by ML Spencer
With that, he headed toward the stairs.
When Aram and Markus just stood looking at each other in confusion, Esmir turned back and demanded, “Unless you’d rather fight naked?”
The trip down the cliff took much longer than it should have, for Esmir had to be loaded into a series of wooden elevators and lowered down by winch. But eventually, they made it all the way down to the level of Hearth Home and entered the town. Aram couldn’t help smiling at the way Markus walked with his eyes drawn upward instead of watching where he was going, narrowly avoiding running into several people. It reminded him of his own reaction when he’d first seen the spectacle of the cliffs and the flights of dragons in the sky.
They followed Esmir through the town’s busy streets, passing people and carts and goats and chickens fluttering by. They came at last to one of the broader streets, where the larger craft houses were located. There, Esmir led them to a two-story building with a large workshop behind it.
When they entered the shop, a small bell mounted to the top of the door tinkled, announcing their presence. An old man wearing a leather bib apron appeared. Seeing Esmir, the armorer broke into a smile and came forward, hugging the old Warden and clapping him on the back.
“Adric!” Esmir all but bellowed. “I’ve brought you two young waifs. This here is Aram Raythe, Champion-in-Training. And this is Markus Galliar, who might someday be his Warden, if the gods hate him enough.”
“This is Adric Krommer,” Esmir told the boys. “He has been Master Armorer for the eyries longer than I’ve been alive.”
Knowing how old Esmir was, Aram exclaimed in awe, “Wow, you’re old!”
The armorer’s eyebrows shot up, and he exchanged looks with Esmir. Aram felt Markus’s hand on his back. There was a short but awkward moment of silence, then Master Krommer chuckled and patted him on the shoulder.
“Let’s take your measurements, son.” He directed Aram toward the back of the room where another door opened into the workshop. Esmir and the armorer went through first, and when Aram started after them, Markus caught his shoulder.
“Don’t point out to people that they’re old. You can hurt their feelings.”
Aram flushed, mortified that he might have hurt Master Krommer’s feelings. He’d said the wrong thing again, just as he always did. He could kick himself.
“Should I say I’m sorry?”
“Maybe.” Markus frowned. “Actually, don’t. It might make it worse.”
Cheeks flushed, Aram hurried through the door into the back of the workshop. There, six apprentices were hard at work, tooling and stitching leather, shaping metal plates, and riveting chain links. One of the younger boys came toward them, bowing to Esmir.
“Get their measurements.” Master Krommer motioned at Aram and Markus.
The boy produced a length of knotted string and went right to work, starting with Markus.
While Aram waited his turn, Esmir explained, “Each piece of armor crafted in Master Krommer’s workshop is fitted specifically for the wearer, taking into account his abilities and style of fighting.”
“Why does it matter?” asked Aram.
“Because the armor has to move with you, not against you. You want it to fit you perfectly in every situation, so you’re not encumbered. The armor crafted in this workshop is the finest in the world—either world. No other could approach it.”
Aram considered the Master Armorer with a newfound respect and felt suddenly wretched. Hanging his head, he mumbled, “I’m sorry I hurt your feelings by pointing out that you’re old.”
Hearing that, Master Krommer closed his eyes and brought a hand up to his face. Then he threw his head back in a fit of hearty laughter. Clapping Aram on the back, he said to Esmir, “He’s just like Darand, isn’t he?”
Hearing that, Aram said, “My father’s name was Darand.”
Esmir blinked. With a forced smile, he muttered, “Well, isn’t that a coincidence,” then guided Aram quickly toward a full suit of scale mail hanging from a rack. “Here’s an example of the kind of armor Master Krommer’s workshop is capable of turning out.”
Aram reached out and touched one of the red lacquered scales of the cuirass. It had a satin sheen and seemed as fragile as glass. Each scale was etched with fine patterns that were almost invisible to the eye. “What kind of material is this?”
“Dragon scale,” Master Krommer answered with a smile. “It makes for the lightest and strongest armor.”
Aram tensed, retracting his hand. “You slaughter dragons?”
The old armorer smiled. “Not at all. Most dragons petrify when they die. But sometimes—no one knows why—that doesn’t happen. In that case, a dragon’s remains are never wasted. The hide is used for armor, the meat is fed to the ill and injured, and the bones are made into weapons, among other things.”
Finished with Markus, the young apprentice came over to take Aram’s measurements. When he was finished, Master Krommer explained that they would have to return in four months so that he could check the fit and make any necessary adjustments.
“Four months?” Aram was stunned. It seemed like such a long time for a workshop with that many apprentices.
Esmir explained, “Because it’s so resistant, dragon scale is the most difficult material to work with. Making a suit of armor out of it is a very long and detailed process.”
“How is it made?” Aram asked.
“Each cuirass has about a thousand scales. The scales have to go through a lengthy curing process that can take up to two months. After that, we lace them together then lay them out in rows to be tooled and lacquered. It takes a couple of weeks to tool them all, and each scale receives ten coats of lacquer. Each layer must dry and be sanded before the next can be applied. After lacquering, we tie them all together.”
