#withal

"As much."

"Good."

"Will you take it now?"

"I will – to break it on the forge where it was made." And he pointed to the ramshackle smithy in the distance.

The Crippled God hissed, "You said it would never be broken, Withal!"

The weaponsmith shrugged. "We're always saying things like that. Pays the bills."

A horrid cry was loosed from the Crippled God, ending in strangled hacking coughs.

The giant was studying Withal in return, and he now asked, "You made this cursed weapon?"

"I did."

The back-handed slap caught Withal by surprise, sent him flying backward. Thumping hard onto his back, staring up at the spinning blue sky – that suddenly filled with the warrior, looking down.

"Don't do it again."

And after saying that, the giant moved off.

Blinking in the white sunlight, Withal managed to turn onto his side, and saw the giant walk into a portal of fire, then vanish as the Crippled God screamed again. The portal suddenly disappeared with a snarl.

“Nothing,” Withal replied.

Hacking laughter. “You fear angering me, yes? No need. I give you leave to speak your mind.”

“I have sat in my share of taverns,” Withal said, “in the company of fellow veterans. A select company, perhaps, not grown so blind with sentimentality as to fashion nostalgia from times of horror and terror. Did we spin out those days of our youth? No. Did we speak of war? Not if we could avoid it, and we worked hard at avoiding it.”

“Why?”

“Why? Because the faces come back. So young, one after another. A flash of life, an eternity of death, there in our minds. Because loyalty is not to be spoken of, and honour is to be endured. Whilst courage is to be survived. Those virtues, Chained One, belong to silence.”

“Indeed,” the god rasped, leaning forward. “Yet how they proliferate in peace! Crowed again and again, as if solemn pronouncement bestows those very qualities upon the speaker. Do they not make you wince, every time you hear them? Do they not twist in your gut, grip hard your throat? Do you not feel a building rage—”

“Aye,” Withal growled, “when I hear them used to raise a people once more to war.”