Then, without meeting my eye, she turned and went into her house, closing the door silently behind her.
For a while, I wandered aimlessly. I went to watch the sword tree, hoping I might find Celean there, but she was nowhere to be seen. Watching the tree itself did nothing to soothe me. Not today.
So I went to the baths, where I soaked myself joylessly. Afterward, in one of the mirrors scattered through the smaller rooms, I caught the first glimpse of my face since Vashet had struck me. Half my face was red and swollen, with bruises beginning to mottle blue and yellow around my temple and the line of my jaw. I also had the raw beginnings of a profoundly blackened eye.
As I stared at myself in the mirror I felt a low anger flicker to life deep in my belly. I was, I decided, tired of waiting helplessly while others decided whether I could come or go. I had played their game, learned their language, been unfailingly polite, and in return I had been treated like a dog. I had been beaten, sneered at, and threatened with death and worse. I was finished with it.
So I made my way slowly around Haert. I visited the twin sisters, the talkative smithy, and the tailor where I had bought my clothes. I chatted amiably, passing the time, asking questions, and pretending I didn’t look as if someone had beaten me unconscious a handful of hours ago.
My preparations took a long time. I missed dinner, and the sky was growing dark by the time I came back to the school. I went straight to my room and closed the door behind me.
Then I emptied the contents of my pockets onto my bed, some purchased, some stolen. Two fine, soft beeswax candles. A long shard of brittle steel from a poorly forged sword. A spool of blood-red thread. A small stoppered bottle of water from the baths.
I closed my fist tightly around the last. Most people don’t understand how much heat water holds inside it. That is why it takes so long to boil. Despite the fact that the scalding-hot pool I had pulled this from was more than half a mile away, what I held in my hand was of better use to a sympathist than a glowing coal. This water had fire in it.
I thought of Penthe with a twinge of regret. Then I picked up a candle and began to turn it in my hands, warming it with my skin, softening the wax and beginning to shape a doll of it.
I sat in my room, thinking dark thoughts as the last of the light faded from the sky. I looked over the tools I had gathered and knew deep in my gut that sometimes a situation grows so tangled that words are useless. What other option did I have, now that words had failed me?
What do any of us have when words fail us?
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED TWENTY-ONE
When Words Fail
IT WAS WELL INTO the dark hours of night when I approached Vashet’s house, but there was candlelight flickering in her window. I didn’t doubt she would have me killed or crippled for the good of all Ademre, but Vashet was nothing if not careful. She would give it a long night’s thought beforehand.
Empty-handed, I knocked softly on her door. After a moment, she opened it. She still wore her mercenary reds, but she had removed most of the silk ties that held it tight to her body. Her eyes were tired.
Her mouth thinned when she saw me standing there, and I knew if I spoke she would refuse to listen. So I gestured entreaty and stepped backward, out of the candlelight and into the dark. I knew her well enough by this point to be sure of her curiosity. Her eyes narrowed suspiciously as I stepped away, but after a moment’s hesitation she followed me. She did not bring her sword.
It was a clear night, and we had a piece of moon to light our way. I led us up into the hills, away from the school, away from the scattered houses and shops of Haert.
We walked more than a mile before we came to the place I had chosen. A small grove of trees where a tall jumble of stone would keep any noise from carrying back toward the sleeping town.
The moonlight slanted in through the trees, revealing dark shapes in a tiny clear space tucked among the stones. There were two small wooden benches here. I took gentle hold of Vashet’s arm and guided her to sit.
Moving slowly, I reached into the deep leeward shadow of a nearby tree and brought out my shaed. I draped it carefully over a low-hanging branch so it hung like a dark curtain between us.
Then I sat on the other bench, bent, and worked the clasps on my lute case. As each of them snapped open, the lute within made a familiar harmonic thrum, as if eager to be free.
I brought it out and gently began to play.
I had tucked a piece of cloth inside the bowl of the lute to soften the sound, not wanting it to carry over the rocky hills. And I had woven some of the red thread between the strings. Partly to keep them from ringing too brightly, and partly out of a desperate hope that it might bring me luck.
I began with “In the Village Smithy.” I did not sing, worried Vashet would be offended if I went that far. But even without the words, it is a song that sounds like weeping. It is music that speaks of empty rooms and a chill bed and the loss of love.
Without pausing, I moved on to “Violet Bide,” then “Home Westward Wind.” The last had been a favorite of my mother’s, and as I played it I thought of her and began to cry.
Then I played the song that hides in the center of me.That wordless music that moves through the secret places in my heart. I played it carefully, strumming it slow and low into the dark stillness of the night. I would like to say it is a happy song, that it is sweet and bright, but it is not.
And, eventually, I stopped. The tips of my fingers burned and ached. It had been a month since I had played for any length of time, and they had lost their calluses.
Looking up, I saw Vashet had pulled my shaed aside and was watching me. The moon hung behind her, and I could not see the expression on her face.
“This is why I do not have knives instead of hands, Vashet,” I said quietly. “This is what I am.”
