House of Blades Read online

  Contents

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Copyright

  Chapter One: Ghosts and Demons

  Chapter Two: Sacrifices

  Chapter Three: Travelers

  Chapter Four: Hidden Talents

  Chapter Five: A Step Forward

  Chapter Six: Welcome to Valinhall

  Chapter Seven: Sharp Lessons

  Chapter Eight: Risks and Rewards

  Chapter Nine: Deals and Darkness

  Chapter Ten: Another Test

  Chapter Eleven: Orgrith Cave

  Chapter Twelve: Escape

  Chapter Thirteen: The Chains of Valinhall

  Chapter Fourteen: The Wrong Place

  Chapter Fifteen: Playing With Dolls

  Chapter Sixteen: The Road to Bel Calem

  Chapter Seventeen: Midsummer's Eve

  Chapter Eighteen: Convergence

  Chapter Nineteen: Overlord Malachi

  Chapter Twenty: Bad Habits

  Chapter Twenty-One: A Victory

  Chapter Twenty-Two: The Hope of Escape

  Chapter Twenty-Three: Aftermath

  Sequel Page

  HOUSE OF BLADES

  Will Wight

  www.WillWight.com

  To my sister Rebecca, whose nagging skills are the stuff of legend.

  Copyright © 2013 Will Wight

  All rights reserved.

  Cover Design: Caitlin and Chelsey Bateson

  CHAPTER ONE:

  GHOSTS AND DEMONS

  350th Year of the Damascan Calendar

  16th Year in the Reign of King Zakareth VI

  10 Days Until Midsummer

  Simon was huddled under a tree when he saw the ghost.

  He could barely make it out through the darkness and the pouring rain, but he knew a ghost when he saw one. A man-shaped cloud of mist drifting through the air in the opposite direction of the wind, glowing softly as if it stood alone in a shaft of moonlight, couldn’t be anything else. It had no face and no features, just a blank doll’s body of mist and moonlight.

  The ghost raised one hand and pointed straight at Simon.

  Terror gripped him, but he clung closer to his mother, who sat beside him at the base of the tree. He looked up to make sure she had seen, and was relieved when he saw her staring straight at the spirit. Now he wouldn’t have to waste time trying to convince her that yes, he really had seen a ghost.

  Simon’s father, Kalman, stood only paces away, standing over their wooden cart, trying to rearrange the bags and barrels inside so that they were all covered by one old oilskin tarp. Simon’s father was a tall man, and lean, with arms so long that he could reach all the way across the cart without bending. He was too absorbed in his work to notice anything else until his wife called his name.

  “Kalman,” she said softly. He looked up, startled. “What is that?” she asked. She didn’t sound worried, but she stroked Simon’s hair like she did when she thought he needed soothing.

  Kalman frowned. “I don’t know what that is.” He walked around the cart, toward the glowing spirit. He probably wanted a better look, but Simon felt comfortable curled up dry and warm next to his mother underneath their tree. He was as close to the ghost as he wanted to be.

  When Simon’s father was only a pace away, the ghost vanished. It just blew apart, as though the wind were suddenly too strong for it to hold together, scattering into a thousand drifting particles and dissolving into the rain.

  Simon’s mother gasped and stood up, and Simon let himself be pulled along with her. She was a tiny woman, only a few inches taller than her son, but she had a grip like a vice. Besides, he felt better with his hand in hers. Simon was eight years old, in his opinion more than old enough to take care of himself, but for some reason he wanted his parents close tonight.

  Kalman waved a hand through the space where the ghost had been. “Travelers?” he muttered. “Here? This has to be Traveler work.”

  “Travelers?” Simon asked, perking up. He had always wanted to see a Traveler.

  “It’s not always Travelers,” Simon’s mother said. She smiled at him. “It could have been something worse. Maybe it was a demon. The villagers near here tell stories about a demon in Latari Forest, right where we are, that catches innocent people and cuts them all up.” Her voice sparkled like it did whenever she told a joke, and she grinned at him. Simon rolled his eyes. Even at eight years old, he had learned not to listen to his mother’s stories.

