20
A SWORD-MONK LEARNS A LESSON

‘You’re late.’ Tasahre held her sword perfectly still. Berren matched her. Now and then they both glanced at the sky. The seasons were changing. The clouds above warned of afternoon summer rains come early.

The sword-monk’s face was bruised. She had an ugly brown and purple splodge on her left cheek where someone had punched her. Berren knew better than to ask how she’d come by it.

‘Yes. I’m living in the temple now. I had things to do.’ Which was another way of saying that he’d nodded to his master as he’d left and and the thief-taker had nodded back, just like on any other day, and then he’d made his way slowly across the city, taking in the dawn sights and the sun, ambling at his own pace to The Peak and the new life that was waiting for him. It felt like he was being sent to prison. He stared hard at the bruise on Tasahre’s face. Maybe he could make her feel conscious of it.

‘I have heard.’ Tasahre didn’t blink. If she noticed him staring, it didn’t show. ‘The temple does you and your master a great honour. I hope you both deserve it.’

‘Master Sy has many friends among the priests here. He’s done a lot for them.’ Not that Berren knew exactly what the thief-taker had done. Whatever it was, it had obviously been enough to survive Prince Sharda forcing them to teach Berren, despite his master’s grumbles.

They looked at each other across the circle in the dirt. Eight minutes gone. Tasahre still had the hourglass balanced on the flat of her blade, still held it perfectly still. Berren had a waster again. His precious sword had stayed at Wrecking Point. There were hiding places galore up there. At the end of the path where they’d tipped the bodies only the night before, he and Master Sy had finally practised, steel against steel. As night-time fell, they’d looked over the edge one last time. The sea and the tides had done their job and there was no sign of the men they’d killed. He’d held the blade he’d taken from the dead snuffer and looked at it for a while; then he’d clambered among the rocks away from the path, wrapped it carefully in a sheet that Master Sy had brought for him and slid it between a pair of boulders. He’d covered it with sand and earth and taken a good look at where he was. It would be a while, he knew, before he could go back. At least until then, it was somewhere safe. Until he needed it. And for one glorious day, he’d been a true swordsman …

‘This is something to do with the people who drove your master here, is it not?’

Berren stared at the bruise.

‘I’ve heard his story. An unusual one. Do you believe what he tells you?’

Mute, Berren nodded. He glanced hopefully at the hourglass. Eight and a half minutes. He could already feel the first twitches in the muscles that ran along the top of his shoulder. ‘He told me bits.’ There had to be a way to distract her, didn’t there?

Tasahre raised her eyebrows the tiniest fraction. ‘The priests have told me that your master is the bastard son of a king from a province on the far reaches of the sun-king’s dominion. They say that a cabal of death-mages fleeing from the sun-king’s witch-breakers took up residence there and that the king was foolish enough to welcome them, for whatever reason. I am told that the princes of the great city of Kalda raised an army, broke the cabal and scattered them. I know that in war, tragedies fall upon the innocent and the guilty alike.’

Berren’s arm was shaking. Half a minute to go. Anger, that would do him. The thief-taker’s anger, the rage that simmered beneath the surface whenever he talked about the past. They were an invading army. Imagine you’d been here in the civil war, Berren. Imagine you were Pelean’s brother, seeing him crucified over Pelean’s Gate, listening to his screams. Then you’ll see what happened in Tethis as I see it … The shaking reached his blade, but his arm still held it level and there were only a few more grains left to go.

Tasahre blinked. ‘How did he come to be a thief-taker? It seems an unusual choice. Do you know?’

No, he didn’t, he didn’t have a clue, that was the simple answer. But Berren couldn’t even shake his head now. His shoulder screamed at him. The last grain of sand tumbled to the bottom of the hourglass. Gritting his teeth, he kept his sword exactly where it was. Tasahre stayed quite still for a few seconds more, then flipped the hourglass into the air and caught it as she sheathed her steel.

‘Well done.’ She almost smiled.