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED TWENTY-TWO
Leaving
THE NEXT MORNING I woke early, ate quickly, and was back in my room before most of the school was stirring in their beds.
I shouldered my lute and travelsack. I wrapped my shaed around me, checking that everything I needed was properly stowed in my pockets: red string, wax mommet, brittle iron, vial of water. Then I drew up the hood of my shaed and left the school, making my way to Vashet’s house.
Vashet opened the door between my second and third knock. She was shirtless, and stood bare-breasted in the doorway. She eyed me pointedly, taking note of my cloak, my travelsack, my lute.
“It is a morning for visitors,” she said. “Come in. The wind is chill this early.”
I stepped inside and tripped on the threshold, stumbling so that I had to rest my hand on Vashet’s shoulder to steady myself. My hand caught clumsily in her hair as I did so.
Vashet shook her head as she closed the door behind me. Unconcerned with her near-nakedness, she reached both her hands behind her head and began to plait half of her hanging hair into a short, tight braid.
“The sun was barely in the sky this morning when Penthe knocked on my door,” she said conversationally. “She knew I was angry with you. And though she did not know what you had done, she spoke on your behalf.”
Holding the braid with one hand, Vashet reached for a piece of red string and tied it off. “Then, almost before my door had time to close, Carceret paid me a visit. She congratulated me on finally giving you the treatment you deserve.”
She reached back to braid the other side of her hair, her fingers twisting nimbly. “Both of them irritated me. They had no place speaking to me about my student.”
Vashet tied off the second braid. “Then I thought to myself, whose opinion do I respect more?” She looked at me, making it a question for me to answer.
“You respect your own opinion more,” I said.
Vashet smiled widely. “You are exactly right. But Penthe is not entirely a fool either. And Carceret can be angry as a man when the mood is on her.”
She picked up a long piece of dark silk and wound it around her to
rso, over her shoulders and across her naked breasts, supporting and holding them close to her chest. Then she tucked the end of the cloth into itself and it somehow remained tightly secured. I had seen her do this several times before, but how it actually worked was still a mystery to me.
“And what have you decided?” I asked.
She shrugged her blood-red shirt over her head. “You are still a puzzle,” she said. “Gentle and troubling and clever and foolish.” Her head emerged from the shirt and she gave me a serious look. “But someone who breaks a puzzle because they cannot solve it has left the Lethani. I am not such a one.”
“I am glad,” I said. “I would not have enjoyed leaving Haert.”
Vashet raised an eyebrow at that. “I daresay you would not.” She gestured at the lute case that hung over my shoulder. “Leave that here, or people will talk. Leave your bag too. You can take them back to your room later.”
She looked at me speculatively. “But bring the cloak. I will show you how to fight while wearing it. Such things can be useful, but only if you can avoid tripping over them.”
I went back to my training almost as if nothing had happened. Vashet showed me how to avoid tripping over my own cloak. How it could be used to bind a weapon or disarm the unwary. She commented on it being very fine, strong, and durable, but never seemed to note anything unusual about it.
Days passed. I continued to spar with Celean and eventually learned to protect my precious manhood from all forms of uncouth attack. Slowly, I grew skilled enough that we were nearly even in our bouts, trading victories back and forth.
There were even a handful of conversations with Penthe at mealtimes, and I was glad to have one other person willing to occasionally smile in my direction.
But I was no longer at my ease in Haert. I had come too close to disaster. Whenever I spoke to Vashet I thought twice about every word. Some words I thought about three times.
And while Vashet seemed to return to her familiar wry and smiling self, I would catch her watching me from time to time, her face grim, her eyes intent.
As the days passed, the tension between us gradually wore away, fading as slowly as the bruises on my face. I like to think eventually it would have disappeared entirely. But we were not given enough time for that.
It came like lightning from the clear blue sky.
Vashet opened her door to my knock. But instead of coming outside, she stood in the doorway. “Tomorrow is your test,” she said.
For a second, I didn’t understand what she was talking about. I had been focusing so intently on my sword practice, my sparring with Celean, the language, the Lethani. I had almost forgotten the purpose of it all.
I felt a rush of excitement in my chest, followed by a chill knot in my stomach. “Tomorrow?” I said stupidly.
She nodded, smiling faintly at my expression.
Her subdued response did little to set me at my ease. “So soon?”
“Shehyn feels it would be best. If we wait another month, there could be early snow, keeping you from going freely on your way.”
I hesitated, then said, “You aren’t telling me the whole truth, Vashet.”
Another faint smile and a small shrug. “You’re right in that, though Shehyn does think waiting is unwise. You are charming, in your clumsy barbarian way. The longer you are here, the more folk will come to feel kindly toward you....”
I felt the chill settle deeper into my gut. “And if I am to be mutilated, it would be better if it were done before more folk realize I’m actually a real person and not some faceless barbarian,” I said harshly, though not as harshly as I wanted to.
Vashet looked down, then nodded. “You would not have heard. But Penthe blackened Carceret’s eye two days ago in an argument about you. Celean too, has grown fond of you, and talks to the other children. They watch you from the trees while you train.” She was still for a moment. “And there are others.”
