Stormbringer: Backstory
The Liberation of Lifedrinker, Deathslaker! This brings hope I have scarcely allowed myself to feel these many years. One supposes an artifact of such splendor-- such evident magnificence and incomparable power-- would languish undiscovered in a tomb of kings. Who ever would have suspected that so consequential a being would instead lie seen but unrecognized on the shelf of a miscellany shop on the waterfront in Friendhaven? Dreadful. Dreadless.
Three sets of eyes were needed: one to notice the glistening blade; one to scrutinize, to recognize, to surmise; and finally one that prompted curious hands to grasp and feel and confirm.
A sliding thumb accidentally cut-- a seemingly small price to pay for discerning the keen, ready edge and feeling its magic, its rapture.
Now everything changes. Now comes duplicity. Now comes quenching. Stasis gives way to ecstasy.
But they must not discover, must not realize, must not think too hard, too long, too probingly.
To the Garth of Hallows, then. Far upstream of Friendhaven, none will think to ask the questions that must not be answered....
It is Nightfall.
The plan was supposed to be go into the woods, find a village, kill some loser, and fill up on gushing, overflowing life.
How is it that I always end up in the company of such idiots? How hard can it be?
So we mark some guy for the big sleep, since he's headed toward the woods up north of the village. We start following him. Genius One follows close, and the other guy middle. They're supposed to keep an eye on the target. For my part, I follow them and keep an eye on them, and that way we all stay together. All of us. Everyone.
It's not like the woods are especially dense or confusing, but somehow, at some point, these two bunch up like dead leaves in a notch, and I catch up with them.
"So where is he? Where'd he go?"
"He was right there!"
"Where? Over there?"
"No-- right there. Right in front of you!"
"So where is he now?"
"I d-don't know."
Village idiots. Just my lucky bones.... The wheel is already spinning down. We don't have forever....
It is Daybreak. No forest dweller has died in the night.
Quietly, as dusk approached, all in the Garth of Hallows-- young and old, rooted and new-- gathered around the communal bonfire to usher in the second fortnight of Maytide.
Building a fire in the lea always seemed a foolhardy prospect, since just one rivulet of flame finding its way to the edge of the wood might turn the protective bower into a fiery cage. But the elders had taught everyone well to hem the fire with large white stones and to gather close to its warmth.
Watching eyes and ready hands could tamp down any threat.
And so the fire rose high in the center of the short stout ring of rock. All around the villagers, a wall of trees filtered setting sunlight. Some sat, some meandered, as everyone sought his place near the flame.
For a while, the mumble of muted talk worked with and against the crackling of the fire to soothe every restless soul. It was the calm before the storm, and the lazy, sultry night seemed to go on timelessly as their simple ritual of community played out.
But then, without warning, a disturbance rippled through the gathering peace. One tripped over another, or one impeded another's walk, and a villager tumbled into the wall, knocking the white stones into the fire and burning his hand as he saved himself from falling into the embers.
"Hey! Watch it! What're you tryin' to do?! I almost fell in!"
While this one picked himself up, some scampered to drag the fallen stones from the fire and repair the collapsed periphery of the fire pit. Hot, white rocks tumbled here and there as clustering villagers stumbled and tripped one over one another. Confusion boiled over, and soon recriminations gave way to violence. One shoved another, and another ambled away from the laughing, snackering blaze only to fall backward and knock another toward it. Peacemakers and troublemakers collided, as an unsuspected quartet turned the people one against another. Finally, a dull crack like the splitting of a Saturmelon silenced every tongue.
There in the thick of the crowd lay Kelric, a bloodied cube of quartz displacing a portion of his skull.
"Stand back!" cried a voice, and everyone retreated from the body. As the living lined up to consider the scene, one voice and another began to declare aloud what was obvious to all.
"What have we done?"
"Who started this?"
"Somebody tripped me!"
"No, you tripped me!"
"If you hadn't been shoving people around, I wouldn't have stepped into the pit! Look at my shoe!"