Berren let his sword down slowly. What he wanted was to hug his arm to his chest and hop in circles wailing and moaning until his shoulder forgave him, but he wasn’t going to let her have that.

‘Guard.’ She walked around him in a circle and adjusted the angles of his wrist and his elbow.

‘He wasn’t the only one who came here, though,’ said Berren. ‘I know that much.’

Tasahre stood in front of him. She picked up a waster and they settled into the usual routine of slow cuts and thrusts to start with, all easily parried.

‘He had a friend, a real friend, called Kasmin. He came to Deephaven a year or two earlier. He was a thief-taker too and then he used to run an alehouse in The Maze. Someone killed him, just before you came.’ Berren watched her closely for any sign that she recognised the name but her face gave nothing away.

‘Your justicar told us this. They, too, were friends once it seems. I’m sorry for your master’s loss,’ she said as they stood apart for a moment. ‘Who is the Headsman?’

The question caught him off-guard. ‘Master Sy’s going to kill him.’ The words blurted out without him thinking. Tasahre cocked her head as Berren cursed himself. He was supposed to be catching her out, not the other way around!

‘The elder dragon tells us that great swordsmen never kill. They do not need to. Their presence is enough.’ She frowned, as if she didn’t quite understand how that could work. Berren had seen it, though. It was the same thing that Master Sy always said, that a good thief-taker never needed to draw his blade, that the thieves should always be too scared to do anything except what the thief-taker wanted them to do. Yes, he’d seen plenty of that over the years. He’d seen Master Sy at work and the fear that followed him.

On the other hand, he’d seen Master Sy kill men too. They set to work again, faster now.

‘Is it true that a sun-priest can talk to the spirits of the dead?’ Velgian. He was thinking of Velgian again, dead and desiccating in the city catacombs. ‘They caught the man who tried to kill Prince Sharda.’

Again her face gave nothing away. ‘Yes.’ She cocked her head. ‘This was some weeks ago was it not? And your justicar wishes to know who the paymaster was. But as for what a priest can and cannot do, you must ask one of them, not me. Sometimes it is not a matter of what is possible, but of what is right. Your justicar keeps a dead man hidden beneath the earth where the sun cannot reach him to take his soul. That is not right.’

‘There’s always the witch-doctor down on the docks.’ Berren watched closely again and this time he got his reward. Tasahre scowled.

‘The creature that lives in the House of Cats and Gulls is a corrupter, an abomination. From men like that every word comes with a heavy price.’

‘Is he a wizard?’ But he’s been to see the grey wizard too! They got their own thing going, that’s what the Headsman’s snuffer had said. Berren shuddered. The witch-doctor’s house scared him.

‘I do not know what he is. Evil. That is enough.’ He’d rattled her somehow. Her timing was slightly off and there was a tension in her movement. ‘Stop, stop! Stay as you are.’ She dropped her waster and moved sharply to one side, kicking his front foot. ‘Further apart! Your stance is too narrow.’ She gave him a hard shove from the side, staggering him. ‘See? Now, in guard.’

She went and stood behind him again. He felt her chest against his back as she reached around him and moved his arms. She was breathing a little fast. Her hands on his wrists felt hot. Berren’s skin tingled.

A fat splat of rain landed on his arm. Both of them looked up. The clouds were breaking.

‘Some say he’s a sorcerer.’

‘There are no sorcerers in Deephaven.’

‘Why not?’ Keep her unsettled, unfocussed. Then catch her with her guard down! Master Sy’s last words of advice.

Berren felt another moment of tension run through her, down her shoulders to her hands. ‘Because they’re all in Varr,’ she said. ‘Because the Usurper’s son desires a glimpse of the glories this world knew before the silver kings waged war on the gods. He scours the realms for any who are skilled in the fickle arcane.’ Her hands fell away. Spatters of rain pock-marked the fighting circle. ‘Guard! Again.’ She came at him once more, faster than before.

