Chapter 15:
Chapter 15: To be a treasured apprentice is Disjointed when you are not aware of it.
"Master have I erred again?" I asked the oldest of my masters.
"No my boy you have not." He said and I could feel the wrongness of the statement without song.
His uncovered eye was gaunt, if not as gaunt as when I saw him first while the other was covered by an eyepatch my master insisted made him look like a pirate and would make him one but he said that he lacked the Tricorne hat of a sailor and could only take it from one to look as one fully, but it was most likely the same.
It showed the same thing all my teachers and siblings and parents showed me before each day of my life until two months ago when I have finally found an art that sang to me and masters to teach generously to me.
I was not the best student I believe, my masters altering the language we spoke our craft in with nary a word when they saw me stumble and made it easier to write and speak. My master told me that it was not my fault when I first said this that is was the fault of my previous teachers that had failed me and that my family and themselves will seek vengeance for what they have done.
They still claim that they are planning it as they try to lift my spirits and I do not believe them for I knew the look of disappointment in one's eyes when they looked at me and while it may be gone and hidden from that of my parents mostly, my masters still held it for they are younger and do not know to hide it well.
Today my oldest master Bessar Agail would be teaching me, the others Guraith Gean, Marsa Saddbas and Aesan Dillean would do so in turn after the break they had insisted on to visit family.
"You are a good student my apprentice, my heart is heavy for danger awaits me and in a year you won't be my apprentice anymore for it will be your turn to teach me."
I was a poor student so while I supped from the knowledge he and his siblings were teaching me I did not believe his words for I knew I was a failure but chose to ignore them for now.
"Dangers master? The world of a thousand names is safe."
"That it is apprentice, for now at least, but in two years at most I won't be on it, but go and seek a home of my own where doom does not approach for yet and I will fortify it with the lessons I have learned from the princess of the world that has given me this house and a family that I adore but I cannot take as my own. I will thank her wisdom forever as her and any of her descendants and those of her husband will be welcome in my home once it is built." My master shared with pride.
I believed that, the princess was wise and mighty and wrathful to that which threatens her home.
Those that desecrated her gardens yet burn and many will continue to do so for thousands of years as she sings her praises to her husband for it but he despairs for the forest is to him a sign of shame even as his wife and children dance in joy among the flames now and praise him for it for it is pretty.
"I cannot imagine them master." I said I poured more tea.
For some reason my master liked the one that gave a weak sensation of false frost on the tongue the most out of all for he told me it helps calm him.
Not a single ingredient in it does anything like that for I have tasted it and given it to my siblings to do so too and they claimed it did not. I have drunk from what I serve my master as well to compare it for my master is happy to share his tea.
It was the same as that which I served my siblings, it did not calm us, it did nothing but provide a slight sensation of false frost upon the tongue. It felt a bit refreshing but that was the aftertaste of an aftertaste.
"You don't, for you live in safety and your mind is still fully your own and you have not had to make sacrifices to escape danger."
He took a long sip but sang of me to stop and I did not pour.
"What sacrifices master? I have heard songs of the madness that waxes and wanes across the Empire but the conflicts were of fire, swords and death on the side of the righteous and of madness and degeneracy on the other."
My master mimed caressing of his non-existent stubble. That I understood even if my siblings did not.
It allowed one to think and feel wise while doing so and sometimes awakened wisdom one did not know to possess. I took it upon myself to do like my master so that I would find wisdom and be a better student.
I had limited success but any was better than none for that is the only lesson I could learn in 200 years of swinging a sword.
"I see that you worry that you have made a mistake boy and are trying to figure out what you have done to chastise yourself for it, please cease for it tires me more to see it."
"Tires you master?"
"Yes you fool, for you tire me endlessly. You sup from my knowledge and will learn all I can teach you in a year. You tire me and my siblings for you learn faster than we can teach and so we have to rotate and rest and even that is not enough for you exhaust us and learn more so we have to find ways to incorporate what you learn into what we know so we do not teach you wrongly."
"I-I.." I tried to stammered but the master who was younger than me put his finger on my mouth to silence me.