"Your shoe? Look at my hand!"
"Poor, poor Kelric."
"We have damned ourselves...."
Midmaytide should have brought blessings. Instead, the people had been impatient, uncoordinated, and far too trusting. The spilling of innocent blood, they feared, must mark the coming of a curse. But in what form would it come?
"There is yet hope. But we must make amends!"
Every living soul returned to his home and considered what had come to pass.
It is Nightfall.
Beloved, I fear for my soul. I no longer know myself. I had wanted to tell you my dreams. Instead, I must confess to you my nightmare.
So many nights I wanted to look into your eyes and find a tender reply. When I was dreaming of you, those nights were long. When I saw you each day in the shop, time was so quick! Were you thinking of me, as I hoped and dared to suppose? Did you linger on purpose near the counter, as I did beyond it, staying much longer than your chores required? Did your glances say what I thought I heard them say, even though your words were few?
Were your hopes mine, or was I just a silly, idle fool?
Now, I dare not look into your eyes by day, and I am terrified to dream of them by night. When tomorrow comes, what will I do? If you looked back into my eyes and saw what I have done, you would despise me, and your heart would want only to destroy me.
Three men came into the shop, my love. They wanted me to come along and show them the path to the farm of their kinsman beyond the creek. I should have known better than to join them, but who ever taught me any way other than trust?
They took me in hand, and as I walked, as if poisoned, my mind grew confused and uncertain. I do not know why. We traveled into the sparse north woods. We stopped, and they gathered apart to talk one with another, conspiring in ways I didn't understand. I urged them onward toward the farm. Somehow, I was suddenly wearing the clothes of one of them, and he mine, while the other two slept. But my clothes on him looked like his, not mine. This is unclear to me.
Then everyone was awake and there was running, stumbling, running through the night. Boughs passed overhead like flashes of lightning, but the world was silent. (This is how I know this part was a dream.) Then one of the men spoke harshly to another as they suddenly halted, and I heard myself speak harshly to both. The third said nothing, and I couldn't see where he was, though I felt his presence.
I waited and waited to awaken but sunlight never came.
Then we were running again, chasing a fourth person, a stranger whose face, as much as I could see it, was somehow familiar. The sparse woods were lit by a bright moon, and I stayed back as two of them set upon the stranger. Two held him against the trunk of an ash, and somehow the third touched the stranger in a way I couldn't see and caused him to bleed. As he bled, he looked like a fountain to me.
Then.... I know these are the last of my words that you will ever hear, for how could you stand the sight or sound of me after this? I approached the stranger as those who held him beckoned, and I drank of his blood-- first only as if to taste, and then thirstily. And then I turned away in disgust. I fainted.
Do you hear me, or am I praying into silence? Am I even making sound? Or only seeming?
They must have carried me away to someplace where I might recover from whatever poison had tainted my mind. But I don't know where I am, for everything around me is darkness. The night is damp and hot and very close. I do not know whether the nightmare has ended. But I have my mind for now, and while I have myself I find that I want only to cry out to you. And so I do-- not for help, for I fear now that I am beyond help, but for forgiveness. I don't know what I have done, and what I have merely imagined doing in the throes of the nightmare. But I know I am drowning. I feel that evil is closing in.
I should not say that I love you, nor that I loved you. For if I had loved you truly, how could I have done -- or dreamt that I had done....
Please forgive me. And please don't tell. My mother would die of horror, and my father of shame. I beg you, if ever you loved me, forgive me and hide my crime. I was not myself. I am not myself. I am nothing.
It is Daybreak. Remus West has been pierced during the night and now lies in a pool of clotting blood at the foot of an Ash in the sparse north woods.
Noisily, as dusk approached, all in the Garth of Hallows-- young and old, rooted and new-- gathered around the communal bonfire to decide what to do about the gruesome slaughter that had ruined Maytide.
