5

The library at Galemoor was one of the greatest in the empire. But that was of little use until Bleak Hope learned to read.

“Do you think I’ll be able to learn this skill, Grandteacher?” asked Hope as the two stood in the library. The room was no larger than Hurlo’s sleeping quarters, but it was packed from floor to ceiling with scrolls, books, and stacks of parchment.

“Why wouldn’t you?” asked Hurlo as he pulled down a thick bound volume.

“No one in my village could read. Not even Shamka, our elder. And I’m only a girl.”

Hurlo looked at her sharply. “You will not utter the phrase ‘only a girl’ ever again. You are my student. You will do as I say and learn what I teach you. No excuses. Do you understand?”

Hope dropped her gaze to the floor. “Yes, Grandteacher.”

He smiled. “Excellent. Then we will begin with this.” He held up the book. “The History of Selk the Brave, Founder of the Vinchen Order, volume one.”

It was slow going at first. Hurlo found it was lack of confidence rather than lack of intelligence that made reading a struggle for Hope. But once she crossed that threshold and no longer had to labor over individual words, her appetite for knowledge proved boundless. She consumed the five-volume history of Selk the Brave, followed quickly by the three-volume set of Manay the True. She finished the entire ten-volume A Brief History of the Empire in less than a month.

Once Hurlo was satisfied that she had a sense of history, he assigned her books on geography and biology. It was this last field of study that really seemed to spark her passion.

“Grandteacher!” She burst into his room one afternoon holding a ragged book, the binding nearly undone. Her eyes were wide.

Hurlo had been meditating. Rather than break from it, startled and off balance, he simply allowed her into his meditation. He closed his eyes again, and said softly, “Yes, child?”

“Did you know,” she said, “that no one knows how snakes move?”

“Yes, child.”

“It can’t be magic, can it?”

“It’s unlikely.”

“Then there must be a reason. It just hasn’t been discovered yet.”

“Yes, child.”

“Do we have any snakes on the island, Grandteacher? Maybe I could be the one to discover it!”

Hurlo smiled faintly, his eyes still closed. “You are welcome to try.” Because what good was book knowledge without practical application? And when she did finally catch a snake and study it, she may not have discovered how it moved, but she did learn how to treat a snakebite.

The other monks did not understand Hurlo’s sudden interest in educating the girl. By this time, they had accepted her as a part of their lives, but only in a servant capacity. Nearly all Vinchen came from upper-class families who employed servants, so it wasn’t a difficult stretch for them. But the idea of educating a servant was baffling. Some thought him kind, some thought him indulgent, some thought him slipping into senility, and others suspected him of ulterior motives, such as lechery. None of them actually expected him to succeed. So it was with quite a bit of shock when old Brother Wentu discovered her on a cold winter afternoon curled up next to the oven with a copy of The History of Economic Trade During the Reign of Emperor Bastelinus.

Hurlo did not mind their shock, speculation, or gossip. While it did create a little unrest in the monastery, it also distracted them from the much graver crime he was committing. Not even his authority extended to sanctioning the training of a female in the ways of the Vinchen warrior. So while he openly trained her mind during the day, it was at night, while the rest of the order were in their beds, that he trained her body.

*  *  *

Hope learned that it was in the east side of the monastery that the Vinchen warrior monks trained. It had an armory, a smithy, and a small tannery. But the largest building was a long, rectangular sparring hall. The walls of the hall were sliding canvas doors that could be opened in the warm months. The floor was a smooth pine, much softer than the hard black stone that comprised most of the floors in the monastery.

At night, when the other monks were asleep, Hurlo took Hope to the sparring hall, where he put her through a battery of exercises to increase her strength, stamina, and agility. For several months, that was all they did, because by the end of it, she was too exhausted to do anything else.

Once she could perform the exercises to Hurlo’s satisfaction and still have energy left to move, he began to teach her close combat. At first, this involved mostly punching and kicking a padded wooden dummy. But as her technique grew more assured, he began to spar with her directly. She was amazed at how nimble the old man was. She sparred with him every night for hours, and it was almost a month before he even needed to block one of her strikes.

As valuable as she knew this training was, there was something else she hungered for even more. So one night, when they had finished sparring and Hope was mopping the sweat from her body with a thick rag, she said, “Grandteacher, when will I be able to use a sword?”

He stood looking through a window at the night sky. Not once in their months of sparring had he broken a sweat. “Why do you ask?”

“I don’t know.” She opened and closed her hand, unable to put into words her longing to feel a weapon in her grasp. “I just…think about it a lot.”

He turned from the window to regard her for a moment. “Come with me.”

She followed him from the sparring hall into the courtyard. The night air quickly dried her sweat and sent a chill straight down her spine. He led her into the temple. The lamps were not kept burning at night, but the candles on the altar continued their flickering dance. By this light, she saw him gesture to the meditation mat in front of the altar. She knelt silently on the mat while he continued behind the altar and opened the same cabinet that Racklock had taken the cane from. Hope felt a ripple of fear when she saw that, but quickly admonished herself. Grandteacher Hurlo would never beat her simply for asking a question.