Aram stared at the suit of scale mail with a greater appreciation. He wondered if his armor would look similar
“What about swords?” Markus asked.
Esmir smiled a mischievous grin. “That’s where we’re headed to next.”
Chapter Fifty
“Where are we going now?” Aram asked.
“To the Brausa family workshop,” Esmir answered. “They own the only forge hot enough to produce a star-steel blade. It’s been in their family for generations. And by generations, I mean thousands of years.”
Aram followed Esmir down the street into the main market square, his eyes roving over the tower houses surrounding it. Each house was several stories tall with an entrance on the second floor. Bronze placards were mounted to the sides of the buildings, many of which bore the symbols of the trade practiced by each workshop. Some were etched with the craft master’s personal trademark, usually the stylized picture of an animal or craft item.
They arrived at a building marked by a bronze placard featuring a sword crossed with a feather. Flagstone steps led from the street to a large oaken door, which Esmir held open for them. Within, they found themselves in a long, thin room with many swords mounted on the walls. Aram was drawn to the nearest wall, which contained blades of various types, some familiar, others not. His eyes roved over the weapons, which all looked to be made of superior workmanship.
The rear wall of the shop contained only a single, elegant sword mounted horizontally. Walking closer to view it, Aram saw that the blade was single-edged, long and thin with a graceful curve, the point tapered slightly upward. The hilt, carved of bone and wrapped with cord, canted in the opposite direction and had a disk-shaped guard. Aram had never seen any sword like it. The metal of the blade had a satiny sheen and seemed to lack any imperfection.
“What kind of sword is this?” Aram asked.
Coming up behind him, Esmir answered, “That is a star-steel blade. It is the sword of a Champion.”
Aram reached out slowly, gripping the hilt and testing the feel of it in his palm. “Why do Champions need special swords?”
“Because a Champion’s sword must be able to withstand blows that would sh
atter normal steel. A Champion strikes with the strength of his soul, not the strength of his muscles.” A strange smile slipped to Esmir’s lips. “Tell me, Aram, how strong is your soul?”
Aram frowned, thinking hard, for it was a novel and intriguing concept. “I don’t know. I’ve never measured it.”
“Yes, you have,” said Markus. “You survived four years in the cellars of the Exilari—and you can still smile. That says something.” He turned to Esmir. “Do you think they can make a blade that strong?”
The old man raised his eyebrows thoughtfully. “We’ll see.”
They turned at the sound of a door opening behind them, admitting the swordsmith who owned the workshop. He was the antithesis of every blacksmith Aram had ever met, a small man with delicate features. His dark hair was worn tied back from a round face that was glistening with sweat and yet somehow without a trace of soot. Esmir immediately strode forward, greeting him warmly.
“Onsel! Good to see you again. This is Aram and Markus.” He motioned them over. “Markus will be needing a Warden’s sword. Aram will be needing a star-steel blade.”
At that, the swordsmith frowned, and he looked at Aram with acute speculation. Walking forward, he went to Markus first, taking him by the shoulders and running his gaze over him, turning him slightly first one way, then the other. Then he moved to Aram and did the same.
“Let’s go in the back,” he said, motioning with his head toward the door.
The two young men followed him into an enormous workshop. Many apprentices were working at different stations around the room, attending to their various tasks with acute attention. There were three live forges in the center of the room, heating the air of the workshop to an uncomfortable temperature, even though the walls were set with many windows that let in the cool breeze from the gorge. Only a couple of apprentices looked up upon their entry, their eyes going right back to their work. Seeing them, a thin man slightly taller than Onsel rose from where he’d been crouched by one of the forges and approached them.
“This is my brother, Gadan Brausa,” Onsel said. “He will see to the construction of the Warden’s sword.”
Gadan Brausa greeted them with a meek smile and a nod, then drew Markus aside and started questioning him.
“I will be constructing the star-steel blade,” said the smaller brother, and bade Aram follow him to the other side of the workshop, to a cold forge set into the back corner. There, he produced a wax tablet and told Aram to stand up as straight as he could, correcting his posture and examining him from various angles while Aram stood rigid, feeling intensely uncomfortable. At length, the swordsmith stepped back to look at him, knuckling his chin, a grave frown on his face. With a grunt, he started the whole process over again. Occasionally, he would motion for Aram to turn slightly, taking more notes on his tablet. At one point, he produced a string and started measuring everything about him, from the length of his forearms to the diameter of his legs. Aram glanced across the workshop and saw that Markus was receiving a similar treatment by Onsel’s brother, which made him feel mollified.
“The creation of a Champion’s blade is a monumental undertaking,” the swordsmith explained in a soft voice as he worked. “Each blade is forged from iron mined from a fallen star. But more importantly, the source of carbon in the steel is dragon bone, which allows the steel to be heated far beyond what normal steel could ever endure.”
Aram had seen plenty of falling stars, but he had never heard of anyone actually catching one. “How long will it take?”
The swordsmith answered, “Six months.”
Aram winced, casting a questioning glance at Esmir. “Will it be ready in time for my Trials?”
“You won’t need it for your Trials,” Esmir answered. “You’ll need it after.”