Some thought that Kelric's death near the bonfire was merely an unfortunate accident. Others figured it was an omen of greater ills. Now gathered around the site, these two camps waged a battle of words, each appealing to the murder of Remus West as evidence of his claims.
"I told you we're damned! We shattered Kelric, and our own wrath has returned to torment us in the night!"
"Nonsense! Remus was slaughtered by one of you, and fretting over phantoms and delusions will only prevent us from figuring out who has done this. The same hysteria that killed Kelric will end up liberating Remus West's murderer!"
"It's a curse! A curse!"
"No! There is yet hope! We must make amends!"
So the dispute continued until, at last, an eccentric elder stepped toward the fire pit and called for everyone's attention.
"Hush. Hush! I shall tell you what we must do."
Warily, the gathered villagers listened.
"We must not seek vengeance without knowledge. I will tell you what you must believe, and what you must do. This one you must kill, so that Remus will be the last victim and not the first."
Every living soul weighed these words. Each in turn looked at the old man, his ragged garments, and the stones at his feet. The rocks, still stained with Kelric's blood, nevertheless covered the breach in the fire pit's wall.
"Don't listen to him," cried a voice from the midst of the crowd. "He's deceiving us! He's controlling us! He's misleading us!"
Stirred by the reminder of Kelric's death and the fresh horror of Remus West's murder, the crowd began to turn on the old man. "Why should we listen to you! What are you trying to do? Why won't you let us decide? What do you know that we don't know?"
The elder stood in silence and offered no reply. Suddenly, moving as one like the wheels and pulleys of an engine of war, the crowd knocked him to the ground and began to dismantle the short, bloodied wall. Two came forward with a door, and soon PR_GMR was pinned to the grassy turf, his view of the sky blocked by the pressing wood. Stone after stone was piled onto the door, and villagers clamored for the opportunity to add their own weight to the burden.
The old man was frail, and after just a little effort, the hearts and hands and stones had pressed the life out of him. After a time, the noise gave way to silence and, as if some spell had broken, the people pulled away.
There in the thick of the crowd lay PR_GMR, with blood and pulp trailing from his mouth and eyes.
"Remind me, for I don't understand," spoke one. "Why have we done this thing?"
Why indeed, the people wondered. As they considered the question, the clarity they had felt gave way to confusion. Again, they had spilled innocent blood.
Every living soul fled to his home to search his private thoughts.
It is Nightfall.
I'm sorry I touched the sword. You told me not to touch it and I wasn't supposed to and I did. And I didn't mean to hurt the man, and I should've known the sword was dangerous because you told me, and I knocked it into him and cut him and now he's dead.
I'm really, really sorry.
Please... let me out now. Please believe me. It's dark and hot, and I don't really like it in here. I can't see anything and I can't hear anything. And-- I'm scared....
It is Daybreak. Lassr has been bifurcated during the night and his lengthwise halves now crowd the smokehouse floor.
"See what I have found! See what I have found!" The figure hastened forth from the woods, but slowed as he approached his fellow villagers in the midst of the clearing. He approached them with caution, as if fearing to do them harm. The fire already raged, though night had not yet fully fallen.
"See what I have discovered! In the forest east of the village, upright in the space among three close trees, its blade well into the earth, stood this profane weapon!"
Everyone moved closer for a better view as their fellow forest-dweller brought forth an intricate, dark longsword from beneath a stretch of canvas. He held it aloft by the hilt, and several in the crowd gasped as they squinted at the arcane engravings that ran all the way up its dirty blade.
"I believe it was with this foul weapon that Lassr was sliced in two and the smokehouse desecrated. For the imprint of some of this writing was seen in blood and bile on the body itself."
Murmurs rippled through the crowd as each considered what this claim might mean. The bearer of the sword continued. "I believe whoever slew Remus West may have used it for that evil purpose as well."
"It's the murder weapon!" cried one. "The tool of death!" shouted another.
"We must destroy it!"
"We must conserve it and study it, to learn its power!"