Instead of a cane, Hurlo took a sheathed sword from the cabinet. He held it reverently in two hands, parallel to the ground, as he brought it to the front of the altar and knelt in front of Hope. The sheath was black lacquered wood carved with inlaid gold designs. The handle was intercrossed with black-and-white fabric, while the hilt and pommel were gold.

He slowly pulled the sword from its sheath. As he did, the blade hummed softly.

“This sword is called the Song of Sorrows. It is one of the greatest swords ever made.” He moved the sword slowly through the air, and again the blade hummed.

Hope’s eyes were wide as she took in the cold, beautiful gleam of the blade. “Why does it make that sound?”

“It was forged by the biomancer Xunera Ray for Manay the True, back when biomancers and Vinchen still worked together for the good of the empire. The method of its creation has been lost, but it is said that the Song of Sorrows remembers every life it takes, and the sound you hear…” He swept the blade through the air again, faster this time, and the hum came louder, with a solemn, mournful air. “It is the loss it feels at every death.”

“Can a sword truly remember and feel?” asked Hope.

“I don’t know,” said Hurlo. “My teacher, Shilgo the Wise, believed so, although he also admitted to me, when I asked him, that he had no proof. All we know for certain is that there is no logical reason for it to make such a sound.” He sheathed the blade, and the hum abruptly cut off. “Now, you asked when you would learn to use a sword.” He held out the Song of Sorrows to Hope.

“I…can touch it?”

“Take it in your hands.”

She took the sword from him. It was much heavier than she expected.

“Hold it by the handle,” instructed Hurlo.

Hope shifted her hands to the black-and-white grip. The tip of the sword immediately sank to the ground.

“When you can hold this sword upright, we will begin your training with it.”

It seemed impossibly heavy, and Hope’s heart sank as low as the sword. “Yes, Grandteacher.”

“You doubt this is possible?”

She looked away, embarrassed. Vinchen warriors did not doubt themselves or their teacher. “It is very heavy, Grandteacher.”

“It is indeed. And it will take a long time for you to get strong enough. Years, I expect. But I promise you, Bleak Hope. When you are finally able to wield a blade such as this, you will be a fearsome warrior indeed.”

A fearsome warrior. Hope hardly thought it possible, but as she stared down at the sword in her hands, she knew that was exactly what she needed to become. No matter how long it took, or how difficult the journey.

*  *  *

After a few months, Hurlo realized that Bleak Hope was beginning to show signs of training, particularly in strength and muscle tone. To allay suspicion, he assigned her a strenuous regimen of morning chores that included as much manual labor as he could find. She moved ale barrels and repaired furniture. She stretched hides for the tanner, and even assisted the brother responsible for the smithy. Some days, when there was nothing else to be done, he would have her move a pile of rocks from one side of a building to the other.

Many of the brothers saw Hope’s increased task load as a sign that Hurlo had begun to dislike her as much as they did. He allowed them to think that. But not all the brothers were so easily fooled.

Hurlo was in the sparring hall alone one afternoon. The sunlight streamed in through the open sliding doors, casting the grandteacher in silhouette as he moved slowly and steadily with a heavy wooden sword, his breath perfectly in time with the motion. Hurlo saw no difference between sword training and meditation.

“May I spar with you, Grandteacher?” Racklock stood with his thick shoulders filling the doorway. He held a wooden sword in his hand.

“You may,” said Hurlo as he finished his final form. He came to stillness, his sword held upright before him, and allowed himself one last peaceful breath. Then he angled his body to face Racklock. “Come.”

Racklock moved in swiftly with an overhead blow, but Hurlo knocked it aside, the wooden swords giving a sharp clack as they met.

Hurlo smiled. “Always trying to catch me off guard with that first blow.”

“One day it will work, Grandteacher,” said Racklock. “That is when I will know that my time has come to lead the order.” He swung again.

Hurlo parried again. “And what will you do, that you are so eager to lead the order?”

Racklock executed a series of attacks, all of which Hurlo blocked or dodged. “I will take us out of exile on this cold rock. I will make us once again a respected and feared order in the empire.”

“If respect and fear is what you desire, you have that already from your own brothers,” said Hurlo.

Racklock attacked again, striking as he said, “I also want power. And renown.”

“Power, I can understand,” said Hurlo, blocking each strike. “All men crave power, if only to protect what they cherish. But renown? That will bring you nothing but unhappiness.”

“That is easy for you to say, Hurlo the Cunning. Your place among the great stories is assured. I wonder, though, do you keep us all here so that none of us have the opportunity to eclipse you?”

Hurlo’s gaze hardened and he switched to the offensive, delivering a succession of blows that Racklock was barely able to counter. “You know why it is we remain here. As long as we are at cross-purpose with the emperor, our only options are self-exile or insurrection. Would you have us clash directly with the emperor and his biomancers? That would tear the empire apart.”

