Second Kiss (14 page)

A Specially Made Sword

E
ven
though he wore Vallaine's chameleon cloak, Xemion kept out of sight lest Glittervein or one of his confederates should see him as he made his way to the Panthemium. He had no clear plan yet what he'd do if and when he located Montither. It would not be wrong, would it, to cut off his hand as he had once tried to cut off Xemion's? Or to break it? Or to shatter his head?

“Stay here,” he ordered Bargest as he entered the Panthemium. Unnoticed, he approached Gnasher, who, along with several other of Montither's thugs and drink Thralls, was loitering in the common area, covertly gulping down great quantities of grain alcohol from a large jug.

“Where is Montither?” he asked from inside the shadow of his dusk-grey hood. The lifelessness in his voice startled him. The words had come out in a dull, almost threatening tone.

“And who is it that asks?” Gnasher inquired with nearly concealed malice.

“The representative of Mr. Glittervein,” Xemion growled back, his voice as menacing as he could make it.

One of the others piped up, “Well, you've missed him.”

“He's already gone up to the stack,” another said.

Xemion had nothing more to say to them — for now. He felt the strength from the biscuit surging within him, but he would not waste it on such as these. With no further comment, he turned and quickly walked away, ignoring Gnasher's repeated calls. The oncoming storm was gathering momentum over the sea as he dashed through the clinging, damp air toward Uldestack. Ready to help if need be, Bargest loped along just close enough to keep Xemion in his sight.

Xemion kept under cover, darting from one shadow to the next at full speed as he made his way up the long, slow, sloping roadway that led to the stack. He got to the top just in time to see Montither knocking on the wooden door of the workshop. Montither turned around and peered back the way he had come before furtively entering. Xemion dashed up the road and took up a place at a window through which he could see a narrow slice of the smithy's interior.

“Well, hello again, O Lord of Nains,” he heard Montither say with snide politeness.

“Ah, yes, the young Montither,” Glittervein replied with an equally disdainful courtesy. “What brings you to my smithy on this windy night?”

“I wonder, sir, since as always my question requires some discretion, if your helper there might leave us alone for a moment.” Xemion had to lean in a little closer to see that Montither was indicating the large Thrall girl who was quietly eating cheese curds at a table on the other side of the room. Xemion began to salivate at the sight of the cheese curds. He was hungry.

“That is Oime,” replied Glittervein. “She neither sees nor hears.”

Montither walked over and examined the gentle-faced Thralleen more closely. Suddenly he clapped his hands loudly behind her left ear.

“I see,” he said with a smile when there was no reaction. “What possible use is she to you?” he asked with a laugh. “Is she your—?” Montither raised his eyebrows and finished his question with a lewd movement of his hips.

“She is a nocturnal Thrall from deep under Alder,” Glittervein explained dryly, his smile stopping far short of his eyes. “She has the strongest arms for hammering I have ever seen, I promise you.”

“But, sir, if she's blind, how does she know where or what to hammer?”

“I position her,” Glittervein replied with clear disdain. He definitely did not enjoy being interrogated. “Very accurate, I assure you. I tap her shoulder and she knows what to do.”

“That is so kind of you,” Montither said, giving a sudden loud clap of his hand by her ear again, just to make sure.

“Now, what can I do for you?” Glittervein asked curtly.

“Mr. Glittervein, you know very well what you can do for me. You can give me my new sword.” At these words a chill bit into Xemion's blood and he started shaking, whether with wrath or fear he couldn't quite tell.

“Well, I'm sorry, but it is not quite ready.”

“What?” Montither dropped all pretense of courtesy and spoke with anger. “I paid you an enormous amount of money for it. Now I want my sword and I want it tonight!”

“And as I told you on your last inquiry,” Glittervein replied with apparent calmness, “it requires only one more firing and then it will be done. I told you that I would have it to you on time for the tournament. That is still my intent. And I might even have had it for you tonight but other things have had to take precedence and my machinery is overheated. Just be patient while it cools and I will have it for you in the morning.” Glittervein's pipe, hanging at an angle from the scarred side of his mouth, emitted regular quick bursts of thick smoke as he sucked at it.

“The Phaer Tourney
is
tomorrow,” Montither bellowed, his jaw thrust forward in rage. “I need to practice with the sword I intend to use. That is
my precedent
.”

“I really do wish I could help you.” The Nain's ability to maintain a calm voice and game face was possibly reaching its limit. “But I possess no north wind to suddenly cool my machinery down and—”

“I want my sword!” Montither bellowed, actually stamping his foot.

Glittervein put his hands on his hips, tilted his head back a little, and grinned. “Well, I want my rest.”

“Look, if I don't get that sword, I'll—”

“You'll what, I wonder?” There was a slight glint of mirth in the Nain's expression now. “Bring in the … family?”

