The Return of the Sword Read online

  ‘She’s just an old woman,’ Farnor said, knowing that this was not true even as he spoke. Then, anxious to end his tenure as the butt of their mirth, he asked, ‘Can she use this . . . Power . . . that you were talking about? Is that how she did it?’

  The laughter faded.

  ‘No one knows what Gulda can do. Or even who she is. Most of us had thought never to hear of her again after the war.’ It was Olvric. ‘She’s like Hawklan – deep and puzzling. Very deep.’

  ‘And formidable,’ Yengar added. ‘In every way. I wouldn’t be surprised if she could use the Power, but she wouldn’t have needed it to deal with you. If it’s any comfort to you, none of us here would choose to threaten her. Nor any that I know.’

  Farnor gave a defiant shrug. ‘But still . . .’

  Yengar met the young man’s pained gaze, then looked skywards. ‘All right. I can see it’s something that’s troubling you. We’ll do as you ask. We all know what it’s like to receive a beating. Things like that do harm that lasts a long time. We’ll show you what we can. A few tricks and a little thought will soon have you feeling more confident in yourself.’ He became serious. ‘But I meant what I said about you before. Warrior’s not a word I’d choose, but you have the heart of what you need already; a profound determination to survive. Without that, weapons, fighting skills, they’re all worthless.’

  He cast a glance at Marna. ‘It must be something in the water in that valley of yours. Now we have two pupils. However . . .’ He looked at Farnor significantly. ‘While I might possibly be able to give you the benefit of ten years of thought about conflict and violence in ten days, when it comes to learning how to fight and all that that involves – including such matters as talking your way out of problems, like Gryss, and surviving out here – then I’m afraid you have to go the long way.’

  ‘I understand,’ Farnor replied, a little nervous now that his request had been granted. ‘When can we . . . start?’

  Yengar raised an eyebrow and his previous laughter returned. ‘We’ll start right now,’ he said. ‘Here’s your first and most important lesson in self-defence. Remember it well.’ He leaned across to Farnor and placed a confidential arm around his shoulders. Farnor bent towards him keenly.

  ‘Don’t swing a stick at Gulda again.’

  Laughter floated into the rain-soaked air as the small procession wended its way along the valley.

  A little later, the rain stopped and the clouds thinned to reveal streaks of blue sky and occasional shafts of sunlight. Coming to the end of the valley they stopped to rest the horses and to eat. And to decide where to go next, for the valley opened into an even broader one running north and south.

  ‘Pick a gap,’ Yengar said to Farnor as they surveyed the peaks along the far side.

  Farnor looked at him blankly. ‘Where are we going?’

  Yengar smiled. ‘Second rule of self-defence – ask questions like that before you set out.’

  Farnor scowled at him.

  ‘They’re like this all the time,’ Marna said, her mouth full of a large Valderen pie. ‘And they laugh a lot – except him.’ She waved the pie at Olvric who inclined his head slightly towards her by way of reply. ‘Their main rule of self-defence is keep inventing new rules to make sure everything your students do is wrong.’

  ‘To make sure your students understand that everything they do can always be done better,’ Yengar intervened.

  ‘See what I mean?’ Marna declared with heavy fatalism.

  ‘Even so, it’s a good question,’ Jenna said. ‘Where are we going now? We were going to go to Vakloss, to give our accounting to the Geadrol, but . . .’ She indicated Farnor who shifted uncomfortably as all four turned to look at him.

  ‘Anderras Darion,’ Olvric said flatly, turning back to the strap on one of the panniers that he was repairing. ‘Gulda will be there.’

  Farnor felt an uneasiness pervade the group momentarily. Yengar ended it by looking at the others for any sign of dissent.

  ‘It’s there or the Cadwanen,’ Jenna said. ‘There’s no one at Vakloss who can answer his questions. And the quickest way to the Cadwanen will be past Anderras Darion anyway.’

  ‘We’ll take you to Hawklan’s castle then, Farnor,’ Yengar said. ‘He’s the best man to advise you from there.’

  ‘And Gulda?’ Farnor asked. ‘Will she be there?’

  Again he sensed the uneasiness.