"Shush you fool, for you are my apprentice and I see you do not believe in your own worth and I curse the incompetents who made you feel like this." My master said kindly.
I didn't believe him even if I wished to.
My master sighed.
"We are one hour early but I do not believe we will be able to continue our lessons for today, I don't think we have what else to go through anyway, we just walked back through the material to make sure that you are ready to present it to your parents and the rest of your family. We will do so in four days as I rest for one, and go visit my elder sisters' only son and his family."
That was truth, we did not learn anything new today, merely went through the materials to ensure tomorrow my presentation was complete and I could rest for some days as well.
The craft of my master involved two steps each that cannot be done one after the other but must be done at the same time even as they are learned separately.
In four days I would present my mastery of these two steps in front of my family, my masters and that of the man among men and his family.
"As for the dangers you do not understand I will give you a taste of a taste of what I have felt so that if you ever decide to take my advice and only build a house on this land and not a home and run when doom approaches, so you may be prepared and know what happens as you run."
"I thank you master but I'm not sure if I can do so. I don't know who to even build a home with, I will defend the homes of my family instead."
"Do you not have that girl, Aisse Geara*? I thought you faced the same incompetence from your incompetents, have you not bonded over it?"
"She has taken the name Innia Bris recently for she continues to bring shame on her family. I try to remain friendly but she has taken it upon herself to distance herself from me 'lest my stupidity infect your chance at greatness too' in her own words and song Master."
My master looked in hate at an empty sky and through a wall.
"Your are only to address her as Aisse Geara, for if I find you uttering the second name ever again I will ensure I will grant you the heaviest punishment I know to give you and I know to give plenty. You are to bring her to me when I return to watch your performance and you will show what you have learned to your family. I will offer to look upon her soul there or in private to see if I can't find her a craft or art worth doing."
"I am scared master but I swear upon my soul that I will do so." I said and did not lie.
I have learned that master was quite creative for the art he taught me was but a fifth of what he and his siblings knew and used together for it was the one I had the blessing for and the other fifth I might learn is only taught to family.
I have also learned from my mother that she had looked upon the soul of my masters within the limits of propriety and while she had found plenty of compassion in all of them, she had found no mercy from the eldest. The younger masters did have it but the older did not as even as the rivets that would let compassion flow existed and had been used extensively compared to the rivets that would let mercy flow. For the rivets of mercy are rusted and have never been used.
"Indeed family is important and you are at the age when you should start thinking of finding one and I have talked with your mother of this and she approves of the match and will provide assistance and considering the fools Aisse Geara calls parents let her change her name like that, I doubt they'd care if you took her hand as your own."
"I will do so master, she was the only one beyond my family that gave me the time of day since we were children and all saw that we had no talent for the blade despite having blessings for it. I do not wish for her to distance herself from me."
"Good, I remember when I too was once a kid and my siblings made me a cake to remember. The oldest of them Aesan was so exuberant back then as we has blessed by Asuryan with a stout heart."
I laughed as my master made a jest. The topic of age always one he found funny.
"Master Aesan is the youngest and blessed by Lileath and both he and Guraith are blessed by Lileath and too serious a lot of the time if my mother and Great Aunt are to be believed. You are too young to be having memory problems master."
My master took the last sip of tea as he smiled at me. As he finished his face turned very serious.
"He was then both the oldest of the triplets and blessed by Asuryan, Guraith the youngest and blessed by Lileath. Before we left the orphanage they were so and by the time we left through the Webway they were as they are now.
His craft is born of his former blessing and the discordance with the new one for he had learned a craft he had the blessing for when we had a home and when we left our birth world he had another blessing and another craft to remember. This then lead him to combine what his soul remembered with what his muscles did to create a new craft and we do not remember when the change happened. We remember neither the change between blessings and crafts or the forging of the new one, only that they happened and that he had this third craft."
I have not faced this feeling in almost two months. I didn't know anyone but mother could make me feel terror.
I bowed again to my master as I prepared to leave.
"I am very scared now master."
"I am very scared too apprentice, why do you think I'm running? Now go hug your mother and father and speak to none what I have just said."
