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pestered the cooks and the stablehands and the smiths till they were half-demented with us. Generally, in other words, we were children.
    It was the swordsmith Raineach I’d gone to annoy, one autumn day just after I turned twelve. I liked the woman, surly as she was, and I admired the way she worked, and I was hoping that one day she’d make me the sword I wanted, so I sucked up to her relentlessly. She knew that was what I was doing, but she put up with it, because she liked me as much as I liked her. I think when Raineach was young she’d been an outcast too. We can always recognise one another. It’s something feral in the eyes.
    That day, as soon as I stepped from the bright morning chill into the dark wall of roaring heat that was her workshop, she raised her eyes from the half-made weapon hissing in the long water trough, gave me a nod, then jerked her head very slightly towards a corner. I thought she was palming me off on her two sons, both good company but younger than me. There was no sign of them. Instead Eili was there, intent on a small piece of silver that she was twisting with pliers. Pushing sweaty spikes of hair out of her eyes she licked her lips, fixated on the work. Raineach’s three-year-old stepdaughter stood watching every move of her hands, dark eyes wide and mouth open.
    Trying not to go straight to Eili’s side, I folded my arms and watched the smith beat the soldered steel, the razor hard strips to the softer core.
    ‘Another sword?’ I said hopefully.
    ‘Aye,’ said Raineach darkly. ‘Not for you, greenarse.’ She thrust it back into the furnace.
    ‘Who, then?’
    ‘Not that it’s any of your business.’
    ‘No, but who?’
    ‘Eorna.’
    ‘Why does Eorna need another sword?’ I said resentfully.
    With a sigh of exasperation, she whipped the annealed metal from the furnace, then wiped sweat off her face with her bare forearm. ‘Don’t you keep your cloddish ears open? You know fine Alasdair Kilrevin’s restless. Kate expects trouble from him, and she expects your father to put him back in his box. Happens every decade or so. Kilrevin gets bored if he can’t do some killing now and again. The bastard needs to let off steam.’
    ‘Good,’ I said hopefully. ‘Can I fight?’
    ‘You, greenarse? Don’t make me laugh.’ She laughed anyway.
    ‘I’m good enough.’
    ‘You’re a fumbling beginner and you’re too damn short. Look at your brother. When you’re as tall as he is and half as good with a sword, then you can fight.’ She slammed her hammer onto the steel, fountaining white-hot sparks.
    Scowling, I turned on my heel, hoping Eili hadn’t overheard that. Did the sharp-tongued cow have to say it so loud? It was pretty rich coming from Raineach, who wasn’t so tall herself: she was small and slender, elfin-faced, and you’d never have thought from lookingat her that she had the power in her arms to forge swords.
    Eili remained hunched over her workbench till I was beside her, and only then did she look up with a wry smile. Her brown eyes were sympathetic. Hell: she’d heard Raineach’s snide remark. The little girl shrank back behind her, mistrustful, but Eili tutted.
    ‘Come on. He doesn’t bite, believe it or not.’
    I bared my teeth and gnashed them, and the child giggled.
    I stuck out my tongue, and she giggled again, and stuck hers out in return.
    ‘So short I can’t even scare a midget like you,’ I said.
    ‘Take no notice of Raineach,’ said Eili softly. ‘She doesn’t mean it, it’s the way she is.’
    ‘Course,’ I said, as if I didn’t much care. ‘What’s that?’
    In fact I could see what it was. She had twisted thick silver wire into a rope, and now she was coaxing it into a torque, the size that would fit a wrist. It was a basic piece, but she’d made it well, and she was taking enormous care to shape the curve of it just right. With tongs she softened it briefly in the small stone forge, then cooled it in a bowl and examined it