I awaken. My limbs are chilled and stiff. The heat of the furnace has faded completely by now and the sand has not insulated me much either. I stand and stretch, yawn and rub my eyes to get the sleep out, stamp my feet to try and shake some vigor back into my body. The burn on my foot stings. Out the corner of my eyes I see dwarves in the stands pointing at me. Some are shaking those who've fallen asleep awake.
Many here slept when I did. This realization feels very strange.
Nervously I look at the timers, and am relieved to see that only half a long-hour has passed since the contest began. I'm ahead of schedule.
I frown. Maybe I shouldn't feel relieved about this. Guildmaster Wharoth always used to tell me I was too impatient, and though I thought I'd got rid of that bad habit down in the fort, maybe I'm still hurrying things. I still have the equivalent of four and a half days left of forging left for this craft. I should take more time, be more careful.
I switch on the furnace, and this time I only heat the welding rod up to red heat. This proves too little to soften the titanium, so I heat it to orange. This works, though I have to keep reheating it every other touch I make to the seam.
A whole short-hour passes before the outside of the helm is welded into its final shape, but I think taking the time has been worth it: apart from at the top where I made my mistake, the join is even.
My mistake shouldn't affect the overall structural integrity much, but it will hurt the runic flow. At least it's not as bad as my other mistake, the one with the rod. I examine them again. Yes, the sixth is unusable. When I tap it the sound is high and uneven in pitch.
So I'm back to the same difficult question: do I go through with spending the rest of my money on another rod and risk disaster should I run out of reagent; or else do I re-jig the angles at the top of each rod and make the frame pentagonal?
I don't want to rush the decision. I'll come back to it later.
I start work on the runes. I'm going to do two poems: one will be a great long single line spiraling down the outer skin of the helm; and the another, a thematic sequel, will go on the inner framework.
On the inner loops will be an interlude that links the two.
Paper first, like always. My writing-stick scratches and ancient symbols are reborn—just ancient ones, I'm keeping tight control for now. I need to work out the basic concepts. Yet it's proving a real challenge. It's been too long since I wrote out a poem, or even read one. I crammed my head with new runes, but vocabulary plus grammar doesn't become art so easily.
I scratch failed draft after failed draft into existence. Nothing fits together, not a single line works. I've gone rusty—forgotten my skills. My only consolation is that I'm writing so small that surely none of the crowd can read my failures.
Sleeping won't help; I just did that. How about a walk? I approach Judge Daztat:
“There's no rule saying I can't walk around the arena, is there?”
“None.”
“I'll be taking a stroll then. Don't touch my equipment.”
He scowls. “Of course not.”
“Good. You respect me that much, at least.”
Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.
“I respect you just the minimum I am required to, and the rules say that only you are to touch your craft. So go ahead: waste your time with your little stroll.”
Seems that I touched a nerve. In Vanerak's pocket he may be, but perhaps he still has a smidge of honor left in him. He won't go so far as to interfere directly with another dwarf's craft. That really would be an unforgivable sin.
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“What's he doing? He's left his forge!”
“Has he given up?”
“Maybe he's going to admit his guilt. Maybe it's all too much to handle.”
Guildmaster Wharoth shuts down the discussion with a single word: “No.”
“You think?”
“Of course that's what I bloody think. Don't question me. Zathar is not one to give up. He never gives up. And he won't admit any guilt so easily.”
“I think he should. End our shame quickly.”
Wharoth glares at the speaker. “What right do you have to speak of him? You were a child when the black dragon came. You have never met him. Do not presume to judge. That is not your job: it is no one's job.”
She bows her head. “I'm sorry.”
“And our shame will be cleared however this trial ends.”
“Will it?” another dwarf asks nervously. “There are many who won't—“
“Those sorts won't forgive us even if he is executed. Don't bother treating with them.”
He looks down at Zathar pacing around the arena, hoping that the runes spinning inside the young dwarf's head will be enough to stave off total defeat.
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Once I'm back at the forge I feel rather refreshed. The coolness of the sand below my thin shoes and the murmur of the crowd reminds me of a kind of place I once read about called a beach. They exist on the surface, next to great water oceans. The motion of the water over the millennia has smashed the rocks to sand so fine it's almost powder. They're described as calming places, where humans travel to get away from the stresses of their short lives, and I think if I live through this I'd like to visit one some day.
Days! And on the surface I could see the sun directly, and the moon also.
Strange hope buoying my heart, I get back to my compositions. The runes flow a little easier, and the stanzas are coming together. The theme of it will be diversion, of taking the enemy force and throwing it elsewhere, like a rock throwing apart a mighty river. Hits, divides, spreads, flows away, vanishes. That's what will happen to the force of Barahtan's hammer-blow.
The poem around the outside is similar in theme. It is of rain falling upon a mountain and rolling down it. No matter the storm, the mountain prevails, and indeed grows stronger as the very droplets of the enemy deposit minerals.
The two lines on the loops reinforce the concept of water as the enemy and the stone as the heroic resistor. Too dynamic a theme for armor, some might criticize, yet it'll work well with the incandesite.
Though that reagent isn't the best for platinum or silver runes, and isn't particularly suited to defense either, it's what I know how to use best, and it's relatively inexpensive also. Hytrigite would be the best choice, but it's way out of my budget.
I glance at the sand-timers. Most of the first long-hour has run down; I'm nearly halfway through the forging. My heart quickens a touch. I was lost in the runes—can I perfect them and still have enough time to bend the wires and graft without error?
And I also need to make a decision about whether to use five rods or six.
Runes first. I read over my drafts a couple times to get the overall feel into my head, then I take up my platinum and silver wire and begin to work it into shape.
I don't give my strange instincts absolute freedom, but neither do I restrict them overly harshly. My fingers make bends where there should be straights, and corners turn at alternative angles. Every third or so snick of my clippers heralds a new creation. The lines of poetry now taking life upon the anvil become superior to what is on the paper. The mountain becomes more solid, the rainstorm more ferocious. I can hear and feel the spray, smell the water and taste the stone.
This is it! This is the trance I've been craving. The thrill of creation! It is more intense than any regular forging trance. Everything around me vanishes—even my tools, even my wire and my hands and my very heartbeat. All that exists are the runes.
My mind is a forge for them—no, my soul is. They spring from the fire below the magma sea—
A chill freezes me; my hands stop. I am being watched. Slowly, I turn my head up to the stands. Eyes, made beady by magnifying lenses, stare; yet it's not those that have halted me.
There! I see him for the first time in many years, in a shadowed box above the platform where my craft will meet its test. He wears tungsten armor, a mirror-mask; a brutally magnificent poll-axe rests upon his lap. He needs no lenses to see me and my runes that he desires. His unseen gaze is piercing me and I tremble.
Vanerak is watching.