I bowed again and ran back home and did as ordered.
My parents asked me why I cried and shivered and I told them my master had imparted on me a dark secret in relation to his craft even if I would not speak of what said secret was, for I was forbidden to do so by him.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"That boy will be the death of me nephew, he absorbs both knowledge and insults like sponges and both affect his mind just as much." I said as I complained to my nephew who was again older than me.
I have never met his mother but it did not matter for both me and her learned at the feet of the Laughing Blade while my father yet lived and that made us family.
"I know uncle and my heart bleeds for him, for you have been a good uncle and from your song, him a good apprentice."
He was a good nephew too, even if he was older than my own apprentice who again is older than myself and all my younger siblings together.
I have never met his sister but she was still my sibling and her child and his own and entitled to the inheritance my sister did not have time to teach her child.
I did do so, for I have granted him and his two daughter a crystal filled with all the information we have saved from our home as a gift and birthright for his children so that which has been rightfully earned will be given as birthright to those we both would call family.
"Yes, now I find out that his love to be is now broken in mind if not yet in soul and I still seek to find all that I can to enact my revenge for the boy is my apprentice and his Grand Aunt and Uncle my friends and so I continue to plot vengeance on the incompetents who broke him and her so."
"I do so too, I have managed to find all their businesses and favors owned and I will make you a crystal of it once I have finished making sense of it."
My soul sang in thanks to him which were far more heartfelt than what I could articulate with my tongue.
I looked at the older man, the only thing he had in common with my sibling was the blue hair of his mother and the fact he had the same grin as when he was my brother. His eyes were blue too and sparkled with mischief just as mine did.
His clothes were tackier though, too much pink and neon green but I loved him still for he was family and family always plots together.
"Do your daughters rejoice still at their birthright?"
He laughed now too.
"Yes they do uncle, even if their mother and my father are rather cross that they cannot learn them."
"That is only for family to give them leave to do so. I can give the three of you those crystals for you are family and my sister did not manage to fully teach you your birthright. I do not have the authority to do so and teach those not born of her womb or your loins, not without leave from your mother which she has not and will not give me for if she would have done so, she would have given it to your father as she still lived at the very least and yet she has not done so."
My nephew nodded seriously at that, the first serious expression either of us had had all day making clear how important this was.
"I know uncle and your crystals and what words I can remember as she spoke of it made it clear why."
I looked him in the eye and nodded at the same time as him.
"Good, now are you certain you do not wish to join me on my travels with your family nephew?"
"This again uncle? I know what you are trying again, you are trying to trick me to leave my home with you and settle temporarily in your home as you build it then make sure that when I wish to return I will either not wish or be able to do so. Please stop!"
My foolish nephew said and rose up from the bench we shared and plotted on. I looked up to him with a pleading voice as I used my hand to bring him back.
I did not care that people heard it, I was not the only one to do it today in the park and neither was his outburst noticeable.
He did so with no resistance, he knew that he was family and I loved him for it and it is the only reason I dishonored myself so.
"My boy, do not hold it against your younger uncle, you know why I make the offer I do."
My nephew looked at me with the same tired eyes I looked upon him as he sat down.
"Uncle I know doom approaches, but I will not leave my home and this is final, we will face what comes together."
"Let me save at least one of your family then you fool. Your oldest had also made a home for herself and I will not try to separate a woman and father from their newly born and take your unborn son, but your second daughter, she is the right age for an apprenticeship, allow me to take her with me to teach and save her. I can teach her much and none have taken her as apprentice yet."
"We tried uncle, we tried to convince her but she is blessed by Isha and refuses to abandon her family for she too knows that doom approaches and refuses to let our homes be broken without her song."
"A family of fools, for a foolish uncle and she refuses to let me speak to her after I tried to convince her a month ago as we had dinner."
"That she does, but let us no longer speak of our doom but of that which have wronged us. I will sing to you the frequency upon which the one that broke the mind of the one who your apprentice holds dear carries their favors and property on."
He did so and it was one more frequency among seven I now have memorized, the last of them, of those that taught at the sword school that have almost broken my apprentice and actually did so to his beloved.
