'Looks like it has a nice edge.'
'Nice! This sword could shave the wind and not leave a whisker. In fact—' Herewiss looked around the room for something to try it on. 'In fact—' He moved toward the grindstone, grinning with wicked merriment.
'Are you going to — Dusty, you're, you've got to be—'
Herewiss took the sword two-handed, swung it up behind his head, felt a wild joy as the Flame ran up through his arms and into the blade, poised, waiting. He brought it sweeping down hard, channeling the Fire down into the striking fulcrum of the sword, as he had been taught to channel the force of his arms. The blade struck the grindstone and clove it in two, kept on going and smote through the oak framework, kept on going and finally struck the floor, slitting it a foot deep like a knife cutting into a cheese. The grindstone smashed in pieces to the floor, leaving no mark on the shining gray surface.
Herewiss stood up straight, turned and grinned at Freelorn. 'Showoff,' Freelorn said, grinning back.
'Have I ever denied it? Lorn, I'm ripe, serves me right for sleeping in my clothes. Come on, let's take a bath.'
'There's hardly enough water in your cistern for that—'
Herewiss drew himself up to his full height. 'That,' he said smugly, 'can be fixed . . .'
By afternoon it had rained four times, once with a mad magnificence of thunder, and lightning like fireworks; and the knobby barren sage around the hold was in bloom a month early. Freelorn's people were walking around with grins almost wide enough to match Herewiss's. Despite the terror, they had been present at a miracle, or something that could pass for one, and they were also relishing the prospect of seeing Freelorn back on his throne again, escorted there by Herewiss's Flame.
For a while that afternoon Herewiss sat down in the great hall, one arm around Freelorn and the other hand holding the sword across his knees, answering all the questions about how it felt and where the hralcins had come from and what had happened to Sunspark and what Herewiss was going to do now. When Segnbora asked that one, Herewiss looked sidewise at Freelorn and smiled.
'How much did you say you got, Lorn?' 'Eight thousand.'
'Mmm. We could bribe a lot of people with that.' 'Or hire a lot of soldiers.'
'Lorn, I'd still rather sidestep that solution. When you're king, your people will bless your name for taking Throne and Stave without bloodshed. And with this—' he rapped one knuckle against Freelorn's skull — 'and this—' he lifted up the sword — 'we should be able to work something out. But as soon as you people are ready, maybe in a few days, when we're all rested, we'll start heading west. The Arlenes have been without a child of the Lion's line for six years now, and the effects are beginning to show. It's time something was done about it.'
He got up, and they stood with him, nodding and murmuring agreement. 'I have a few things to take care of,' he said to them all, 'so I'll see you around dinnertime. Is there enough of that deer left?'
'We'll get another,' Dritt said, and smiled. 'This is too important an occasion for leftovers.'
They headed for the door, Segnbora walking slowly behind the rest of them. She looked very tired. Herewiss glanced at Freelorn, and Lorn nodded and went off to the back of the hall to be busy elsewhere for a moment.
'Segnbora—'
She turned as Herewiss came up behind her. 'Yes?' she said. She held herself proudly erect, as usual, with her hand on her sword hilt. The prideful stance wouldn't have fooled anyone, with or without underhearing.
He reached out, took that terribly capable-looking hand in his and raised it to his lips. 'It was a valiant gesture,' he said, 'even though it didn't work for long. You gave all you had to give, and you bought me the time I needed, one way or the other. Without you we would have all been someone's dinner last night.'
She smiled at him, but her eyes were still very very tired. 'I see what you're saying, Herewiss,' she said. 'Thank you.' He started to let go of her hand, but she bespoke him suddenly. (I'm as sorry for you, though, as I am for myself. You may be fooling the rest of them, even Freelorn perhaps, but not me. Somehow or other, my perceptions tell me, you've paid more for your Power than you'd thought to. And worse than that, though you have the Fire indeed, you also still have all your problems. A new grief to replace your old one, a king to put on his throne without any sure idea of how to do it — and, worst of all, no real idea of what you yourself will do when you're finished with that.)
He stared at her, too incredulous to really hear the compassion in her voice.
She was still smiling faintly, sadly. (They really pushed us at Nhairedi,) she said. (Too hard, I think. See you later.)
She turned, and went outside.
Herewiss walked slowly back to Freelorn, looking sober, and Freelorn nodded and slipped his arms around Herewiss again. 'It does seem a shame about her,' he said.
'Yeah.'
'You never did tell me if this ridiculous chunk of steel had a name.'
'Oh, it has,' Herewiss said, smiling again, holding the sword up before him. 'I haven't done the whole blood-and-four-elements number on it yet — well, actually, it's had the blood — but whatever. Its name is Khavrinen.'
'Mmph. Trust you to go for something obscure.''No, it's in the original Brightwood dialect of Darthene, a few hundred years removed from Nhaired. You could render it as HarrowHeart.'
'Mmmm . . .'
'I mean, really, Lorn. Was ever heart harrowed as mine was last night?'
'If it was,' Freelorn said with a slow smile, 'I'm sure that whoever wrote the ballad about it divorced the emotion from the reality somewhat.'
They stood smiling at one another, Herewiss's face between his hands, long and passionately.
and Freelorn reached up, took pulled it down, and kissed him
'We've been all over you all day,' he said. 'I'm going out with them so you can have some time by yourself.'
'You know,' Herewiss said, 'I think I love you.'
'And I, you,' Freelorn said, and reluctantly — with a longing backward look — hurried out after his people.
The first thing Herewiss did when he got back to the tower room was find the old spear he had carried with him on all his travels since Herelaf's death. Khavrinen made short work of it, and Herewiss threw the splintered remains out the window, chuckling all the while.
The second thing he did was to send word to Hearn about what had happened, while he rooted around in the room for the materials necessary to finish the sword. The Wardress should be in the Wood this time of month, with the full Moon just past, he thought. (Kerim!) he called, digging around in his chest for the sword- fittings he'd been saving.
(What? What? Who's that?)
(It's Herewiss, Lord Hearn's son—) (Impossible! I smell Flame!)
(Impossible?) Herewiss laughed. (I'll show you impossible!) He bound sight into the linkage between them, and held Khavrinen before his eyes, pushing Flame into it. The sword blazed like a blue noon.
(Dear Mother of Everything—)
(She is that, every bit of it,) Herewiss agreed. (Kerim, will you give my father a message?)
(Why . . . why, surely, but Herewiss, how, how . . .)
(Say to Hearn that his son sends him greetings, and bids him know that the Phoenix is risen again, though the fire is blue this time. Say also to him that the name of my focus is Khavrinen. Will you do that?)
(Certainly, but Herewiss—)
(I'll let you have a look at it when I get back to the Wood,) he said. (Be nice to your students, Kerim.)
(But-)
Herewiss cut the contact and found the sword-fittings. 'Spark,' he said, 'I'm going to need—'
He fell silent. A pillar of fire, torn, devoured, gone, and only a dark space where a bright lance of flame had defied the long night.