  Simon’s father gave his wife an amused smile, but he did start tying the tarp down over his cart. “Well, if that was the demon, everyone in the village can relax. You’d think a real demon could do better than a little mist.”

  Their miserable donkey—still hitched to the cart, despite the weather—snapped at Simon’s father when he moved too close. Kalman whispered soothingly and patted the donkey’s side, all the while buckling straps and checking the cart for damage.

  Simon’s mother laughed. “And how many demons have you seen in your life, misty or otherwise?”

  Kalman glanced out into the rain, his face serious. “Well,” he said, “there’s something here that has the locals worried. I was willing to risk it before, but now…well, it might be smarter to ride all the way back to Myria in the rain. That’s all.”

  “Wait,” Simon said. “Is there really a demon here?” He had thought his mother was only joking, but if his father took the threat seriously, maybe there really was something out there. The forest suddenly looked much darker than it had before.

  Simon’s mother squeezed his hand and looked down, her face solemn. “Who knows?” she said. “But we talked to some of the people in the village last night. They were supposed to get visits from three different merchants this year, not just us. We made it, and so did one other man. But the third merchant…”

  “What happened to him?” Simon whispered.

  “They went looking for him last week. And they found him. His goods were all spoiled, his cart was broken, and he and his donkey were dead. Something cut them all to pieces.”

  Simon shivered. She’s probably making this up, he thought. This is just another one of her jokes. Right?

  “But here’s the crazy thing,” his mother went on. “Any team of bandits can cut somebody up, there’s nothing special about that. But this merchant had on a full suit of chainmail and carried a sword. Whatever killed him cut straight through his chain armor like it was made of cheese. And they found his sword in three pieces, with no blood on it. The Demon cut straight through it.”

  “No, he didn’t,” Simon said, sure that he’d caught her in a lie this time. “You can’t cut through metal.”

  “You can’t and I can’t,” his mother said. “But a demon? Who knows? They say he has claws the size of—”

  “Stop it, Edina,” Simon’s father said. “You’re going to give him nightmares.”

  Edina laughed and hugged Simon. “No, he knows better than that. Right, Simon?”

  “Right,” Simon said shakily. He eyed the dark forest again.

  “We’re about ready now,” his father said. “Let’s get moving before that thing comes back.”

  “How’s the tarp?” Edina asked.

  Kalman sighed. “Full of holes and far too small. The paper will be ruined by the time we get back, and half the salt will probably be useless. But it’s the best I can do.”

  Edina smiled and reached up to clap her husband on the shoulder. “No need to worry about what you can’t change. Let’s just get a move on, all right?”

  Simon’s father agreed, so Simon climbed up and sat on the edge of the cart. Once they started moving, his father would make him crawl under the tarp, but until then Simon preferred to be up
high.

  That was when he saw a torch in the forest. In the darkness under the trees, all Simon could see was an orange light bobbing in the distance, but he immediately pointed. “Look! There’s somebody in there.”

  Simon’s mother and father shared a worried look.

  “We could just keep going, hope they go their own way,” Edina said quietly.

  “Too late now,” Kalman responded. “There’s only one road out of here. Might as well see what they want.” He walked over to stand between the cart and the incoming torch, his arms crossed.

  They didn’t have long to wait. There were two people, it turned out, the one in front carrying a torch that looked a little too bright to Simon. It burned too steadily, like an orange star instead of a dirty, smoky, regular fire, and it didn’t hiss or throw up steam when it passed through the rain.

  The one with the strange torch was a big man with scars all over his face, so much that you could barely see any unscarred skin, and he wore a grey cloak the color of the rain. Simon would have expected someone with that many scars to look mean, but he didn’t; he looked peaceful. He smiled at Simon as he approached, though he seemed a little sad.