“I don't need my father to get my way,” Montither spat back, enraged.

“I'm sure.”

“Well, be sure, Nain. I have my own way. It's just not as subtle as my father's.”

“I can see that.” By now Glittervein's tone had sharpened. He would not be intimidated.

Montither softened. “Just be fair with me,” he said, almost sweetly. “You did promise.”

After an intense silence, during which the two glared at each other eye-to-eye, Glittervein let out a raspy chuckle and then smiled so broadly it was very difficult to tell if he was being sarcastic.

“All right then, let's not you and I fight. A promise is a promise. Maybe I will have to summon up a bit of extra north wind tonight.”

Montither nodded and Xemion could see that he'd become so emotional that there was a threat of tears in his eyes.

“Yes, no need to be upset,” Glittervein cooed. “Your family has been good to me, but as I said, my machinery does have to cool off a while. If you come back, let's say just after midnight, I will have it ready for you.”

Montither smiled with relief. “And this sword will definitely be hard and sharp enough to do what I told you I needed it to do?”

“Of course,” Glittervein confirmed, his pipe accenting his words with three quick jerking billows of smoke. “
If
you have sufficient strength and know where to strike. But you have to come at it right. If you want to penetrate, you have to strike at the place of least resistance in the breastplate with the point of maximum thrust in the sword.”

“Maximum thrust?”

“The point, boy. Surely Lighthammer has taught you that. If you hack or hew with the edge of the sword, that only dissipates the impact all along the length of the blade and thus diminishes it. Look.” Glittervein took up a half-finished bronze sword from his worktable and, after whipping it through the air a few times, lunged forward with amazing quickness. “With a thrust forward, all your power is concentrated in one place: the point. You throw the whole weight of your body into it. That's how you penetrate armour.”

Montither beheld this with raised eyebrows. “You know the sword well,” he said with admiration.

“Of course.”

“But you won't be … competing?”

“Of course not. Why would I? What would it prove that Nains haven't always proven but can never get accepted?”

Montither laughed and shrugged. “A shame,” he said, but the look of relief on his face was obvious.

“I had you worried, did I?” Glittervein had become very solicitous and avuncular. “Look, the best thing is to show you. Let me give you a lesson in fighting dirty, my boy. I have an iron breastplate all set up in a vice in the workshop. We'll quaff a brew or two while my machinery cools down and I can show you some extremely nasty things, I promise you.”

“Well, yes, that is most considerate of you, Mr. Glittervein.”

Xemion crouched down in the dark as Glittervein closed and bolted the shutters to the window.

Glittervein chortled as he and Montither exited the smithy. “And so are you. But not too considerate to fight filthy, I hope.”

“No, not quite that prissy,” Montither joked.

“Well, we shall drink to dirty fighting then.”

“Yes, we shall, Mr. Glittervein.”

“To secret weapons,” Mr. Glittervein chortled.

“To secret weapons and to poison.”

“To secret weapons and to friends with secret weapons.”

“And to friends with friends.”

“To friends with friends,” Montither returned. The two of them crossed the yard laughing equally as though each had just one-upped the other.

Glittervein's Machinery

A
s
the dark of night edged up over the top of the stack and the storm brooded on the dark green dreams of the sea, Xemion quietly tried the door. He didn't yet know what his plan was, but he had to stop Montither from getting that sword. The door was locked. He tried the shutter, but it, too, was bolted shut. There was only one way to get into the smithy — he would have to climb up the great stack and enter through the hole in the top.

There were plenty of ropes about the smithy grounds. He had seen the Nains use them to lower iron rods over the edge of the promontory as they constructed the small gate at the end of the ridge. Finding one coiled against the smithy wall, Xemion climbed onto the roof of the workshop. Quickly, he wrapped the thick rope around the wide, upwardly slanting base of the stack, kicked off his shoes, put one bare foot up against the smooth stone, and began to walk up the side of the stack. Little by little, edging the rope higher and higher as he leaned back against it, he made his way to the top, and lifted himself over the rim.

The opening of the chimney was even wider than he had expected. The smoke of one hundred fires at once used to stream through here. The thick deposit of soot all around the great rim testified to that. He peered down and beheld, far below in the darkness, the dim glow of a long pit from which hot air and a terrible stink arose: Glittervein's kiln. But where was the sword?

Xemion had planned to loop the rope under the outside lip of the rim, but there was no need. The long-ago builders had allowed for the labours of their massive Cyclopean chimney sweeps by installing wide iron loops on either side of the flue. Quickly tying a firm knot through one of these, he began to lower himself hand-over-hand into the dark. It took longer than he expected. The bottom of the smithy, where the great kiln and Glittervein's other machinery lay, was much below ground level. The stink intensified the lower he got until finally the rope stopped. It was impossible to tell what was immediately below him, nor how far down it might be, but Xemion let go.

