The Dagger of Adendigaeth (A Pattern of Shadow & Light) (91 page)

Ean wasn’t so certain, but he was grateful for Ramu’s compassion—such a far
leap from Markal’s churlish instruction. With the
drachwyr
still holding the blade, Ean wrapped his hand around the hilt, feeling the cold stone—so impossibly hard and unyielding. It immediately began leeching the warmth from his fingers.

Contrary to his expectations, there was no flash of memory
upon taking hold of the hilt—the room did not suddenly drip with blood, nor did the sounds of remembered violence accost his consciousness—but something
did
happen when he felt the sword once again in his hand. A sort of…recognition, as if the weapon remembered him even as he’d remembered it.

Before he knew what he was doing, Ean had wrapped his mind around the blade—there was no other way to describe the embracive feeling than to say that the sword hovered within his awareness more like a third appendage than a foreign substance forged of mineral and magic
. He hardly realized he’d drawn it from Ramu’s grasp and was slowly slicing the air, testing its weight, and listening intently as the weapon hummed within his consciousness, the Merdanti ‘song’ Ramu had mentioned.

When Ean finally roused from
this reunion, he lowered the weapon to his side. The blade felt light as a feather in his hand, no heavier to wield than his own arm. Marveling at the experience, Ean lifted wondrous eyes back to Ramu. “Is it always like this?” he asked, somewhat startled by the unexpected exhilaration he was experiencing just holding the weapon in his hand. His gaze strayed to Ramu’s blade, which hovered behind the drachwyr’s shoulder.

“When one wields a
sentient sword, he touches the elemental power of the very realm. So yes,” Ramu answered with a shadowy smile, “it usually is.” 

Letting Ean have the moment, the
drachwyr
wandered closer to the wall and looked it over with hands clasped behind his back. “These are the weapons of heroes, those who fell,” he offered, gazing upon the multitude of arms as if remembering each and every man whose life they represented in trade. “We hold them here in trust, to be reclaimed in the Returning.”

The prince’s gaze flashed to him.
“How many have been reclaimed?”

Ramu’s dark eyes
were grave as he gazed at Ean over his shoulder, though an undeniable insouciance hinted in them as well. “One…so far.” Ean gave him a pained look in reply, to which Ramu chuckled good-naturedly and moved to clap Ean on the shoulder. “You have not changed, my friend. That is good to see.”

“Is it?” Ean
held his gaze. “Markal wouldn’t have me think so.”

“Markal sees only the pupil—”

“Who failed him,” Ean supplied tightly.

But Ramu shook his head
. “I fear you have the wrong of it, Ean. Markal feels he failed you.”

“Failed
me
?”

Ramu looked him over with his
unfathomably dark eyes. They were like depthless pools out of which the sentient realm observed the inartful fumblings of man. “You two are more alike than you know,” he remarked with a smile hinting in his gaze. “I have told Markal this many times, though he ever argues the point with me, but both of you, in your egocentricity—and I intend no slight by so saying, Ean—are all too willing to assume responsibility for the evils of the world. Markal believes any pupil’s failure is his failure as an instructor. And you, my friend,” and here he gazed quietly but forcefully upon Ean, “you have ever believed that any failure in the First Lord’s game is your failure alone.”

Ean stared at the
drachwyr
in silence. It was a difficult truth to realize that Ramu—whom he’d met only once—knew him better than he knew himself.

“But come, Ean,”
the Lord of the Heavens said, clearly perceptive to his troubled state of mind, “Markal asked me to work with you today as we restore you to the
cortata
.”

Ean tried to shake off the anxious feeling that always accompanied references to the man he used to be
. “The
cortata
,” he murmured
.
“What is it?”

“You might think of it as an Adept’s version of the Dance of Swords,” Ramu answered
. “It is an age-old training routine taken from the
Sobra I’ternin
. I’m told you saw part of it being practiced in the courtyard on the day we met in the city.”

Ean remembered watching Isabel lead the class through a series of complicated interconnected steps and motions that had indeed reminded him of the Dance of Swords
. “The
cortata
,” he repeated.

“Indeed.”
Ramu walked to the center of the vast hall and turned to face Ean as he came to a halt. “The
cortata
is itself a pattern, but it must only be wielded with a talisman.”

“
Really? Why?”

Ramu cast him a considering eye. “
What do you remember about the use of talismans?”

Ean grimaced. “Markal and I have been working with them as regards the Seventeenth Law:
The use of talismans must focus force without limiting scope.
Whatever that means,” he added under his breath, shooting the
drachwyr
a disgruntled look. The Seventeenth Law had already proven far more complicated and aggravating than it seemed upon first inspection. He was relatively certain now that he had only ever maintained an adversarial and combative relationship with the Laws of Patterning.

“Talismans
, of themselves, may have little or no power,” Ramu echoed Markal’s own words as he reached across his shoulder and drew his sword with a quick circling of his arm. Sighting down the blade aligned towards Ean, he continued, “By the Seventeenth Law, talismans become a focal point for channeling the force of a working.” 

He lowered the weapon
with a sweep to the side. “The moment you summon
elae
, you gather a grave quantity of potential force within your own sphere. The use of a talisman gives you a means of channeling this potential force to more effectively guide it along the framework of your intention.” Ramu spun his sword around in his hand and caught his blade up casually beneath his arm. “Think of it as channeling a river through a canyon as opposed to allowing it to flow across a wide delta.”

