In a hollow mountain deep, within a rocky split,

the Burlies sense the imminence of a darkling messenger.

They leap to score the craggy mountain walls wherein they swarm.

Black claws open and clutch in weird rhythm to their keening whine.

Anxious they are, for they smell its coming,

Filled they are, with unnatural tuition.

A summoning! A summoning!

Yellow eyes glitter like citrine pits sunk deep in obsidian shadow.

Closer comes the darkling wraith. Greater grow the Burlies' cries....

My bright blade cleaves the mountain vale, and they vanish, like vapor waft away by the rising sun.

-From The Lay of the Smith, by Thavis Wayland

I awoke sweating and tormented but the bizarre images slid out of mind like oil off Teflon. Eyes stinging with night sweat I rolled out of bed and headed for the bathroom to splash away the evening's ephemera at the sink, still troubled by dissolving nightmares. My fingers hunted blindly for the after-shave shelved above the mirror. A prior owner had installed the ledge higher than suited me. For one reason or another, I never got around to adjusting it.

Wide shoulders make it tough to find jackets that fit without tailoring so I normally go everywhere casually dressed. I have only one custom sport coat kept should a client need to be met somewhere swank. Today, it stayed in the closet.

At an armor exhibition, someone remarked that few modern men were short enough to fit the steel suits on display. They had looked pretty much a good height for me, but my chest would never have fit in any of them -- fat-free and 285 pounds, I make up in breadth for a lack in height.

I scraped a comb through my hair and threw on a tight fitting, extra-large cotton undershirt. Good enough for the shop.

The package from Steve Markham arrived as promised. It contained unfamiliar material that felt like ivory and had a partially transparent, watery finish, similar in hue to the blade itself. The material looked to be a good match for Markham's order.

I set to work immediately and between the lathe, mill, and a few hand tools, finish up the unsettling designs in good time, being a pretty good carver. Assembled, the blade was incredible. I carefully wrapped it in oilcloth and put it up for Markham.

Evening brought a repetition of Sunday's nightmares, so I woke up Tuesday morning in a fog. Markham turned up early to the spiny tinkle of the entrance's service bell. His bored gray eyes roamed the store walls. His long yellow hair hung in a trim, if out of style ponytail and a black blousing shirt tucked into a pair of designer jeans completed a cavalier, if dated look.

Markham always seemed to exude a certain habitual furtiveness that bothered me. A tendency to look away from you when he spoke, a forced bravado in his manner, that put me off a little. Still, a customer's a customer, in my book.

"How goes the war, Drake? Did you get those materials I sent?"

I nodded. "Came in Monday morning as promised, Mr. Markham. I finished the handle before closing just last night."

"It's ready?"

I retrieved the blade and set it on the counter, pulling the oilcloth aside to display the sword. His eyes roamed the piece with calculating admiration. I clamed up, as the work spoke for itself.

"My God, it's beautiful," he said.

"It's twenty three hundred including taxes."

"Bill me. I want to take it with me."

"Bank's still open; go get a certified check and it's yours."

I hadn't known Markham very long; he wasn't one of my regulars. Twenty three hundred is a lot of money. I had waived the usual deposit for the work, since the man supplied most of the materials for it. Possibly a mistake.

"Look," he said, "I'll give you fifteen now and the balance when you bill me." He reached to take the blade.

I flipped the oilcloth back over the sword and put it beneath the counter. "No hurry. It will be here for you when you're ready."

Color rose in Markham's face and he squinted, starting to speak. I rolled my shoulders forward leaning both of my forearms on the counter, giving Markham my patented Being-Patient-With-The-Customer look. He snapped his mouth shut, took a breath, and smiled blandly.

"Tomorrow then."

Closing up early for a change I dropped by Pete's Eats n' Brew, a sort of rundown establishment on my usual route home. The late fall overcast made the lot seem dark, despite the gaily crackling neon lights fronting the lounge. Over the door, Pete has a horseshoe that I unbent on a bet barehanded. Above the shoe a small sign reads, "Bring Your Own Luck." I try to buy it back from time to time, but he just laughs the offer off.

Pete's tending bar for Lucy, who's off sick, so a standby cook currently clatters pans in the back kitchen, Pete's usual station. The pair of them are relatively new additions to my small pool of non-work related acquaintances. Pete pops up from under the bar's counter grinning, ducking the low strung 50's–style lights he hangs there for 'ambience'.

"Ah, the village smithy has returned! So what's new, Bill? Got that new truck yet?"

"William."

"Sorry. William then. I forgot."

"I used to let people call me that, you know."

"So what changed your mind?"

"After a while it was Billy, then Billy-Dee. So I quashed it. William. Just William is fine. No offense, its just a thing with me."

Pete looked embarrassed, so I went on, "Anyway, no, still thinking about it--I'd need heavy-duty suspension on it for the smithy. Not cheap." I waved the problem off. "Anyway , there's no hurry. Been too buried in work lately, haven't had the time to shop, or even look at the local papers. Speaking of which, anything new going on in this burg? Word about town is, anything you haven't heard about, didn't happen. So what's new? Spill."

Pete wiped hands through his curly red hair and snorts, "Aw, got me figured out already, eh? So...got anything in mind, or do you just want the smut of the day?"

