006: THE HOOK
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After I regained my composure, Amelie and Konrad left. I didn’t have much on me, just a bag of clothes, a simple set of toiletries and 500 Soren, the currency of Eshore.
The old man didn’t waste his time and got straight to business, “Ma name’s Hemlock. But to ya it’s Master. Got that?”
“Yes Master,” I replied. Hemlock seemed pleased with my response and gestured for me to follow him. He led me to a small shed behind the forge. It was a fairly small shed, around 7 by 5 feet in size. Not bad, this could’ve easily been a 3k-a-month apartment in New York.
“Dis shed is ya’s. Do wha’ever ya please with it. Dere’s an ‘ammock in the storage shed. Figure out ‘ow that works. Sleep werever ya please, bu’ be awake at sunrise. I don’t need no lazy appren’ice.” Hemlock was leaning into the no craps-given style of mentoring. This was refreshing.
Hemlock showed me around the rest of his property, apart from the forge, storeroom and my hut, we had a public outhouse and Hemlock’s cabin.
It was about noon when Hemlock had finished giving me the tour, he instructed me to get changed into working clothes and meet him at the forge so that I could get to work.
When I was ready, I found that the forge was populated by several other people apart from Hemlock. “Ya didn’t think that ya were ma only appren’ice didya?”
“No. Not at all Master.”
“Good. I want ya to grab one of them buckets and bring ten loads of coal from the store room.” Hemlock was using me to get his menial work done. This was fine because I got to be around the forge and learn a thing or two about the practical side of things.
I did as I was told and filled up two buckets with coal in the store room. The two buckets didn’t look that heavy, but I soon found that they weighed more than they looked. Fun. Nevertheless, I persevered and pushed through it. Eventually, I managed to get all ten buckets of coal to the forge.
Hemlock looked quite pleased by my work, “Right, now grab one of them shovels and go ‘elp Finn by the forge.”
When I saw Finn, it was very apparent that he wasn’t human. He was tall, around six foot, two inches. His hair was black, just a very black (I’m going to call this Finn black if I can ever figure out how to make a pigment that matched it) and had a jawline you could slice your finger on. What gave away his non-human nature were his ears. They were long and pointy. An Elf.
“I don’t want to sound prejudiced or anything, but what brings an elf out here?” I asked Finn, who was already shovelling coal into the forge.
“Just because you say that you don’t want to sound prejudiced, doesn’t make your question any less so,” Finn replied, his voice conveying an incredible amount of annoyance.
“Sorry about that. Can we start over?”
“I guess so.” This guy had a very familiar style of talking. Though I wasn’t quite sure where I’d heard it before.
“I’m Alberich von Eisenwerk, and are?”
Finn stopped his shovelling and stared at me as if I were some mythical creature. It then dawned on me that I was technically a noble. Nobles don’t shovel coal.
“Nah. You aren’t one of those Eisenwerks are you?”
“In the flesh.”
“Aren’t you like… supposed to be the smart one from the bunch?”, Finn said as he shovelled a pile of coal into the forge. “Like… There are rumours of you being loads smart and scaring off your tutors. What’s that like? Not being understood by the people around you?”
Another realization dawned on me. This guy was totally an Emo. He did pose an interesting question though.
“I’ve never thought about it that way,” I said as I joined him in his shovelling. “I know that I’m smarter than everyone. By a long shot. But I also don’t feel smart?”
“I get that.” Finn finished shovelling his pile and started to help me with mine. “Aren’t you a bit young for this line of work?”
“I am. But this beats sitting through lessons I’m already good at.”
“I like that. You get it.”
“Get what?”
A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
“Ummm? The point?”
“Right.”
It didn’t take too long for us to finish shovelling in the coal. Hemlock, seeing that we were done, barked out orders for us to refill the water tanks. After that, it was to grab Iron ingots from the store room, after that, it was to deliver a hammer to a customer, and after that, it was to sweep the workshop.
To put it bluntly, I was learning nothing that day. Nor did I the next, and the day after, and the day after that. The highlight of that week was Amelie coming by with Konrad bringing me a fresh set of clothes, some honey-pickled apples and a set of hot meals for the entire forge.
This cycle carried on for about a month before I started getting sick of it. I wasn’t getting any hands-on experience and frankly, it felt like I was wasting my time.
“He,y Finn. Don’t you want to do more than the menial tasks?” I asked my teenage(? I never asked him about his age) elf friend as I handed him a slice of honey-pickled apples.
“I’m just happy to be getting paid what I’m worth,” Finn said, taking a bite out of the slice.
“You get paid?” I asked, staring at Finn.
“You don’t?” Finn asked, looking at me equally as shocked. “I thought that you were here to just learn the trade.”
“I am, but I’d also like to get paid for the work I do. It doesn’t have to be minimum wage, I’m fine with anything.”
