The cauldron was deep and challenging, and Weyland did not get it right the first, or second, or even third time. Loch swore at him often, correcting his handling of the mold, or the metal, or the tools themselves. He took comfort in the curves of the cup and the tight weave of the hamper, now complete and securely finished with the twine he'd made.
Listening with cunning ears, he heard her footsteps on the path long before he saw her. Myrddin squawked and darted into tower, where Weyland could hear him rattling around, muttering to himself and digging through the things on his desk.
When she emerged on the western path and crossed the meadow, Weyland was struck first by the swirl of power like heat rising in the summer, and then by her severity. She wore a long black cloak, a pouch on the belt that secured her tunic and trousers. Her hair was tucked up under a hat, her face filthy. Weyland realized she was traveling as a boy.
As she stood in the yard below the steps leading up to the tower door, once more in place to keep out the weather and keep in mischief. A single blue paw-print was on the leftmost edge of the door, and Weyland blushed as he saw her note the mark. She took no notice of him, however, and simply waited.
Avril the hound, for she was no longer a pup but a gangly juvenile who was all leg and body and eagerness, sat at Weyland's feet, as patient as the woman.
Finally, the woman pulled off the hat, and her hair fell in a dark gold wave, a broad white streak flowing off her temple and catching mysteries among the strands as the breeze lifted it.
Her face was too angular to be pretty, but the power swirling around her had a stately dignity that Weyland found riviting. She was poised, deerlike, in her waiting.
Finally, the door swung inward, and Myrddin emerged, his face red and his hands empty.
"Gilda," he said, his voice breaking. "I have no gift for you that matches the song you sing in my heart." He raised his empty hands, tears spilling over his face and staining his tunic.
"Master," Weyland called, quickly gathering a thing or two from the shelf in the smithy. "You forgot these, they just weren't where you were looking," he carried the things to Myrddin, putting the cup and the wrapped thimble and needles in the man's outstretched hands.
"Oh!" Myrddin looked at the things in his hands, and back up at the woman. "I forgot these, my dearest love, surely they must be worthy." He gave her the needles and thimble, and fumbled the cup into the fresh bucket of water Weyland brought him. "You must be thirsty." Neither woman or skald looked at Weyland, and as the woman drank he sensed that he was intruding upon something profound.
Thoughtful, he turned away from them, and finished the cauldron, light and strong and a lighter grey than the other cast iron pieces he'd made, in one final cast, bending the handles around it with a flourish. He scribed a rune for fullness on the bottom, and set it out to dry and cool on the bench.
Loch was not present to witness his success, but Weyland was not disturbed by her absence. Myrddin and the woman Gilda had disappeared, probably gone into the tower, so Weyland set off to follow the stream, thinking to gather more rushes.
Thus, he came upon Loch, standing naked and waist deep in the water. Her back was to him, her hands outstretched on the surface of the water. As he watched, she lifted her hands, depositing handfuls of red mud on a plank floating next to her. When the plank was full to overflowing, she turned and pushed it back to the shore, ignoring gobbets of mud that spilled back into the water. She looked once at him, and started pulling on her clothing.
"The last thing you will make is a sword, one like no other sword ever seen. I will give you the metals for it."
Loch brought a basket of mud with her the next morning. Myrddin and Gilda had not yet reappeared, and Weyland went about the business of repairing the tower. He was throwing rotted shingles off of the high tower-top when he saw her emerge from the woods by the stream. Glancing at the skies - which were clear that morning - he made sure the bales of thatching were secure and ready to lay out, and came down from the tower top.
"We need to burn off the wet from this. After that," she went on to describe a process that boardered on arcane. In the end, he worked on repairing the roof while Loch prepared the metal. For as large a basket of mud that she'd brought, the yeild of metal was small. He still prepared the molds for the sword, thinking that there was probably enough scrap to make up the difference if needed.
"No, I'll gather more and bring it in the morning."
"Show me how it's done?" he asked, remembering what he'd seen the day before.
"That's a powerful secret, Weyland. Secrets like that, magic like that, comes with a price." She turned as if to leave.
"Wait. I'll pay the price."
Loch rounded on him, furious. "Never agree to something without knowing the cost, boy. You have no idea what I'd ask."