  Next to him was a woman with yellow hair in dark red, almost black, robes. She was short—though taller than Simon’s mother—and she had blue eyes. Simon had never seen anyone with blue eyes before. When she saw Simon’s family, she looked angry, not sad.

  “You said this wouldn’t happen,” the woman was saying to her companion.

  “We had to check it out,” the man said. His voice was deep and calm. “This is going to be hard enough when we find a real one. Slow and steady, that’s the way.”

  “Ho there,” Simon’s father called.

  The two strangers did not even acknowledge him. They kept walking, closer and closer.

  “Start calling another seeker, then, I suppose,” the woman said with a sigh.

  “Are you going to take care of this?”

  “We have to,” she said. Then she turned and looked straight at Simon, and suddenly he found her blue eyes far more frightening than the ghost. “I’m sorry,” she said. “This is not justice. But it is necessary.”

  Edina tugged on her husband’s sleeve. “I think it’s time to go,” she said, her voice low. Simon agreed.

  Then the woman in the red robes raised her hands toward them, palm out. She had a design tattooed in the middle of her hand, maybe a letter in some strange language. It glowed bright red.

  “We’re leaving now,” Simon’s father said. He held his own hands up to show that he wasn’t armed. “We’re leaving right now.” Edina had already grabbed the donkey’s reins and was scrambling up onto his back.

  Neither stranger responded. The woman moved her hand in a twisting circle, over and over, the symbol on her palm flaring brighter.

  The cart finally started to move forward, and Simon thought that the yellow-haired woman might stop her strange dance now that they were leaving. Instead she ended by thrusting her glowing palm toward them. She grimaced at the same time and raised her free hand to her head, as though she had a sudden headache.

  There was a flash of red light from her palm, and a monster appeared, buzzing in the air in front of her. It was like a wasp the size of a small dog, and it glowed with an orange light like dying coals.

  They are Travelers! Simon thought. Real ones! He had always imagined what it would be like seeing a Traveler in person, but he’d thought it would be exciting. Not terrifying.

  The wasp let out a noise like a screaming wood saw, flexed its stinger, and flew straight toward Simon.

  Simon shrank backwards, still frozen on the edge of the cart. He couldn’t move. He knew he needed to run, that even throwing himself off the edge and onto the ground would be better than letting that huge wasp stab him with its stinger, but his body wouldn’t listen.

  “No!” his father cried, and ran after the cart. When he got close enough, he lunged at the wasp with his whole body, tackling it to the ground. He drew it into his chest, curling himself around the monster, though Simon could see its wings and glowing legs struggling, trying to escape.

  Edina screamed, wrestling the donkey to a stop. She scrambled down, running toward her husband.

  Then the wasp flashed brighter, coal-orange, and Simon’s father caught flame.

  Kalman’s agonized screams were too much for Simon. He wanted to help, but he was too scared, and he didn’t know what to do. He slid down into the cart, wedging himself between two barrels. The tarp was level with his eyes; he could still see, still hear everything that happened. He covered his ears with both hands, trying to block out the screams, crying helplessly.

  His mother ran over to Kalman’s side, shouting “Stop, please! Stop this!” The woman in red ignored her. This time her companion stepped forward, the man in the rain-colored cloak, and he rested one huge, scarred hand on her forehead.

  At Edina’s feet, another shape of glowing mist rose from the ground, just like the ghost. This one wasn’t shaped like a man, but like a long tendril, like an earthworm, sticking its head up and questing around in the air. The mist touched Edina’s cheek tenderly, feather-light, and then it pulled back a few inches. It hesitated, weaving in front of her face, for just a second or two.

  Then it struck like a snake, the mist plunging into Edina’s open mouth. She inhaled roughly, like screaming in reverse, but she didn’t look in pain. At first she just looked stunned, as if she had seen Simon do something so bad that she was too surprised to punish him for it.

