I ATEN'T DEAD!
Ano… it's been a few months… sorry. I had no motivation at all to write this, but hopefully I won't do the half-year-plus wait again.
But, as some of you may already know, I did get a story published in my school's lit mag, so please go check it out. It was Ashes to Ashes, which can be found in the fairytales section of ficcynet. Thanks!
And thank yous to Fireblade K'Chona, Fimbrethil, Ragnchild, ChaosLightning13, mugglepirate, cocokate, Fallsong K'animelover, Slinki, Shadow Cat17, Esca, Amberstag, the real Shored, and of course, Mischa Kitsune for betaing. Thanks so much you guys!
The more he bleeds, the more he lives.
He never forgets and he never forgives….
Sweeney wishes the world away,
Sweeney's weeping for yesterday,
Hugging the blade, waiting the years,
Hearing the music that nobody hears.
Finale of Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street
Chapter 29: Hugging the BladeIt was a dismal day when Rowen, Julian and Shored rode through Haven's East Gate. Since the message had come by way of the teleson, the Changechild had barely said a word to anyone, even Julian.
Vendors and shopkeepers looked their way and then would quickly glance away; Rowen had been frightening before, but now he was positively terrifying. The armor he wore and weapons he carried made him look akin to a machine of war, and the expression on his face was as cold and forbidding as the frozen wastelands above the Ice Wall mountains were purported to be.
Heralds Dirk and Talia met them at the entrance to the Healer's Collegium. Talia took charge of Shored and Gaelan, leaving the two men with Dirk.
"Where is he?" Julian asked, sending a tendril of thought towards Rowen. He was met with a stony wall of nothing from the other man and a sigh from the Herald.
"Follow me. We've got him in cold storage."
The Herald led them through a series of hallways and down several sets of stairs before bringing them to a room that made the hair on the back of Julian's neck stand on end.
"It's cold," he said, hugging himself in vain.
"This is where we keep the bodies that can't be buried right away," Dirk said. "You'll find Nadar on the end table." Footsteps sounded at the door and then stopped. "I'm so sorry," Dirk said, and then left.
Julian heard Rowen slowly move to the other side of the room and the shfff of a cloth being pulled back.
A low growl came from the other side of the room. "Rowen?" Julian asked tentatively.
"Melles," Rowen rasped.
"What?" Julian said, not sure if he'd heard him correctly.
"Melles," Rowen rasped. "It had to be."
"But what if it's not—" though he couldn't see, Julian knew Rowen was glaring at him.
"It is, I know it," Rowen said.
"What will you do?"
Without hesitation, Rowen said four words that made Julian at first confused, then when Rowen sent him the definition through the lifebond, horror.
"I cry blood-feud."
§
The tent-shrine was a hastily erected structure in the middle of Companion's Field, and though the altars had the required objects on them—wheat sheaf, stone, flame, and fresh flower—Rowen felt a sense of trepidation when he entered the tent. He had thought it through—knew that Melles had to be destroyed—and knew that he would sacrifice anything to see it done. Nadar had been his last link with his old life. Thinking back on Sa'heera, she had changed from when he knew her in the Clan. She was married—which she had sworn never to do—had married an outlander and was pregnant. She was more sedate, more calm. She was no longer the Sa'heera shena Tale'sedrin who Rowen had known.
And his last link was gone. His brother was lying dead on a table in the pits of Healers Collegium because of Melles. Rage coursed through him again, followed by raw pain and then regret—not for himself, but for the man he was leaving behind. Julian.
Oh, the life they could have lived together once this war was over. Now—now one would be forever longing and the other forever vengeful.
Julian waited outside with Nadar's last gift, a knife. It was a sleek, simple thing. Perfect for every day use.
Rowen planned to leave it in Melles' breast when all was said and done.
He closed the flaps of the tent behind him and returned to the center of the tent. Then he began to sing the song of the Sworn, to sing and to remember his brother and his short life and death upon a scythe. To remember all of the travesties visited on the people of Hardorn and what he knew of Shored's sad life.
Before he finished a strong wind began to blow out of the South. What was supposed to be the last wind to appear was the first—and the only.
He was the target of a harsh wind that carried with it the scent of burning things and a hot day on the Plains. The wind was dry and stung his eyes, but he kept them open, waiting, singing, praying that She would appear.