I sang it to my siblings so they may continue the categorization of their assets and debts so we can find a vector of attack. That was the only one Gua Bis had not been able to do so for as my siblings and her family parsed through the interconnected web of favors and ownership the seven incompetents had crafted for themselves.
They had more success doing that than me trying to save our distant family for they were loyal fools to their homes.
"Very well nephew, I will cease my attempts for now, but I will continue to try and save your daughter, she is the only one I can do so to."
He nodded for he knew I was right and was trying to help me do just that.
A screech interrupted our plotting and attempts at salvation for it was mighty and joined by a loud clang and the woman that came from was unpleasant.
"A piddly boy and a piddly slave, can you even do anything right you damned boy? You parents didn't want you, your siblings spat upon you to clear their debts and you can't even carry a tray with your fingers!"
We looked upon the woman that was more pink cloth in weight and volume than flesh. Even her hair and eyelashes and eyes were a bright pink. Her skin was alabaster and ears black.
We looked in annoyance at the unpleasant woman and her poor slave boy.
I heard something sing to me from the boy, two somethings.
The first was the full blessing of Asuryan-Khaine and not the three half blessings I now owned. The second was a frequency same as that my older nephew had granted me.
I sang in secret to my nephew and my siblings and the family of Gua Bis and her youngest. I've had a plan and all three of them to share it with and they sang in glee.
"How much for the boy my fair lady?" I sang to the woman with sweetness I possessed for her demise and pretended to hold for her.
Both I and my nephew came with song and dance to greet the dead.
"For a dashing pair of young men I will grant my piddly slave boy for a piddly sword and a piddly song."
We made her the piddliest sword the two of us could conjure and we sung of joy as we sang two songs off beat, one she heard mocking the boy and the other that we heard only ourselves mocking the woman to our friends and family and both songs sang of the doom of those the songs sang about.
And both herself and ourselves rejoiced and laughed, for the legacy of the Laughing Blade is to fight your foes when they laugh and laugh with them as they die.
AN: Aisse Geara = Aigne Géar → Sharp Mind.
Innia Bris= Intinn Bhriste → Broken Mind
"Master have I erred again?" I asked the oldest of my masters.
"No my boy you have not." He said and I could feel the wrongness of the statement without song.
His uncovered eye was gaunt, if not as gaunt as when I saw him first while the other was covered by an eyepatch my master insisted made him look like a pirate and would make him one but he said that he lacked the Tricorne hat of a sailor and could only take it from one to look as one fully, but it was most likely the same.
It showed the same thing all my teachers and siblings and parents showed me before each day of my life until two months ago when I have finally found an art that sang to me and masters to teach generously to me.
I was not the best student I believe, my masters altering the language we spoke our craft in with nary a word when they saw me stumble and made it easier to write and speak. My master told me that it was not my fault when I first said this that is was the fault of my previous teachers that had failed me and that my family and themselves will seek vengeance for what they have done.
They still claim that they are planning it as they try to lift my spirits and I do not believe them for I knew the look of disappointment in one's eyes when they looked at me and while it may be gone and hidden from that of my parents mostly, my masters still held it for they are younger and do not know to hide it well.
Today my oldest master Bessar Agail would be teaching me, the others Guraith Gean, Marsa Saddbas and Aesan Dillean would do so in turn after the break they had insisted on to visit family.
"You are a good student my apprentice, my heart is heavy for danger awaits me and in a year you won't be my apprentice anymore for it will be your turn to teach me."
I was a poor student so while I supped from the knowledge he and his siblings were teaching me I did not believe his words for I knew I was a failure but chose to ignore them for now.
"Dangers master? The world of a thousand names is safe."
"That it is apprentice, for now at least, but in two years at most I won't be on it, but go and seek a home of my own where doom does not approach for yet and I will fortify it with the lessons I have learned from the princess of the world that has given me this house and a family that I adore but I cannot take as my own. I will thank her wisdom forever as her and any of her descendants and those of her husband will be welcome in my home once it is built." My master shared with pride.
I believed that, the princess was wise and mighty and wrathful to that which threatens her home.