  ‘What’s the matter?’ he asked, unable to prevent the question. Without any apparent signal, everyone was standing and preparing to set off again.

  ‘Gulda has a way of . . . gravitating . . . towards trouble,’ Yengar told him, as they began leading their horses down into the valley. ‘To be honest, from what you’ve told me I don’t think she’d have left you in the Forest unless she’d some other more urgent errand in mind.’ He made an effort at a reassuring smile. ‘Still, that’s all conjecture, isn’t it? We’ll find out if she’s there soon enough. All we need bother ourselves with at the moment is which gap you’ve picked for us to go through.’ He pointed across the valley.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Farnor protested in some alarm. ‘Don’t you have some way of telling which is the best way?’

  ‘Yes,’ Yengar said pensively. ‘It’s called guessing.’

  It took them the rest of the day to cross the valley. Apart from a search for a shallow stretch by which to cross over an otherwise fast and turbulent river, the journey was without incident and they camped near the top of a col which they had agreed looked, ‘as good a way as any’.

  Alone in his tent Farnor pondered the events of the day from his first nervous encounter with Olvric. It had been good, he decided, though the sense of some hidden darkness when Gulda was mentioned disturbed him a little. Still, these people were soldiers and by all accounts they had fought in a bitter war long before they came in search of Nilsson and his men. There were probably many things that they would not wish to share with either him or Marna. Then he realized that this was the first time since his parents had been killed that he had lain in a bed and felt both security around him and a future ahead of him. He was looking forward to it as he drifted into sleep, his thoughts fragmenting and scattering into disjointed nonsense.

  Then he was wide awake, with fear crawling through every part of him.

  Chapter 13

  Farnor started upright, his heart pounding. It took him a little time to realize that the strange noise rasping through the tent was his own breathing. It took him even longer to bring it under any semblance of control, for the fear he had woken to was still with him. At one point he was tempted to call out, but something stopped him. Slowly it came to him that the fear was not fear. It was more like the response he might have had to fingernails drawn down glass. And it was familiar.

  Then there was fear.

  This was how he had felt when, as he had confronted Rannick and his terrible familiar, a gash through this reality had been torn to reveal the myriad worlds beyond. As the memory returned, so now, as had happened then, he found part of himself reaching out to make right this affront – a part that he did not understand and that seemed more to be controlling him than he it. His helplessness brought fear of another kind. Not least because a struggle developed. Some power was opposing this other part of him!

  Then, abruptly, the struggle was over. The gash was gone, as was this inner self. Everything was whole again.

  He was leaning forward supporting himself on one arm as though, with opposition removed, he had stumbled forward. And he was shaking violently.

  What had happened?

  A nightmare?

  No.

  The feeling had been real, without a doubt, but what it had meant he had no idea. This time there had been no vision of the rent through into the worlds beyond. There had been just the darkness of the tent all around him. Nor had it been so intense. But it had been the same, without question. Except that this time something had opposed whatever it was in him that sought to right the inj
ury.

  Again he was tempted to call out but again he forced himself not to. Whatever had happened, it had definitely passed and, welcoming though his new hosts had proved to be, it was unlikely they would take kindly to being wakened in the middle of the night by what they would almost certainly consider to be a nightmare. For he doubted that he would be able to describe the incident adequately.

  Nevertheless, the following day, as they broke camp, he told them about it.

  His story met with an uncomfortable silence.

  ‘I don’t know what to say,’ Yengar said. ‘It’s . . .’

  ‘Did you sense danger?’ Olvric intruded quietly.

  Farnor thought before he replied. ‘I was afraid,’ he said. ‘But I think that was because of what had happened before. And I couldn’t do anything – not deliberately, anyway – I was helpless. The sensation wasn’t frightening in itself.’ He floundered. ‘I’m sorry, I don’t really have any words for it. It was just wrong, unnatural, something that shouldn’t be. It made my flesh creep.’ He shuddered noisily, then looked round at the others. They were watching him intently. Silently Marna pulled her horse alongside him in a small show of support against these potentially hostile strangers.

  ‘Did you sense danger?’ Olvric repeated his question.

