The Swordbearer by Glen Cook

Author:Glen Cook
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Fantasy - General, Fantasy - Short Stories, Science Fiction & Fantasy, Short stories, Fiction - Fantasy, Fiction, Fantasy, General, Science Fiction And Fantasy
ISBN: 9781597801508
Publisher: Night Shade Books
Published: 2009-03-14T07:00:00+00:00

Two days passed before Gathrid saw the Mindak again. He spent his time talking to servants and visiting with Loida. Gacioch disappeared. The girl said Rogala had collected him. She did not mind. Gacioch was beginning to grate.

Ahlert had them attend what he called a small family dinner. A hundred people attended. Brothers and cousins, uncles, and others and others, some of such far remove that in Gudermuth they would not have been considered family at all. The meal lasted for hours, and was an adventure in itself.

Gathrid met the Mindak's wife there. Her name was Mead, she was in her late twenties, and she was the most radiantly beautiful woman Gathrid had ever seen. He was smitten. Her smile melted the hardness growing in him. He hardly heard Ahlert's annoying chatter.

"We'll be here at least two months. I have to mend more fences than I expected. Some members of my syndicate aren't as philosophical about Nieroda as we are. They consider her defection an insult from us."

Gathrid half-listened while he watched Mead chat with Ahlert's sister. The topic was babies. The sister was extremely gravid. Mead was in the third or fourth month of her first pregnancy. Gathrid would not have guessed had she not mentioned it.

Ahlert continued, "I'll have to smooth their feathers, then get them to raise another army. So you don't get bored in the meantime, I arranged access to our libraries and historians. Rogala says you're interested in the history of the Great Sword. My people did a lot of research when we thought we could lay hands on it first."

"Uhm." Gathrid nodded. He watched Mead till Loida poked him in the ribs. "Why'd you do that?"

"It's not polite to stare. And the Mindak is trying to tell you something."

Embarrassed, he devoted more attention to Ahlert.

"We found a cache of readable books in Ansorge. They span several thousand years. Some are in Old Petralian. Those are the springboard my people are using to translate the rest. You could help, being familiar with Petralian."

"I suppose." Ahlert had become formal and remote. The youth's staring had not won him any affection.

"You seem distracted, Gathrid."

"It's a strange land. Everything is different. I don't know what to do. I grew up in a remote outpost. This's the first real city I've seen. No one here but Loida shares my background."

Ahlert smiled. "I suppose so. That hadn't occurred to me. Well, scholars are scholars. You won't be uncomfortable doing your research."

The Mindak was right. The men he joined next morning were indifferent to anything but their pursuit of knowledge.

He was a research project himself, Gathrid discovered. He spent half the day answering questions. After lunch they answered his and showed him where to find the histories he wanted to plumb. The pattern persisted for weeks. They drained him of every thought even vaguely relating to the Great Sword.

The first thing Gathrid read was a report delivered to the Mindak two years earlier, "A Summary History of the Great Sword, also known as the Sword of Suchara, also known as Daubendiek.

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