Those that desecrated her gardens yet burn and many will continue to do so for thousands of years as she sings her praises to her husband for it but he despairs for the forest is to him a sign of shame even as his wife and children dance in joy among the flames now and praise him for it for it is pretty.
"I cannot imagine them master." I said I poured more tea.
For some reason my master liked the one that gave a weak sensation of false frost on the tongue the most out of all for he told me it helps calm him.
Not a single ingredient in it does anything like that for I have tasted it and given it to my siblings to do so too and they claimed it did not. I have drunk from what I serve my master as well to compare it for my master is happy to share his tea.
It was the same as that which I served my siblings, it did not calm us, it did nothing but provide a slight sensation of false frost upon the tongue. It felt a bit refreshing but that was the aftertaste of an aftertaste.
"You don't, for you live in safety and your mind is still fully your own and you have not had to make sacrifices to escape danger."
He took a long sip but sang of me to stop and I did not pour.
"What sacrifices master? I have heard songs of the madness that waxes and wanes across the Empire but the conflicts were of fire, swords and death on the side of the righteous and of madness and degeneracy on the other."
My master mimed caressing of his non-existent stubble. That I understood even if my siblings did not.
It allowed one to think and feel wise while doing so and sometimes awakened wisdom one did not know to possess. I took it upon myself to do like my master so that I would find wisdom and be a better student.
I had limited success but any was better than none for that is the only lesson I could learn in 200 years of swinging a sword.
"I see that you worry that you have made a mistake boy and are trying to figure out what you have done to chastise yourself for it, please cease for it tires me more to see it."
"Tires you master?"
"Yes you fool, for you tire me endlessly. You sup from my knowledge and will learn all I can teach you in a year. You tire me and my siblings for you learn faster than we can teach and so we have to rotate and rest and even that is not enough for you exhaust us and learn more so we have to find ways to incorporate what you learn into what we know so we do not teach you wrongly."
"I-I.." I tried to stammered but the master who was younger than me put his finger on my mouth to silence me.
"Shush you fool, for you are my apprentice and I see you do not believe in your own worth and I curse the incompetents who made you feel like this." My master said kindly.
I didn't believe him even if I wished to.
My master sighed.
"We are one hour early but I do not believe we will be able to continue our lessons for today, I don't think we have what else to go through anyway, we just walked back through the material to make sure that you are ready to present it to your parents and the rest of your family. We will do so in four days as I rest for one, and go visit my elder sisters' only son and his family."
That was truth, we did not learn anything new today, merely went through the materials to ensure tomorrow my presentation was complete and I could rest for some days as well.
The craft of my master involved two steps each that cannot be done one after the other but must be done at the same time even as they are learned separately.
In four days I would present my mastery of these two steps in front of my family, my masters and that of the man among men and his family.
"As for the dangers you do not understand I will give you a taste of a taste of what I have felt so that if you ever decide to take my advice and only build a house on this land and not a home and run when doom approaches, so you may be prepared and know what happens as you run."
"I thank you master but I'm not sure if I can do so. I don't know who to even build a home with, I will defend the homes of my family instead."
"Do you not have that girl, Aisse Geara*? I thought you faced the same incompetence from your incompetents, have you not bonded over it?"
"She has taken the name Innia Bris recently for she continues to bring shame on her family. I try to remain friendly but she has taken it upon herself to distance herself from me 'lest my stupidity infect your chance at greatness too' in her own words and song Master."
My master looked in hate at an empty sky and through a wall.
"Your are only to address her as Aisse Geara, for if I find you uttering the second name ever again I will ensure I will grant you the heaviest punishment I know to give you and I know to give plenty. You are to bring her to me when I return to watch your performance and you will show what you have learned to your family. I will offer to look upon her soul there or in private to see if I can't find her a craft or art worth doing."
"I am scared master but I swear upon my soul that I will do so." I said and did not lie.
I have learned that master was quite creative for the art he taught me was but a fifth of what he and his siblings knew and used together for it was the one I had the blessing for and the other fifth I might learn is only taught to family.