Ean
had heard this explanation before from Markal, but he still followed with the same question, “Why couldn’t I just be the talisman?”

Ramu
nodded, granting credence to the legitimacy of his reasoning. “Yes, it would seem the obvious answer. Yet if you became the talisman, the collected force of your working must channel through your body. With the workings you’ve done so far, that might not seem problematic, but by the end of today, I think you will have a better understanding of the inherent flaws of such a course.” 

He gestured to the weapon in Ean’s hand
. “Since you’ve chosen your talisman for today, we can begin the
cortata
.” He turned his back on Ean and looked at him over his shoulder as he ordered, “Follow and mimic my motion as exactly as you can.”

Thus did Ramu begin.

Ean’s eyes were glued to the tall
drachwyr
as he began the Adept Dance of Swords. The sequence seemed very different when performed while holding a weapon than it had while watching the Adepts in the court with Isabel. Ean had barely begun before he began to sense the power inherent in the
cortata
, and he realized it was a pattern he was working with each sweep of hands and feet, with every twist and turn. He was not even consciously drawing upon
elae
, yet it began collecting around him.

“The
cortata
can be summoned through any strand of
elae
,” Ramu advised as he lifted his sword overhead with two hands and then slowly sliced down through the air. He stepped to his right and turned slightly in the same direction, and one hand swept the blade in an arc while the other lifted outward and upward. He made every motion slow and deliberate that Ean might mimic it exactly. “Yet it is at its most powerful if wielded through the fifth,” he continued. “Much like the Merdanti weapon in your hands, the
cortata
—itself a weapon in pattern form—draws upon the power of the realm.” 

Ramu brought both hands to
the hilt of his greatsword and lifted the blade above his head and over behind him, ducking low as he slowly turned a circle. Ean followed, laboring to keep his balance in the awkward position. “The fifth being the most powerful of the strands of
elae
,” Ramu continued as he rose again and circled his sword around in a deadly sideways slash, “the
cortata
is at its most potent when wielded with the fifth. Its power diminishes as you move up the strands from five through two, until it becomes completely powerless in the first.”

“Why is that?” Ean asked as he followed Ramu in bringing his sword up above his head again
. He stepped backwards as he mimicked the
drachwyr’s
motions, turning another slow circle.

“Because it is a destructive pattern,” Ramu answered while sweeping his weapon in
a diagonal arc, “the antithesis of the first strand.”

They retreated to silence after this, for the
cortata
became more complicated, and Ean had to focus carefully on following Ramu’s motions. Eventually the practice became meditative, and soon Ean knew only the motion, the ever-present hum of his sword deep within his consciousness, and the feeling of
elae
surrounding and infusing him. 

It took the better part of an hour to move through the motions with the deliberateness of the pouring of thick honey
. Finally Ramu brought his feet together, extended his sword in front of him and took hold of the hilt with both hands again. He raised the flat of the blade before his eyes, pressed the cross guard to forehead and then lips, and bowed.

Ean mimicked the motion, and as he straightened, he sensed power draining away
. It was a strange feeling that fell upon him then: a sense of accomplishment in having completed the entire pattern, and an unexpected sense of loss for the same reason.

Ramu turned to him
. “You sensed, perhaps, the meditative state that accompanies the
cortata
?”

Ean lowered his blade beside him
. He felt unaccountably drained. “Very much so.”

“No doubt, also, you felt
elae
accumulating.”

“Absolutely.”

“Very good. Now we do it again, but with intent leveled as a guide for the power the
cortata
summons. In other words, we must now
intend
for the
cortata
to assist us in accomplishing a specific end.”

Ean frowned
. “How do we do that?”

Ramu settled him a regretful look,
and Ean saw something flash in his dark eyes before he said, “I must apologize to you now for what I am required to do.” 

Then he attacked.

In retrospect, Ean decided there was no experience in the living world that brought one so close to the dark grace of death like watching the Sundragon Ramuhárihkamáth rushing toward you with his liquid black eyes pinning your soul and his deadly blade raised for the claiming.

But in that moment, all Ean had time to do was bring up his sword to deflect the
drachwyr’s
downward stroke. Their blades clashed with a resounding clang, the hum of the Merdanti stone rippling the air, and Ean felt the force of Ramu’s strike reverberating through his very bones and even into the stone beneath his feet. The blow sent him staggering backwards, but the
drachwyr
gave no reprieve. He pressed Ean with focused intent, and Ean struggled to deflect each powerful stroke—Ramu came on like an avalanche, and the prince tumbled at its stormy edge. Every move of the
drachwyr’s
blade slammed and battered him with thunderous force. Even calling upon
elae
to give him strength, Ean could not match the man.

Still, the prince was sure they were merely sparring, despite the force of Ramu’s advance—that is
, until he faltered. He expected Ramu to compensate accordingly, but to Ean’s rising dismay, the Sundragon took advantage instead and marked a gash in the meat of his shoulder that could’ve been worse but for Ean barely jerking away.

The prince staggered both from the blow and with the conclusion that the man might actually kill him, and he lost precious moments trying to find some equilibrium in the realization
. Ramu almost caught him again, and his blade sliced through Ean’s pants high at his thigh, marking his flesh in a thin stripe of blood.

  Ean knew on some level that this was no different than what Isabel had done, requiring dire necessity to rouse the instincts and
long years of training yet buried beneath the veil of death, but the knowledge served only to rouse an underlying sense of desperation, for he was dreadfully overmatched in facing this ancient, elemental creature.