Racklock struck back harder. “Or we could join them. The world has changed, old man. We must change as well, or perish.”

Hurlo smiled mischievously. “You do not think we are changing?”

They traded a few more blows without speaking. The crack of wood on wood echoed through the training hall.

“You have been punishing the girl hard with work lately,” said Racklock. “The others think it is because you dislike her. But I know different, Grandteacher.”

“A heavy load in the hands forgets a heavy load in the heart,” said Hurlo. “I believe she finds peace in the work.”

“You have grown soft in your old age.”

“I have grown kind,” said Hurlo. “There is a difference.”

Racklock stepped back from Hurlo and lowered his sword. “You have some other plan at work, Hurlo the Cunning. And it has something to do with that girl.”

“You are right,” said Hurlo. “That plan is the rehabilitation of my soul.”

*  *  *

Hurlo had always been one to speak from the heart. Many times, he would say things and not know that they were true until he said them. His famous cunning came in part from his ability to surprise even himself. So when he told Racklock that Bleak Hope was the rehabilitation of his soul, he had not considered it at all before then. And yet, the moment he spoke it, he knew it to be true.

That night, he took her down to the rocky shoreline. The wind howled fiercely, pulling at their black robes as they stood on the narrow spit of gray sand in slippered feet. Before them, hard waves crashed against the ragged black rocks that lay half-submerged in the dark water.

“It is so cold, Grandteacher!” Bleak Hope’s arms hugged her torso, and her entire body shivered. Her blue eyes were so comically wide that Hurlo laughed.

“Yes, child, it is. And why is that?”

Hope’s pale brow furrowed. “What do you mean, Grandteacher?”

“Why is it so cold here, now, in this place?”

“Oh, because it is winter and we are in the Southern Isles, which are the coldest in the empire.”

“Correct. And what would happen if we traveled north by boat?”

“It would get slowly warmer?”

“Yes. Your studies are coming along well. Now, if we were to travel by boat, how would we know which way is north?”

“By the sun, which rises in the east and sets in the west.”

“What if we were to travel by night?” He gestured up at the black-and-purple sky.

“I…don’t know, Grandteacher.”

“By the stars. Have you not read that astronomy book?”

“I have not yet,” admitted Hope. “I thought it was…unimportant. What difference do the stars make to us down here?”

“When you read it, you will learn about the constellations. Pictures in the sky that never change. There.” He pointed up to a five-point cluster. “That is the Fist of Selk the Brave. And there.” He pointed to a small cluster of stars with a thin line of stars trailing behind it. “That is the Great Serpent. And there.” He pointed to a large cluster of stars. “That is the Kraken.” He turned back to her. “Learn these shapes. Memorize them. They will help guide you on your way.”

“Us, Grandteacher,” corrected Hope. “You mean they will help guide us.”

“Of course,” said Hurlo.

Hope stared up at the dark, twinkling sky for a while. Hurlo could tell she was working something out for herself, so he waited.

“I have seen a symbol, Grandteacher. A black oval with eight trailing lines. It looks like a squid or kraken. The captain who brought me here. He said it was the symbol of the biomancers.”

“He is correct,” Hurlo said quietly.

Hope nodded, still staring up at the sky. “What are the biomancers, Grandteacher? They are mentioned frequently in histories of the empire, yet it is never clear who they are exactly. Are they sorcerers? Or holy men?”

“They are scientists, of a sort. Mystics of biology. They can take living creatures and change them.”

“Change them how?”

“Make them bigger or smaller. For example, mole rats used to be tiny things no bigger than mice, once upon a time. Did you know that?”

Hope shook her head.

“A biomancer may make a living thing grow, or decay, or make it into something else completely.”

“Are biomancers good or bad?”

“They serve the emperor, for good or bad.”

“Don’t the Vinchen serve the emperor?” asked Hope.

“We serve the empire. That is why we live and train far from the palace and its corrupting influence and power. A single emperor may be flawed or cruel. But the empire is bigger than one man. And it is always worth fighting for. Perhaps when the time comes, you will be the one to correct its course.”

Hope looked at him then. Her gaze had softened over the months of their training. But now it looked again as it did that night Toa brought her to him. “A biomancer killed my parents and everyone in my village.”

“I know,” said Hurlo.

“Is it wrong that I want to kill a servant of the emperor?”

“What does the Vinchen code say about vengeance?”

Bleak Hope closed her eyes, as if reading it on the backs of her eyelids. “Vengeance is one of the most sacred duties of a warrior. It may be swift or slow, but it must be done with honor. When a warrior confronts his offender, he must give his name and ask the offender for his. The warrior must state clearly his reason for vengeance and allow the offender the chance to arm himself. The only true vengeance is the death of the offender. If the warrior fails in this, better that he die than live in such dishonor.”

“Will you abide by this code?” asked Hurlo.

The wind lashed at Hope’s hair as she stood with her eyes still closed. “Yes, Grandteacher.”

“Then you have your answer.”