Renni Ashfire's Arc

Chapter 5 of 12

Renni stood at the grave with the blade in her hand. The satyr watched. She had meant to walk away. Instead she looked at the steel, because looking twice was the thing she did now. The grip felt right. The weight felt right. But the flat of the blade caught the gray light wrong. She turned it. Down its length ran fine engravings she had never carved, in a script she could not read. Small gems sat in the crossguard like teeth. Her blade had been plain steel, a working tool, nothing more. This was not her blade. This was something older, given back to her in her blade's shape. She sat down hard on the grave meant for her. Memory came up like cold water. A stone shrine deep in the woods, years ago. Weathered carvings. A name half-eaten by moss. A jeweled holder mounted in the rock, empty. She had been young and poor and the blade had been lying loose at its foot, as if waiting. She had told herself it was abandoned. She had told the guild she forged her own. Every hunt since then. Every kill. All of it carried on borrowed steel from a place that was not hers to take from. The beast had not given back her weapon. It had shown her she had never owned one. It had cleaned the lie and laid it on her stone. Renni wiped her face once. She pressed the blade flat against the dirt of the grave and left her hand there a long moment. Then she lifted it, gems and all, and stood. If the steel was stolen, she would use it for one honest thing before she gave it back. The satyr turned toward the trees. Renni followed, slower than before, the truth heavy in her grip.