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Dearest Readers, may the choices you make be your own, the cause always just and of courage and of love. And a Merry Christmas to ye all!
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THE HIDDEN SWORD
Book One: From the Earth | Chapter 41: A Bend in the River
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Sheathed in its simple scabbard, the tachi Kogitsune appeared no more than a sword of modest form. Were it not for the curiously dark hue of its steel, others might dismiss the blade as the product of common iron and a common smith, the fittings on this one bearing no proud embellishments.
Its tsuba an unadorned disc, humble in comparison to that of masterwork blades whose handguards were fashioned with elaborate engravings or in the delicate forms of lotus and chrysanthemum. The habaki, the metal collar over the tang to secure the tsuba in place and keep the blade from falling out of the scabbard, plain smooth and without flourish or inscriptions. The menuki ornaments on the hilt meant for grip, not wrought in the precise miniature contours of mythical creatures but mere roughly hammered pegs. Its wooden sheath, the saya, lightly sanded and plain, far from the rich lacquered scabbards of redwood some even with carved dragons flowing across their length.
Yet the sword's austere trappings belied its true substance. For along with the blade, all other components of steel were likewise hammered from adamantine. Of its wooden parts, the hilt, pegs securing the blade, and the saya were carved from ironwood, a gift from the Wisewoman who acquired the rare planks from druid friends, cut and shaped by a master woodworker they befriended in the City.
A sword that will never rust and a scabbard that shall never decay, purposed to outlast the creators.
And perhaps, even the inheritor. At least, whoever's going to be the lucky idiot who will come into it someday, Irse mused.
Fleetingly and unbidden, the mind's eye flashed the tall and lean silhouette of another, rapid-drawing the tachi as she and Okami would have done, except the glimmer of moonbeams and stars weaved through their free hand as the blade traced a perfect arc against the sun.
Where did it come from? The elf wagged her head to collect the straying thoughts, resting the chin on knuckles and turning her eyes to Okami who sat by the hearth as he cleaned and oiled the tachi.
Reverently, he ran a soft cloth from hilt to tip, careful to keep his fingers on the mune, the spine, lest he cut himself. Ever so cautious.
Her, on the other hand. Pale scars slivered across the palms and fingers, mementos from her own mishaps with cleaning a katana, now joined with the first ones acquired from another sword that one night some years ago.
A moment of heedlessness it had been, thinking a blade unsheathed yet unmeant to kill wouldn't turn on its wielder. She had tried to make light of the accident, casually wriggling her fingers to show them still complete though resembling raw and bleeding sausages.
Oddly, Okami who often spoke nonchalantly of the most horrific injuries in the battlefield and himself surely bearing scars of near every kind, had paled at the sight despite demonstrating his usual calm.
Bloodied rags, pouches of staunching herb, and a healing potion later which she insisted were all unnecessary, Irse had to sit through his sternest lecture and practice on a wooden bokken over and over until she could do so blindfolded.
A rather messy lesson on cleaning up.
On both sides and the spine, Okami tapped finely ground polishing stone which he gently rubbed into the steel, then wiped away the snowy powder, finishing with a meticulous application of clove oil upon the blade. Before returning the Kogitsune to its sheath, he held it aloft, angling the tachi as if to catch the firelight on both sides, with satisfaction sighting the tempering line, the hamon gracing its length.
Truth be told with being fashioned from adamantine, this sword should never dull nor chip, one could toss it anywhere without care and still it would keep its edge and sheen.
Yet even after proving it successfully against steel during the customary tests on armor and bucklers and helmets, he treated like it a mortal tool, a delicate treasure, a fragile instrument requiring care and thorough minding.
Why even go through such trouble? In her hands and were she to have her way with it, the Kogitsune would be employed to its fullest potential – whacking at weeds, poking at ceiling cobwebs, chopping wood, stirring the pickling solution for rusted iron, a makeshift spit for roasting fowl, and breaking up rocks.
When the cleaning and oiling implements had been put away, courage found the space to speak.
"Teacher," she said, breathing deeply. "I'm joining the Blackmauls."
Okami paused to stare at his apprentice who took a second gulp of air.
"Think about it for a moment - you don't need me around as much, so long as this stupid plague is chasing away our commissions. You're essential here while I'm just an apprentice. My absence won't hurt anyone, and I'll be one less mouth to feed."
Unreadable, his face at her words, and it pricked at the heart – of course, he would never be so callous as to think her a burden to him but cushioning hard truths won't fill a soon-to-be depleted purse.
"The things is… Mister Kagain's seeking to bolster his line, what with bandit raids seriously thinning their ranks. "
But why must it be with you, his eyes admonished, sharp and daring her to answer. Irse almost shriveled in her seat, but then set her jaw and leaned forward. Now shouldn't be the time for meekness.
"You've heard from everyone – caravans through the trade roads are being targeted and their people slaughtered. Might be even worse than the occasional raids from before the iron plague. It's dangerous, I know, but I can take care of myself, and that means I can protect others, keep them safe, get them home to their families."