He sensed the whoosh of the ground coming at him just in time to roll so that even though he hit hard he was only winded. Standing up and peering into the dying glow coming from the open kiln, Xemion spied a large hill of shadow:
A huge mound of coal to fuel the machinery?
And there, beside it upon a stone table, was the sword. Xemion started to run toward it, but just then there was a great whooshing sound as though someone had stepped on a giant bellows. Xemion stopped in his tracks and gasped. Warm air rushed over his face and with it the hideous smell intensified. Staring into the hill of shadow, Xemion now saw wisps of smoke billowing up from two dark holes, and there, could those other two holes be large reptilian eyes? Surely he didn't see the hill shift a little.

Xemion clasped his hands together with the fiercest grip of his life. He pictured some guardian tiger demon about to spring. He prepared to die. But to his amazement, there followed a sob, a sigh of some kind. Then a small flicker of flame shot out from one of the two holes. It was by the light of that flame that Xemion at last saw the source of Glittervein's intense heat. This was no hill of coal, no heap of tiger; this was a dragon. In fact, Xemion knew beyond a doubt that this was the very same dragon he had encountered months ago in the Valley of Ulde.

As his eyes adjusted to the darkness, Xemion saw that most of the dragon's lower body was contained in a long rectangular pit. A gate made of metal so finely meshed it might have been a net stretched over the exposed upper portions of the dragon's back, its frame fastened into the rock floor by hinges on one side and a short length of chain on the other. This served as a lid, keeping the dragon in the pit and constraining everything but her head.

The dragon sobbed again, exhaling enough fiery breath for Xemion to see the crisscross of cuts and welts on her once scaly back where the beast's attempts at escape had caused the mesh of metal to cut into her flesh. Other cuts, gouges, and bruises were too deep to have been caused by such exertions. Everywhere the flesh was open, stripped of scales. There were white edges to some of these thin cuts as though they might be infected. Xemion felt sick to see such a tortured being.

Just then, from above, came the sound of a key turning in a lock and light suddenly flooded into the chamber, casting a shadow of the stairs that led up to Glittervein's workshop. Xemion ran and hid in the dark at the back of the smithy. Oime, who held aloft a burning brand, slowly descended the stone stairs with Glittervein following behind.

“How are you then, my little darling?” Glittervein called out malevolently to the dragon. “Are we having a nice evening then?”

The dragon shuddered and strained against the latticework as he approached.

Xemion watched, horrified, as Glittervein took Montither's broadsword from its place on the stone table and put it into a dark vice in front of the dragon's snarling mouth. Glittervein darted away and thereby avoided the sudden jet of blue fire, which the poor beast exhaled at him.

“Oh yes, prepare to flame, my dearie,” Glittervein mocked with a sinister, angry laugh.

Steering Oime to the edge of the pit, over which the dragon's upper body projected some six or seven feet, he placed a long, black metal rod in her hand. Just as she might have swung the huge hammer in the foundry, poor blind Oime, not knowing what she was doing, swung the heavy metal rod with a great sodden thump that drove the metal mesh deep into the dragon's already raw flank. At first there was no fire, only those screams and roars, which Xemion had heard from outside the smithy that night when he'd gone to Uldestack to practice the sword. The dragon bucked and strained against the harness, but there was no escape, only the lashing, until finally, when the screams stopped, helplessly, the fire began.

Repeated bursts of blue flame exploded incandescent yellow and orange again and again, as the whipping continued. If he'd looked, Glittervein would have seen Xemion lit up by the fire, crouched at the back of the smithy, but Glittervein's eyes were riveted eagerly on the sword, which was beginning to change colour in the terrible heat. Xemion remained utterly still as the increasing heat of the sword shifted it through every colour of the spectrum until all but its extended point was red-hot. And here the fire briefly began to fail.

“Keep it up,” Glittervein screamed, smacking Oime on the back. Oime lashed harder and the intensity of the fire increased.

Now Glittervein began to dance and sing that strange chant of his. Xemion had heard it before, but Glittervein's tone had been pure and clear compared to what it was tonight. He was obviously enraged. He was gritting his teeth and stomping about in fury as he sang. Xemion wondered if it was Montither who was the object of his rage.

Hard is the hand

And hard is the heel,

Hard as the soul

Make this steel.

Hard as my flesh,

Burned and scarred.

Of my mettle make this metal

Hard, so hard.

Sharp, sharp,

As the lie is sharp.

Sharp as wind

That cleaves the scarp.

Sharp as the cry

In a newborn's heart.

Of my mettle make this metal

Sharp, so sharp.

Flailing and staggering in wider and wider circles around the dragon, the Nain was coming alarmingly close to where Xemion crouched. Just when it seemed he might almost stumble over him, the fire decreased again.