‘Is he a bad man, the Emperor?’ Berren dodged and parried. He felt fast today. Alive. Maybe it was the rain, the talk of sorcerers, the feel of Tasahre’s touch still on his skin, or maybe he was finally learning what she was trying to teach him. For a moment he was almost as quick as she was.

‘I cannot say. As emperors go he has been wise and just and fair. But he is an emperor nevertheless and is set on his course. He follows the Usurper in turning his back on the sun. In the end he would not spurn a tool, however black, if its edge was sharp and could be turned to his purpose. So the abominations go to Varr and the Emperor’s gold fills their pockets.’ The rain was starting in earnest now. He could feel its coldness prodding at his skin. The skies were opening.

‘A sorcerer saved my life once.’ That was probably an exaggeration, but why did she call them abominations? ‘Master Sy said the witch-doctor saved his, too. So is he a wizard?’ Tasahre came at him hard, blow after blow. If she was holding anything back, it wasn’t much. Still, he parried most of them and she was getting careless.

‘Focus on the blade!’ She feinted and caught him a bruising crack on the knee.

‘I mean a grey wizard.’ Heavier and heavier came the rain. Water ran down his forehead, out of his hair towards his eyes. He flicked it away.

Tasahre’s face drew taut. Her waster snapped at his head with three sharp blows which he managed to block and then came a hard lunge to his ribs which he didn’t. He tried not to wince. That one was going to hurt. ‘The creature on the docks is worse than an abomination, it is an anathema. It is only a matter of time before it draws the wrath of the sun.’

He couldn’t be that terrible, could he? The witch-doctor was a friend to Master Sy, and the thief-taker was hardly evil. Angry sometimes, and gods help you if you were on the wrong side of his steel, but he was still a servant of the city and Berren had seen kindness in him more often than spite.

They were both soaked now. Their light clothes clung to their skin. Most of the time, Tasahre looked more like a boy with her short cropped hair and the sunburst tattoo breaking the lines of her face; most of the time, but not now.

The prince’s token around his neck seemed to burn, urging him away. Rain ran in rivers down his face, down his arms, and suddenly it was there, the opening he’d been looking for. Maybe Tasahre caught an inkling of what was on his mind, or maybe even sword-monks made mistakes from time to time. Whatever it was, Berren didn’t care, because for an instant he was inside her guard. He dropped his waster, lunged and rammed her with his shoulder. He grabbed her arm, jabbed at her ribs with his elbow and reached a foot between her legs to sweep her over, all at once. She staggered, and then his foot caught her and she went down with Berren on top of her. He grabbed her other arm. She was still as quick as a snake, every bit as strong as him and he wasn’t even much heavier, but this was what Master Sy had shown him, and he’d meant it to work on men twice his size. She almost wriggled free, but then he had her down flat on her back, sitting astride her, pinning her arms with his knees and his hands. Rain dripped from his hair into her face. She looked furious.

‘What are you doing?’

His hands wanted to touch her, but that meant letting go and he didn’t dare. ‘Concede.’

She almost laughed at him. ‘What?’

‘Concede. Surrender!’

‘Why?’

‘I’ve got you.’

‘You are as paralysed as I.’

‘I’m on top.’

‘If you move, I will be free. If this were a fight, how would you kill me?’

‘I could bite your face off I suppose.’

‘If you come close enough, I will bite yours first.’

He tried not to think about that. His heart was racing.

Beneath him, Tasahre bucked, heaving him upwards. The next thing he knew, she had her legs around his chest and a bear-like force had grabbed him, tearing him backwards, and then he was flat on his back and Tasahre was on top of him, arms and legs all tangled together, with two fingertips at his throat. ‘If that was a fight then this is a knife and you are dead. Now get up.’

She seemed to pause for a moment more than needed before she sprang away. For the rest of their practice time she fought with cold unforgiving precision. The rain came down and made no difference at all. But afterwards, in the steamy evening twilight before sunset prayers, she took him back with her to the yard.

‘Show me again how you did that,’ she said.