“There is something about the way the metal was forged. There’s power held here, generated when the lorcith comes together. It wants to come together.”
“I fail to see how that matters.”
They all turned to see a large man leaning against the wall. Boldan Thenas, a smith they had rescued from Asador, had his arms crossed over his chest and fixed Rsiran with a hard look. Rsiran hadn’t seen or heard him enter, and noted that he had nothing of lorcith—or heartstone—on him. That wasn’t surprising; the smiths he’d met growing up and working alongside rarely kept anything of lorcith on them. They claimed that the metal was for the Elvraeth, and they would not presume to have such power. Rsiran had always believed that to be the reason, but now he wondered if there might not be something else.
He took a step forward and nodded his head toward the piercing. “Typical timing to send word that he was here, Ephram.”
“If you think I kept this from the smiths…”
Boldan glared at Ephram a moment before turning his attention to Rsiran. “Tell me why you think the lorcith cares, Lareth.”
“Master Boldan,” Rsiran said, tipping his head respectfully.
Boldan reached across the table and plucked the piercing off it. He twisted it, squinting at it as he did. Boldan had eyes of a moderate green, and Rsiran never knew his ability. Many smiths were Sighted. It helped with forging and allowed much finer detail than they would be able to produce without Sight. If they were willing to listen to the lorcith, to hear its song, they wouldn’t even need Sight.
“Lorcith takes shape just like any other metal, Lareth. Some can hear its call,” he said, looking up and meeting Rsiran’s eyes, “but that doesn’t help them shape it any better.”
“Can you hear it, Master Boldan?” Rsiran asked.
Boldan set the piercing back on the table. He sighed. “Not as I once could. And what I hear doesn’t tell me anything. This piece is silent. Only the fresh ore speaks.”
“Not to me.” Rsiran pulled the piercing to him again. Boldan’s eyes widened slightly. Rsiran took the piercing and held it up. “This came from a mine to the south, and deep beneath the earth.”
“There are no mines to the south,” Ephram said.
“Lorcith can be found in many places. Ilphaesn is the most plentiful.” He set the piercing back on the table. “As I said, this came from far to the south, deep within a mine. When it was pulled from the mine, it was separated from another half. Joined with the other half…”
Rsiran closed his eyes and listened for the connection to lorcith, searching for the missing piece. If the alchemists had recovered this one, it was likely they had the other half. They would have been together on the person they were taken from.
Not knowing what to expect, he was surprised when he found it hidden beneath Ephram’s long cloak. How had he shielded its presence from him?
Rsiran pulled on the piercing, drawing it free. Ephram’s eyes narrowed as the one piercing joined with the other. “These two belong together,” Rsiran said. “They want to be together. And when they are”—he tapped the metal together and light glowing from them flared for a moment—“they are more powerful.” He realized that he might be the only one able to see the light from the piercings as he tapped them together.
Boldan took a quick breath. “I hear it.”
Rsiran pushed the piercings to him. “That is how these work. They were forced into this shape, not asked or coaxed, and given a promise that they would come back together, but a price was required of the lorcith.” How did he know this? Was he able to hear it from the metal itself, or was there something about the way that they were brought together?
Boldan studied the piercings for a moment and then set them down and looked up at Rsiran with a new light in his eyes. “You have an interesting talent, Lareth. You could have been a skilled smith.”
Brusus pulled a knife from under his jacket and set it spinning on the table. The knife was one of Rsiran’s more recent creations, one that had a long, slender blade that he had folded dozens of times to give it the appearance of water falling over it, almost making it appear wet. The knife was well crafted, and he had been proud to affix his mark to it.
“What do you mean he could have been a skilled smith?” Brusus asked. “Seems to me Rsiran here has learned everything necessary, no thanks to his father or the others of the Smith Guild, to surpass your traditional skills.”
Boldan took the knife and held it out, examining it as he turned it from side to side. “Hmm. Excellent weight. Interesting design. And sturdy.” He set it back on the table. “This is serviceable.”