“You rich folk have a thing called minimum wage?” Finn looked at me with an extremely confused expression. Crap! I thought. I was bringing my earthly sensibilities into this world.
“Never mind that. What do you think we can do to get his attention?”
“I don’t know. Let’s work harder?” Finn said, quite apathetically.
“Come on Finn! We have to think bigger!”
“We… Start our own forge?”
“No! What I’m saying is, let’s build something and give it to Master Hemlock. If we do a good job, he’ll finally acknowledge us.” This tactic had worked when I first joined the Les Fantomes group. I spent a lot of my own time researching a new type of spring. These were later fitted into several Jeeps sent to aid the South Koreans against the North[1]. That was a good year, I got a promotion along with a hefty bonus.
“I like your style, Alber,” Finn said as he finished the apple slice. “But what do we forge?”
“I was thinking… a pocket knife.”
“That’s a good idea. We should forge a pocket knife.”
“That’s exactly what we’re gonna do!” Finn exclaimed with the most energy I’ve heard come from him. “Quick question though. How exactly are we going to do this? We can’t exactly do this in broad daylight.”
“That’s why we sneak in at night,” I said, “And don’t worry. I have a set of keys. Master Hemlock has me firing up the forge every morning.”
“So that’s why work’s been starting much earlier since you got here.”
“Anyway, you in?” I asked.
“For sure, I’ll meet you five hours before sunrise.”
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True to his word, Finn arrived five hours before the sun came up. I used the ring of keys given to me and opened the forge. Everything was dark, which was ideal since we wanted secrecy.
I got the forge going and Finn fetched three iron ingots and we got started with the forging process.
The first step to forging anything is heating the metal. This is called heating. None of the books I’d read gave a specific temperature to head the ingot to. It only mentioned to heat the ingot till it was malleable.
Finn and I got the ingot to a white-hot state. Now it was time to shape the ingot. I grabbed the white glowing Ingot and moved it to the nearest anvil. Finn grabbed a hammer and started to flatten the now incredibly malleable metal. Now that we had a red hot sheet of metal, I had Finn take out the Iron Chisel and refine the shape of the knife. Once it was to my satisfaction, I took the knife and dipped it in hot water. At this point, the sun was rising and we were running out of time. I had Finn start the grinder and we used the remaining time we had to sharpen the blade. To finish the knife off, I wrapped the handle of the knife in cloth. Our pocket knife was complete.
As Finn and I walked out of the barn, we were met with a not-so-happy voice. “OI. WHAT DO YA RATS THINK YA BE DOING?”
It was Hemlock. Time to dazzle him.
“Master, I- I mean Finn and I made this,” I said, pulling out the pocket knife and placing it in Hemlock’s hands.
He took a look at me, and then back at the knife. “Ya rats made this?” he asked.
Finn and I responded with a “Yes Master.”
Hemlock held the knife in one hand and squeezed it. Blaze and all. The knife crumbled in his hands. “Ya call dat a knife?”
Hemlock seemed disappointed and left the forge, leaving the two of us alone.
He came back later, once the rest of his apprentices came. He spoke to each of them and gave them blueprints of the work they had to follow, but gave us no work.
Finn and I spent the rest of the day watching the others work and assisting them with anything they required.
Once it was time for everyone to go home, Finn left. Though Hemlock didn’t ask me to close up the forge as usual. Instead, he finally spoke to me.
“Boy. Come ‘ere,” I did as I was told and found myself standing behind Hemlock who was leaning over his anvil. “Did ya design dat knife?”
“Yes sir.”
“Do ya know why dat thing crumbled in me hand?”
“No sir.”
Hemlock gave out a deep sigh. “Materials are sacred. Did ya know dat one of dose ingots ya wasted dis morning took someone a whole day ta make?”
“No sir.”
“Dat’s why I didn’t want ya ta work with da forge yet. E’ry smith has ta pay their due.” Hemlock paused and turned to me. “Ma master had me sweeping da floors, fetching coal and water for six ‘ears b’fore he ever let make a simple hook.” Hemlock sighed and continued, “Our work here is sacred. We turn iron ingots ta all sorts of things. Helmets, pi’axes, arrow’eads. People see it as un’oly witchcraft. We do the tings magic can never do.”
“I’m sorry for my disrespect, Master.”
“No lad. It is I who be sorry. Ya design be a work of art. It failed b’cause I failed ta teach ya.” Hemlock knelt down to my level. “Lad. ya brother brought you ‘ere because ‘e saw somming in ya. Starting tomorrow, ya be ‘andling ma drawings.
[1]: In Kenji’s version of Earth, North Korea tried to invade the South in the year 2035. Kenji’s springs were used in the shock absorbers of the jeeps sent as military aid and allowed a much smoother ride, the military used these machines to transport fragile goods to and from the battlefield. Kenji’s efforts were later recognised by the American and Korean governments, and he also got a hefty bonus at the end of the year.