"You will feel what the situation requires, for you will be a new thing," said the Blacksmith. "Nothing about life, though, will be the same."
"Will Scythia still be my wife?" Again, he was not worried, but curious, in large part on Scythia's behalf.
"You will be flesh, of course, for I wish for you to be seen," the Blacksmith said. "I would not separate yours from hers, and therefore I tell you, yes, you will still be husband to the woman who has loved you rightly."
"And the one who murdered me," Axebourne said, "shall I seek revenge?" It was an honest question, concerned only with the notion of justice.
"You must not," said the Blacksmith. "The murderer yet lives, but must serve another purpose before they return to me. You will show them the true meaning of mercy."
"Yes, father," Axebourne said.
"And though your friends may still call you Axebourne, I give you this," the Blacksmith said.
In his hand was a white stone, attached to the end of a golden chain. In the center of the stone was an engraving.
"Read it,' said the Blacksmith.
It said, AHNM, but the word would not escape Axebourne's lips to be heard in the wider world.
"This is your new name," the Blacksmith said, "known only to you who receive it. Even were you to speak it to another, they would not comprehend it, nor be capable of repeating it back to you. Even Scythia will not be able to grasp it, until she, too, has come to meet me on the Path."
Axebourne took the stone, slipped its chain around his neck, and felt the authority it granted. The Ten Great Skills ignited deep in his restored flesh, ten and more. He knew now that nothing could destroy him, unless he were to forsake the name. He didn't even think that would be possible.
"Come, see your new self," said the Blacksmith. He led the way off the path to a still pond in a hollow between two hills. He washed his hands clean in the pure water so that the soot made it opaque. Immediately the water started to dissolve the soot and become clear again, but before it did, AHNM saw his own reflection.
He'd never been one for mirrors, for he knew he was not a handsome man, but he did know his own image. Here he looked much the same. He'd kept the dignity of his ripe age, his low brow and deep-set eyes. The eyes were brighter, though, silver like the moonlight. Any freckles or moles had disappeared, and there was a glow to his skin like that of a newborn babe. His hair was still wild and untamed, but its fiery red had been purified so that it truly looked aflame. He was himself, but renewed. AHNM looked up at the Blacksmith.
"I can only say thank you, father," he said.
"It is only what I have promised," said the Blacksmith. "You will be a Guardian to the world, and not only Overland, but every land. Remember to let the others do their work, for though you can do many things now, you cannot live their lives for them."
"How will I know when to act, and when to refrain?" AHNM asked.
"You will know."
The Blacksmith held out a hand, clean now from the soot of his forge, and drew AHNM up onto his feet.
"Come," he said, "let us go and see the City. There is yet time before you must go."
They walked together down the Glorious Path, and AHNM was treated to awe after awe as truths and beauties that he never had guessed at were revealed to him.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
Shells
The surface of Scythia's rage calmed after an initial storming march away from the Chasm's edge. The rest of Gorgonbane had followed closely, while trying to give her space. She finally slowed her mad march and seemed to fall into a more calculating mode. What she was thinking, though, no one else could say.
Pierce wanted to guess that it was all just as simple as revenge. Something priceless had been taken from her, and she wanted an eye for an eye, death for death. Though this was the teaching of the Glorious Path, that one wronged should be repaid or avenged, storming up to Kash in his fortress did not seem the most prudent solution. Scythia was a legend, though, a heroine among the greatest of heroes and myths in Overland. Pierce believed that she would see reason before it was too late.
And if she didn't, well, he would still fight by her side.
"What I can't figure out," Agrathor was saying to Ess, "is where those greater Monstrosities came from. You can't just hide something that big. Especially that last one..." He trailed off thinking about it. It really was mind-boggling, Pierce agreed.
"They must be something from deeper in the Chasmic depths," Ess said, "from places I've never been."
"Could he have other forgemasters, Sev?" Agrathor asked the big grey man. "Could there be other teams working on the Monstrosities that you didn't know about?"
Sev shrugged. "It is possible, master Agrathor. But not likely. I have never known there to be secrets kept between forgemasters. And anyhow, the Monstrosities are not built. They are harvested."
"They're plants?" Agrathor said incredulously.
Sev gave out something like a chuckle. "Many believe they are like the undead, that we forgemasters construct them from those killed in battle or otherwise. How we would then cause them to grow to such impressive statures, I could not imagine."
"So what are they?" asked Ess. "I, too, have never understood."
"They are born in the ground, like plants I suppose, or the crystals that grow in the deep caves of the earth. We find them, excavate them, and train them for their chosen tasks," Sev said.
"So they are creatures," Pierce said. "I mean, they have life."
"Such as it is," Sev said. "But what life they have is not complex. It is trivial to fill their minds with imperatives and procedures. It is easy to teach them
