Mark Sehestedt - Hand of the Hunter

Gleed kept talking. "You are the first whom the Master has left with any knowledge of who they are. Why? I do not know, but it is not for me to question his will. The Master has chosen you to be his Hand, little girl, but you are raw, unshaped… unworthy. To serve the Master, to honor the Master, you will be honed into the perfect weapon."

The first whom the Master has left with any knowledge of who they are… Hweilan wasn't so sure about that. The Master had seemed determined to do something to her-wipe her memories perhaps-until he had come upon something inside her. Something that fought back.

But she didn't tell this to Gleed. Instead she seized on the last thing he'd said, about being honed.

"By you?" she said.

Gleed scowled and his voice came out barely above a whisper. "Don't underestimate me, girl. I could turn you to ash with a word. But to speak the whole truth: You will have three teachers, of which I will be one. I will teach you, yes. Teach you Making. But before you can Make, first you must Know. You will be given the Lore."

"Lore?"

Gleed ignored her question. "I will feed you-can't have you dying on me-and then we should see to your wounds. Whatever you've been doing these past days, you've gotten yourself covered in cuts and scrapes.

"Tomorrow you will meet Kesh Naan, and it will be most dangerous if she smells blood on you. Kesh Naan will give you the Lore, and then you will return to me-if you survive. So listen to me very carefully."

"Your brother is dead." said Argalath.

Jatara shrieked. The two Nar holding her flinched and strengthened their holds on her arms. They'd forced her to her knees. She could feel the tendons in her shoulders stretching. The blood running from her mouth and nostrils was staining the rug that took up most of Argalath's bedchamber. The rug was ruined. At least it would give the Nar something in which they could wrap the two dead men on the floor behind them.

"Release her."

Argalath's voice. Strained with weariness, but no fear. Both guards looked up in shock. Jatara followed their gaze.

Argalath sat in the room's one chair. Here, in the privacy of his bedchamber, he'd removed the robes and wore loose trousers and a sleeveless undershirt. The mottled blue of his spellscar covered every inch of exposed pale skin, from the tips of his fingers to the top of his hairless head. Behind him stood a tall, imposing figure, the fine Damaran clothes covering a frame of hard muscle and sinew. Guric. Or what had once been Guric. The body no longer breathed, the heart lay still in his chest, and the hunger lurking in his black eyes had not been born in this world. The remains of the table Jatara had shattered in her attempt to murder her lord lay strewn on the floor before Argalath. Had Guric not been there, she would have succeeded, and there would be more than two corpses cooling in the room.

Argalath spoke again. "I said release her."

The man holding her right arm kicked the bloody knife away. It clattered against the far wall, then both men released her arms and stepped back.

Jatara collapsed. Sobs shook her, and the sound of her weeping drowned out the crackle of flames in the hearth.

Squinting against the glare from the fire, Argalath looked down on her, shook his head, and said, "I am sorry."

From the corner of her one remaining eye, Jatara could see the Nar just behind her and to her left. He'd stepped back. But not enough.

"You're… sorry?"

Her arm snapped out and she snatched the knife from the Nar's belt. He lunged backward-sure that in the next moment he'd feel his own steel spilling his guts on the rug.

But Jatara leaped for Argalath.

He didn't move, but from behind him Guric did, stepping around his master and crouching to meet her.

Jatara knew her business. This monster had thwarted her once. She didn't need to kill Guric. Just get past him.

She landed and kept low, spinning prone and aiming one boot at Guric's knee. Bone shattered.

Guric didn't cry out in pain. Didn't even wince. But he did topple as his leg collapsed under him.

Jatara was on the move again before he even hit the floor.

Guric's hand shot out to grasp her, but she twisted away. Another three steps. She raised the knife and lunged.

Argalath's spellscar glowed.

The center of Jatara's chest constricted, and agony shot outward from it, locking her limbs in a tight spasm. She crumpled to the floor. Her head bounced off the rug so close to Argalath's foot that she could have counted the stitches lining the sole of his boot. She had no idea if she still held the knife; she couldn't feel her hands. Couldn't feel anything except the pain radiating out from her chest. She tried to draw breath, but that only made blackness close in around the edges of her vision.

"You know better, Jatara." Argalath's voice, seeming faint and far away. "Now stop this foolishness. I did not kill Kadrigul."

The pain left her as swiftly as it had come. But with it went the last of her strength and the will to fight. All she had left was the hollowness inside. She couldn't even muster the strength to cry.

"Help her up," said Argalath. "Put her on the bed."

The Nar obeyed, laying her atop the thick fur coverlets. Guric was sitting up and staring at the lower half of his leg, which bent outward.

"Your brother is dead, Jatara," said Argalath. "And even if your grief makes you think otherwise, I am indeed sorry. I loved him as you did." His gaze flicked away, and for a moment the barest hint of a smile bent his lips. "Well, perhaps not exactly as you did, but I loved him nonetheless. I did not kill him. But I know who did. We will discuss it here, now, and then never again. You know me. You know my word. Do you understand?"

He leaned forward in his chair, his chin resting on his clasped fingertips. He stared at Jatara, where she still lay strengthless on the bed. The flames in the hearth were burning low, and the room was more shadow than light. She could not see Argalath's eyes. Just two wells of darkness. But she could feel his gaze on her. Her heartbeat still felt stiff and strained, as if it had just been thawed and was straining to its work. Her limbs were tingling, and she couldn't stop the shivering in her body.

Jatara made a sound of assent. Her mouth was bone dry and she didn't yet trust herself to speak.

"Very well," said Argalath. "Your brother died in my service. You and he have both faced death in my service more times than I can remember. You did so with honor. Without complaint. With eagerness even. Why do you now blame me?"

Tears welled in Jatara's eye. Her brother, the only one in the world she truly loved, was dead, and she hadn't even been there. Wolves and ravens would eat his corpse.

"You sent him," she said, forcing the words out through a throat that still seemed narrow as a pipe stem. "With that… monster."

Argalath sat silent a moment, as if waiting for her to continue. When she didn't, he said, "That monster as you call it did not kill your brother. He was, in fact, the best protection I could have sent with Kadrigul."

"You could have sent me."

"Then you, too, would be dead."

Had the knife been within reach, had she been able to muster the strength to move, she would have tried to kill him again. The damned, cursed fool. Didn't he know she'd rather be dead than have to live without Kadrigul?

"But," Argalath continued, and she heard a strange note in his voice, "here you do speak-speak truly-of my mistake, and I beg your forgiveness, Jatara."

Nothing he could have said could have shocked her more. She'd heard him ask forgiveness from others before-those whom he served or who stood in higher station than him. But never to one who served him. And never with such sincerity.