“Every ounce! Every ounce!” Glittervein shouted, running back to tap Oime three times on the back. Incredibly, Oime's energy redoubled and she began to hit the dragon's back with even mightier and more rapid blows. This final assault cost the dragon her silence, for she started to scream with each exhaled fire burst. The whipping continued until at last the long narrow point of the sword turned to steel and the job was done. Glittervein signalled Oime to desist. Using long tongs, he retrieved the glowing sword and quenched it with a great hiss in the water of the font. The dragon, whose whimpers had only just subsided, arched up again in terror at the sound of the hiss.

“Oh, you'd like to, wouldn't you?” Glittervein patted Oime's back. “Give her one more for good measure,” he said, poking her, “just to light my pipe.” He held out a long piece of kindling before the dragon's mouth and Oime lashed. A long, thin flare of pale blue fire shot out of the dragon's mouth, lighting the kindling. Glittervein lit his pipe with it and exhaled the smoke into the poor beast's eye.

“Good. Good. Now you rest up, my little darling.” Glittervein poked the dragon's hide with the heel of his boot, causing the exhausted beast to bare her long, fanged teeth and snarl weakly. “You think you can frighten me, my darling?” he hissed. “You think you can take the other side of my face? I think not,” he growled and poked the sword into the beast's side. Xemion's blood turned very cold and he shook with shame. The dragon hissed weakly and steam shot out of her side.

“Oh, you'd like me to cut your heart out right now, wouldn't you, my little pet,” Glittervein crooned. “I think not. I need one more steeling from you yet.” He tapped Oime on the shoulder and the two started to leave. “You just catch your breath, my darling,” Glittervein called over his shoulder, as he ascended the stone stairway that led back to the smithy. “I shall soon return with some more caresses.”

As soon as Glittervein and Oime were gone, Xemion did what he had to do. He could not leave the dragon here like this. He crossed the floor and took Montither's still-hot sword in hand. Raising it over his head, he approached the dragon, and when he was close enough, he brought it down with all his might on the chain that bolted the latticework to the stone. The sword rang out in his hand like a battered bell. It sent a severe vibration up into his bones that jangled his teeth and hurt his elbow. But the blow had left a deep nick in the chain. Again he raised the blade and again he struck. Five times he suffered the great reverberation of the sword until finally the chain was severed. At that, he signalled wearily to the startled beast, which had all this time whimpered and cowered at each blow like a frightened puppy.

“Go,” he whispered to it. “Fly.” Xemion pointed up to where the cloud-muffled moon glowed through the great hole in the top of the stack. He backed away, expecting the beast to break forth immediately, but she remained there, utterly bound. Xemion was scared, but he held on and tiptoed forward so that he could grab the very edge of the framework that kept the dragon down. He lifted its back edge just the tiniest amount and let it clang back down. Xemion repeated his action but the dragon did not get the meaning of his act. She continued to cower in her bleak condition. Xemion had to do something to break the dragon's stupor, so he poked her with the pommel of the sword. With a jolt the dragon came alive. Quickly as a flame might leap with the first great gust of wind over long-smouldering coals, she leaped up. She was much larger than Xemion had thought. She swelled under the mesh so that the whole frame strained on her spiny back and Xemion saw that there was another, smaller chain that still secured the latticework. Constrained, enraged, in panic, so near freedom, the poor dragon glared down at Xemion, and seeing him with the sword held up high to hack at that last piece of chain, she let out a great gust of fiery breath upon him, so that as the sword struck the metal, the flame struck the man. And so Xemion was caught in a fiery wind, which scorched his skin and singed his eyebrows. Lucky this was a weary dragon, a drained dragon, or he would have been dead. As it was, the sword was flung from his grasp and he was knocked against the far wall from where he watched as the dragon breathed in deeply again and swelled herself up. The metal mesh shrieked in protest, the frame strained, the dragon shrieked, and with that, the half-severed chain snapped. Like a Jack-in-a-box, the mesh popped back with a mighty crash and the dragon shot up from her captivity and began to circle around under the wide mouth of the chimney, another long chain hanging from a metal collar about her neck. The hole above was wide but not so wide as the dragon's wingspan. In a panic, she slapped around and around, beneath her the long chain rattling against the conical walls.

Suddenly Glittervein reappeared atop the stairs. “What have you done?” he shrieked, spying Xemion and seeing his dragon flapping about overhead. Lifting his sword, the little man rushed down the stairs with a bloodthirsty shriek. “I will kill you.” High above Xemion, the dragon kept circling around under the opening. Seeing Glittervein, she looked as though she might just swoop down on him and bring the final fire upon this place of her torment. Indeed, for a second, she did fold her wings to her sides and dropped toward him, but at the last moment the dragon must have realized her flame was weak and her freedom frail, so she wisely soared straight back up and right through the hole in the top of the stack.