“You have made a true friend,” Caliphestros muses to the tracker, allowing the slight — and, he knows, somewhat absurd — jealousy that he feels to reveal itself plainly in the tone of his words.
“She honors me, my lord,” Keera says. “But such adversities as the two of you have conquered together must surely have marked you as forever her closest friend.”
“And here are your vaunted books, my lord,” Veloc calls, having reached one of Caliphestros’s rough-hewn shelves in the cave walls, upon which sit many of the former Second Minister of Broken’s volumes. “Even in a cave, so many — yet have they truly aided the creation of this wondrous home?”
“More than you could likely comprehend, Veloc,” the old man answers. “These are but a small part of the collection that I brought with me to Broken, and built upon during my years there. And, with a few exceptions, they were chosen because they had some relevance to my survival in this place, and to the final reckoning with Broken that I first prayed, then later hoped, and finally believed would come: hence, as you see, I have pored time and again over examinations of history and medicine, of science and war, and of the realms in which science and war merge — those of metallurgy and chemistry.”
Heldo-Bah, having detected attractive aromas emerging from a large iron pot that sits on the edge of the cookstove’s surface, has begun to lift its lid; but at these last words, he drops it noisily. “Alchemy!” he cries, glancing from Veloc to Keera quickly. “So — that is why they exiled you from Broken!”
Caliphestros only tilts his head judiciously. “If, by that ridiculous outburst, you mean to say that the rulers of the great city and its kingdom were, in the end, as superstitious, ignorant, and hostile to reason and knowledge as yourself, Heldo-Bah, then you are correct.”
“Oho!” the impertinent forager scoffs. “You call alchemy reason, do you? And attempting to transform base metals into gold is evidence of high scientific wisdom, I suppose? Tell me, then — do you also abuse yourself out in the great Wood, spending your seed into holes the ground and attempting to grow tiny men like vegetables?”†
Caliphestros sighs, heavily. “Only imagine the blessèd silence, Keera, were he gone … He would feel little pain, I promise you: only the brief stab of Stasi’s largest teeth into the great artery of his neck, and his life’s blood would quickly and quietly stream away …”‡
Keera laughs quietly (for she has ceased to believe, rightly, that the old man intends Heldo-Bah actual harm), and says only, “We seem to have far too many things to pack and carry, my lord, to allow the loss of even one bearer. And, as I have said, he can carry a great deal.”
“Very well. I shall trust your word, and let the matter rest.” Lifting his head to call to the sharp-toothed Bane again, Caliphestros says, “Heldo-Bah, allow me to propose a more practical test of what you ignorantly call ‘alchemy’: the weapons that you and Veloc carry — I believe that I noted two rather well-crafted short-swords of Broken manufacture among them. Is this so?”
“Indeed it is,” Heldo-Bah crows. “Veloc’s was taken, just days ago, from one of our own Outragers, who had stolen it, I suspect, while undertaking one of his errands of murder and imagined justice for the Moon priestess. My own, however, came directly from a member of Lord Baster-kin’s Guard, whom I myself subdued!” And with that, Heldo-Bah unsheathes the sword and brings it out from under his cloak, holding its unarguably fine blade out toward his host.
Caliphestros nods silently, taking one or two steps toward Heldo-Bah and seemingly impressed by both the blade and its origins. But then it becomes plain that he has stepped less toward Heldo-Bah than in the direction of his own bedding, where, in a quick movement not at all encumbered by his crutches, he reaches beneath his sack of goose down and produces a sword of his own. Though not so elegant as either Heldo-Bah’s or Veloc’s, especially in the crafting of its hilt, handle, and pommel, the sword nevertheless has a peculiar and impressive effect on the three Bane, achieved primarily through the ripples of cold blue-grey that seem shot through its carefully honed, single-edged blade of moderate length.
“And suppose I were to tell you,” the old man says amiably, still holding his weapon out and toward Heldo-Bah, who uneasily but quickly moves his own blade into a position of defense, “that I could offer you something better — far better, in fact? Would you still cling so tightly to your prize?”
Further unnerved by Caliphestros’s attitude — which is less one of threat than of confidence — Heldo-Bah says only, “If you think to trick me into some sort of barter for that unadorned slab of steel, old man, I tell you that you would as likely persuade me to put my head in your companion’s maw.”
Once again, Caliphestros nods with seeming indifference; he then moves his own blade up and down casually, gripping its deerskin-wrapped handle with his right hand lightly—
And suddenly, in a pair of movements that seem to the foragers far too quick for a crippled old man to achieve, Caliphestros releases the pressure of his right armpit on the corresponding crutch, letting it clatter to the cave floor as he shifts all of his weight leftward, onto his wooden leg and remaining crutch. Even as he does this, he raises his right arm and his sword swiftly and brings the strangely tinted length of steel down with great force on Heldo-Bah’s blade. When all is still once more, Heldo-Bah stands in precisely the same attitude, save that his eyes have gone wide as they look down to see that the prize he took from the unfortunate young member of Lord Baster-kin’s Guard has been severed by Caliphestros’s seemingly humble blade. The piercing tip of the Bane’s once-proud trophy, along with more than a foot of the best Broken steel, now lie on the cave floor.
{iv:}
Caliphestros examines the cutting edge of his own sword, and frowns slightly. “Hmm — not so clean as I would have liked,” he says calmly. “I seem to have nicked the edge of my blade, a bit …”
“Truly?” Veloc says in amazed derision. “Nicked it a bit? How unacceptable …”
Heldo-Bah’s head slowly shakes in disbelief, before nodding with envy; and finally, when he regains his complete composure, he casts his diminished sword to the cave floor as thoughtlessly as he stole it. He then fairly leaps to Caliphestros’s side, and anxiously indicates the blade that Keera has also moved closer to examine. “May I–Lord Caliphestros, may I have this one? It’s only fair, after all, now that you’ve rendered mine useless.”
Caliphestros shrugs. “If you wish,” he says. “I have several more like it.”
Heldo-Bah takes Caliphestros’s sword from the old man and gauges its weight. “So light!” he pronounces. “By the Moon, Veloc — we could sweep through the Tall as though they were so much wheat, had we blades the like of this!”
“Aye, Heldo-Bah,” Veloc replies, “I can already envision the historical epics I shall compose and relate, concerning the swords of the Bane that dealt mighty blows to the Tall and their kingdom.”
Caliphestros’s tone turns momentarily harsh. “You will be tempted to think you can achieve such feats, as would almost any people who have been maligned and subdued for so long, and who suddenly find themselves offered the chance for forceful redress; but the weapons are useless unless one learns the proper ways in which to use them. Repeat that phrase to yourself, Heldo-Bah, from now ‘till we reach Okot; nay, until we find ourselves, one day, before the gates of Broken itself. And if you can believe it, at length, and make your people believe it, then we may, we just may, succeed …”