David Zindell - The Lightstone - The Silver Sword - Part Two

‘The wood is too wet,’ he said as he knelt over a pile of it that he had made. ‘There’s too little light coming through these damn clouds.’

‘Hmmph, you’ve gotten a fire out of your crystal before with as little light,’ Atara chided him. ‘I should think the test of it is at times such as these rather than in waiting for perfect conditions.’

‘I didn’t know I was being tested,’ Maram fired back.

‘Our whole journey is a test for all of us,’ Atara told him. ‘And all our lives may someday depend on your firestone.’

Her words cut deep into me and remained in my mind as I fell asleep that night. For I had a sword that I must learn to wield – and not by crossing blades with Kane every night during our fencing practice. Although Alkaladur might indeed be hard enough to slice through the hardest steel, it had more vital powers that I was only beginning to sense. It would take all my will, I thought, all my awareness and concentration of my lifefire to find myself in the silvery substance of the sword and it in me.

Morning brought with it a little sun, which lasted scarcely long enough for us to saddle the horses and break camp. It began to rain again, but much of its sting was taken away by the needles of the towering trees above us. Here were hemlocks and spruce two hundred feet high, and great King Firs perhaps even higher. They formed a vast shield of green protecting against wind and water, and sheltering the many squirrels, foxes and birds that lived here. I might have been content to ride through this lovely forest another month, for its smells of mosses and wildflowers pleased me greatly. Soon, however, the trees gave way to more farmland, cut with numerous streams running down from the mountains. In this more open country, the rain found us easy targets, and pelted us with icy drops that streaked down through the sky like silver arrows. It soaked our garments, making a misery of what should have been an easy ride. By late afternoon, with the ground rising steeply toward the mountains’ foothills, we were all of us considering knocking on the door of some stout farmhouse and asking refuge for the night.

‘But if we do that,’ I said to my friends as we stopped to water the horses by a stream, ‘these poor people will have to feed us, and they’ve nothing to spare.’

‘Perhaps we could feed them,’ Atara suggested. ‘ We’ve plenty to spare.’

Liljana cast her a troubled look and said, ‘If travelers came through the Wendrush offering food to their hosts, what would they think?’

‘Ha,’ Kane said, ‘if travelers came through the Wendrush offering food to the Kurmak , they’d likely be put to the sword for the insult of it.’

Although Atara didn’t respond to this remark about her people, her grim face suggested it might be true.

‘I have an idea,’ Maram said. ‘It’s time we began inquiring if anyone hereabouts knows of a road through the mountains. If anyone happens also to offer us shelter and also has enough food, we’ll accept. Otherwise we’ll ride on.’

It was a good plan, I thought, and the others agreed. We spent the next few hours riding from farmhouse to farmhouse, even as the rain grew stronger. But none of the Surrapamers knew of the road we sought. Most of them did offer us lodgings for the night, even though their sunken faces and bony bodies told us that this was an act of pride and politesse they could ill afford. It amazed me that they were willing to succor us at all, for we were strangers from distant lands of which few had heard; we were girt for war and riding across their fields at a time when many of their kinsmen had been taken by war – and many more might soon be. I thanked our stars that all their knights and warriors had ridden off, and so left these brave people little more than goodwill, and faith in our goodwill, with which to face us.

But as the day faded toward a gray, rainy evening, it seemed that I had given my thanks too soon. Just after we had knocked on the door of yet another farmhouse, a company of armed men came thundering down the road from the east and turned onto the farm’s muddy lane. There were twenty of them, and they all wore rusted mail with no surcoat to cover it or identify their domains or houses. Shabby knights they seemed, and yet their lances appeared sharp enough and their swords ready at hand. Although they were quite as gaunt as the rest of their countrymen, they sat straight in their saddles and rode with good discipline.

‘Who are you?’ their leader called out to us as his large war horse kicked up clots of mud and came to a halt ten yards from us. He himself was a large man, with a thick gray beard and braided gray plaits hanging down from beneath his open-faced helmet. ‘What are you doing in our land?’

The door of the house having been shut behind us, I stood by Altaru as he stomped about and eyed this man’s horse ferociously. My companions had already mounted their horses; Atara was fingering her strung bow while Kane cast his black eyes on the men before us.

I gave the knight our names, and asked him his. He presented himself as Toman of Eastdale; he said that he and his men had been riding off to join King Kaiman at Azam.

‘We’d heard there were strange knights about,’ Toman said, studying my surcoat and other accouterments. ‘We were afraid you might be Hesperuk spies.’

‘Do we look like spies?’ I said to him.

‘No, you don’t,’ he admitted graciously. ‘But not everyone is who they seem. The Hesperuks haven’t won half our kingdom through force of arms alone.’

I pulled myself on top of Altaru and patted his neck to steady him. To Toman, I said, ‘We’re not Kallimun priests, if that’s what you’re thinking.’

‘Perhaps not,’ he said, ‘but that is for the King to decide. I’m afraid you’ll have to lay down your arms and come with us.’

At a nod from him, four of his knights rode up by his side with their lances held ready. Toman looked from Atara to Maram and then back at me. ‘Please give me your sword, Sar Valashu.’

‘I’ll give you mine ,’ Kane growled as his eyes flashed and his hand moved quick as a snake’s to draw his sword.

‘Kane!’ I said. With almost miraculous control, Kane caught himself in mid-motion and stared at me. ‘Kane, don’t draw on him!’

But all of Toman’s knights had now drawn their swords. Unlike their armor, they showed no spot of rust.

‘You must understand,’ Toman said to me, ‘that we can’t allow you to go armed about our land – not with the Hesperuks knocking on our doors, too.’

‘Very well,’ I said, ‘but we’ve no desire to go riding about Surrapam at all – only to find a way to leave it.’

I explained that we were journeying to the Library at Khaisham; I told him that we had made vows to seek the Lightstone along with a thousand others in King Kiritan’s hall in Tria.

‘We’ve heard of this quest,’ he said, pulling at his beard. ‘But how do we know that you have truly set out upon it?’

I nudged Altaru forward, then drew forth the medallion that King Kiritan had given me. At the sight of this circle of gold, Toman’s eyes held wonder but no greed. Then, at my bidding, my companions approached to show their medallions as well. Toman’s knights, gathering around us, suddenly put away their swords at his bidding.

‘We must honor the impulse behind this quest, even if we do not believe in it,’ Toman said. ‘If you truly oppose the Crucifier, you’d do better to come to battle with us.’

‘That appears to be the thought of most of your countrymen,’ I said. Then I told him of meeting Thaman at Duke Rezu’s castle in Anjo, and his plea to the Valari.