Companions At Last

Brochwel clambered down off the boulder and dusted flakes of lichen off his clothes. He hadn't seen a mirror in a long time, but he knew he looked ragged. The tunic had been washed recently, yesterday in fact, but that was in a muddy stream and had succeeded only in adding some silt to the dirt and grime. Tecca looked him up and down with a grimace.

"What happened to you? You look like you've rolled in half the forest."

Before he could answer, Tecca stepped in for closer examination. "But somehow you don't smell like anything, even to my nose. Unless ... tree bark? Not just any tree though ..."

Having someone lean in to smell him, looking as he did after months alone in the forest made Brochwel recoil in horror.

"Stop! I know, I'll shave and burn these clothes the first chance I get."

Tecca backed him up against the boulder. "But you don't smell bad, just earthy."

"It's for hunting," Brochwel said. "I experimented with using a few kinds of moss and tree bark so I can sneak up on animals with a rough spear."

"Which did you settle on?"

"They didn't teach tree recognition in the Flaxen Order. I don't know what they're called."

She relented and stepped back for now. Brochwel breathed again. After spending so long with no conversation except asking bounty hunters to leave him alone, he had been worried he would someday soon forget how to speak. Nice to see talking to himself in the woods like a crazy person had paid off.

"Why did you come find me? Also, how did you ..." Brochwel went silent as Tecca pointed north and up.

"We should prepare for that first."

Thunder split the sky to the north. The roiling squall line had closed the distance fast, looming and building over Brochwel and Tecca. A curtain of rain fell downslope of them, for now.

"What have you got, tent-wise?"

Brochwel held up a tattered piece of oilskin tarp a bit larger than himself and a bundle of cord.

"O-oh. Guess we'll use mine."

They hurried to put up Tecca's tent. Small, triangular in cross section, it's only complication being an awning that attached to one side to offer a little shelter for the horses. As he started to drive in the stakes, Brochwel found the soil full of tree roots and suggested they move to somewhere further from trees. Tecca insisted the tent would be safe from lightning and they continued. The rain's vanguard thudded down as a few heavy drops as they lashed the bamboo supports together, and the torrential downpour began as Brochwel finished securing the awning.

When he ducked inside, Brochwel found the tent spacious as a cathedral compared to his tarp. But with Tecca seated as far back as she could and Brochwel right up against the tent's opening there was only distance between them because each was sitting cross-legged to not intrude on each other's space. Like so many tents, the 'fits two' claim had been based on both occupants being good neighbors and dead tired when they clambered inside.

Rain drummed the skin of the tent as Brochwel wished his past self had thought to include a shaving razor in his escape preparations. He had never expected to see Tecca again, not since Aeden pointed out the phony last name. But here they both were. Tecca gave him an icy look. No smile this time.

"Last time we spoke, you asked me to train an order of knights in Kirrglos. If that position is still open, I accept."

"I knew convincing you to join us wouldn't be easy, so I ... what?"

"I'll train your knights, if you and Kirrglos will still take me."

Tecca curled her hand under her chin. Her gaze hadn't changed, but Brochwel started to think he had misinterpreted her stare as lingering disappoint for his months-old rejection. Brochwel finally decided that Macsen had been right about him needing more practice.

"We still need you, but the situation has changed," Tecca said. "The offer I made before, training up a chivalric order, isn't possible right now."

"Could you tell me what's happened while I've been rolling in tree bark? The birds are lousy at passing along the news."

Tecca closed her eyes. "Tragaron fought for a few months and it sounded like they were winning every battle. Then a few weeks ago they were routed at the Chasm River ford and ... they've asked Rhosaire for terms. Negotiations might take another week or might have already ended, but Tragaron is surrendering. The survivors of your Flaxen Order have disbanded. We never imagined they would collapse this fast."

Tecca's hazel eyes flicked open. Brochwel just nodded.

Tecca continued, "Kirrglos is pinning it's hopes on someone else now. Someone who knows the embedding magic that put that amethyst—"

"It's purple chert."

"—in your face better than anyone else alive. His name is Silvester Halsal, and he was taken from a caravan ten years ago. We recently learned he is being held at Maurcoret."

Old cobwebbed memories offered themselves for Brochwel's inspection. "Bookish fellow, can't see a thing without his spectacles, ears and horns of a water buffalo and shuffles his feet as he walks?"

"You've met Silvester? When?"

"He studied under the old man who embedded members of the Order while I was a trainee."

"I see. Well, he trained under several other masters of that type of magic. You and I are going to get him back."

Thunder rolled in the distance while Brochwel thought. So Kirrglos wanted their own embedded warriors. He had far more experience being one, but did that give him place to comment on what they should or shouldn't have? Perhaps, if this all went well, Silvester Halsal could tune Brochwel's stone, giving him a chance at any other kind of life.

"Both of us? Can you fight?"

"I do a little casting and a little summoning."

"Oh. That'll work."

"I do have an incentive to offer you." Tecca reached into a bag tucked into the corner of the tent and drew a sword, still in its scabbard. The scabbard and hilt looked ancient. "Help me bring back Silvester. Afterward, if you'll lead a contingent, fight at the front lines, and blunt the attack that is surely coming, then you will be allowed to found a new Flaxen Order. As a guarantee and sign of our good faith, Kirrglos will give you the legendary sword, Cambadr."

Cambadr! There was a name Brochwel had not heard in a long time. The Flaxen Order drilled the description of this sword into the head of every trainee so they would recognize it if one of them ever found it. The hilt was of oval cross section with no guard, and the pommel a ring as though the hilt had been curled under to meet itself. The Order's description said the grip was wrapped in black leather, missing from this sword, that was already ragged from Kadwahlon's many battles, but the description hadn't been updated in 700 years so Brochwel could forgive that discrepancy. To know for sure, he had to inspect the blade itself.

"Where did you find it?"

"Kadwahlon and Sirigin's battlefield lies in modern Kirrglos, of course we had it."

Given the fact that last time they met she had tried to give him a fancy scroll with a forgery of his commanding officer's signature, Brochwel intended to make a very thorough examination.

Brochwel, with the look on his face of a child who's parent has just placed a plate of dubious vegetables before them, took the sword. Wary of triggering his embedding and being stuck a full day waving around an ancient sword, he stuck his thumb in the pommel-ring and pulled. He didn't get it out an inch before a voice boomed in his head.

"I am Cambadr! Sword of Kadwah—"

He slammed the blade home, jerked his thumb free, and turned a bewildered eye to Tecca. "It talks! I mean, the legend said it would, but even the old lore-master knights thought that was an embellishment."

Tecca nodded. "It talked at me too."

But he hadn't seen the key details that would prove the sword was Cambadr: a nick a third of the way up where the blade had connected with Sirigin's armor. He eased the blade out again.

"Ahem. I am Cambadr! Sword of Kadwahlon, founder of the Flaxen Order. You have taken the oath. You must ... are you listening to m—"

It was real. Satisfied, Brochwel sheathed Cambadr again.

"Thank you, Tecca." He handed back the noisy artifact. "I will help you rescue Silvester and I'll fight alongside Kirrglos. But the Flaxen Order should stay buried."

The rain continued, but now slowed to a tapping on the tent's canvas. Light enough to ride in. They broke down the tent and rearranged the gear so that Brochwel could ride the pack horse. As he swung his leg over and into the stirrup for the first time in months, his embedding activated again. Dismounting would be ... interesting. He guided the pack horse alongside hers as they started northwest, toward Rhosaire.

"Hey, Tecca. You know any songs?"