  Farnor found himself being thankful for his cold, searching manner. It carried no judgement, only a need to know.

  ‘No,’ he said firmly. ‘No danger. But it was still a bad thing, something that shouldn’t have been. And this time something resisted whatever it was I was doing to close the rift. That didn’t happen before.’

  ‘You’ve said before twice. This hasn’t happened at any other time since you faced Rannick?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Wake us if it happens again.’

  ‘But . . .’

  ‘Wake us.’ Olvric’s tone was both matter-of-fact and unequivocal and seemed to dispel the uncertainty pervading the others.

  ‘I’m sorry if we gaped at you,’ Yengar said. ‘You caught us all by surprise. Olvric’s right. Wake us next time – if there’s a next time. Other things may be happening which you’re unaware of and which we’ll be able to see.’

  ‘But . . .’

  ‘Information, Farnor,’ Yengar pressed, explanatory now. ‘I told you. Our job. Gathering information. The more we can tell Hawklan or Andawyr about what’s happening to you, the better.’

  ‘And if there’s nothing for you to see – or feel – or anything?’

  ‘That’s information in itself, isn’t it? It may be just as significant. Who are we to say? What we have to do is note events accurately so that we can describe them to others accurately.’

  ‘I suppose so,’ Farnor conceded reluctantly. The mood of the group was lightening. ‘It just seems – fussy.’

  Yengar mulled over the word. ‘Well, we’ve been called worse. I prefer to think of myself as being . . . obsessive. Fussy sounds rather petty, don’t you think?’

  Farnor eyed him suspiciously, testing the self-deprecating humour that seemed to be a common feature of the group. His response caused some amusement.

  ‘Never underestimate the effects of the small action,’ the two women said to him in unison, obviously recalling an insistent teaching.

  ‘Sumeral’s in the details,’ Yrain said in a strident, authoritative voice that Farnor thought he should know.

  ‘Ethriss is in the details,’ Jenna echoed in the same vein.

  Then they both laughed.

  ‘I’m sure Gulda will be greatly heartened to find how carefully you listened to her,’ Yengar said with affected sternness. Farnor remembered the voice.

  ‘Memsa Gulda, Goraidin. Memsa,’ the two women chimed, to even greater amusement. Yengar resisted for a moment, then capitulated. ‘It doesn’t concern me, I can always have Farnor chase her with a stick, I suppose.’

  ‘I told you, they’re like this all the time,’ Marna said to the bemused Farnor through the ensuing clamour. ‘When they’re not getting someone else to do all the dirty work,’ she added loudly.

  ‘A necessary part of your training, cadet,’ Jenna said, maintaining Gulda’s persona.

  Marna gave Farnor a knowing look and dropped back to join them. Olvric replaced her.

  ‘Don’t confuse our humour with frivolity, Farnor,’ he said after they had ridden a little way in silence. ‘We’ve done many things together. Many things. We know and trust one another deeply.’

  ‘I understand,’ Farnor replied, Olvric’s remarks bringing to him the memory of the friends and the laughter he had left back at the village. It all seemed to be such a long time ago. Then, abruptly, he did understand, and though the laughter behind him did not change it was suddenly different, echoing into the depths of who these people were.

  ‘It’s what Marken called your lightness of touch,’ he said, turning and looking directly at the enigmatic Goraidin.

  Olvric raised his eyebrows and bent his head forward slightly in appreciation.

  Farnor straightened as if a weight had been lifted from him.

  ‘But you don’t laugh much,’ he heard himself saying.

  Unexpectedly, Olvric chuckled. ‘I do in my own way,’ he replied as the sound rumbled through him to break out in an equally unexpected, if brief, smile. ‘Have no fear about that.’ He became pensive for a moment then said, ‘It’s good to have you both along,’ before easing his horse forward a little to ride alone.

  The sky was overcast, but the clouds were high and light and seemed set to remain so for the rest of the day. Towards midday, however, a wind sprang up and began to disperse them. The valley that they had chosen twisted and turned, but it carried them generally eastward and the going was easy. Farnor was gradually inducted into the ways of their travelling, now walking, now riding, now resting, now eating. And throughout, he was aware that both he and Marna were being gently instructed.