I frowned. "You know, there is something. Finished a custom order for this guy, a Steve Markham, you know him? He came in today all hot and ready to pick up this order, then backed off when asked to pay up."

Pete's mouth formed an "O." He rocked back from the lights and straightened up. "Well, he hasn't been in town long. He came here from the west coast, as I heard it, some kind of archaeologist or something. Anyway big time medieval hobbyist. He leased something in the Townsend Tower area on the west end."

There aren't many properties renting out in Townsend, save for the tower it self, for which the district is labeled. It's a pretty countrified area. Remembering Markham's billing address, I make a guess at what the Townsend tower's street address might be - would have to look it up but they could be the same place, now that I thought on it.

The Townsend property is a medieval Scottish tower, every stone of it imported by a wealthy, if suicidal, local celebrity, a recording executive or something. Soon as it went up, he leapt off the top of it. It had been built on a three-acre fenced property west of town, and these days, rented out cheap, since it was impossible to heat. All in all, no one intending a prolonged stay would take a lease on it.

I had been hired to inspect its wrought iron staircase a while back, so the address should be in my records. The tower had eight or nine vertical rooms accessible from the iron spiral as it wound up the center. The relic terminated in a real battlement that offered a superb view of the horizon in every direction. The fact Markham might have leased the place didn't tell me very much about his personal habits, like if he paid his bills on time, except that he was a transient and given the problems with the place couldn't possibly be planning to stay on there. Still, it would support the detail about being an archaeologist. I could see a medieval scholar being attracted to it, at least for the summer. His story about wanting the sword for an SCA event matched up with the choice well.

" Huh. Maybe he's staying at the tower itself. He talks about the SCA a lot."

"Oh, yeah." Pete agreed, "The Renaissance festival guys, right? Ah, the Society for Creative Anachonisim. I heard of 'em. You're a little old for that kind of stuff aren't you? Mid-thirtys, I'd guess."

"That's them. I set up a small smithy exhibition at their festivals once in a while. Just business. In fact, I met Markham at the last exhibition."

"I wish I could tell you more," said Pete, "but like I said, he's not been by here much."

I finished my drink and rose, flipping some cash on the bar. "Give my best to Lucy."

All this talk about Markham starts the back of my neck itching,so I decide to return to the forge, check the address and secure Markham's order in the safe.

A cold draft gusted outward when I unlocked the shop front and defeated the alarm. The door closed rather quicker than usual, which was curious, but nothing special. Hurried, I cross to the counter and stepped behind it. Looking down, something seemed odd about its lock-up chest. My fingers explored the casement to find the latches pried open. I swept my arm back and forth inside. The sword was gone!

My arms knotted, and a throbbing pressure built behind my eyes. As my adrenaline rose the draft again caught my attention, coming from the rear of the shop.

My hand hesitated over the counter's phone for a moment, but my anger needed walking off, so I decided to inventory the rest of the forge before calling the police. Everything else seemed undisturbed until I made it to the back of the shop.

The contact alarm on the rear window was shorted with some sort of sticky foil and wire, still plastered to the magnetic contacts and the frames clasps were jimmied open. Already angered, a red haze overtook my eyes, and my temper flamed. I imagined Markham, waiting around until closing, then climbing through the alley window. Nothing else in the shop had seemed disturbed, and Markham was the only person who had seen me place the sword under the counter.

###

My tires shrieked around the tight, unlit curves of the tarred country road. Furious, I'd even forgotten to call the police about the break-in. Nothing mattered except getting back my stolen property. The white stripes stuttered by matching the color of my clenched knuckles as I ground back my anger. Then, speared in the headlights, appeared the forested private drive of the medieval tower. A black-gated entrance closed the lane. Swerving off onto the gravel shoulder, I exited, slamming the car door and sprinting around the gate's pylons to storm up the winding dirt drive on foot.

The flimsy poorly painted tower door barely slowed my progress. I grabbed the knob and push through the simple latch plate of the lock. The door burst inward. Faint sounds of singing and mumbling echoed down the tower's central hollow.

Markham's wheedling tenor! I leapt up the winding stairs two at a time, following the noise. By halfway up the spiral the sing-song cadence resolved into a staccato chant. One or two of the tower room doors stood ajar, revealing the antique flocked walls and bare wood flooring of the rooms behind them. Dim light streamed from these, to bloom softly against the unlit rough stonework of the shadowed stairwell. I neared the hatch to the tower's crenelated top, and from the clatter, it sounded like Markham might still be up there. Before quite mounting to the battlement's roof-hatch a glitter from inside one final room caught my eye. A further glance inside revealed my stolen property mounted to a wooden frame point down, on a covered table in the room's center. Light from a bare bulb shone on it, glinting off the blade.

To hell with that bastard. I divert my search for Markham to go after the sword. Above me, the chanting has concluded, and through the red roar of my outrage, metallic footfalls descend the battlement steps. I was in the room, right hand closed upon the haft of the sword to pull it free, when behind me, feet shuffled.

I swung around to confront a surprised Markham, and a giddy sensation passed through me. The room continued to spin beyond my turning, and a lampblack veil fell over the world.