignoring her.

Aurian crept closer. “Forral, I’m sorry,” she said in a small voice. The swordsman slowly raised his head and held out his arms. Aurian, too relieved to speak, ran to him and climbed onto his lap. He hugged her hard, then she was crying and to her surprise, he was crying, too. “Don’t cry,” she begged him, puzzled. “Nobody spanked you,” she added, with a touch of indignation.

Forral’s mouth twitched in a smile. “Oh, child,” he said. “Don’t you know how much it hurt me to punish you like that?”

For the first time, Forral told her exactly what had happened to her father—how Geraint had been destroyed by his own Fire-magic. By the time he had finished, Aurian was trembling. “I didn’t know,” she gasped.

“I should have told you sooner,” Forral said, “but I’d hoped to spare you until you were older. Now do you see why I was angry? It was because you frightened me, love. What if you accidentally did the same thing? I’ll do anything to stop you, even if it does mean hurting you. I love you too much to lose you the way your father was lost.”

“But I can’t help it,” Aurian protested. “Really and truly I can’t! It’s inside me, and if I have nothing to do, it just sort of —pops out. What shall I do, Forral?” she wailed, truly frightened now.

“Don’t worry, love, we’ll think q£ something,” Forral comforted her. He held her in silence for a while, his brow furrowed with thought. Aurian found herself growing more and more tired, but was reluctant to leave the comfort of his arms for her bed. “Forral, will you tell me a story?” she asked sleepily. “Tell me the one about the world’s greatest swordsman. It’s my favorite.”

“That’s it!” Forral shot bolt upright, almost spilling her from his lap. “Aurian, how would you like to become the world’s most famous swordswoman?”

Aurian’s face lit up with incredulous delight. “Could I?” she asked, awed.

“I don’t see why not. I’ll teach you—but I warn you, it’ll be very hard work. You won’t get to be the greatest swordswoman by messing about. When I started to learn I was just about battered to bits, and I was so sore and tired at the end of every day that I could hardly crawl into bed. If you want me to teach you, you’ll have to endure all that—and it’ll be too late then to change your mind. But at least you won’t have a single spare minute of the day to get yourself into trouble. What do you say?”

Aurian thought about it. It didn’t sound like fun the way he described it, but on the other hand she was sore and tired right now—and she never wanted to go through another day like this one. If it would keep her out of that kind of trouble, she was all for it. The heroes from Forral’s stories marched through her memory, firing her imagination. “Yes,” she cried, suddenly filled with determination. “I’ll do it!”

That was the beginning of Aurian’s training. The very next day, Forral made them two wooden practice swords, and they found a secluded spot for their lessons, well away from the tower. When Eilin returned, Forral swore Aurian to secrecy. “I’m sure your mother wouldn’t approve of this, and we don’t want to have to explain to her why we started doing it,” he warned her. Aurian agreed wholeheartedly.

At first it was terrible. Forral made no allowance for her lack of size and strength, and she soon learned that she would have to become very good in a very short time if she wanted to avoid a bludgeoning. ^J’ll show him,” Aurian said through gritted teeth, as she sweated and puffed. At first it was all she could do to dodge and turn his blows, without thinking about attacking. Each night she would go to her bed aching and bruised all over, and the first valuable lesson she learned was how to endure. Forral also taught her other things—the exercises to stay supple and build muscle, and exercises of breathing and meditation to calm and sharpen the mind for battle. Aurian had no idea then how lucky she was. Forral, though he was too modest to admit it, was the best. Under his tutelage she eventually learned the Is of the Warrior—the trancelike state in which all senses combined to become something far greater than the sum of their parts. The Is created a single sense that became an extension of the living sword—that was the sword—so that by the time the mind worked out the next move, the blade was already there.

Aurian began to love it. She lived for her lessons, going out with Forral in summer and winter alike. She suffered and slogged and sweated and endured, and by the time she was twelve she had the skill to take on an average swordsman twice her age and size—and win. She was growing like a weed, and that helped. But when her breasts began to grow she was appalled. They kept getting in the way. When she complained about it to Forral he blushed, but made her a tight-fitting leather vest such as female warriors favored. It laced tightly up the front and kept the ridiculous things in check very effectively.

A few weeks before her thirteenth birthday, Forral went away on a mysterious errand of his own. Aurian pined, missing him keenly. In his absence the temptation to take up her tricks with the fireballs surfaced strongly, but she was determined to keep her promise to the swordsman. Instead, she asked her mother to teach her more about Earth-magic.

“Ah, now that Forral is away, you suddenly have time to spend with your mother,” Eilin complained, but she was smiling. Forral’s presence had made a tremendous difference to her, and mother and daughter were getting along much better these days. Over those few weeks, Aurian found herself enjoying Eilin’s company. As well as magic, the Mage took the opportunity to teach her daughter what would soon be happening to her maturing body, and the way thit Mages dealt with the matter. And of course Aurian worked hard at Forral’s exercises, hoping to impress him with her improvement when he returned.