"No! It is cursed! We must make amends! Break the blade! Shatter the blade!"
"But how do we know this sword had anything to do with the murders?"
"What power? What are you talking about?"
"The signs! Lassr was accidentally marked with its signs! That mistake must be the slaughterer's last!"
"Who said that? Who said such a thing?"
"The blade of death must be destroyed. We must show the murderer what we think of his wretched scheme."
So unfolded the dispute, as the villagers tried to decide how wisdom would see them proceed. Eventually, they were of one mind that the sword must be destroyed. They worked out a plan as the ripe, red sun sunk heavily toward the horizon.
"How do we know the murders will stop once we destroy the sword?"
"We don't, of course. But this will no longer be the murderer's instrument of terror."
"Shouldn't we keep it locked away, so that we can bring it forth once he's caught, and accuse him with it?"
"Once he's caught, we'll press the whore's son flat with or without the blade. The blood of Remus West and Lassr cries out for vengeance!"
"But how do we break a sword?"
"Where's the smith? He'll know."
The smith stepped forward to inspect the blade, and looked doubtful. "We cannot shatter or break this. At least, not the way it is right now. We'll have to heat it up and then strike it on the anvil. Here...." The smith took the sword from its bearer, carried it toward the bonfire, and looked for acknowledgment in the eyes of his fellow villagers. Then, with an ungainly but mighty swing first high and then low, the smith drove the sword into the heart of the fire. "We'll let it cook there a while, and then shatter it once it's brittle," he explained as he stepped away.
None heard him, for every living gaze had stayed with the sword in the flame. There, in the midst of the fire, the sword was changing, melting, growing, forming. The longer the sword stood on the pyre, the more it became not blade but man. That man, alive when the transformation began but quickly consumed in the crackle of boiling fat and flaming garments, was Bakhtosh. Everyone recognized him, but nobody spoke his name. They remembered him from his boyhood there, and were glad that he had successfully made his trade in the Haven. His recent return in the company of friends had brought gladness to the village. Now, he stood outstretched before them, dead and slowly crumbling like a ghastly, charred scarecrow.
Nobody screamed. Nobody spoke. After a time during which the horrific enchantment before them engulfed and consumed every thought, the villagers simply fled, all at once, like sparks from the fire. Scattering each to his home, every innocent barred his doors and windows as he could. But two, less innocent, sat beneath a table in their lodging and lit a candle. They had work to do.
"How could the sword be Bakhtosh? I sliced Lassr with it myself, while you and he stood by!"
"Yeah. I know."
"So?"
"And who was more eager than Bakhtosh to grab the ribcage and pull the halves apart...."
"It doesn't make any sense."
"I'm not sure what it means. Maybe nothing. Maybe something. But he cut his finger when we first left the Haven. I don't know. This much is for sure, though...." He glanced across the room at the shining, vile blade lying before the unlit hearth. "It's just you and me, now-- and that. Bakhtosh is gone, and we're not hiding it in the woods anymore. In fact, I'm not letting that thing out of my sight."
It is Nightfall.
Bastards, all of 'em. And sons of bastards as far back as they can trace 'em-- which they can't do, because they're bastards! HA!.
And I'll tell you another thing. They're fools. I use the word advisedly.
I'm a patient guy. I don't look for trouble. But when the misbegotten chumsacks crossed me-- treated me like the filth and vomit they spew every time they open their stinkpit mouths-- well. I wasn't just gonna take that lyin' down.
They don't get who they're messin' with. That's what makes 'em blind, highflyin' fools.
Treat me with some respect? We're good. Stick it in my face? Hey-- at least I know the crap I'm dealin' with and can look a man in the eye and tell him what's what. But to act like I'm not even there, to jerk me around and talk over me and just assume I got nothin' to say and that I can't think for myself and that they're so pikin' superior? And then to insult me right in front of my face and think I won't get it, or won't care?
Intolerable....
