darkened blade_ A fallen blade novel - Kelly McCullough Page 0,48
mourn him all the days of my life.”
She took a deep breath, and I could see her locking her pain away. “But not right now. Right now, we have plans to form. Which means that you have a decision to make. Do I take the bulk of the students east into the Magelands where the Son of Heaven cannot easily reach us? Or do we all go west to the temple in the hope of finding the lost swords?”
“How many of your students are ready to take their oaths?” I asked.
Jax paused for a long moment. “That depends. By the standards of Namara? I don’t honestly know. There are deep flaws in some of them, scars left by the fall of the temple and the wandering time before Loris and I brought them here. They are, every one of them, wounded in ways that can never be cured. I do not know how many of them the goddess would have taken into her full service. Roric here, certainly. Inaya, Xin, Kumi. Probably Javan. Before her torture at the abbey I would have said Maryam was the readiest of them all. Now . . . my answer remains yes, though I worry about the rage that lives in her heart.”
I held up a hand before she could continue. “Namara is dead, Jax. The only opinion that matters to me right now is yours. You are the chancellor of the order’s school. How many of your students would you trust with one of these?” I drew my swords and set them on the table between us.
“Entirely?”
I snorted. “No splitting hairs. The question is practical and immediate.”
She sighed. “All of them except Malok . . . and, maybe, Altia.” I raised an eyebrow in question, since the girl had impressed me with her efficiency and no-nonsense attitude over the last hour, and Jax continued. “Malok is still too young at fifteen. He was only seven at the fall, barely bonded with Yinthiss—I honestly don’t know how he managed to escape.”
“And Altia?” asked Triss. “She was one of Faran’s closest friends before the fall, and I remember her as being a very promising young mage. She has done very well this morning, or so it seems to me.”
“Altia is . . . my fault. Entirely. She’s smart, and she’s efficient, as you’ve seen today. But she lacks the proper ruthlessness a Blade needs. In that, she reminds me of you at twelve or thirteen, Aral. Ultimately, the temple trained the worst of that out of you, but I haven’t done the same for her. She was the first of the children that I rescued—not even a year after the fall—and I have coddled her because of my own pain. If she’d had to live on her own for a time, she might be stronger now, but she was lucky there, too. A band of Rovers found her scant days after the temple’s ruin. She has been too much sheltered, I think.”
“But if you had to make the decision right now?” I asked. “If this was the one chance to give or deny her her swords for at least the next few years?”
“I would hand them over and I would pray that I had done the right thing.”
“That leaves only Malok, then.” I took a deep breath and nodded. “We go west. If we can find the swords I will see every one of them invested.”
“I just told you Malok was too young,” said Jax.
“I will not have one boy singled out, alone of all who survived the fall on their own, and refused his swords. I don’t know if we will find the swords. Further, I don’t know when or if we’ll be able to go back to the temple after this trip. It might be years, it might be never. Much will depend on how things play out with any attempt to deal with the Son of Heaven. But if this is our young people’s only chance, and if you have that much faith in them, I will not see any of them denied. If I’m wrong, so be it. I will accept the consequences, however it falls out.”
The door to the council chamber opened again. It was Maryam, with Faran and Siri trailing along behind. Siri had collected the rest of my gear as well as her own, and she slid it across the table to me now. I was particularly happy to have a trick bag again after going so long