Chapter 29 #2
The scholar paused. The Dervish was staring at him. Edmund reached for a plausible lie. “He can’t go very far from the sword,” he said, which was true, so far as it went. “Or the wielder. If the two aren’t together, it burns like…” Inspiration struck. “Like the sap of the manchineel tree.”
“The what?”
The Dervish, thank all the gods, was quicker on the uptake than Edmund had ever been. “It’s true,” he said, reaching out to take the sheath and holding his hand out for the sword. “If the wielder doesn’t have the sword, it’s very painful for me. Perhaps your colleagues could come here?”
Scholar Andraste frowned. “Nothing like this was in the literature.”
“The literature,” said Edmund, feeling as if he’d been floundering in quicksand and had suddenly found a buried iron girder under his feet, “should never be considered a substitute for reality. For centuries, the literature said that humans had twenty-eight teeth, that the earth was flat, that women were biologically inferior—”
Andraste rolled her eyes. “Fine, fine. I yield. I’ll fetch my colleagues.” She handed the sword to the Dervish. “Wait here.” The door closed with a loud click behind her.
Edmund was on his feet in an instant, examining the wrought-iron grate on the near window. It was solid work, probably made by an actual servant of the Forge God.
“Mind telling me what’s going on?” the Dervish asked over his shoulder, already checking the other window.
“She’s a fake. I don’t know if she’s taken the real Scholar Andraste’s place or if she’s always been a fake, but she’s lying about being a servant of the Forge God.”
“And you know this because…?”
“I started to get suspicious when she didn’t seem interested in indestructible metal. Then when I said ‘eleven hundred degrees,’ she didn’t correct me. Steel doesn’t turn orange until about eighteen hundred. No real scholar of the Forge God would have let that pass.”
“That seems a bit flimsy,” the Dervish said.
“Also I’m pretty sure she locked the door.”
The Dervish sprinted across the room, tried the handle, and uttered a low curse. “I retract my objection. Do you think she’s one of these Sainted Smith cult people?”
“I don’t know. All I know is she’s not with the Forge God.
” Edmund went back to studying the windows and the bars on them.
The grate was cut into a floral design—lots of curves, very decorative, and almost disguising the fact that it would keep intruders from getting in, or prisoners from getting out.
“We have to get you out of here,” the Dervish said.
“Me? Why me? You’re the one they’re after.”
“Because if they kill you, one of them can wield the sword.”
“Oh.” Edmund banged his knuckles on the iron grate. “I don’t think I’m getting out this way.”
He heard grunting behind him, and turned to find the Dervish’s legs sticking out of the fireplace. A moment later, the man emerged, covered in soot. “Or that way,” he said grimly.
“Dervish…”
“Here’s what we’re going to do. You stand behind the door, and when she comes in, I’ll kill her. Then the next one after her, then the next one, and when I say run, you get out of here.”
Edmund closed his eyes briefly. “I suspect that since they know what you are, they might have planned for something like that.”
“Planned? How could they plan for it?”
“That servant saw you. If he … sorry … described your eyes…”
“Damn my unnatural beauty.”
Edmund ran a finger over the wrought-iron grate. There was a narrow opening down the middle, about three inches long, just above where the swooping leaves converged.
Voices rang out at the end of the hall. The Dervish cursed and grabbed a chair, wedging it under the door handle. Edmund counted three sets of footsteps, possibly four.
“What’s going on?” Scholar Andraste demanded, rattling the handle. “Why is this door locked?”
“Because you locked it.”
“That was definitely a misunderstanding.”
“Was it?”
“If you just open the door, I’m sure we can talk about this like civilized beings.”
“You’re not a servant of the Forge God, are you?” Edmund called.
There was a long, long pause, and then apparently Andraste decided to give up the pretense. “I serve the Sainted Smith.” Her voice was no longer dispassionate, but edged with a terrible ecstasy. “She who conquered death with steel.”
“Oh fuck,” said the Dervish.
Calm settled over Edmund like a coat of frost. He knew what he had to do.
The Dervish was probably never going to forgive him, but at least he wouldn’t be trapped in bondage to whoever Scholar Andraste actually served.
And since a servant of the Many-Armed God had been the one to bind him, over and over, maybe it was appropriate that another of the god’s servants set him free.
The door rattled as something heavy hit it. “I’m sorry,” Edmund said, picking up the sword.
“What?” The Dervish turned. “What are you—”
Edmund met those fierce quicksilver eyes across the room, and allowed himself one moment to fall into them.
And said, “I love you.”
And sheathed the sword.
His last glimpse of the Dervish was of lips parting, probably about to demand answers, but looking, for one instant, like a kiss.
The sword fit through the gap in the wrought iron with half an inch to spare.
Edmund hastily wrapped the cloth strip around the guard and tied it to the sheath.
Hopefully that would keep the sword from falling out.
It would ruin everything if the Dervish popped back into existence and came in trying to rescue him.
He fitted the point through the gap, uttered a brief prayer to the Many-Armed One, and shoved it as hard as he could.
Clunk.
Thud.
“Ow!”
Edmund closed his eyes briefly. He was still calm, but he could feel a hysterical laugh building somewhere in his chest.
“The hell?” a voice said from below. “Some bastard threw a sword at me!”
“Free sword,” another voice said cheerfully. And then, louder, “Hey, you got a shield up there too?”
May all the gods bless the city and those who dwell in it.
By the time Scholar Andraste broke in, accompanied by a small man with a crossbow and a very large man with a club, Edmund was sitting tranquilly at the desk.
“Where is the sword?” Andraste demanded.
Edmund smiled. “At this point,” he said, with absolute honesty, “it could be just about anywhere.”