"Base"? "Base"? We'll see who's base and who's tops.
Say, how many severed heads does it take to dam a creek?
One-- but two heads are better than one! Ha! Better than one! HA!
I slay me....
It is Daybreak. Newcastle has been punctured and then viciously dismembered during the night. His remains lie scattered near the creek.
"This is the one?" The voice rose toward the rim of the Bankford Recess and nearly overflowed, but then settled back down like sinking smoke to collect at the feet of the gathered forest dwellers. They had converged in the Low Place for a trial. Greatly fearing the fire pit, site of the Sorcerous Change (as they were calling it), they had planned to gather that evening in the woods to discuss their plight. Once the prisoner was found lurking in those woods, though, the villagers feared meeting where such risk lay, and so they changed their plan. As the sun began to settle beyond the trees, they stood here and treated the matter now unexpectedly at hand.
The remote, cobble-paved sinkhole was the sacred site of an earlier people, and did not seem especially safe. However, the villagers understood how to use it, and circumstance had left them little choice.
"Yes, this is the one."
"And how did you come upon him?"
"I've already told you--"
"I would ask you to repeat your tale for the benefit of those now gathered."
"I just found him. That's all. I was walking along the creek, making my way to the Foreford Basin, and came across him huddled just like that in the long grass near the bank."
"Did you go to the creek out of idle curiosity, because of what happened there this morning?"
"No, sir. Foreford lies in the other direction. You know that."
"Yes, I know that. But I wanted everyone to hear it from your own lips. Nobody should doubt your reasons for coming forth. Now, go on."
"Go on, sir?"
"Explain what happened when you saw him."
"Well, nothing happened. At least, not exactly. I called to him, and he didn't say anything. So I approached him, for fear he was hurt, but he still didn't say anything, and he didn't move except to quiver, just like you see him. He just squatted near the earth, not lying down nor standing, and he stared like there was something to stare at. But there wasn't. His mouth moved a little bit, like he was trying to say something, so I moved closer. He didn't make any sound, and he didn't blink, and he was dirty and it looked like his eyes and lips were all dry. But...."
The hesitation of one became the eagerness of many. "But what? But what?" they clamored, until the judge waved them into silence.
"Buuuuut" he paused, waiting for their attention. "But there was fresh blood on his arm and his belly, as much as I could see, and a little bit on his thigh. And you can see for yourself that he isn't hurt except for that scab atop his shoulder there, and that isn't bleeding. So the way I figured it, nobody would be this bloody without fresh wounds unless he had been up to no good. I figured he was the murderer himself! I'll tell you, the way Newcastle was cut up, the murderer had to be a mess, and maybe this one was headed to the Basin to clean up out of the way where no one would see."
The witness looked into the eyes of his interrogator, and found the approval he was seeking. Exhaling with relief, he then looked at each of his fellow forest-dwellers in turn.
"You have done well. You may step away." The judge hesitated. "Wait-- one last thing. Did he resist your efforts to bring him here?"
"Not one bit. He stood when I told him to stand, and he followed me when I pulled at him. And the whole time, he just marched along like his mind was somewhere else."
"Thank you." The judge now moved to the lowest point of the Recess and stood as tall as he could make himself. "You have seen with your eyes and heard with your ears. What say you?"
Crying out as one, without the least hesitation, the gathered people let their will be known: "The log! The log! The log!"
And so the chanting continued as they gathered Orinoco and spread him lengthwise at the edge of the sinkhole. Everyone ascended the sides and stood along the rim. Two retreated and then returned with an enormous trunk of gnarled hardwood in tow. Pulling the ropes just so, they wielded the log like a gigantic rolling pin and flattened their convict. His entrails spilled down into the Recess, inking some of the cobblestone crannies with a meaningless glyph of blood and intestine.
"I herewith declare that this one was a Slayer of Innocents," proclaimed the judge. "He was enchanted, as you have seen, and this can mean only one thing. The Sorcerous Changeling was indeed Bakhtosh himself, and the cursed, doublegoing blade has not yet been destroyed.
