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‘Berren!’ Tarn was beckoning him, holding a waster. He had a nasty smile on his face. The two men in the fighting square raised their swords to salute one another and then withdrew, sitting heavily down at the edge of the square and wiping their brows. Berren squinted and Tarn started to laugh. ‘Come on! Or are you afraid of me?’

You’re trying to make me angry? Berren rubbed his eyes. He walked smartly across to Tarn and snatched one of the wasters out of his hands. When he held it, he couldn’t help but smile. It had been such a long time, and yet it felt like it was a part of him at once, an extension of his arm. He twirled it, wondering how much more he’d remember. Then he walked to the middle of the fighting square and held it out in front of him, straight and level. He pointed the tip of it at Tarn the way he used to practise with Tasahre. Either this waster was lighter than the one he’d used among the sword-monks or else the years at sea had made him stronger. All the weariness, the stuffiness inside his head, all of that was draining away. He felt sharp like lightning and as pitilessly cold as ice.

Tarn made a face. He stepped into the square too, holding his waster loose, peering at Berren and looking puzzled. ‘What in the name of Kelm’s dick are you doing? You think you’re some sort of duellist? This is a battlefield, son. There are people fighting and dying all around you.’ He pointed to Berren’s left. ‘There. You’ve got a friend there and he’s face to face with someone you’ve never seen before who wants to kill both of you. Their hilts are locked together. They’re pushing and snarling and there’s a madness in their eyes and — oh — someone else just skewered your friend with a spear and now he’s dead.’ Tarn paced back and forth outside Berren’s reach. Berren tracked him with the point of his waster. ‘On the other side of you, a man you’ve known for years has just had his arm hacked clean off. He’s been doing this for longer than you, eight years with this his ninth. Each year he’s put his pay somewhere safe. Like most of your friends here, he thinks he’s going to stop this soldiering one day and buy himself a piece of land and start a farm. He’ll marry a nice girl and raise a fistful of sons who’ll never see a sword in their lives if he has anything to do with it. Unlike the rest of your friends, he means it. And now you’ve got his blood spraying over your face. One-armed farmers aren’t much use. Neither are one-armed soldiers, but that probably doesn’t matter since he’s going to bleed out before your eyes. You could stop to finish him off. A mercy maybe, but no, you’re standing there, doing nothing, pointing your sword out like some prick. Maybe it doesn’t matter about your friends — you’ve got plenty more after all — but now there’s arrows raining down and they’re scurrying away, the ones who don’t get skewered as they flee.’

Tarn stopped pacing. He stared at Berren, almost in disbelief. In all the time he’d been talking, Berren’s sword hadn’t wavered at all. Ten minutes a day, every day, rain or shine, Tasahre had made him do this and he’d never quite understood why. He’d thought it had been about building the strength in his arm. Maybe it was, but he could see now that it had been more than that. The look in Tarn’s face showed him. This was a fight he’d already won.

He started to move, one slow step at a time, the end of the waster kept pointed right between Tarn’s eyes. Tarn backed away and Berren moved after him. After all this time his footwork was sloppy. Tasahre would have scolded him.

Tarn circled, keeping space behind him and his waster up on guard, wise enough not to be backed into a corner. Berren lunged. He couldn’t jump the way a sword-monk could jump, but it was still quick enough and far enough to take Tarn by surprise. He blocked Berren’s waster awkwardly, tried a riposte but he was much too slow. Berren knocked it aside, tapped Tarn hard on the hip as he turned his parry into a cut and then, in the same motion, let the end of his waster come to rest touching the side of Tarn’s neck.

‘Your friend who taught you everything that matters lies at your feet,’ he said. ‘You have her blood on your hands. You watch as it pools on the wooden deck beneath your feet. She’s dead because you interfered. Because you thought you could make something better. Because you couldn’t stay out of what wasn’t your business.’ He let the sword stay touching Tarn’s neck for another second and then backed away and gave the sword-monk salute. Tarn stared at him, eyes wide.

‘Gods,’ he murmured. ‘Who are you?’

Berren took a deep breath and rubbed his head. Now the fight was done, his hangover was coming back.

‘Well, Syannis didn’t teach him that,’ he heard Silvestre say behind him.

‘No, he certainly didn’t.’

There was awe in Talon’s voice. The sword-master sniffed. ‘Well he’s clearly not a donkey. Feet were ropey but we can work on that.’ He clapped Berren on the shoulder. ‘Welcome to my house, Berren. When we’re training, you can call me Sword-Master or Teacher. When we’re done, then you can call me Master Silvestre and pay for my beer.’

Berren only half heard him. He was smiling. In the fight with Tarn he’d felt Tasahre beside him, watching him, guiding him, moulding his shape and his movement as she used to do. For a moment he’d found a feeling that he’d forgotten could exist. Inside his head he’d felt at peace.

7

THE COMPANY OF MERCENARIES

Berren got up early in the morning every day after that and trudged up the slope to the house of Silvestre, arriving before dawn. Tarn came with him. For two hours they exercised, sometimes on their own, sometimes with others. It was a familiar routine, like the one he’d grown used to among the sword-monks of Deephaven. After that came breakfast and then Silvestre would sit them all down and talk. Sometimes he’d talk about swords, sometimes he’d talk about wars, sometimes about anything at all. As a teacher he was all fire and passion and temper, as different from Tasahre as Berren could imagine. He’d fought in a dozen battles, he’d spent what sounded like half his life as a pirate, half of it as a thief, most of it as a soldier and almost all of it chasing after one woman or another. With the scraps and scrapes he’d been in, it was a wonder he was still alive; yet whenever they took a break to rest and drink, another story would come of how he’d been chased through the straits of somewhere or other by the sun-king’s navy, or how he’d stolen the first farscope in Caladir from the Taiytakei emissary there, or how he’d almost been caught making love to some countess and had only escaped by wearing one of her dresses and hiding in a closet for an hour. Berren suspected much was simply made up, but he listened anyway. Silvestre was as good at telling his stories as he was with his sword: everything he did came with a little flourish. Even when he fought, he couldn’t resist just a little bit of showing off.