She did not. There was a breath of warm wind around his bare shoulders, and tickling as his hair brushed away from him to lie in front of the flame on the south altar.
When he left the tent only three people stood in wait. Jarim saw Rowen's hair and left to seek the clothing that the local hertasi had provided.
The Queen's Own had stayed to provide counseling should Kal'enel reject his Oath, and when she had seen that it had been accepted, she merely came forward to place a hand on his shoulder and then mount Rolan to go back to the Palace.
Rowen felt Julian's mind probe, and then the Bard just turned and walked away.
Rowen didn't follow.
§
In the night a calling woke him from where he lay dreaming fitfully of his brother's death. Rowen rose and left the ekele. He'd not seen Julian since he'd taken the Oath, and the musician wasn't upstairs.
Outside in the misty grass of Companion's Field, something waited.
The Field was lit on the far side by the lanterns at the stable and a few lights in the windows of the darkened Palace and Collegiums were visible. Other than the tiny flame Rowen had conjured to light his way, all was dark.
A sharp blow to his cheek sent his head snapping around, and when he dared to look at the source, he found himself looking at a woman, armed, dangerous, and expressionless. Hair as dark as night and short to her shoulders fell from the crown of her head, and she was dressed all in black armor and harsh cloth. A headband held her braids out of her eyes, the only part of her face visible between the headband and the veil concealing the rest of her face. Her eyes, the mark of the leshya'kal'enedral, for they were black entirely lit only by the light of a few cold stars.
"What right had you to take the Oath, Rowen shena Tale'sedrin?" she asked in a monotonous though rasping voice that echoed as from the depths of a cave.
"Melles killed my brother, Wise One. He is a tyrant and seeks to destroy these countries. I seek to end his reign and bring peace to these countries."
"Others have lost more than you and still did not seek to follow Her."
"Others have also lost less than I and have been accepted by Her."
"Would you deny the lifebond?"
"I do not."
"Then why do you seek the sexless way of the Kal'enedral?"
"The Kal'enedral are bound only from feeling sexual desire. They are not bound from love."
The corners of her eyes crinkled. "It is a good answer."
Her next words surprised him. "Now defend yourself."
Though he had only a sword with him and no armor, he parried her blows as easily as he had Kerowyn's—not very, but enough to keep her from landing a blow.
"I am to train you," she said in that rough voice that would have made him cringe had he not been trying to keep her from lopping his head off.
"Train me?"
"In the ways of the Sworn."
Then she shoved her black sword into his lower body, and into his second heart.
Blackness, then he found himself staring up at the night sky. Someone was prodding him with a boot. "Wake," the spirit sworn said. "You have much to learn."
In time, he learned to wake in mid-night and meet his teacher with weapons and armor, and that to kill her did not mean her end, and that he was only killed—though with the accompanying pain—to teach him a lesson.
On the eleventh night when he had killed the harsh-voiced woman six times in a row and she had barely been able to score him, she nodded at him at the end of the night and did not come the next.
Instead there was a creature that made him nearly rear in surprise.
"You are surprised to see me, I think," the black gryphon said in surprisingly clipped trade-tongue.
"How—how could a gryphon become a Kal'enedral?" he asked, gaping.
"It is a story for another time," the gryphon said slowly, then attacked Rowen with such ferocity that he died within ten seconds.
He was so different, Rowen thought as he got up from the ground, still shaking with the memory of being flayed alive. Humans I can handle, but I've never had to handle a gryphon like this one. Even Treyvan and Hydona weren't this hard.
The Changechild readied himself again and instead of waiting for the gryphon to attack, launched himself at the creature, blades spinning. This time he managed to kick the gryphon's head in before a spastic death-throe from one of the gryphon's hind legs tore half of Rowen's rib cage off and threw it into a tree with a wet splat.
It took him six nights before Rowen managed to kill the gryphon without making the death a double one.
On that occasion the gryphon called a momentary truce and allowed Rowen to ask a question.
Rowen had been waiting for this for weeks; the question rose to the top of his mind and he spoke it. "How did a gryphon become Sworn to the Warrior?"
"That is an interesting question with an equally interesting answer," the gryphon said.
"I was one of the gryphons living in the Pelagris woods with my mate—Ysferil," he said, and his brows lowered in an almost human frown. "We came to live with the Barban'edras many, many centuries ago."