I have also learned from my mother that she had looked upon the soul of my masters within the limits of propriety and while she had found plenty of compassion in all of them, she had found no mercy from the eldest. The younger masters did have it but the older did not as even as the rivets that would let compassion flow existed and had been used extensively compared to the rivets that would let mercy flow. For the rivets of mercy are rusted and have never been used.
"Indeed family is important and you are at the age when you should start thinking of finding one and I have talked with your mother of this and she approves of the match and will provide assistance and considering the fools Aisse Geara calls parents let her change her name like that, I doubt they'd care if you took her hand as your own."
"I will do so master, she was the only one beyond my family that gave me the time of day since we were children and all saw that we had no talent for the blade despite having blessings for it. I do not wish for her to distance herself from me."
"Good, I remember when I too was once a kid and my siblings made me a cake to remember. The oldest of them Aesan was so exuberant back then as we has blessed by Asuryan with a stout heart."
I laughed as my master made a jest. The topic of age always one he found funny.
"Master Aesan is the youngest and blessed by Lileath and both he and Guraith are blessed by Lileath and too serious a lot of the time if my mother and Great Aunt are to be believed. You are too young to be having memory problems master."
My master took the last sip of tea as he smiled at me. As he finished his face turned very serious.
"He was then both the oldest of the triplets and blessed by Asuryan, Guraith the youngest and blessed by Lileath. Before we left the orphanage they were so and by the time we left through the Webway they were as they are now.
His craft is born of his former blessing and the discordance with the new one for he had learned a craft he had the blessing for when we had a home and when we left our birth world he had another blessing and another craft to remember. This then lead him to combine what his soul remembered with what his muscles did to create a new craft and we do not remember when the change happened. We remember neither the change between blessings and crafts or the forging of the new one, only that they happened and that he had this third craft."
I have not faced this feeling in almost two months. I didn't know anyone but mother could make me feel terror.
I bowed again to my master as I prepared to leave.
"I am very scared now master."
"I am very scared too apprentice, why do you think I'm running? Now go hug your mother and father and speak to none what I have just said."
I bowed again and ran back home and did as ordered.
My parents asked me why I cried and shivered and I told them my master had imparted on me a dark secret in relation to his craft even if I would not speak of what said secret was, for I was forbidden to do so by him.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"That boy will be the death of me nephew, he absorbs both knowledge and insults like sponges and both affect his mind just as much." I said as I complained to my nephew who was again older than me.
I have never met his mother but it did not matter for both me and her learned at the feet of the Laughing Blade while my father yet lived and that made us family.
"I know uncle and my heart bleeds for him, for you have been a good uncle and from your song, him a good apprentice."
He was a good nephew too, even if he was older than my own apprentice who again is older than myself and all my younger siblings together.
I have never met his sister but she was still my sibling and her child and his own and entitled to the inheritance my sister did not have time to teach her child.
I did do so, for I have granted him and his two daughter a crystal filled with all the information we have saved from our home as a gift and birthright for his children so that which has been rightfully earned will be given as birthright to those we both would call family.
"Yes, now I find out that his love to be is now broken in mind if not yet in soul and I still seek to find all that I can to enact my revenge for the boy is my apprentice and his Grand Aunt and Uncle my friends and so I continue to plot vengeance on the incompetents who broke him and her so."
"I do so too, I have managed to find all their businesses and favors owned and I will make you a crystal of it once I have finished making sense of it."
My soul sang in thanks to him which were far more heartfelt than what I could articulate with my tongue.
I looked at the older man, the only thing he had in common with my sibling was the blue hair of his mother and the fact he had the same grin as when he was my brother. His eyes were blue too and sparkled with mischief just as mine did.
His clothes were tackier though, too much pink and neon green but I loved him still for he was family and family always plots together.
"Do your daughters rejoice still at their birthright?"
He laughed now too.
"Yes they do uncle, even if their mother and my father are rather cross that they cannot learn them."
"That is only for family to give them leave to do so. I can give the three of you those crystals for you are family and my sister did not manage to fully teach you your birthright. I do not have the authority to do so and teach those not born of her womb or your loins, not without leave from your mother which she has not and will not give me for if she would have done so, she would have given it to your father as she still lived at the very least and yet she has not done so."
