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They’re exactly what we need to escape.

But that doesn’t solve how I’ll get Kellyn away from all thoseguards before they can hurt him, or how we’ll get out of here without Ravis’s men right on our heels.

When just a few days later all the hilts are shaped and welded to their blades, everyone turns to me expectantly.

It’s time for me to magic Ravis’s swords.

Ten days. That’s how long it took for my team to craft over five dozen swords. So many, even with my efforts to slow down the process by having a hand in making each one. They’re simple blades with no finery or ornamentation, but they’ll kill a man just as well.

And now I have to make them even deadlier.

“You need them put back in the kiln, yes?” Elany asks. “You mentioned they needed to be hot in order for your magic to work?”

I nod.

My team does the task for me, which is good, because my hands have started to sweat. As if I weren’t already under enough pressure with Kellyn healing from a head wound and countless guards watching my every move.

I don’t like magicking in front of others. Sometimes I even make Temra leave the forge when it’s time for that part of the process. It’s something that comes from inside me, and outside distractions will often lock that part of me away.

Or cause whatever I’m magicking to have unanticipated abilities.

That’s how I made Secret Eater, the sword Warlord Kymora was so eager to possess that she chased me all over Ghadra for it. I’d been distracted by Kellyn while trying to make the weapon. It was the first time I’d ever seen him, and I ended upcreating the most dangerous sword the world has ever known. Thankfully, Secret Eater is tucked away in the small town of Amanor, buried in a rock of iron, where only someone worthy may pull it free.

When the steel has had enough time to reheat, Elany treads over to the kiln, pulls out one of the swords with a pair of tongs, and thrusts it at me.

I take it, and for the first time in my life, the tools that I hold so very dear feel wrong in my hands. Today I’m not using my abilities for protection. These blades have one purpose, that of destruction.

The knowledge makes my heart ache, but I cannot bear to see Kellyn chopped into small bits.

I have no choice but to try and do the least amount of damage.

Back when I had a shop in Lirasu, I would make smaller items in bulk: daggers, buckles, arrows, nails, and the like. They were imbued with simple magic. They’d never dull or rust or break. Arrows would always hit their mark. Everyday items that more ordinary folk could afford.

Maybe I could do that. Imbue Ravis’s swords with simple magic. He didn’t ask for specifics. He asked for volume.

Fine.

That I can do.

As I inspect the weapon, the forges go quiet. Everyone around me ceases working. The constant hammering and scraping and bellowing all cease. Breaths are held, and heads lean in.

To watch me.

I close my eyes and pretend no one is around. That it’s just me in the forge. Me in my safe space.

And I think of Temra.

We’re bound by blood and years of sisterhood. Our love for each other is warm and accepting and unbreakable. I hold that feeling close as I think fondly through my memories of her.Watching her take the lead in city plays. Seeing her face light up when she dances. Seeing her bent over her schoolwork or listening to her babble about boys. They’re little things, but I would give anything to have more of those moments with her.

I feel the light pulse of magic from the weapon before me. Satisfied, I quench the blade and hand it off to a nearby worker, before starting the process over again on another sword.

Elany interrupts me after I finish magicking the second one.

“What did you do to them?”

“Extended their life spans—and that of Ravis’s soldiers.”

When she says nothing more, I look up. She and everyone else around me have expectant faces.