[h3]Zerul City, the Drunken Dove[/h3]
Violet shook her head no at Morgan’s question, making a gesture in the Dirge’s general direction. “Bane-weapons possess something much worse than any kind of enchantment you are likely to have encountered, I’m afraid. It’s a property of the Stones that are imparted to and corrupted by whichever weapon they are attached to; they are capable of injuring souls, not just flesh. Wounds caused by a bane never heal, not even in the afterlife, and if one hurts another enough with a bane, one can cause the soul to unravel... effectively destroying it permanently.”
“Even immortals fear banes,” Rose pointed out grimly, “and with good reason. A bane can kill immortals, too. Permanently.”
“Dirges are no different from other bane-weapons, except for their appearance. Though their scabbards are also enchanted, made so that they will destroy the Dirge if it is within them when its wearer dies.” Violet eyed Ixion curiously. “Which meant that the Blue Tool must have been made to draw the Dirge before she was killed. That’s quite the feat; as far as I know, they are forbidden from doing that except under extraordinary circumstances.
All Tools supposedly have one,” she continued, “one for each master. We’re not sure how many of them there are, but we do know that there’s at least one in each of the Rodorian duchies... and that the Fixer has a Dirge, as well. Which means that he has either killed a Tool before, or that he was once a Tool himself.”

“Before we go on about this,” Rose interrupted her sister, holding up a furry finger to call attention to herself, “there is something I want to know.” Now it was her turn to look curiously at Ixion. “When you fought the Fixer, did you notice anything odd about the way he fought? I mean, maybe he never took his hands out of his pockets, or he refused to draw his weapons; things like that.”