“In the meantime, I will loan you a similar blade, though of far less quality,” Onsel Brausa said. “You must understand, a star-steel blade is crafted specifically for its wielder. The materials are very rare, and the work that goes into it is great. It takes time to smelt the iron from the meteorite to make the steel, but then I will need you present to begin the forging process. Return here a month from now, before dawn.”
Aram nodded, his eyes wandering over the tools in the workshop and the glowing coals of the forges. “One month.”
Seeming satisfied, the swordsmith turned back to his forge. When Markus was done with Onsel’s brother, they were loaned blades that would resemble the ones that had been commissioned for them. Though dulled and made of mundane steel, they were still of excellent craftsmanship.
After that, Esmir led them back to his eyrie then spent the rest of the afternoon working with Markus while assigning Aram to the task of scrubbing his floor. They remained with Esmir the rest of the day, at last going down to supper with the other apprentices.
After supper, they returned to the dormitory, where Markus had a chance to become better acquainted with their roommates. He and Jeran found they had much in common, for they both came from families of fishermen. Although Jeran’s family had grown up fishing the shoals of southern Pyrial, he had led a similar life, with an overbearing father and an absent mother. Even Iver showed Markus a wary respect, clasping his hand in greeting before probing him about his training as an Exilar, which seemed to intrigue him greatly. The conversation was hampered by Markus’s difficulty with their accents, but in the end, that just seemed to make it more fun.
Aram sat on his cot, watching Markus with his new friends, feeling a little lonelier every second. Many of them were closer to Markus’s age than his own, and he began to fear Markus would enjoy their company more than his. But it turned out that his fears were misplaced for, seeing him sitting on his bunk, staring at the floor, Markus called Aram over and included him in the conversation. In that moment, Aram realized that, for the first time in his life, he was surrounded by a group of people he could call true friends.
That night when he went to sleep, it was with that thought in his mind and a smile on his face, feeling more content than ever in his life.
The next month passed agonizingly slow.
In the mornings, they trained in the Henge with the new weapons the Brausa brothers had lent them. The weighted broadsword they had loaned Markus had a long, double-edged blade attached to a hilt with a sturdy crossguard and a disk-shaped pommel. Aram had been given a dulled sword that resembled the beautiful star-steel weapon on the wall of the Brausas’ workshop.
In the afternoons, while Esmir worked with Markus on fundamentals he would need if he was ever to be a Warden, Aram returned to the never-ending supply of books Esmir was always providing him. They ranged in topic from anything to do with knots to mathematics to music and history. He applied himself to their study with an obsessive fixation, for he found them fascinating. Every day on the way to Esmir’s, he could feel his heartbeat pick up in anticipation of what he might find within a leather binding. Books, he was finding out, could be just as much of an adventure as knots, and equally rewarding.
So caught up was he in his studies that he began neglecting other things. His friends started chiding him that he was always occupied, and they started searching for ways to pry him from his studies. They also started getting on him about his appearance, teasingly at first, then with increasing concern. It was true that he found it increasingly hard to tear himself away from his studies to do things as boring and unnecessary as folding his bedsheets or scrubbing the stains out of his clothes. Both were an enormous waste of time, and, really, who could tell if he was a couple days late on changing his breeches?
“Look,” Markus said to him one night, pulling Aram aside. “I know you love your knots and books, but if you want to have any friends left, you’d better learn to break yourself away and spend more time with them. And start taking better care of yourself. You’re not a boy anymore.”
Red-faced, Aram glanced down at his rumpled, sweat-stained tunic, the same one he’d been wearing for the past few days.
“
And you need to start shaving,” Markus insisted, prompting Aram to raise a hand to his face.
Feeling around, he discovered that he had somehow managed to grow patches of scraggly whiskers on his cheeks. He didn’t know where they’d come from or when they’d gotten there. He’d been sporting peach fuzz on his chin for months, but at some point, it had given way to the real beginnings of a beard—and he hadn’t even noticed.
“I don’t know how to shave,” he whispered.
So commenced his first shaving lesson, when he received his first-ever gift from Markus: a bone-handled razor.
After that, Aram became scrupulous about spending more time with his friends and making sure his clothes were always clean and his face recently shaven. He recognized that, while obsessing over things like knots and books might be a strength, it could also be another weakness. He could learn a lot by applying himself so obsessively—but he could lose a lot of friends doing that too. There was a delicate art to balance that he needed to find, and he vowed to strive for it.
A month went by.
He hardly noticed.
But one day, Aram found himself waking before dawn to take the first of many walks down the long stairs to Hearth Home, to knock on the door of the Brausas’ workshop.
The door opened, and he was met by Onsel, who motioned him inside without speaking. He led Aram to the smithy in the back of the workshop, which was empty, save for two apprentices. Both boys bowed formally to him when Aram entered. One came forward and handed him a black apron, which he tied on before following Onsel to the forge.
“A star-steel blade is a work of art,” Onsel Brausa informed him. “But more than anything, it is an extension of its wielder. Because of that, you must be present during critical moments of the forging of your blade, and you must also put your own effort into it, so the blade knows you as its master. From time to time, I will ask you to return here to participate in different steps of the process.”