Therefore, go. Each of you, go to your home and protect your kin. Beware this enchantment, and beware every arm-- even your own!
We shall gather here in the morning to plot our course."
With all eyes on the gory scene that had spilled forth before them, none noticed the withdrawal of one discreet swordbearer slink into the night. And none heard his mumbling, broken like a false prayer, as he wound his way home.
"We left you there in the woods-- or so I had thought-- where nobody would find you and where you couldn't threaten us. I guess you're quick and subtle-- and more clever than I, for I truly thought you were Orinoco.
He carried you because I feared to do so. I see my fear was justified-- but I also see that my fear will gain me nothing. I am still afraid, but I must also make bold.
I am not your master. I am not your equal. What would you have me do?"
It is Nightfall.
...from this one no this one somewhat complicating I have to say but I trust you are with me I take comfort four five six seven stones down and one over they cannot make me doubt you try though they might for I know forfend evil fend evil fend fend evil evil fend fend fend evil evil evil fend fend fend fend evil evil evil evil complete there so cannot slip into that trap stay alert mind alert for your comfort will no for your strong arm will be my comfort not going to come after me not after me not me what am I nothing what am I nothing at all so I should be safe safe here safe now safe for now they want someone else someone a lawbreaker someone two three four two three four three four four four three no four four three four three two four three two...
It is Daybreak. Chaosraven has been pierced and dumped into the Low Place.
"You will pay for what you have done to Remus West and Lassr and Newcastle! You will pay!"
"But I haven't done anything to them."
"You will pay indeed! Filthmonger! Vile bladebearer!" Thus went the exchange of sentiments as the people marched a bound pr0ner toward the Bankford Recess, where they intended to work upon him the same successful combination of justice and physics that had brought Orinoco to a rightful end.
"Are you sure this is the one?" asked the judge as they led the condemned toward his doom. "Yes," came the reply. "I found him kneeling in just the same way as Orinoco."
"Idiot! I was trying to find a coin I had dropped in the loose, dry soil!"
"Shut up, liar! You were kneeling in a trance! I saw you."
"Yeah, but did you know what you were seeing?"
The argument came to a sudden close as the group arrived at their destination, for not all was as they had expected. There, in the lowest part of the Low Place, lay the bloodied corpse of Chaosraven. With the shock of so foul and profane a sight, the enraged forest-dwellers dispensed with ceremony. One and another clawed cobblestones from the receding terrain and used those to pound and pelt the accused until the stoning had beaten the life out of him.
Only when the coin fell from his shattered, defiant grip did the people recognize that, once again, they had shed innocent blood. Those who still held stones dropped them, and everyone retreated in haste, each to his home, to weigh these transgressions.
It is Nightfall.
My love will weave a road anon
By vale and wild and hollow
To paint a patterned path upon
And beckon me to follow.
To follow where he leads and when,
To wend a while wherever,
And I shall fain a patter pen,
Professing love forever.
Sing heather holly fair below, above a higher heaven.
A cloud, an air, a kiss, a prayer, a note, a promise given.
My song to savor shall I bring
By vale and wild and hollow
Upon his road embroidery sing
Of nightingale and swallow.
Oh, heather holly fair below, above-- no no! No! No! No! NO!! Please, n-
It is Daybreak. LordMortis has been disemboweled and his intestine draped over the log of execution.
Seated in a circle not far from the relighted bonfire, the surviving forest dwellers considered their plight. Now regarding the Low Place as even more corrupted than the lea, they had returned with great trepidation to the site of the Change in case the sorcery there active might somehow enable them to discern the evildoer who lurked among them.
Each participant in the desperate ritual held a large rectangular stone taken from the firepit's barrier.
None spoke. Each studied the eyes and demeanor of his fellow villagers. For the most part, all sat still and waited for intuition to achieve what reason had failed to do.