"It doesn't matter. I want to know how to gather iron the way you called this iron."
She took a deep breath. "Very well. You will spend three nights with me, lie with me naked under the dark of the moon for those three nights, and on the morning after the third night I will teach you to call iron from water. After that, you will not see me again."
He was taken aback, both by her demand and the determination in her voice.
"Well?" There was infinite scorn and sadness in her voice.
"Y-yes," he answered, his heart hammering in his chest. The hound Avril raised her nose to the sky and let out a mournful howl. Only after Loch took his hand and led him into the woods did he wonder how she knew the name given to him by Bruni and Frig.
Three mornings after, they stood in the cold of the pond water, both naked in the morning sunlight. He followed her, breath for breath, and they lifted the metal from the water together. They distilled its essence out of it, and twice the amount of metal as the first batch made its way into the crucible. When they were done with calling the iron and steel from the clay, she left him at moonrise.
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Thoughtfully, Weyland went to the baskets they'd used to carry the gritty mud. He'd held some in reserve, thinking to exercise the technique himself. He wrapped it up in an old cloth and put it under the workbench in the smithy.
The next morning, he pulled the molten metal from the bloomery and poured it into the mold. He lifted the rough form of the sword, and with great care, thinking of all the other things he'd learned, he struck it with the hammer he'd made under Loch's watchful eyes. The rest was a blur, turning and folding, heating and striking, and at the end of the day, he looked at the blade. It had waves, like water, and they were grey and vivid blue, unlike anything he'd ever seen in a blade.
All that day he saw no-one, not Myrddin or Gilda, not Loch. The hound Avril stayed close, watchful and standing guard.
He slept on the ground next to the smithy that night, looking up at the stars. He thought of a sword that would answer only to a leader pure of heart and intention. He thought of a sword that would kill a man who would pervert it and use it for evil. He thought of the lies and deceit of Lord Hroth, of the mercenary acts of the Geat, and the wretched violence of the Nightstalker.
"You will be a king-maker," he whispered to the sword where it lay on the bench. "You will serve the one man who can unite the land against incursion and enemy, and bring the blessings of the gods upon us all."
At dawn once again, he took up the hammer and thrust the sword into the fires of the forge. He folded the metal, shaped it and made it long and elegant, a sword half again longer than Hervor's gladius, as long as the cudgel he'd made of a monster's arm. He cut long strips of leather from the ram's hide, almost the last of it, from all his creating. At dusk, he laid out the sword with its long tang, the pieces of horn and leather he would use to make the pommel, the metal he'd poured and forged for the short crosspiece. He thought of the day, and knew that he would let the pieces rest with their meaning and intention, and assemble the whole of it at noontide the next day.
As for the night, he set the last of the red mud in the bloomery, and as the moon rose he pulled the iron from it.
The moon was bright and full, and looking up at it he thought of the nights spent with a woman, when the moon rose clad in shadows. He shaped a mold, a wicked hunting knife, with a curve like the dip of a woman's hip ascending to her waist. "Fast, you will be swift and bright," he whispered to the metal as he poured the last of it into the mold. "You will seek out the heart of evil, put out its eye and cripple its steps. You will protect the women who wield you, all in her name."
He paused, looking at the moon as it sank towards the horizon. Touching his brow, he tasted his sweat, seasoned with coal and the tang of metal, the bitterness of the water of Myrddin's well. "All in her name," he whispered again, thinking of the brightness of his mother's eyes, and Hervor's steadfast loyalty, Frig's grace, and We'al's resolute dedication to protecting her people. He thought of the woman Gilda, and the way Myrddin looked at her, and her gaze upon him. He could not conjure to his mind anything of the woman he'd lain with, not her name, and her face was fading before his mind's eye.
He cast out his mind like a hawk, soaring through the waning night in search of a secret. "Vivienne.”
His heart did not answer, and he recognized a difference between the regard he saw in the skald for the woman Gilda, and the way his own mind responded to the woman who had taught him, whispering the secrets of iron and steel. Deep in thought, he forged the dagger as morning broke over the meadow. He became aware of Myrddin and Gilda watching, sitting on the ground in front of the door to the smithy as he folded and forged and shaped the knife, gave it a finger's-breadth of guard to rest a thumb upon for leverage. The hilt of ram's horn, the last of the ram's horn, he shaped and smoothed, curving it to fit a woman's hand, though it fit his well enough as well.
