Stormblade

32

Stormblade.

Kingsword made from pieces of twilight and a midnight star. Though it was his, Hornfel had not buckled on the sword, not felt its weight on his hip, in all the three days since the battle in Northgate. Though the dwarves of Thorbardin acknowledged him, cheerfully some and sullenly others, as king regent, his investiture would not take place for seven nights. It would not be appropriate for him to wear the Kingsword before then.

Hornfel lifted the lid of the coffer that held Stormblade. Lined with velvet the color of smoke, satin the color of the steel’s red heart, this coffer had held the Kingswords of generations of high kings. Now it holds that of a king regent, he thought, and holds it here in the Court of Thanes, well under guard, but here for all to see, wonder at, exclaim over.

They had come like people seeking the blessings of a relic. The Court of Thanes had never been so well guarded as it had these two days past. The house guards of each of the six thanedoms stood shared watches for all the hours of the day and night.

Hornfel stepped back from the coffer, away from the long display case, which looked more and more like a bier each time he saw it. He wondered if any Kingsword had ever cost so dearly as Stormblade had cost. When word returned to the Theiwar fighting at the Klar city that their thane was dead, they had fallen into confused disarray and fled back their dark cities.

It was a confusion, Hornfel thought now, that would not find resolution until the Theiwar found time to stand back from the bloody waters of their own internal politics and choose a leader from among those still living. Though Ranee would not admit to a death count, in the farming warrens Ranee’s Daergar had moved swiftly and savagely against the refugees. Sturm had pinned them neatly in the south entrance to the farming warrens and Caramon had closed them in from the north. Tanis and his captains had stood true.

It was the end of the revolution. Ranee stood by his claim of defending his holding when he’d thought it surrounded by Outlanders taking advantage of the Theiwar uprising to loot and pillage. None could prove he was allied with Realgar.

Hornfel shuddered and found his eyes drawn to the sword. Silver chased gold hilt, perfect sapphires, and a flame-hearted blade of finest steel: it was the price of so many lives!

His weariness was soul-deep and he didn’t know how he was going to make his regency worth the lives of the kin, friends, and strangers who had died for it.

He heard a footstep behind him. Hornfel turned, thinking suddenly of Piper. He almost called the mage’s name aloud, but stopped himself when the kender, Lavim, rounded a broad, high column.

Hornfel stared at the kender. He had gotten past twenty-four armed warriors and none of them could have so much as thought a shadow was passing!

The kender, cheerfully unconcerned, greeted Hornfel with casual goodwill. “You know, sir, they’ve been looking for you all over the place. It’s almost sunset now. They’ll be waiting for you in the Valley of the Thanes. Me, I figured this was where you’d be, so I came to get you. Besides, I kind of wanted to get another look at Stormblade.” He cocked a thumb at the Kingsword. “I’ve been looking at that thing for a couple of weeks now. I have to tell you, it doesn’t look like itself in there.”

Hornfel smiled. “What does it look like?”

“Well, bigger, I guess.”

Lavim stepped closer to the coffer for a better look. Hornfel kept close beside him. Amusing and ingenuous as he was, Lavim was still, after all, a kender.

“No,” Lavim said, revising his opinion. “Not bigger. Just—I dunno, not like Kelida’s sword. Or Hauk’s. Or whoever’s it is.” Lavim shrugged and then looked up at a deeply shadowed corner of the far ceiling, his eyes narrowed. “Right. His.”

A shiver of something partly fear and partly anticipation slid along Hornfel’s arms. “Lavim,” he said slowly, carefully, “who are you talking to?”

Lavim’s face, a weathered mass of deep wrinkles, brightened. “Piper, of course.”

Piper. Hornfel had heard the story in the gatehouse, Lavim’s fast-talking explanation as to how he came to be entering Northgate by a five-foot ledge a thousand feet above a burning valley. The kender claimed that he spoke with Piper’s ghost. To his credit, Finn grudgingly backed Lavim up. Hornfel did not know what to believe.

Lavim, his eyes full of mischief, cocked his head again, listening to some voice Hornfel could not hear. “Oh,” he said as though reminded of something, “right. I forgot.” Hands kender-quick, he reached into a deep pocket of his old black coat and rummaged only a little. What he produced from that pocket made Hornfel smile. Cherry wood, polished smooth as satin, and so very familiar, the kender held up Jordy’s pipe.

“You know this, don’t you? Piper’s flute. It’s magic. I know because I used it twice. Once to save young Stanach from the—the waddayacall’ems—”

“Theiwar.”

“Right. And once to transport me and Finn and Kem and—” Lavim hesitated only a little, his eyes darkening. “—and Tyorl out of the Hills of Blood. Stanach was going to bring it back to you because he said that you and Piper were particular friends.”

“Particular friends, eh? Stanach said that?”

“Well, no. I just did. But Stanach would have said it if he’d thought of it.”

Hornfel reached out and ran a finger down the flute’s length. “Does he really talk to you, Lavim?”

Lavim nodded vigorously, white braid bobbing. “Oh, sure he does. He told me all about how you kept him out of the dungeons and how light gets into the city from outside and about the gardens and farms.” Lavim’s eyes twinkled. “And he told me something else, too. He told me—oh. Well, I can’t tell you that.” He shrugged. “But never mind, you’ll know all about it soon anyway. There’s one thing I can tell you.”

Amused, Hornfel smiled indulgently. “What is that?”

Suddenly solemn, Lavim tucked the flute back into his pocket. “He said you should bring Stormblade to the Valley of the Thanes when you come for—when you come.”

For Tyorl’s funeral. There had been funerals enough in the last few days. Hornfel had attended those he could. This one, small and private, would be different. Tyorl’s funeral would serve, at least for Hornfel, as Piper’s, too. And Kyan’s. Elf, dwarf, and human mage, they had died for Stormblade. And for him.

Though it would be fitting for the Kingsword to be present, Hornfel would not be able to wear it until his investiture. Not even for this. The dwarf shook his head. “I can’t do that, Lavim. I can’t wear it yet.”

“Mmmm. You really can’t? Would it just be impolite, or is it some kind of law or something?”

“Both.”

Lavim thought, or listened, for a moment. “So, then don’t wear it. Just bring it.”

“Lavim, I don’t think—”

“Now you see,” Lavim said earnestly, stepping closer to the coffer as he spoke. “That’s just the problem everyone seems to have. They say ‘I don’t think,’ and they really mean they’re thinking. It’s no good, thinking. Just gets you into trouble.”

Quick as a trout darting, Lavim took up the Kingsword and tossed it to Hornfel, who caught it. “There! Now you’ve got it. If you’ve broken some law or been impolite—though I think you’ve certainly been polite enough all along—you might as well do it for an hour or so as do it for ten seconds, right?”

Stormblade balanced perfectly in Hornfel’s grip. It had been made for his hand and fit well there.

“Piper says to bring it?” Hornfel asked.

Lavim nodded solemnly.

“All right then, I’ll bring it. What about the flute?”

“Oh, that.” Lavim patted his pocket. “You’ve got that heavy sword to carry. Don’t worry about the flute. I’ll keep it for you temporarily, right here in my pocket.”