Thorgrim Frostborne's Arc

Chapter 5 of 11

The vision left the sword cold. Thorgrim raised the blade and spoke the river's name again, softer this time. The crystal bush stayed dark. No light climbed the vines. No images broke behind his eyes. He pressed the blade to the frozen tangle and waited. Nothing came. He looked at Elara, the exiled witch whose people had grown both the sword and this bush. "It's empty," he said. "The name doesn't work anymore." Elara touched the crystal vines. They rang once, then went silent. "You drained it," she said. "The blade spent everything to show you the storm. It needs to fill again before it can speak." She met his eyes. He knew she was glad. A dead sword could not ask for her blood. Above them, the keeper still waited at the stair's mouth, held back by the forge fire. Thorgrim could not climb past it. He could not draw another vision. He had one question left and no way to ask it. He gripped the cold hilt and felt only his own pulse in the metal. Then a cry cut through the forge. High and sharp. A pale bird dropped through the crack in the stone ceiling and swept over the fire pits. Frost trailed from its wings. Thorgrim knew it at once. His hawk had followed him from the stone hall, down through the broken slab, past the thing that hunted him. The bird landed on a cold anvil near the crystal bush. It folded its wings and watched the vines. Then it hopped closer and pressed its breast against the frozen crystal. Light bloomed where the feathers touched. Faint at first, then stronger. The vines drank from the bird the way they had drunk from the blade. "It carries the same magic," Elara whispered. She stepped back. "They were grown from one root. My people kept birds like that. I forgot." Her face went tight. She had wanted the sword to stay silent. The bush filled with pale fire. Thorgrim did not wait. He laid the blade against the glowing vines and spoke the river's name. Light poured back into the sword. It struck him hot and fast. He saw the sealed half of the storm, folded tight in the crystal. He saw the lock that held it. And he saw the shape of the key. Not just blood from any maker. Blood spilled on the anvil where the sword was first poured. This anvil. Here. The light faded. The hawk slumped, spent, and Thorgrim caught it in his free hand. It breathed. It lived. Elara had gone white. "You saw where," she said. "I saw where," Thorgrim answered. He looked down at the cold anvil under his hand. The place waited. Now he needed the one thing Elara would not give. Her blood, spilled here, on the iron that made the blade.