The Four Forges Read Online Free PDF Page A

what she is. Another Vaelinar slave.”
    He left in a haze of smoke and orange light, and Lindala gathered up her daughter, holding her close, trying to ease away the pain of the shackles, trying to stop the cutting and bleeding, and weeping her own river, to no avail. When she caught her breath, she listened for hope, for the floods to come.
     
The back gate to the furnace creaked as the great doors swung up, and Quendius filled the threshold as if bidden by thought to appear. Fyrvae squinted through the swirling heat of the forge at his master.
    He wore ivory robes of soft curled and combed fur, hanging open over a bare torso, his leather pants cut to move supplely, the grain as soft as butter. The light gray irises of his eyes were spoked with obsidian streaks so that it was like looking into a dark star that had exploded into shards against a gray dawn sky. With his skin a soft, sooty charcoal, and his blue-black hair tied back, Quendius filled the doorway, the biggest Vaelinar Fyrvae had ever met in his life. Rumors said he had no Talent but that of strength. Fyrvae had never found any Talent in him except cruelty and shrewdness.
    His square jawed face showed the barest approval at the forge stirring to life. “We’ve guests coming.”
    “I felt them, master.” Fyrvae dropped in a half bow.
    “I see you’re getting the furnaces hot. Excellent. I want a sword finished. These guests are not invited, but they should be impressed with the caliber of the swords only you can make.” Quendius stepped inside the forge, forcing Fyrvae to look up at him with a painful stretch of his neck and shoulders as he settled into a wide-legged stance. He wore the first of Fyrvae’s specially commissioned swords on his hip, the only man who could have worn it that way, as most would have carried it in a back sheath. He, however, had the height and arm span to wear it as he did.
    He did not wish just any sword, then, any cutting blade, but one of them. “A second sword, master, as agreed?” The making of a second imbued sword would free him from his indenture; that was the pact they had made when Quendius found him and offered shelter for the fugitives. Better perhaps that he’d stayed to face the judgment of the Council, though they were said to have little mercy for those who broke the Peace Accords. Even little mercy would be more than this man held.
    “Agreements change,” Quendius reminded him amiably, “as ours did when you tried to escape.” The black shards in his eyes seemed to glint harshly, catching the reflected orange light of the banked fires. “Two swords for two Vaelinars, but now there is a third, is there not? I wonder if she could live in the daylight, away from the caverns. Away from yourself . . . and your wife. Best to stay in the shelter I’ve given you, and work your way to freedom.”
    Fyrvae felt rebellion rising in his chest and tried to quell it as cold realization leached the fire out of him. Quendius would never be through with him. Fyrvae and Lindala would always owe him, the pact would never be completed. They had sunk from indentured servants to slaves and now he knew they could sink even lower. Little choice left; looking up at the armorer, he contained his expression most carefully, unwilling to admit defeat. “You know more than I, then.”
    “So it seems. A second sword, and I want the best from you. You’ve been working on one . . .” Quendius’ glance scoured the forge, and fell upon a nearly finished blade in a rack to the side. “Your craftsmanship shows. How much longer till that one is finished?”
    “It’s nearly done.” His thoughts threatened to scatter impossibly far from him despite his need to focus. He had no life expectancy beyond that of the finished sword as a surety. He knew that. The Talent he poured into the metal and the fire, working it, took nearly every fiber of his being. Fyrvae considered the blade as well. He’d already made the hilt and pommel, which