Serpent Swords
Crickets chirp. The grass rustles. The limbs of an ancient willow creak in the wind.
A boy approaches the edge of the water. Gray river is slow an deep here; he follows a muddy path through the reeds. He jingles as he walks. The crescent moon reflects in water filling his footprints. He passes beneath the tree and kneels to fill his pail.
His feet are bare. As he kneels an upthrust root catches the leather thong at his ankle. The thong snaps, and the tinkling tin figurines fall in the mud. Something moves in the reeds.
Three things happen at once. Something leaves the grass, coiling by the bare foot of the Marukan boy. The river is lit as though by the noon-day sun. A falling star of light drops from the willow tree.
The boy shrieks and turns around to see a short warrior in jade armor gleaming before him, surrounded by gouts of transparent blue essence. Beneath one heel he sees a writhing form. He shouts in terror, "Fourfang, the Thief of Souls!"
Rivers Between Us reached down with one gauntleted fist and lifted the two headed serpent up to his visor. "I think the child is right. Is he?"
The boy ran past up the trail, and Rivers sat down on the bank, lifting his visor. He sighed and rubbed his eyes with his free hand. "Three days and three nights of waiting for you, Fourfang. I must say, you don't impress."
The tiny serpent was barely and hand long, though halfway up its tail the body diverged to two necks and two heads. The scale shone green as emeralds and glinted in the bonfire of his essence. "For ten generations of men I've claimed the unwary; my poison shall attest to my puissance!" Even as it spoke from one mouth, the second one struck at the sorcerer's unprotected face. Essence flared, blinding the little godblood, and it found its target unharmed.
"Oh, trust me, I respect your reputation and your bite."
The two heads arced back for a moment, then began to undulate meekly, their necks bared to him. "Let me go, and I'll give you a sword that won't break, a bag that can never be filled, and a yellow goat! Three promises for one escape!"
Rivers twisted his hand, and the snake went limp. "You'll give me two swords and your life, for ten generation of fear."
Thus Rivers Between Us began construction of the Serpent Swords.
"That is too thin to be a sword, master..." The clockwork servitor shook its head sadly at the result of the craftsman's labor.
Indeed, the blade was thin. Formed from orichalcum beaten to the breadth of a dream, it was translucent on the anvil. Rivers gently turned the blade of the hook sword on its side, and when it was perpendicular to their field of vision it disappeared, leaving a ghostly shadow on the floor. "This is only the beginning... watch carefully."
In the heart of the Halls of Mars, Rivers began to carefully move armatures into position. He talked as he worked. "The Promise was an idea as much as a blade, a wedge that could be driven through the heart of a yozi and pass through unscathed. Against such a weight of steel and orichalc', my little blades could scarcely hope to stand up. No, these blade must be able to bend with the strongest of blows, to slide around defenses rather than break against them."
Pure, superheated essence blasted the blade. In a moment it glowed with white light as it reacted to the flames. Rivers cut off the essence flow and carefully moved into place a long, thin stylus of silver attached to a braided cable that ran into the blazing furnace behind him.
"The orichalcum must be layered, and layered finer than folded steel. Each layer must adhere and slide at the same instant, relentlessly rigid at its edge but supple as a willow branch at its side. First we'll coat the hot metal with the finest of green jade dust, just a breeze really..." he moved the stylus with gentle precision over the metal, a faint green mist hissing over the blade. "...then we apply another layer." He cooled the blade briefly in purest distilled alcohol, then taking it in an essence gauntlet he proceeded the forge and passed the blade in a single, clean slash through a falling curtain of molten orichalcum.
He held it aloft for his assistants to view. When turned on its edge, it disappeared once again, seeming no wider or stronger from the process.
"How many times shall we do this, master?"
Rivers nodded his head and answered instantly, "Seven hundred thousand and seven times for each blade. Don't worry, it will go much quicker as we go along."
Rivers had nearly finished the etchings when she entered. Marta looked over his shoulder as he hunched over the blade. "Which one is that?"
"They don't have names yet... they're not quite finished." He frowned as he passed the diamond in gentle sweeps over the sword's surface, sweeping out undulating coils trailing down from the hooked blade to rest at the base of the crescent guard. The blade he held in his hand had a hilt wrapped in the black skin of a ten pace long cobra from the south.
He worked in the hearthstone room of the Plum Blossom Retreat, where the gentle mists slowly cooled the temperament of the blades much as the imported blocks of glacial ice had cooled their temperature. Marta lifted the second sword, with its hilt wrapped in the pure white skin of a northern snow snake.
"I like this one... I think this one will be mine."
Rivers opened his eyes wide in horror. "No... these aren't any toys sister. You don't know what you mean if you claim that blade... what it might do in your name."
"I know you brother, and believe in you and what you're doing."
"I do too... so much so that I'd give my life for it. I could lose that sword someday... then what?"
"Don't even think it. I know you're more than enough for the task."
"You're much more certain than I am."
"That'll be the name for this sword. Nathan's sister's hope!"
Rivers Between Us stood and gasped with horror. "What? Every martial artist I meet will make mock me if I carry a sword with that name!"
"Fine then, we'll call it Irrational Hope."
"Hmm... that's more fitting. But Hope must be paired with something a little more practical..."
"Well then, how about you call the other one Boring Practicality, or The Worrying Warblade?"
"How about Faith. Unbreakable Faith."
"All right, but remember, this one is still mine. I'll let you use it, but..." she took the blade in both hands to hand it back to him, but as she did so a sound like a single clear bell sounded through the manse. Outside, a blue jay in one of the great guardian oaks turned its head to one side. The thousand students in the School stopped writing for a moment, listening to the breeze. A thousand miles to the east a stag, pursued by a great wolf, stopped on a hilltop, and the two faced one another for a moment, still and silent. And hundreds of miles to the southwest, deep in his citadel atop the back of his decaying behemoth, a deathlord cast his bones and wondered at the meaning of this strange augury.
"Marta, you're hurt!" The girl looked down at her hands, and the blade lying there was covered with bright red blood. Gently she set it on the floor and looked at her brother. In his hands, the black hilted blade of purest golden light was also slick with blood. Rivers set it on the floor and summoned his jokun with a shout; they quickly brought a basin of water and bandages, a clockwork servitor in tow. They cleaned her hands, but the wound was so thin and light it closed before their eyes, leaving no trace of its presence. When Rivers washed the blood from his own palms, he found the same.
Marta looked up from the basin. "Brother, what does this mean?"
Rivers looked at her for a moment, then turned and looked at the two bloody swords leaning against the wall.
The Serpent Swords are paired hookswords with the following properties imbued in them. All material bonuses are included.
Speed 4, Acc +5, Dam +5L, Def +5, Rate 3
- When used paired, the swords reduce the cost of snake martial arts by one mote, to a minimum of one mote.
- Unbreakable Faith acts a defense against surprise attacks.
- Irrational Hope ties the wielder to another individual with a sorcerously forged intimacy, which requires blood. If the object of the intimacy is in physical danger, then the sword will jingle like tiny bells, becoming more insistent as the danger grows.----
