Unfinished (First of the Blade Book 5)
UNFINISHED
First of the Blade Book 5
D.K. HOLMBERG
Copyright © 2022 by D.K. Holmberg
Cover by Damonza.com
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Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Author’s Note
Series by D.K. Holmberg
Chapter One
The sword whistled through the air and narrowly missed Imogen’s head. She ducked and rolled to the side, focusing on the pattern that came to mind, and immediately pushed it away. She could not be too predictable.
It had been a long time since she had felt challenged like this.
She brought her blade up, recovering for a moment in Tree Stands in the Forest, and held it upright as she centered herself, getting ready for the next movement that she might have to make, but she was already a step too slow. She spun, swinging her blade around, forming Stream through the Mountains, but that wasn’t quick enough.
A gentle thought came into the back of her mind, a chiding that reminded her of the lessons that she’d had all those years ago when she’d started at the sacred temple, and it rang true even now.
Especially now.
Precision is not the key to the sacred patterns.
It was all about the flow.
The air was cool, crisp, and her footing was a little off, having to work around the rocky mountainside that she found herself on. She ducked beneath a small rock, using that for cover, and then focused once again. Tree Stands in the Forest.
But it wasn’t Tree Stands in the Forest that she wanted. She needed to borrow from some of the other sacred patterns, and particularly from those that were not tied to the kind of lessons that she could learn now. She needed to borrow from patterns that would guide her to a different understanding.
They were lessons that had been given to her by Benji, and as she concentrated on what he had shown her, she started to feel the energy building within her, and started to see the patterns forming; an understanding that was out there but difficult to fully master.
She’d seen the glimmering lines of potential when she had used that sacred pattern before and as she did now, Imogen traced that understanding, trying to use that to know what Master Liu might do.
He was a true master.
And here she thought that she had progressed so quickly, so skillfully, that she would even be able to defeat one of the sacred sword masters.
Tree Stands in the Forest.
She mixed it, adding something different with her understanding of Tree Stands in the Forest. It was a complicated pattern she had seen Benji demonstrate in one of her visions, but it was enough that she could see the various lines of possibility. As she attempted it, there was something more, a different complexity to it, a layer that she had not anticipated.
She focused, feeling for the pattern, trying to see just what it was that Master Liu might do, but the various possibilities that came from him were far more complicated than she had expected.
They were more complicated than they had been for anybody that she had dealt with recently. She saw several lines converging, and she slipped down the mountainside, allowing herself to tumble. She took a spill and had to accept the pain that came with it, but even as she did, she felt something change.
There seemed to be, crackling in the air, a certain energy out there, and she pushed off, using a blast of Lightning Strikes in the Storm. This was one of the simpler sacred patterns she had mastered. As she used it, she found herself gliding across the stone, which snagged at her jacket, her legs, and pain bloomed.
She was Leier. She could ignore it.
Imogen shot to her feet, jumped up, and spun. Her blade came around in a sharp arc—
And was met by another.
Master Liu was there. He had a thin switch of a blade, barely more than needle thick, or so it seemed. He made it dance, whipping it around, the sound of the blade carving through the air something like a whistle. Imogen found herself thinking that she would shatter the blade each time that she struck it, but she never managed to do so. There had to be some other technique behind it.
It was a blade she had never even known Master Liu possessed. He had pulled it out of one of his canes. As he danced, it seemed as if the blade became a part of him, part of his arms, part of some flow he managed to sweep around him.
More lines of potential bloomed around Imogen.
She was trying to understand them, and she thought that if she had more experience, she might know which ones to concentrate on more, and how to prune some of the accessories, using those so that she could anticipate just what he would do, but she didn’t have that experience yet.
That was part of the intention behind the sparring session. Imogen jumped, looking back, keeping her blade clutched in hand, and flowed off to the side. She twisted again, this one a sacred pattern that she had created from what she’d seen.
It was Snow in the Wind.
She’d seen her brother use that same pattern to disappear. She felt a surprising stirring deep within her as she spun, and it caused her to falter. That sacred pattern was not one that she had expected, but she’d seen Timo using it and thought that she could re-create it.
Then she fell, catching her hip on the stone, and tried to bounce back up, but Master Liu was there. It took everything in Imogen’s concentration for her to form Tree Stands in the Forest before him so that his blade didn’t sweep down toward her.