Over and over she had mulled over this. If only the Flaming Fist would do more, as should Berdusk and Iriaebor, the latter both affected from trade through the Uldoon and Dusk Road, but things merely seemed to go on as they have with no action nor end in sight.
Perhaps such things lay beyond her grasp, higher and wider than the understanding of a commoner like herself, yet the consequences lay too real and too close. Must one wait until it touches them as well? What manner of hands does she possess if they lay still and do nothing?
For a long while, silence hung weighted in the air between them and hushed even the crackling of wood in the fire. Okami turned his eyes to the hearth, quiet and seemingly considering her words. But this time, not as she would've done before, Irse held back, refrained from pressing him. Rather she kept her peace and waited and observed.
Through the weave of firelight and shadows, she saw him as he were when they first met – in the darkness a still and quiet soul amidst the wailings and smoke. How swiftly the years fluttered by and how they had been kind to him – not a gray hair nor a line on his face despite their labors.
And why should he sport a hoary crown so soon, when he would only be in his thirties, Irse justified to herself. After all, she hadn't been the worst apprentice in the world to give him a mountain's pile of grief, right?
A league-long tally of incidents unrolled itself in recollection to dispute the fact. All right then, she conceded, perhaps even Kozakuran gray hairs have the patience not to sprout up too quickly.
Still silent, the blacksmith continued to gaze at the fire, impassive and unyielding as stone. Yet even now, there lay the faintest of cracks – a slight furrow in the brow and a tight quirk in the corner of his mouth. Irse exhaled, for once feeling like a parent patiently waiting for their child to come to terms with something unpleasant but inevitable.
"I appreciate how you'd be worried, but there's no need to fear for me. You've taught me well and I've learned much, I think can take care of myself now."
"I know," he murmured evenly.
What great relief, he didn't sound too doubtful.
"And you believe me when I say this choice isn't because of boredom, or because I wish to see the world?"
"Yes, I would believe that."
Irse narrowed her eyes with a smirk. "Or because I'm tired of your cooking?"
He crossed his arms and glared. "I have always assumed you were too busy devouring everything to complain."
She grinned. Even down to the last jar of pickled radish.
Irse folded her hands before her, touching them to her chin. "I could also use this chance to visit Father. You always say I should. Finally I can see for myself how he's faring."
Shifting slightly in his seat, Okami bobbed his head. "You are right. Perhaps it is time you visited Gorion," he agreed.
To make peace, unspoken but loud.
The blacksmith uncrossed his arms, clasping his hands over his knee, face eased in contemplation. "More importantly, as your cause is just and not of arrogance, the Shining One himself will light the path and guide your sword."
Irse cupped her mouth, realizing the permission granted in his words. "Does this mean you'll let me go? You won't refuse?" she asked, daring to hope.
"As I have said before – I am not your warden," he said. "It is not my place to decide what you wish to do with your life, only to teach you as best as I can so that you are prepared to face it on your own."
Elated, forgetting herself, she scrambled from her chair and knelt at his feet, grasping his lap and knees in uncontained excitement.
"Thank you, Teacher! I thought you wouldn't, but you did! Thank you! Your blessing means everything to me. I…Oh-"
She drew back, embarrassed at her outburst, Okami likewise startled and staring. Irse hasted to stand, and Master and Apprentice both coughed and cleared their throats.
"If it makes you feel better – I promise I'll run away when there's too many of them, instead of standing still to fight them off like some ninny who can't count. I won't be stupid, and I won't play the hero," she swore.
He raised a skeptical eyebrow.
"Besides, it's not as if I'd be alone out there, I'll be surrounded by Blackmauls."
At least, what's left of them anyway.
"And if any bandit gets too close, I'll drop my sword, grab Mister Kagain by his elbows and lob him at the enemy!" she quipped, motioning at picking up a squirming dwarf and tossing him, like a crusty iron ring in a game of quoits.
No soul in the whole of Toril could resist feeling some satisfaction at the idea of it, for a low chuckle escaped Okami's lips. It lightened the air and her spirit as she looked down at him.
The hardest part of her plan now done, then to the City to sign up with the company, pack her stuff and take care of anything left undone while awaiting deployment which Kagain said would be less than a tenday hence.
But lest they forget, there remained the most important task of all.
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"This is a Going-Away Party, not a Gone-Away-Party," Irse grumbled. "Because I'm still here, so they'd better not act so happy."
And who invited those vultures anyway, the elf groused at the sight of Lanie and her cadre as they surrounded the blacksmith, fawning and so obviously feigning sadness at his apprentice's leaving, shedding tears of air at her impending absence, craven carrion creeping at the gate.
"Oh, come now," Kerda said soothingly. "Every single folk in the village wants to see you off. Even them."
"Especially them," Irse muttered.
Thadd laughed as he poured ale for his wife and friend. "You shouldn't let this ruin your evening, most of all your appetite."
Irse pulled the tankard to herself with an agreeable wink. After all, this evening was hers. Old Cook Tucky put the word out that o'l General Elf is getting out there to do some good work of helping protect people going through the trade roads from the scum of the Coast. Dearg's residents, these simple and gentle folk who welcomed the young elf into their fold, were likewise keen on celebrating the occasion in the common room of Mister Denwy's tiny village inn.