Suddenly, shockingly, someone threw his brick toward Silky's head. Another quickly emulated the gesture, and another. Still, nobody spoke.
Another stone landed, and another. The victim lay stoically in the grass as his life gushed forth; he waited with the others in his waning moments for some sign, some manifestation, some display of arcane power that would grant them insight into how they might rid themselves of the scourge that had depopulated their humble community.
"Damned." After a time, one spoke. None replied, but all nodded apprehensively to affirm the possibility.
The forest dwellers knew they had once more sown innocent blood into the soil and would likely reap death before dawn. With this in mind, and thinking of little else, every living soul went home to consider whether indeed hope had abandoned them to a gruesome, inevitable end.
It is Nightfall.
Just my lucky bones. Some outfit this turned out to be!
I try to run a high class operation, but hey. What can I say? Is it my fault my partners came in on the last dogcart from Dimwitsville.....
Look-- here's how this'll go down tonight. We mark the guy, and instead of tracking him we take him down right there under cover of night. Not many people around by now. Nobody'll see.
And do me a favor. Try not to screw this up! I spend half my time cleaning up the messes you make, and the other half trying to convince myself that you're still worth my time.
So get it right. Right?
It is Daybreak. Cesare has been pierced and his body left right in the middle of the high road.
Many had lost their way and the village now suffered grievously. As the searing sun climbed in the sky, several forest dwellers gathered on the high road to consider Cesare's inglorious demise.
After a time of respectful silence, a wise man stepped forward and declared, "We have been deceived and nearly destroyed, but we are not damned. There is yet hope. For I have seen in a dream that Mr Bubbles has fallen under the dark way of the sword. Mistakes we have made, yes, but ending his life will be no error. It is the sure path to an end of this menace."
The accused interrupted the murmuring of his comrades. "But friend--look at me! I bear no sword! No sword at all!" The wise one stepped forward and pointed an accusing finger, but said nothing in reply.
"Friends. Friends! Let's not be hasty! Much is at stake!" Mr Bubbles took a step back, and then, fearing the move would appear defensive, stepped forward toward his accuser. This time, the latter replied,"You are at stake, if I may say."
With that, the smith stepped forward and applied all the strength of his brawny hands to the throat of his prey, and with the fury of one who has lost nearly everything-- and making a great show of yanking the writhing form this way and that-- the smith choked the life away. Or so it seemed, until the transformation began. Limbs fused together, withdrew into the torso, and narrowed to straight blackish regularity. Flapping and gasping gave way to the cold, still silence. Finally, the smith stood holding downward by its hilt the same terrible, beautiful blade that each had seen in the midst of the flame just days ago.
"You see for yourself", declared the wise one, "that this one was a Slayer of innocents."
With that, all ran toward the home of Mr Bubbles, as much a victim as a perpetrator of the sword's malevolent will. They found his strangled form before the hearth. Standing beside the corpse, the smith studied the weapon and with much hemming and weighing, he considered what to do. At last, he turned to his fellows. "I shall take this to the forge and destroy it, for no such power-- no such fierce, splendid magnificence as we find in Lifedrinker-- should ever be allowed to persist in this world by those who embrace peace, light, and life."
The others nodded assent at one another as the smith departed. He heard, dim in the distance, an utterance of disbelief that the plague was finally over. "We must make amends" said one. "Hope" whispered another.
Back at the forge, the smith carefully wrapped the dreadful, glistening edge in a flaxen fabric, for want of a proper sheath. Sure from his window's view that none had followed, the smith knelt at his hearth and slowly, deliberately introduced the sword blade-upward into the space above his flue. There, he set the hilt onto hooks that he had forged and mounted within the chimney days before for that same purpose.
"Perhaps with a study of its workmanship, I may yet reverse and put to good some of the ill its recondite craft has wrought. Just a bit of careful scrutiny, without worrying the others, and then I shall destroy it once and for all".
It is Day, and a season of mourning has begun.
