Heat permeated the soot-stained walls of the smithy, radiating from the twin hearths accompanied by the gentle staccato ticks of the burning coal. Sparks flew as hammers struck hot metal again and again in a steady rhythm that echoed through the smithy. Aiden pumped the bellows with precise regularity to keep his forge burning just enough. Holding his project with the tongs he gently rotated and struck, rotated and struck. Each ringing blow moved the metal slowly but surely into the shape he desired. Pushing the metal back into the glowing coals he wiped the sweat from his brow as he waited. The fire's glow cast flickering shadows across tools hung in neat rows along the walls while the burning coal filled the air with its pungent earthy odor.
Aiden loved working in the smithy. There was the clean pure satisfaction of turning raw metals into useful tools through the alchemy of furnace, anvil, mind, and muscle. With each swing of the hammer, he felt himself growing stronger, honing his body as much as his craft. His lean frame unimpeded by the leather apron and loose heavy cloth shirt as he worked the metal.
"Mind your technique, son," came the gruff voice of Eldric, the village's master blacksmith and Aiden's adopted father. The burly man pushed his own metal into the coals and stepped over to scrutinize Aiden's progress. "You'll wear yourself out too quickly swinging Jake about all willy-nilly. Keep your strokes smooth and even."
"Yes sir," Aiden nodded, adjusting his grip on the hammer that Eldric called Jake. Eldric had names for every tool in the shop. Names Aiden had learned in the four years since he came to live with the master smith.
The mountainous smith had a stern demeanor that did not hide the man's heart and cared deeply for everyone and everything. The fact that he named and talked to his tools was just ignored by the village folk. Aiden wasn't sure if it helped, and he'd never managed to get the tools to produce as fine a work as Eldric managed to get out of them. That was probably just due to a life spent working the smithy. Still... Aiden whispered to the hammer as he started to swing it again "Good Jake, just a little, keep it straight."
As Aiden returned to his task, he let his thoughts wander. He thought about the day his modest skill would rival that of his father's. More than that, he told himself, I will forge my own path, just as I forge this iron into something more. Even now, he longed to push past the limits of mere metalwork, to explore the mystical arts that called to him from the pages of Bram's books.
The rake began to take shape under Aiden's practiced strokes with Jake. He set Jake aside and took up the smaller hammer, Eldric said was named Ned but preferred to be called Nell.
"Just a few small adjustments Nell." He said before he realized he'd done it out loud. He glanced over to see Eldric arguing with two tongs called Stan and Mike as he used them to move a plow blade around in the forge getting ready to quench. Apparently, Eldric was still mad at Stan for dropping the last plow blade into the oil bath despite Mike's attempt to hold it by itself.
Eldric wanted Aiden to speak well to their tools. But, Aiden felt embarrassed and prayed no one in the village would find out he'd recently started to do it, even when Eldric wasn't standing over him insisting he coaxed the tools along. If Eldric caught him doing it on his own he'd blast that knowledge around the tavern and in the span of a single night everyone would hear of it.
Still, with Nell's gentle hammering, he made subtle adjustments to the angle of each tine, ensuring they aligned perfectly to comb through soil and grass with ease. All the tools they made were vital to the daily life of Lapidara's farmers and craftsmen. Aiden was proud his creations contributed to the land and people who'd taken him in so many years ago.
This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.
As he worked, Aiden employed more than just skill and strength. With a simple whispered incantation unheard by Eldric, he called on a hint of magic, a faint glow suffusing the metal. This infusion would help prevent rust and wear, his secret gift to the villagers though they remained oblivious to its presence in his tools.
A loud hissing came from the other side of the smithy followed by Eldric's "Much better Stan, glad to see you and Mike are working together properly again. Ah, this is a good quench no deformations or pings." There was the ringing scrape of a file over quenched metal "Excellent edge! Thank you, Ann."
Aiden put the rake back into the fire to bring it to quenching temperature. While he waited he cleaned and put Jake and Nell back on their hooks."
A few pumps on the billows, a little shifting of the rake around and he watched until it turned just the right shade of orange. He took it and dipped it into his own oil barrel. The hissing boil came with the odor of fried fair food, which made him hungry. Pulling the rake out of the oil he held it on his own anvil and turned it right and left to inspect it. None of the tines had shifted or warped in the quench and he hadn't heard any pings. Taking a file from the slot on the side of the anvil he tested each tine. They all gave the satisfying rasp of hardened steel.
"You’ve quite the gift, Aiden,” Eldric said from right next to Aiden.
Aiden jumped and yelped his heart pounding against his chest. "Gods Dad, don't do that!"
Eldric laughed and smiled proudly. "You didn't drop the rake, it is well-shaped, and it sounded like a solid quench. All excellent signs you'll make a great blacksmith for Lapidara. When I want to retire of course.”
Aiden carefully put the file back in its place and set the rake on the bench to finish cooling off. He couldn't stop smiling at his Dad's praise, but he also felt that odd twist in his gut that had been coming stronger and stronger the last half year every time his father mentioned him taking over the smithy. He lived with a foot in each of two worlds, the physical reality of the forge and the shimmering potential of the arcane. If only I could meld my two worlds as easily as fire melds metal, he thought. For now, he must be content with small applications of magic subtly improving his work. The true depth of enchantment would wait, like metal buried within ore, awaiting the blacksmith’s purifying flame.
Horn, one of the village farmers, bustled up coming in the open double doors to their smithy, face creased with worry. “Eldric, my plow hit a rock something fierce! Snapped the blade right off, it did. I’ve got to get back to the fields soon as can be.”
Eldric handed Aiden the tongs with a reassuring smile to Horn. “Best take a look then. Plow’ll need a whole new blade most like.” He picked up a large leather sack that held a set of field tools and started ushering Horn back out into the street. "Finish the rake, make sure everything is clean and safe before you lock up. Not sure how long this will take. You can get supper at the inn if I'm not back.”
After Eldric left, Aiden gazed into the glowing forges for a time. The smithy was a major part of the village. The tools made and repaired here were essential to the lives of his folk and others far beyond where their foods were shipped for other communities. All of it, food, tools, and shipping, good honest labor essential to many people. And still, he had the longing to do more, be more, could he stop doing this to be a bookseller like Bram? Did people really need to read and do math? What good were the adventure stories, poems, and other common books Bram bought and sold? Bram knew some magic and had been teaching Aiden, but the rake would have worked just as well without the magic. Sure it wouldn't last as long, but the smithy could repair it or make a new one if needed.
Aiden had to admit if Bram closed his bookstore the community would continue without pause. But if the smithy closed the community would suffer. Still, he yearned to delve deeper into the secrets of the world around him, to understand its unfathomable mysteries. His work here served a purpose, and yet his instincts told him it was only the beginning.
Someday he would learn and understand more of the world. But for now, he had a rake to give some grinding to and mount onto the handle.