darkened blade_ A fallen blade novel - Kelly McCullough Page 0,92

in any shape to speak again Mudlight had vanished.

“Not much on good-byes, are they?” Siri said a moment later, though not in a way that invited a response.

Honestly, that was all to the good, because I had found the lost swords. . . .

The goddess had forged her weapons out of black steel taken from the hearts of fallen stars, and then she imbued them with the stuff of the everdark. Namara’s swords are assassin’s blades and all but invisible in the night. But where the swords themselves could not be seen, the glowworms that hung from them made each one into a sort of constellation of its own.

If the glowworms made a shimmering heaven of the cavern’s ceiling, the swords were a swarm of slashing comets cutting their way through the false night. They were scattered in pairs throughout the cave, seemingly at random both in terms of height and placement.

“What’s holding them up?” Faran asked after some minutes of silence had passed. “I’d expect more of those glowing worms to be attached to whatever it is, but I’m not seeing anything like that.”

“I have no idea.” I’d been wondering that myself. “Let’s go look.”

The six of us—Kumi, Roric, and Kelos had arrived shortly after Faran—crossed the short distance to the nearest low-hanging set. There were two pairs we could have gotten to quicker, but both were well out of easy reach. These weren’t much above eye level. But on closer examination we were none the wiser.

“They look like they’re just hanging in space without so much as a wire for support.” Triss formed himself into a ring and passed completely around the swords as a test. “I can’t find anything, physical, magical, or other dimensional. For all that I can tell, Namara simply put them there and told them to stay.”

I looked over at Siri. “You’re the order’s magus, our highest officer for things of spell craft. Any thoughts on what we should do next?”

“God-magic makes me nervous,” she replied, “even Namara’s god-magic. It doesn’t project spell-light, or follow any of the rules the rest of us have to play by.” The worms cast enough light that I could easily see the pensive look on her face. “I really don’t know.”

Faran snorted. “Too much thinking, not enough doing.” She reached up and grabbed the paired hilts.

I found myself drawing in a sharp anticipatory breath, but nothing blew up or started on fire. In fact, nothing happened at all.

I let myself breathe again. “Faran, don’t ever do that again, all right?”

She turned and grinned at me without letting go of the swords. “Done. I will never ever be the first person to touch one of these beauties again.”

“Thank you for drawing the narrowest possible lesson,” I grumbled.

“Any time. It’s one of my best skills, you know.”

Siri glared at both of us. “If you two are done with the witty banter, I’d like to hear more about why Faran hasn’t done anything more than touch the swords yet.”

“Can’t,” replied Faran. “Watch.” She lifted herself off the ground, using the hilts like parallel chinning bars. “They’re as firmly fixed as if they’d been sunk in stone.”

“That could pose a problem for initiating more Blades,” I said.

“May I try?” asked Kelos.

Faran shrugged and dropped free of the swords. “Be my guest, though I don’t think adding an extra helping of manly to the table is the answer.”

“It almost never is,” agreed Siri. “But they just keep trying.”

“It’s sad, really,” replied Faran.

Kelos ignored them as he reached up and yanked on first one hilt and then the other. Nothing. Next, he shifted his grip, so that both hands were on one sword, and swung up to brace his feet against the other. His shoulders creaked and popped as he pushed on it with everything he had.

More nothing.

After a few minutes of various brute force efforts, Kelos dropped free. “They’re not moving for anything.”

I was still wondering what to try next, when Kumi stepped past me and bowed deeply to the hanging swords. “I honor the goddess who placed you here. Please honor my desire to follow in her path.” Then she reached up, took one sword in each hand and, as easily and gently as you could imagine, she pulled them free of whatever held them.

Kelos turned sharply to look down at the young woman. “How did you do that, girl?”

She smiled and bowed to Kelos. “I realized that the problem might not be one of how, Master Kelos, but rather, one of