Brusus grunted and shook his head, reaching for the knife. “Serviceable. Not seen anything like that out of your sanctioned smiths in generations. Don’t tell me it’s only serviceable.”
“What is the point of all of this?” Haern asked. He had been sitting quietly, but now leaned forward, looking to Ephram. “Why the focus on the metal, and on Venass?”
The guildlord sighed. “Because we need to know what Venass might attempt. And we need to know how they might attempt to reach the crystals. If we can’t find out, and we can’t protect them, I fear for what will happen if they manage to acquire one. With Rsiran’s connection to the metal, he might be the only one able to help.”
“I don’t know if there’s anything I can do,” he started. “As to what they want, we found this when we returned to the Forgotten Palace.” He set the schematic on the table and slid it over to Boldan. “Is there anything about this that you can understand?”
Boldan stared at the page for a moment. One thick finger ran along the edge as he read it. “Odd. Looks like plans for something like a forcible alloy, but none that I’ve ever seen.”
Rsiran glanced at Jessa. “Like heartstone?”
Boldan tapped the page. “Not heartstone. Can’t have lorcith in the making of the forge. And this has both heartstone and lorcith. Not sure I’ve ever seen anything like it.”
Ephram studied the page, his lips pressed into a line. “The Forgotten were after this?”
“They had components there,” Rsiran said. “Do you recognize it?”
He shook his head carefully. “I’m no smith to read these plans. But if the Forgotten were after it, and with Venass working with them, I fear it is for nothing good.”
Chapter 13
The thin man stood in front of Rsiran, wiping his hands on his apron and shaking his head. “He’s too busy for a visit unless you have a commission.”
He considered the journeyman. The man hadn’t been here the last time Rsiran had visited Seval. He was no older than Rsiran, and sweat stained his shirt. Once, Rsiran had hoped for nothing more than to be raised to journeyman status. So much had changed for him. “No commission, but he’ll see me.”
“And you are?”
“Rsiran Lareth.”
The journeyman’s eyes widened. Rsiran wondered if he should be alarmed or relieved that the journeyman seemed to recognize his name. “Come inside, but you’ll have to wait for him to finish. He’s in the middle of delicate work.” He rubbed the back of his neck as he turned around.
Rsiran stood in Seval’s smithy, waiting for him to turn his attention away from the forge so that Rsiran could ask him about the schematics. Boldan claimed Seval was one of the few smiths who might be able to provide an answer. He’d suggested a few others, but as he already knew Seval, he was the first person he approached.
While he waited, he watched as Seval worked with the journeyman. It was a different method than Rsiran’s father had used with his students. Whereas his father had the journeymen forge simpler items, Seval, instead, alternated tasks with his student. The master smith would hammer steadily, before occasionally handing his project off to the journeyman.
As they worked, Seval glanced up and saw Rsiran. He nodded and then waved Rsiran over. “Good that you’re here, Lareth. You can help.” When the journeyman handed the project back to Seval, he handed his hammer to Rs
iran. “See what we’re working on here?”
It was a long section of intricate chain, more decorative than anything, and all of steel. He could see a difference between where Seval had been working, and where the journeyman had been. Seval’s section showed much more skill, obviously, leaving the metal folded in such a way that only a master smith could accomplish.
“Not really,” Rsiran said.
The journeyman grunted softly, and Seval only shook his head. He went to his bench and grabbed a scrap of paper and brought it over to Rsiran. “Here,” he said. “I don’t know if you had the chance to learn to read schematics like these.”
Rsiran took the page and scanned it. “That’s what I came here to ask you about,” he said, reaching for the page in his pocket.
“What can you tell me about this?” Seval asked, pointing to his own schematic.
Where as the one in his pocket was complicated, this schematic was fairly straightforward. Rsiran was surprised that he actually could interpret most of what they were doing, and saw the way the chain was nothing more than a part of a larger sculpture that had yet to be forged.
He handed the paper back to Seval. “I think I see.”