Master Liu looked down at her, his eyes blazing with a bright intensity. “You have grown in skill, Imogen Inaratha, and yet you still depend upon too much that you need to control.”
Imogen focused and thought about what she needed to use for Tree Stands in the Forest. It was a lesson he had taught her years ago, and the memories were there, vibrant in her mind, but she had learned so many other lessons in the time since she had left Master Liu that she thought that she did not need all his lessons. She could have some of her own.
Tree Stands in the Forest was only a part of this pattern. There was the power that it began to absorb, power that came from deep beneath her, power that came as she pushed the energy out from the sacred pattern so that it could branch upward and around her, and Imogen used that now.
The massive blooming of energy began to arc up and around, and as it did, she could feel somethin
g solidifying. It was almost as if it were an actual tree. She could see it now, a translucent beam of energy that swirled around her. And as she saw it, she focused on that energy, continuing to hold on to it, knowing that she had withstood the blows of a Sul’toral.
What was a sacred sword master against that?
Master Liu switched his blade, striking at her pattern, and it crumbled.
So much for what a sacred sword master is against something like that.
Imogen rolled, barely avoiding the blow, and flipped to her feet, shooting upward with Lightning Strikes in the Storm. Then she twisted, arcing in the same pattern but sweeping her blade in a different fashion. She brought it around, and Master Liu was there.
He stood motionless. Now he was Tree Stands in the Forest.
Imogen backed away, holding her sword ready, and focused on Tree Stands in the Forest for herself. She pushed downward and could feel the energy he possessed, though it was less than what she had felt when he had protected the sacred temple in the mountains. He had power, but it seemed to Imogen that he had sacrificed some part of himself when he had done that, and had lost some of his connection.
He held his blade casually. It drew the eye, a silver length of metal that seemed almost impossibly delicate but had managed to withstand every attack she had thrown at him. She had no idea how such a blade could even be functional, but he had proven that it was.
A sacred sword master’s blade.
When she had begun learning the blade, she had gone to the First in her village, wanting to learn, wanting to prove herself, and wanting to demonstrate she had what it took to become one of the Firsts. She had thrown herself at every challenger, demonstrating her skill time and again, trying to push herself until she could be the best. And when she had finally challenged for First status, Imogen had known that she was ready. She had known that she was skilled enough and that there were very few people within her village to rival her. She might have been younger, barely more than fifteen, but she had still known those truths.
Receiving her blade was one of the most cherished days in her life. She still held it now, the same blade, though it was now notched, proving her to be a sacred sword master. Or so she had always thought.
She had never seen Master Liu’s blade.
Now she understood why. The sacred sword masters didn’t carry the blades of the Firsts. They carried something altogether different. Something that seemed as if it could summon a different kind of power.
And here she was, forced to find her own way. She had to prove herself.
This hadn’t been the first time that she and Master Liu had sparred since she had saved him from the mountaintop, but it was the first time that she had felt the full force of his sparring. The first time that he had brought out his own sword and waited for her to react, as if he had anticipated that she would need to push him.
Now she understood.
He expected her to challenge him. She had thought herself his equal.
Wasn’t that the arrogance she’d had when she had first come to the sacred temple as one of the Firsts?
At the time, she had known that she was their equal, having seen them fight and knowing what it would take to prove it to herself and the rest of the village. She had never seen Master Liu in full.
During her time at the sacred temple, she had sparred with him and learned much of the sacred patterns, but she had never posed a threat to him while she had been there. Now she had to try something different.
She was focusing, concentrating, but it wasn’t just the sacred patterns Master Liu used. He knew what countered every single sacred pattern that she had ever learned. But he didn’t know the sacred patterns that Benji had taught her.
Even Imogen didn’t know those sacred patterns. She had the image of them, the knowledge of them in the back of her mind, but she wasn’t exactly sure what it was that the sacred patterns did. Benji had not taken the time to explain how those sacred patterns would work, and her meditation had not taught her that, either. Despite those failings, she thought she would have to use them now.
She danced, flowing.
It was a simple technique, one that created a steady pattern around Master Liu, and she moved from one place to the next, though she could feel that he wasn’t even reacting to her. It was as if he were unconcerned about her technique, and perhaps he was. How many times had Master Liu faced somebody like her, somebody who thought they could be a challenger? Could General Derashen have done the same thing?