I knew enough after all this time to read Vashet’s small silence for what it really meant. Suddenly her muted mood, her stillness made much better sense.
“Shehyn must attend to the best interests of the school,” Vashet said. “She must decide according to what is right. She cannot allow herself to be swayed by the fact that some few are fond of you. At the same time, if she makes a correct decision and many in the school resent it, that is not good either.” Another shrug. “So.”
“Am I ready?”
Vashet was quiet for a long time. “That’s not an easy question,” she said. “Being invited to the school isn’t merely a matter of skill. It is a test of fit, of suitability. If one of us fails, we can try again. Tempi took his test four times before he was admitted. For you there will only be one chance.” She looked up at me. “And ready or not, it is time.”
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED TWENTY-THREE
The Spinning Leaf
THE NEXT MORNING VASHET came to collect me just as I was finishing my breakfast. “Come,” she said. “Carceret has been praying for a storm all night, but it’s only gusting.”
I didn’t know what that meant, but I didn’t feel like asking either. I returned my wooden plate and turned around to find Penthe standing there, a slight yellowing bruise along her jawline.
Penthe didn’t say anything, merely gripped my arms in an open show of support. Then she hugged me tightly. I was surprised when her head only came up to my chest. I’d forgotten how small she was. The dining room was even more quiet than normal, and while no one was staring, everyone was watching.
Vashet walked me to the tiny park where we had first met and began our usual limbering stretch. The routine of it relaxed me, lulling my anxiety to a dull rumble. When we were finished,Vashet led me down into the hidden valley of the sword tree. I wasn’t surprised. Where else would the test take place?
There were a dozen people scattered in the open field around the tree. Most of them were dressed in mercenary reds, but I saw three wearing lighter clothes. I guessed they were important members of the community, or perhaps retired mercenaries still involved with the school.
Vashet pointed toward the tree. At first I thought she was drawing my attention to the motion of it. It was, as she had said, a rather blustery day, and the branches lashed wildly at the empty air. Then I saw a glint of metal against its trunk. Looking more closely, I could see a sword there, tied to the trunk of the tree.
I thought of Celean dancing among the sharp leaves to slap the trunk of the tree. Of course.
“There are several items around the base of the tree,”Vashet said. “Your test is to go in, choose one, and bring it out again.”
“This is the test?” I demanded. It came out a little sharper than I’d planned. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Why didn’t you ask?” she countered dryly, then laid her hand gently on my arm. “I would have,” she said. “Eventually. But I knew if I told you too soon, you would try your hand at it and hurt yourself.”
“Well thank God we saved that for today,” I said, then sighed. Resigned apology . “What happens if I go in there and get cut to ribbons?”
“Getting cut is usually a given,” she said and pulled aside the neck of her shirt, revealing a pair of familiar pale, thin scars on her shoulder. “The question is how much, and where, and how you behave.” She shrugged her shirt back into place. “The leaves will not cut deep, but be careful of your face and neck. The places where vessels and tendons are close to the surface. A cut on your chest or arm can be mended easily. Less so a severed ear.”
I watched the tree as it caught a gust of wind, branches flailing madly. “What keeps a person from crawling there on hands and knees?”
“Pride,” she said, her eyes searching my face. “Will you be known as the one who crawled during his test?”
I nodded. This was an issue for me especially. As a barbarian, I had twice as much to prove.
I looked at the tree again. It was thirty feet from the edge of the lashing branches to the trunk. I thought back to the s
cars I’d seen on Tempi’s body, on Carceret’s face. “So this is a test of nerve,” I said. “A test of pride.”
“It is a test of many things,” Vashet said. “Your behavior signifies a great deal. You could throw your arms over your face and rush ahead. The straightest line is quickest, after all. But what does that reveal of you? Are you a bull that charges blindly? Are you an animal without subtlety or grace?” She shook her head, frowning. “I expect better from a student of mine.”
I squinted my eyes, trying to see what other items were gathered around the tree. “I suppose I’m not allowed to ask what the proper choice is.”
“There are many proper choices, and many more improper ones. It is different for everyone. The item you bring back reveals much. What you do with the item afterward reveals much. How you comport yourself reveals much.” She shrugged. “All these things Shehyn will consider before deciding if you are to be admitted into the school.”
“If Shehyn is the one to decide, why are all these others here?”
Vashet forced a smile, and I saw anxiety lurking deep in her eyes. “Shehyn does not embody the entire school herself.” She gestured to the distant Adem standing around the sword tree. “Less does she represent the entirety of the path of the Latantha.”
I looked around and realized the handful of non-red shirts were not light, but white. These were the heads of other schools. They had traveled here to see the barbarian take his test.
“Is this usual?” I asked.
Vashet shook her head. “I could feign ignorance. But I suspect Carceret spread word.”
“Can they overrule Shehyn’s decision?” I asked.
Vashet shook her head. “No. It is her school, her decision. No one would dispute her right to make it.” At her side, her hand flicked. However.