Seval smiled. “Thought you might. Now. If I walk you through it, do you want to help?”
Rsiran hesitated. “That’s not really why I came here…”
“No? Well, seeing how Rhan here hasn’t been able to do more than create this chain, I thought maybe you could help.”
Rsiran smiled and took the hammer that Seval offered and asked, “Can we talk while we work?”
Seval nodded. “That might be best. Rhan can fetch more iron. Stock is a little low, anyway.”
Rhan appeared to bite back a retort, and instead nodded. “Of course, Master Seval.”
He stripped off his apron and left the smithy, leaving Rsiran and Seval to work.
“Are you sure you want me involved?”
Seval looked up with a sour expression on his face. “You’re not going to leave me to Rhan again, are you? The boy is fine, and he’ll make a serviceable smith in time, but there are things that he simply can’t do.”
At first, they simply went back and forth, working through the various elements of the design that had been on the schematics. Rsiran fell into an easy pace, following along as Seval walked him through what he needed to know from the diagram.
Working with Seval was a strange sort of comfort, one that he’d never had with his father. There was the familiar clang of hammer on metal, the heat from the forge, and an odd comfort in sharing the work with another. Working in his smithy had been lonely. Not always a bad loneliness, but there had never been anyone for him to share with, not like with Seval. It made Rsiran long for what he had not had, and maybe still could not have—recognition from the guild.
As they worked, the shape of the main element slowly began to emerge from the metal. “What’s the commission for?” Rsiran asked.
Seval grunted as he hammered, sliding the piece back to Rsiran for smaller detail work. He used a long, slender rod to add a few of the flourishes drawn. “Servants of the Great Watcher. They asked for another marker to replace one that was damaged in the last storm. Not much work from them in the past, so I want to do my best work, you know?”
Rsiran considered the schematic. Now that Seval mentioned the Servants, he understood the purpose of the chain, symbolizing how the Servants were bound to the land and the people, tying them to the Great Watcher as he sat above them, observing. From Rsiran’s experience holding the crystal, he would have described the Great Watcher differently. Not so much sitting, as he seemed to float, aware of everything.
They continued through the schematic, moving on to the rest of the sculpture. With the two of them working, the process went quickly.
The master smith took the sculpture and carried it to a large quenching tub. Rsiran used a large bucket of water to quench, and found that was all that he needed for most of his work. The knives and the sword all fit within the bucket well enough. But Seval had a large tub—much larger than Rsiran’s father had—that he used, and stirred it briefly before he placed the sculpture inside.
“Why stir it?” he asked.
“To mix the polyseed oil. Gives a smoother finish.”
“My father never used anything other than water.”
“Neran? Are you sure? Your grandfather is the one who taught me about polyseed. Kept the ratio a secret, though it’s something that I figured out over time. Water is fine for most, and for lorcith, I think it’s all you can use, but when you’re working with steel—especially like this for the Servants—the polyseed dulls the shine a bit and gives it that weathered appearance they seek.”
When cooled, Seval pulled the sculpture from the water and set it back on the anvil. He took a step back and held the schematic out as he studied it, nodding his head as he did.
“Ah… look at that. Such subtle work. Beautiful.”
Seval pointed to the area that Rsiran had worked on and showed how it matched the diagram made by the Servants. “I’m not sure I would have caught that. See how you got the steel to curve here?” Seval noted, touching an area of the sculpture that had troubled Rsiran as they had worked. He’d found it difficult to get the metal to roll without heating it too much, which would have deformed the rest of the sculpture. “You matched the schematics almost exactly.” Seval glanced over to the door, but Rhan hadn’t returned yet. “And that’s not something that Rhan would have been able to do. Not too many capable of this…”
Seval sighed as he took a step back, his head shaking.
“Master Seval,” Rsiran said, breaking the silence that stretched between them. “I was hoping you could tell me if you saw my father while you were being held by the Forgotten.” It wasn’t the question that had brought him here, but he was still curious, especially after what he’d found in the Forgotten Palace when they returned.