Forral’s return more than made up for his absence. He had brought her a princely gift for her birthday—her own, full-size sword. There was a lump in Aurian’s throat as she unwrapped it, and drew the long, keen blade out of its black and silver scabbard with a steely hiss. She flung her arms around Forral. “Oh, thank you,” she gasped. The sword shone brilliant blue-white in the pale winter sunlight that ran like glittering fire down its razor-sharp edges. There was a single white gem set into the hilt. It was more slender than Forral’s great broadsword, strong, elegant—and deadly. Aurian had never seen anything so beautiful.

It was like going back to the beginning. The sword had been crafted for Aurian to grow into, and she could barely lift the heavy blade, let alone swing it. She gritted her teeth, and doubled her muscle-building exercises. At the end of every lesson her back and arms ached. She found that fighting with a proper blade called for a very different technique from the one that had served her so well with the light, wooden practice swords, and she was forced to start all over again. Aurian had been growing rather arrogant about her prowess, fancying herself a great swordswoman already. Now she learned otherwise. Safety became an important factor in their sessions. Now that she and Forral were using lethal steel blades there was every chance that they could inflict serious injury on one another, and Aurian had to learn that she could no longer improvise, as she had formerly done.

It seemed to take forever, but gradually, as she worked through the following spring and summer, Aurian began to improve. Now, at last, the blade went where she wanted it to. Well balanced and finely crafted, it was a delight to use. Forral taught her how to take care of it, and she kept both blade and scabbard meticulously clean and well oiled. The sword glittered as she swung it, and as it clove the air, it sang. Because of this, Aurian named it Coronach, which meant “Deathsong,” and Forral didn’t smile at her fancy. “A good blade deserves a good name,” he agreed gravely.

Disaster struck near the end of that year, when the first snow covered the ground with a thin sprinkling of white. Perhaps Forral had been too enthusiastic in giving her the sword so soon; or maybe Aurian had become overconfident. Whatever the reason, she made a deadly mistake. She and Forral were sparring in their usual place when she decided, on her own initiative, to try a new move that she had been thinking about lately. Moving back from him, she ducked and twisted, planning to bring her blade up beneath her opponent’s guard to strike at his throat. It went dreadfully wrong. As she twisted, Aurian slipped on the snow. She lost her balance and her stroke went wide, leaving her open to Forral’s lethal downswing. He cried out and tried to wrench the heavy blade aside, but the momentum was too great. The great sword sheared into Aurian’s left shoulder with a sickening crunch of shattered bone.

Eilin came thundering down the tower staircase, alerted by Forral’s frantic shouts for help. She stopped dead at the bottom of the stairs, her face ashen. Forral, tears streaming down his face, bore Aurian’s still body wrapped in his blood-soaked cloak. A trail of blood led out through the open door behind him, and pooled on the stone flags of the kitchen floor. He felt it seeping, warm and sticky, into his clothing. “Oh Gods,” he sobbed, his face twisting with anguish. “Eilin, I’ve killed her!”

Eilin was shaking as she took Aurian from him and laid her gently on the kitchen table. He heard her gasp as she revealed the dreadful extent of the injury. The Mage felt for a pulse in Aurian’s throat. “Thank the Gods, she still lives,” she murmured.

Only then did Forral dare look. His sword had bitten deep into Aurian’s shoulder, shattering her collarbone and almost severing her arm. Her face was gray from shock and loss of blood. Forral sagged. The room blurred around him as he swayed dizzily. On far too many occasions he had seen good friends maimed and killed, and had inflicted worse wounds on enemies in battle without flinching, but this was only a young girl, and one he loved more than life itself. It was more than he could bear. “I’m sorry. It was my fault. I—”

“Quiet!” Eilin snapped. She lai^l her hands on the wound, her eyes narrowing in concentration’as she summoned her powers. “I wish I’d learned more about Healing,” she muttered helplessly. But as Forral watched, holding his breath, the flow of blood diminished to a trickle, then slowly, almost imperceptibly, it died away altogether. Eilin straightened up and turned on him, her eyes blazing.

Forral dropped to his knees. “Eilin, it was an accident—”

“Never mind! Ride to Nexis, Forral. Fetch the Healer from the Academy. Hurry! We may lose her yet!”

Relieved to be doing something that might help, Forral ran, his last glimpse of Aurian’s pale, stricken face blazoned on his mind’s eye. His horse plunged violently, frightened by this wild-eyed madman who flung the saddle so roughly across its back. He clouted it hard across the nose and jerked the girth tight. Springing to its back, he spurred away in a welter of snow, anxious to be out of the rough terrain of the crater before dusk fell. The journey on horseback to Nexis took five days. Forral intended to do it in two.