Probably. He had gone to three of the sacred temples.
At the time, he had claimed that he was doing it only for learning, but what if there was another purpose behind it? What if he had sought to challenge one of the sacred sword masters but had come up short each time? What if he had thought that he had known enough?
When Imogen was growing up, General Derashen had been the most skilled swordsman she had ever seen, and he had proven himself in ways that so few others had, so she had thought it impossible that anybody could have that level of skill. Until she had met Master Liu.
She brought her blade around.
This time, it was a mixture of Lightning Strikes in the Storm, Tree Stands in the Forest, along with a hint of the blasting power of Axe Falling. The combination of energy was enough that Imogen could feel it bubbling, but at the last moment, she spun, and then she brought the blade down.
Tree Stands in the Forest.
Attack into defense.
She didn’t need to blast at Master Liu.
She had done something similar when she had been facing the strange creatures in the mountains and had felt the power underneath the sacred temples. She had needed to use her power to blast those voids. Even now, Imogen could feel the way that those voids had reacted to her driving her blade down, Lightning Strikes in the Storm coming from Tree Stands in the Forest. And perhaps that was what Master Liu was trying to show her here.
Tree Stands in the Forest, and then she focused on what Benji had shown her.
The pattern that was designed to give her possibilities. And as she concentrated on those possibilities, seeing them form in her mind, she realized that Tree Stands in the Forest provided her with a very different concept of what might be out there. She could see those possibilities beginning to form like leaves growing on the branches that stretched out and away from her.
Branches. She focused on each of them, on all of it, trying to comprehend the key to it. And perhaps there were some possibilities that were larger, thicker than the others.
Imogen continued to focus. Tree Stands in the Forest, mixed with this one.
The combination gave her a very different understanding. Imogen continued to drive power down. When Master Liu brought his blade up, suddenly moving, the Tree shifted, and the concentrated possibilities began to shift, almost like leaves fluttering on a branch. Imogen floated toward that, reacting.
She blocked his blade.
And then she went back into Tree Stands in the Forest. This time, she saw the branches even more densely. It was like a translucent tree, filled with the soft glowing white of the possibilities that came from the Porapeth magic. She continued to stand, holding on to that, using the concentrated effort, which might show her something more. And as she felt those possibilities existing in her mind, she saw something greater. It was Tree Stands in the Forest, and it was the understanding of what was there, and it was something more.
It was all of it. It was everything that might happen here.
And then Master Liu took a step toward her.
She saw the way that he was flowing, and she saw the energy he had, and she knew immediately what she had to do. The branch was thick, and the various possibilities that came off it were not nearly as dense as the one he took now.
He brought his blade around.
The possibilities stretched, swaying, leaves on the branches of the Tree. Imogen reacted, and…
She cleaved off that possibility.
She spun. br />
Another possibility sprang up, and she pruned that one.
She moved, one after another, pruning them until there was only one possibility.
Master Liu stood before her, blade upraised, and he brought it toward her. She had seen it. She had followed the various possibilities and had come to know what she would need to do here. As she saw that forming, she could feel that combination of sacred patterns Master Liu used, and she understood what she needed to do.
His whip-thin blade descended, dropping toward her, and Imogen braced. It wasn’t just a sword technique. It wasn’t just a sacred pattern. It was Tree Stands in the Forest; it was Lightning Strikes in the Storm; it was one of the patterns Benji had shown her, all of them linked together for her to block this blow. His sword came down with a crashing of power that seemed to be funneled by everything he channeled.
And Imogen could feel that power.
She shifted her hands, cleaving through the possible branch.
Master Liu dropped. He turned toward her, his blade lowered, the tip of it not touching the ground but no longer a threat. He tipped his head in a polite bow. Then he held out his blade. “Welcome, Master Inaratha.”
Chapter Two
The small fire crackled near them, pushing back some of the cold gusting around the mountainside. It wasn’t nearly as cold as the sacred temple that once had stood atop the mountain, but it did carry a memory of it. In Imogen’s mind, it was almost fitting that she should be here. Some snowflakes danced in the sky around her, swirling, catching in her hair, clinging to her cheeks, and attempting to bite at her flesh. She ignored all of them.