Seval set the schematics back on his table and turned to Rsiran. “Neran wasn’t there.”
“Are you sure?” He’d not yet seen Alyse to confirm the patterns in the cell were the same as those on her necklace, but he felt certain. So if he hadn’t been there, then who would have drawn those patterns on the wall?
“It’s possible that he was somewhere I never saw. When you came, you saw what they had us doing. They kept us separate, working with lorcith. The last few days, they tried to get me to make…” He frowned and shook his head. “Damn, not even sure what it was that they asked me to make.”
“Piercings,” he said.
Seval looked at him askance. “Piercings?”
Rsiran sighed. The smiths needed to understand, or they risked Venass attempting to use others to make them. If not Venass, it could be any of the Forgotten, even the Elvraeth from within the palace. “They use the potential within lorcith and force it. You know what happens when you force lorcith in ways that it doesn’t want to go.”
Seval nodded thoughtfully. “That’s the way I was trained. Work with the metal. Ignore the way it calls to you. Listening is a way toward danger. Seems like those who taught us didn’t know what they were doing.” He clapped Rsiran on the shoulder. “You got a different kind of skill, Lareth. Maybe raw in the ways of the modern smith, reading diagrams and schematics and such, but when it comes to the actual work, that which makes us smiths, you’re not raw at all. More refined than nearly any master in Elaeavn, I’d wager.”
“Not all feel the way that you do, Seval.”
The master smith shrugged. “Then they don’t know what they’re doing. I can teach you how to read schematics, and can show you how to mix the right quench if you’ll help me get back in touch with the call of lorcith.”
“Well… if it’s schematics,” he said, pulling the page from his pocket.
Seval took it and studied the page quickly. “A forge of sorts. Not like the usual forge, but one to mix alloys. Not something smiths often do. Usually the area of the alchemists, especially when you’re de
aling with certain metals.”
“Why certain metals?” Rsiran thought he already knew. His experience with heartstone had taught him enough to know.
“Can’t really explain why. Some will mix, but there’s something missing in order to get them there. Heartstone is one. I hear you’ve got some familiarity with that.”
“Some.”
“This would be like that, only… only it’s more complicated.” He folded the page back up and handed it over to Rsiran. “Wish I could help you more, but don’t really have the answer.”
Rsiran nodded. It had been unlikely, but he’d had to ask. “I’ll still do what I can to help you hear the lorcith.”
Seval grinned. “Good. Then start with that,” he said, pointing to a piece of lorcith sitting on his table.
“Why that one?”
Seval grinned. “Because with that one, I can almost hear it. When I close my eyes and focus…” He did just that and started rocking in place, swaying as if hearing a soft song. Which, if it was anything like what Rsiran experienced, he did.
Rsiran took the piece of lorcith and held it. It called to him, but not strongly, not as it must for Seval to hear it. Rsiran shouldn’t have been surprised that it was different for him. The ore reacted differently for each person, so what was stronger for Seval wouldn’t necessarily be the same for him.
But he could still hear the song. When he listened carefully, he began to understand where this lump came from within Ilphaesn. He felt the memory of when the miner had pulled the ore from the mountain. From there, he could trace it back to its time in the mountain, a sense of purpose there, as if placed by the Great Watcher himself.
How could he hear that? And how could he explain that he heard it without it sounding all too strange?
“What do you hear?” Rsiran asked, setting the piece of lorcith back down on the table.
Seval shook his head. “When I was younger, when I first picked up a hammer, I remember the way that lorcith seemed to hum.” He laughed softly as he shook his head. “Sounds crazy to talk about sometimes. I would hear that hum when I worked with it, and sometimes, I would hear it louder when I tried ignoring it, like it wanted me to hear it. I remember saying something to my father once—like you, my father offered me my first apprenticeship—and he told me much the same that Neran probably told you. ‘Ignore it and it will go away. Only then can you master the ore.’”
The Shadowsteel Forge (The Dark Ability Book 5) Page 10