  Then she sagged in place, going entirely limp and starting to collapse. Something caught her. Something invisible, like the strings on a puppet. Then those strings began to pull. Edina twitched violently, arms bending one way, neck stretching back farther than it should have. Her head moved side to side, jerking back and forth. Moon-colored mist swirled around her form, and Simon could have sworn he saw brightly colored flower petals drifting down around her.

  The scarred man watched her sadly. Then he shook his head, turned, and walked over to his companion.

  Simon choked down a scream. He had to help; he knew he had to help. But all he seemed to be able to do was hide in the cart and cry.

  Kalman’s screams had stopped.

  “I’ll get back to searching,” the man said calmly. “Will you be okay here?”

  The woman turned her head and spat on the ground. “This is wrong,” she said. She looked disgusted, like she would rather be anywhere else, but she raised her red-marked hand toward Simon again.

  “I’m sorry,” she said.

  Then a burning hand grabbed her ankle.

  His father had been burned so badly that Simon barely recognized him. All his clothes had burned away, his hair was gone, and his skin was a horrible reddish-black. Simon couldn’t look too closely, because he was afraid he’d throw up. His father was even still on fire in a few places.

  But he wasn’t dead. He crawled forward, one hand on the robed woman’s ankle, pulling his body off the crushed and broken form of the fiery monster wasp. With an inhuman scream, Kalman heaved the red-robed woman off her feet.

  She tumbled to the ground, but that seemed to have been the end of his father’s strength. He fell to the ground and didn’t move any more.

  Simon held his breath and stared at his father’s body. He couldn’t be dead. He was just unconscious. He would sleep for a while and then get better. But Simon had seen people die before.

  A new voice, a man’s voice, cut through the rain behind Simon. “I’ve never seen a man go more bravely than that,” the voice said.

  Terrified, Simon turned to face whatever new horror was coming. He tried to hunch lower in the cart.

  There was a third stranger in the forest now, standing on the other side of the cart from the two Travelers. He wore a fine black cloak, with the hood up, so Simon couldn’t see what he looked like, but he was sure he had never met this man before. From the depths of
the hood, the man flashed Simon a wide smile.

  How could he smile at a time like this? Did death make him smile?

  The yellow-haired woman scrambled to her feet. “Did you know these people?” she asked.

  The hooded man ignored her. “Are you hurt?” he asked Simon.

  Simon shook his head, speaking through the tears. “My mother and father are hurt. Please, don’t hurt me.”

  “We found them like this,” the scarred man said. He spoke calmly, as though telling a story. “If you could come over here and identify them for us, we would be more than grateful.”

  The hooded man said nothing. He moved forward, around the cart, toward the other two strangers. As he walked, he extended one hand out into the rain. His long arm was heavy with muscle and bare to the shoulder, as though he had cut the sleeves off his shirt. A tattoo of a chain wrapped around his arm from wrist to shoulder, spiraling up like a snake wrapped around the trunk of a tree.

  Suddenly he held a gleaming sword in his outstretched hand, even though he wasn’t holding anything just a moment before. Simon didn’t know much about swords, but this didn’t look like a very good one. It was chipped and pitted, as though he had spent years cutting wood with it.

  The blade was long, though. Huge. And when they saw it, the other two strangers looked as frightened as Simon felt.

  “Here he is,” the man said urgently. He raised his hands in front of him. “This is one of them!”

  “Stop him!” The woman cried. Mist spun around the scar-faced man, and the woman began waving her glowing red hand again.

  The hooded man stepped forward, and it was as though he moved so fast that he didn’t even need to walk. First he was ten paces away, and then he was right in front of the other two strangers.

  A bright orange ball of flame flashed into existence only a pace from the hooded man’s chest, shrieking with a human voice. The hooded man batted the flame away with the flat of his sword, sending the fireball blasting into the dark forest like a bolt of orange lightning.