And just as the women brought pies on her first night in Dearg, so they also did on her last, the sight of these gloriously stuffed wonders spread upon the table, sprinkling the festive air with sweetness and warmth.
At one of the long tables she sat with her friends, gathering as much of the latest gossip as the ears can stand for the stories themselves will soon be like rations on the road, bits of cheer and memory to be taken out when loneliness takes hold.
Old Agnes walked up to them, so squat and stooped she needn't bend down to reach for the seated elf. Half-blind but never half-hearted, the kindly crone grabbed at Irse's face and squished them with gusto.
"Our little elfling," she clucked. "Why, I remember when you came to us like a wee baby."
Indeed, a gangly awkward lanky fifteen-year-old, Irse agreed, her grin pulled wider by the granny's wrinkled pinch on both cheeks.
"And I wouldn't have grown an inch if it weren't for your biscuits, Agnes."
"To think the women worried you wouldn't take well to human fare. But I says to them, no. You feed and feed that little thing and look at you now. Not some slip of a leaf like your pixie kind, but a towering trrrrree trunk!" Agnes appraised with pride, grasped and poked at the young elf's forearm, firmed and toughened from years of working the forge.
"Now you go out there and hammer them bandit bastards to a bloody pulp. When you're done, come back here for tea and cookies?"
"Yes, Ma'am."
After blessing her with an affectionate but overly enthusiastic pat, the old lady padded off to join the others and the elf resumed conversation with her friends.
"Hello, sweetie," Lanie cooed beside her.
Irse's face soured.
"We heard you were going away for a good while. But who's going to help poor Mister Okami at the forge now, more importantly at the kitchen?"
Bear traps, Irse inwardly fumed. Bear traps are going to help, bear traps to clamp down tight on those simpering wayward lashes.
"Don't you fret a dot. Us caring ladies will be at the cottage every single day to make sure he wants for nothing, won't we?" Lanie the Lash Lasher promised too eagerly, affirmed by a chorus of cackling from the other girls.
Delicately the woman petted the top of Irse's head, as she were poking at an ant's nest. Kerda and Thadd exchanged nervous smiles.
"I suppose your old room's going to be empty from now on. How very lonely your Teacher's going to be," Tillie the Titterer tutted, sporting the realms' fakest look of sadness.
Empty? Oh, there's a trio of empty heads she would very much love to fill with molten slag.
"It must be so plain and bare, as if someone doesn't have a woman's touch at all," Pennie the Pie Pincher sneered. "I guess we're going to have to dress it up with some curtains, and flowers, and lace."
Change a clean and practical and pragmatic space into a pocket plane of diabolical daintiness.
"And a cradle," Lanie proclaimed, triumphant. "I can see one, and later a little bed fitting right in there."
What. One elven eye narrowed, the other broadened and twitched dangerously.
Well, these Tel'Quessir eyes are seeing something else sharp and rusty fitting into that big mouth of hers and -
He must have been watching the knife in the elf's hand, for Thadd suddenly leaped out of his seat to grab a passing tray of pork pies. With a practiced performer's grace and the evident urgency of a man desperate to avert a massacre, he juggled the plates and slid them right in front of his seething friend.
"Tadaaa," he croaked hastily, clutching a pastry, and rocking it under the elf's nose. "Here, Irse. Pies. Very nice pies. See these pies, aren't they very nice?"
Kerda patted appreciatively at her husband's arm, then glowered at the taunting trio. "Excuse us, but perhaps you might want to make room instead for the well-wishers now," she snapped at them.
Lanie pursed her lips demurely in mock offense, trading giggles with the other girls as they sashayed away in serpentine synchronicity. Snorting like a bull blindfolded with red, Irse sliced at a piece of pie, irately rubbing the knife back and forth despite having cut the pastry through its crust down to the plate.
"Is that Nalwin and Andor over there?" the elf piped up, eyeing the village hunters among the crowd. "Do you think I can borrow all of their traps? The rustiest ones they've got?"
After all the trouble she went through to secure their healing last year, the men ought to feel obligated to lend to her cause.
More well-wishers poured in from outside and swarmed their table while Irse received them graciously, bashfully scratching at her ear. All bid her well on her journey and voiced their hopes that their caravan won't run into trouble. Some expressed their worries which Irse tried to allay, assuring them she had learned more than enough from her Teacher's lessons and instances with assisting the village watch in fending off wild animals and goblins.
Past the faces and the laughter, she caught sight of the blacksmith among the others, half-heartedly smiling, absently acknowledging a greeting, nodding blankly at the conversation around him. And then his face would revert to an emotionless veil while taking a sip from his tankard, only to don once more a genial mask when addressed by another.
Irse furrowed her brows, on the fence between a tad irked and a bit concerned.
He should be celebrating – an apprentice out of work finally deciding to go out and make herself useful, a student now learned enough to make him proud. Shouldn't he be glad that the village folk threw this little party for her?
More importantly, Irse reasoned, that he didn't have to cook or pay for all this food by himself?
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