When finally it was complete, he sharpened it upon the whetstone, and laid it bright and naked on the shelf above the workbench, turning back to the sword.
He slid the crosspiece and pommel over the tang of the sword. The short crosspiece had a setting for a stone at the center, though he had not found the stone that would live there and bring the whole of the sword together. Reaching to his left for a tool, he felt cool fingers on his, and then the rounded shape of a stone or gem on his palm before the cool fingers closed his around it.
Looking up, he met Gilda's eyes, a mild brown with a hint of earthy green at the center. He set the stone, gleaming a deep red, in the hilt, and the sword embraced it, singing as it came to life. He wrapped the hilt tight in the leather of the ram's hide, braiding it to give a better grip to the one who wielded it in combat.
And then, suddenly, it was finished.
Myrddin handed him a cup of water, a plain clay cup, not the one given to the woman Gilda. Weyland drank deep, and felt the hawk stir in his chest, the cat's lightness in his feet and hands, and another thing, darker and menacing, that he'd never felt before.
"You have done well, son. Now, you have a parcel for me?"
Weyland stared at him for a moment, and then remembered. He reached up to the shelf, and brought down the wrapped package given to him by Bruni and Frig for Myrddin an age ago.
Myrddin unwrapped the leathers protecting it, and held the harp up in the sunlight, touching the strings delicately.
"Ah, my lovely," he whispered to the harp. He raised his eyes to Weyland's. "This is not something I can possess, not a thing for me. Weyland, in your travels, you will find the person who should take this up, as you will find the people to wield the rest of these creations." Myrddin handed the harp back to him, and then placed the palm of his hand on Weyland's brow. "Now, eat with us, and then you must go."
“Go?” Weyland asked, looking at the partially finished roof, the weed choked garden.
The sky darkened, clouds rolling across the afternoon sun, and lightning struck the stone where travellers sometimes sat.
“Well, this is unfortunate,” Myrddin said with a rueful grimace.
“YOU!” With a shriek Loch appeared before Weyland, not acknowledging Gilda or Myrddin. “Thief!”
“What?!” Weyland turned, the sword coming to his hand easily. “It’s made, a sword like none other ever seen, like you said Vi-”
“You may not speak my name, boy,” she shot back. “No the other - the metal you stole, hiding it away. Show me THAT.”
Weyland turned to take up the hunting knife, its edge gleaming in the stormlight. He held it across his hands, presenting it to the woman who was his teacher. She reached for it, and Myrddin stepped forward, staying her hand.
“No, daughter of my bones, that is not for you.” Myrddin stood resolute, a barrier between them. The woman the youth knew as Loch screamed again, fury contorting her face and twisting her body.
“He took from me that which I drew down - “ she began, her voice booming.
“And you took from him as well, without telling him what you were taking from him, his first born child.” Myrddin’s tone was colder than the winters of Weyland’s youth, his face a slab of withering disappointment.
Loch raised her hands, taking a deep breath, and Myrddin extended his arms. Gilda grabbed Weyland by the arm and dragged him into the smithy by main force. She slammed the door shut - a door that Weyland had never seen before. Thunder cracked and the wind howled outside.
“They’ll be at that for a while. Let’s get you packed up and on your way.” She opened a satchel and dumped things inside, most of the things he’d made, folding over the top and wrapping it tight with twine. Even the cauldron made it inside with no difficulties, and the blacksmiths hammer. The hamper she held out to him separately, it was heavy with food. He slung the pack and hamper over his shoulder. She thrust the knife into a sheath, and handed him knife and hatchet. Looking at the sword, she made a face and held it point down, walking in a circle around it. She handed him back a stout walking stick. A particularly loud crash happened and the roof shook. Avril sat next to him, watching calmly, occasionally grumbling at the noise outside.
“Now, leave out the back, and head to the north. You’ll find your way. Your hound will keep you safe, if you’ll just listen to her. Her breed is built for trouble.”