My nephew nodded seriously at that, the first serious expression either of us had had all day making clear how important this was.
"I know uncle and your crystals and what words I can remember as she spoke of it made it clear why."
I looked him in the eye and nodded at the same time as him.
"Good, now are you certain you do not wish to join me on my travels with your family nephew?"
"This again uncle? I know what you are trying again, you are trying to trick me to leave my home with you and settle temporarily in your home as you build it then make sure that when I wish to return I will either not wish or be able to do so. Please stop!"
My foolish nephew said and rose up from the bench we shared and plotted on. I looked up to him with a pleading voice as I used my hand to bring him back.
I did not care that people heard it, I was not the only one to do it today in the park and neither was his outburst noticeable.
He did so with no resistance, he knew that he was family and I loved him for it and it is the only reason I dishonored myself so.
"My boy, do not hold it against your younger uncle, you know why I make the offer I do."
My nephew looked at me with the same tired eyes I looked upon him as he sat down.
"Uncle I know doom approaches, but I will not leave my home and this is final, we will face what comes together."
"Let me save at least one of your family then you fool. Your oldest had also made a home for herself and I will not try to separate a woman and father from their newly born and take your unborn son, but your second daughter, she is the right age for an apprenticeship, allow me to take her with me to teach and save her. I can teach her much and none have taken her as apprentice yet."
"We tried uncle, we tried to convince her but she is blessed by Isha and refuses to abandon her family for she too knows that doom approaches and refuses to let our homes be broken without her song."
"A family of fools, for a foolish uncle and she refuses to let me speak to her after I tried to convince her a month ago as we had dinner."
"That she does, but let us no longer speak of our doom but of that which have wronged us. I will sing to you the frequency upon which the one that broke the mind of the one who your apprentice holds dear carries their favors and property on."
He did so and it was one more frequency among seven I now have memorized, the last of them, of those that taught at the sword school that have almost broken my apprentice and actually did so to his beloved.
I sang it to my siblings so they may continue the categorization of their assets and debts so we can find a vector of attack. That was the only one Gua Bis had not been able to do so for as my siblings and her family parsed through the interconnected web of favors and ownership the seven incompetents had crafted for themselves.
They had more success doing that than me trying to save our distant family for they were loyal fools to their homes.
"Very well nephew, I will cease my attempts for now, but I will continue to try and save your daughter, she is the only one I can do so to."
He nodded for he knew I was right and was trying to help me do just that.
A screech interrupted our plotting and attempts at salvation for it was mighty and joined by a loud clang and the woman that came from was unpleasant.
"A piddly boy and a piddly slave, can you even do anything right you damned boy? You parents didn't want you, your siblings spat upon you to clear their debts and you can't even carry a tray with your fingers!"
We looked upon the woman that was more pink cloth in weight and volume than flesh. Even her hair and eyelashes and eyes were a bright pink. Her skin was alabaster and ears black.
We looked in annoyance at the unpleasant woman and her poor slave boy.
I heard something sing to me from the boy, two somethings.
The first was the full blessing of Asuryan-Khaine and not the three half blessings I now owned. The second was a frequency same as that my older nephew had granted me.
I sang in secret to my nephew and my siblings and the family of Gua Bis and her youngest. I've had a plan and all three of them to share it with and they sang in glee.
"How much for the boy my fair lady?" I sang to the woman with sweetness I possessed for her demise and pretended to hold for her.
Both I and my nephew came with song and dance to greet the dead.
"For a dashing pair of young men I will grant my piddly slave boy for a piddly sword and a piddly song."
We made her the piddliest sword the two of us could conjure and we sung of joy as we sang two songs off beat, one she heard mocking the boy and the other that we heard only ourselves mocking the woman to our friends and family and both songs sang of the doom of those the songs sang about.
And both herself and ourselves rejoiced and laughed, for the legacy of the Laughing Blade is to fight your foes when they laugh and laugh with them as they die.
AN: Aisse Geara = Aigne Géar → Sharp Mind.
Innia Bris= Intinn Bhriste → Broken Mind
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