The Clan of the Siblings of the Wind! The Clan itself only lived for a few short years before it dissolved after a terrible tragedy and the members were accepted back into the Pretera'sedrin.The gryphon recounted a tale of his life with his mate and then with the Shin'a'in. The creature's apparent familiarity with the Clans astonished Rowen. "Ysferil and I lived with the Barban'edras for several years and were adopted into the Clan like we were human. We lived in peace—had children—before a herd of Changelions came out of the Pelagris and attacked the Clans. It could have been any Clan; we just had the bad luck to be camped on the shore of Shin'ta'vis when the lions got hungry. They killed Ysferil and half the children of the Clan and dragged my children off to eat later. I had to save them and eradicate the danger to the Clans, so I did the only thing I could."
"You took the Oath," Rowen concluded.
"No. I went after them, got myself half-killed, saw my children torn apart, didn't kill the Changelions, and then dragged my half-dead self back to the Clans to be Healed. Then I took the Oath."
"And you were trained by the leshya'kal'enedral and then killed the Changelions."
"No, and you should stop jumping to conclusions," the gryphon said. "It's a bad habit."
"Sorry," Rowen said.
"Right. I went after the mage that had made the Changelions and killed him, which weakened the protective magics on the Changelions, then I killed them. I died in the process, but it got rid of that danger to the People."
"Oh," Rowen said.
The gryphon then proceeded to eat his face off. "That was for interrupting me," he said. "Learn some manners!"
§
He learned to use his inner fire to heat his blade enough to sear through leather and to slice through human limbs like butter—to throw sheets of flame at his enemies through both reflex and conscious thought. To kill with only swords, and to kill with only flame.
Two weeks and six more human leshya'kal'enedral teachers later, Nadar was buried and Rowen was ready to fight his way to Melles and kill the one-time Emperor.
The original spirit-Sworn that had appeared appeared on the last night and told him that he was now ready to fight his way to Melles, if that was what he still desired.
Rowen answered in the affirmative, and the spirit departed.
The next morning as he was bringing his arms to a smith to be checked, Alberich sought him out.
"It is my wish to have words with you," the former Weaponsmaster said as Rowen shifted the bulk of the black armor and weapons higher on his back.
"On what?"
"The matter of your brother's death. Believe I do that a grave misunderstanding there has been."
"Wait here." Rowen grabbed a page who had been lurking about and charged him to bring the arms to Armorer Grant. "Tell him the armor should be checked thoroughly and any and all repairs are to be made so the armor is at it's absolute best. The swords are to be sharpened and straightened." When the page had summoned three other boys to help him and then scuttled off with the rest of the armor, Rowen returned to Alberich's side.
"Come."
Rowen followed the Karsite to the salle and through a hidden doorway behind one of the massive mirrors into what he assumed to be Alberich's private suite. Kerowyn popped her head out of one of the doors, saw Rowen and excused herself.
Something is going on here.
"Know you do that I do work in secret for the Queen?" Alberich asked suddenly.
"No."
"Lurk in the taverns of dangerous parts of Haven I do and seek out rumors of those who trouble for the Crown cause. Find rumors I do often of even less savory stuff."
"What does this have to do with me and mine?" Rowen asked, shifting uncomfortably. If Alberich wanted to skulk about, that was his business, and Rowen had no time to worry about him.
"Took it upon myself I did to find the truth behind your brother's death, for the happenings we knew of did not at Melles hint, nor speak to me did they of work done by the Empire."
Alberich searched Rowen's face knowingly for a moment, but obviously did not find what he was looking for. In perfect Valdemaran he saved for only serious situations or circumstances requiring careful diplomacy, he clarified, "Nadar's death was not caused by Melles or any agent of his. Rather a botched robbery attempt it was, caused by those who are too poor or lazy to find honest work."
"You lie," Rowen said. The old man had to be. If Nadar's death hadn't been caused by Melles, then why would She have accepted his Oath?
"Know I do not why the Lady accepted your Oath, but know this I do—when one is desperate enough, and his intentions pure enough, the gods have been known to take pity and give them what they need."
"But—"
"Think more on this I will not," Alberich said. "Up to you to puzzle this it is. Good luck, and remember that sometimes you are not the focus of an empire."
