at my face.
I ducked, twisted, and more or less threw my blade up in the right direction. Elegant it was not, but I survived.
Now look, I said. Kill me, and then what? You lie here for another ten thousand years. Come with me, and think of all the carnage.
The illusionary man held it motionless; I had the impression the sword was thinking about it.
Do you have the soul of a killer?
Yes, I told it.
How can I know?
You aren’t serious!
It waited.
“Daymar,” I said aloud.
“Yes?” he said, drawing the word out.
“If this doesn’t work, could you get a message to Sethra?”
“What message?”
I told him.
“No,” he said carefully. “I do not believe I would care to repeat that to Sethra Lavode.”
I sighed. “No, I suppose not.”
I lowered the stump of my sword. All right, go ahead.
I made up my mind not to scream, just because Daymar was there. So let’s say I didn’t scream when the sword entered my heart; let’s say I made a very loud, high-pitched, sustained groan.
Great. You killed me even if —
I can heal you. Stop whining.
All right.
It hurt a lot. In case you’ve never had a piece of steel shoved into your heart, it hurts a lot. It had told me not to whine, so I couldn’t ask him if this would take long.
What’s your name?
Call me Nightslayer.
Nightslayer. All right. Do you think —
Do not speak or move.
It was there, it was me, it was disembodied fingers reaching through me, touching, touching—
My memories unfolded like a Yendi glove box.
I remember falling down. I was young, so young the memory is just a haze, but I remember a flagstone floor, and feeling I’d been pushed, and a deep voice saying, “Don’t cry.”
I remember my mother blowing up a stone in a flash of fire and light, and I thought, “I want to do that!”
The first time I drew blood in anger I was ninety, and met a Dragonlord on the narrows of Hondra. We exchanged words, and used some terms that angered. When my sword entered his bowels, I twisted it because I wanted to hear him scream, and I did, and I liked it.
Once three peasants coming toward me on the road didn’t get out of my way fast enough. I didn’t kill them, but I did make the ground under their feet rise up so they fell over.
I did once kill a Jhegaala merchant who tried to cheat me with a quick-count. I don’t feel bad about that.
I served in Yinsil’s Private Army, hoping to learn what war was like, but there was an altercation after two months when I killed three Dragonlords in my squad, so that never went anywhere.
I got drunk once and tried to provoke a wizard into a fight, but he laughed me off. I found out later it was Calfri, who could have burned me to ashes without effort.
Then I decided to destroy Sethra Lavode, so I went to Dzur Mountain, and after she’d immobilized me, she offered to teach me.
You’ll do. Nightslayer pulled out of me.
That hurt too, and I once again did the thing that I’d prefer not be called a scream.
Then the pain was gone, and Nightslayer was in my hand.
Can we start by killing that Hawklord?
I guess that’s when I figured out why you made me take the slow way to Adrilankha, and you needn’t have bothered. I don’t need to meet a few peasants to not want to slaughter them, and if I wanted to slaughter them, meeting a few wouldn’t have changed my mind. Uh, where was I? Right.
Sure, I said. Then, Oh, I guess he’s gone.
Smart. Can we go kill some innocents?
Let’s negotiate, I said. How about if we start with the less than completely guilty?
I guess that’ll do, said Nightslayer.
Once we were out of the cave, I teleported. I don’t think you need to know who, I mean, what we did for the next few days. Then I came back here.
So, anyway, that’s the story. You know Nightslayer’s power will stand out like a Lyorn at a harvest festival. Can you help me make a sheath?
END
Copyright © 2011 by Steven Brust
Art copyright © 2011 by John Stanko
Books by Steven
I ducked, twisted, and more or less threw my blade up in the right direction. Elegant it was not, but I survived.
Now look, I said. Kill me, and then what? You lie here for another ten thousand years. Come with me, and think of all the carnage.
The illusionary man held it motionless; I had the impression the sword was thinking about it.
Do you have the soul of a killer?
Yes, I told it.
How can I know?
You aren’t serious!
It waited.
“Daymar,” I said aloud.
“Yes?” he said, drawing the word out.
“If this doesn’t work, could you get a message to Sethra?”
“What message?”
I told him.
“No,” he said carefully. “I do not believe I would care to repeat that to Sethra Lavode.”
I sighed. “No, I suppose not.”
I lowered the stump of my sword. All right, go ahead.
I made up my mind not to scream, just because Daymar was there. So let’s say I didn’t scream when the sword entered my heart; let’s say I made a very loud, high-pitched, sustained groan.
Great. You killed me even if —
I can heal you. Stop whining.
All right.
It hurt a lot. In case you’ve never had a piece of steel shoved into your heart, it hurts a lot. It had told me not to whine, so I couldn’t ask him if this would take long.
What’s your name?
Call me Nightslayer.
Nightslayer. All right. Do you think —
Do not speak or move.
It was there, it was me, it was disembodied fingers reaching through me, touching, touching—
My memories unfolded like a Yendi glove box.
I remember falling down. I was young, so young the memory is just a haze, but I remember a flagstone floor, and feeling I’d been pushed, and a deep voice saying, “Don’t cry.”
I remember my mother blowing up a stone in a flash of fire and light, and I thought, “I want to do that!”
The first time I drew blood in anger I was ninety, and met a Dragonlord on the narrows of Hondra. We exchanged words, and used some terms that angered. When my sword entered his bowels, I twisted it because I wanted to hear him scream, and I did, and I liked it.
Once three peasants coming toward me on the road didn’t get out of my way fast enough. I didn’t kill them, but I did make the ground under their feet rise up so they fell over.
I did once kill a Jhegaala merchant who tried to cheat me with a quick-count. I don’t feel bad about that.
I served in Yinsil’s Private Army, hoping to learn what war was like, but there was an altercation after two months when I killed three Dragonlords in my squad, so that never went anywhere.
I got drunk once and tried to provoke a wizard into a fight, but he laughed me off. I found out later it was Calfri, who could have burned me to ashes without effort.
Then I decided to destroy Sethra Lavode, so I went to Dzur Mountain, and after she’d immobilized me, she offered to teach me.
You’ll do. Nightslayer pulled out of me.
That hurt too, and I once again did the thing that I’d prefer not be called a scream.
Then the pain was gone, and Nightslayer was in my hand.
Can we start by killing that Hawklord?
I guess that’s when I figured out why you made me take the slow way to Adrilankha, and you needn’t have bothered. I don’t need to meet a few peasants to not want to slaughter them, and if I wanted to slaughter them, meeting a few wouldn’t have changed my mind. Uh, where was I? Right.
Sure, I said. Then, Oh, I guess he’s gone.
Smart. Can we go kill some innocents?
Let’s negotiate, I said. How about if we start with the less than completely guilty?
I guess that’ll do, said Nightslayer.
Once we were out of the cave, I teleported. I don’t think you need to know who, I mean, what we did for the next few days. Then I came back here.
So, anyway, that’s the story. You know Nightslayer’s power will stand out like a Lyorn at a harvest festival. Can you help me make a sheath?
END
Copyright © 2011 by Steven Brust
Art copyright © 2011 by John Stanko
Books by Steven
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