  When they stopped in the late afternoon to make camp for the night he was given the task of choosing a suitable site. After some wandering about and a disproportionate amount of fretful thought, he chose the lee of a rock face.

  Jenna looked at it critically. ‘Dry ground, out of the wind, no sign of loose rocks above to give us a rude awakening, near a stream but not so near that it’ll disturb us or cover unwelcome sounds. Not bad.’

  Later, they sat around the fire, eating.

  ‘I’m afraid we’re not going to be able to give you much hunting experience, Farnor,’ Yengar said, dropping a well-gnawed bone on to the fire. ‘Not with the quantity of supplies that we’ve still got left.’ He pulled a rueful face. ‘In fact, I think some of the food will be going bad before we can eat it. We’ll have to leave it for the local scavengers.’

  ‘I’ve trapped rabbits and foxes,’ Farnor told him.

  ‘Can you use a bow?’ Olvric asked.

  Farnor shook his head. ‘Not really. There were quite a few in the village, but I don’t think anyone could use one properly. Gryss wouldn’t allow anyone to take one when we first went looking for the creature.’

  ‘It’s not a good idea to have a weapon you can’t use,’ Olvric went on.

  Farnor shrugged. ‘If they were ever for anything it was probably hunting, and there was precious little need for that. I don’t think anyone ever thought about them being used as weapons. We’d no need at all for weapons.’ His voice faded. ‘Well, we thought we’d no need.’

  ‘An apt epitaph,’ Olvric said, staring bleakly into the fire. ‘And an old one.’

  ‘Speaking of which, what’s that?’ Yrain was pointing to a sword lying by Farnor’s saddle.

  ‘It’s a sword,’ Farnor replied, with a hint of indignation.

  ‘May I look at it?’

  Farnor held out his hand towards it by way of invitation. Yrain took the sword from its scabbard and brought it back to the fire. She was grimacing as she lifted it.

  ‘It’s just an old thing I found,’ Farnor said.

  ‘It certainly is,’ Y
rain agreed.

  ‘I wanted a Threshold Sword. Like the Valderen. I think everyone in the village has one now. I know the blacksmith’s been kept busy making new ones and repairing old ones. Better late than never, I suppose.’

  Yrain tested the edge and her expression changed. ‘Almost everything about this thing leaves a lot to be desired, but this edge is good,’ she said, openly surprised. ‘Did your blacksmith do it for you?’

  ‘No, I did that. I could always put a good edge on things.’ Yrain’s surprise became frank admiration. The sword did the rounds of the four soldiers who all reacted similarly.

  ‘I don’t suppose you know how to use this either?’ Olvric said, returning it to Farnor.

  ‘What’s to know?’ Farnor replied, making a mock fighting gesture with the sword to the considerable consternation of the others.

  ‘A lot,’ Olvric said tersely as his grip closed powerfully around Farnor’s wrist and he gently prised the sword from his hand. He signalled to Yrain.

  ‘Come on, you two, over there,’ she said to Farnor and Marna.

  After some ritual opposition from both of them, they spent the next hour receiving instruction in swordsmanship.

  ‘Keep it very basic,’ Olvric emphasized to her after watching them for a little while. ‘Just enough to make sure we don’t get cut down by our own fireside and they don’t cut their own heads off.’

  When finally Yrain finished with them, it was almost dark. Farnor and Marna, red-faced and breathless, collapsed gracelessly by the fire. Farnor was wriggling his shoulders and massaging his right arm. Yengar made to speak but Farnor gave him a baleful look. ‘Don’t tell me to relax, that’s all I’ve heard for the last hour.’

  ‘You won’t want to do any close-quarter, unarmed fighting, then?’ Yengar grinned at him. Farnor’s look became grimmer.

  ‘I’ll take that as a refusal,’ Yengar said, this time laughing.

  Olvric gave Yrain an inquiring look.

  ‘Not bad,’ she said. ‘I’ve dealt with worse. Just impatient with themselves like most young people.’ She became serious. ‘But they’re both clearer in their minds than most.’