On the seventeenth day of his smith apprenticeship, Khollo was working the bellows when a growl of frustration distracted him. He looked around and saw Tarrik slam half of his oak staff against his workbench.
“It’s no use!” the smith cried, tearing at his short hair. “I can’t find a way to make the join!”
Khollo sighed with disappointment. They had both known this would be the hardest part of creating the new weapon, but had been confident a solution would present itself.
“You’ll think of something,” Khollo said bracingly, turning back to the bellows.
“Like hell I will,” Tarrik snapped. “More than two weeks I’ve put into this, and now that I’m on the last, the most critical piece, everything falls apart.”
Khollo left the bellows and wandered over to examine the pieces Tarrik was working with. Rolling back and forth on the work bench were the two halves of the weapon, sword blades and cross guards already attached. A metal sleeve had been slipped over the end of one, and in between the sleeve and the other half of the weapon were bits and bobs of metal Khollo could make no sense of.
“Is there any way – ”
“You can’t help,” Tarrik muttered. “This is the result of my failure, and mine alone. I will fix this.”
“Can it be fixed?”
Tarrik shrugged helplessly. “It requires such delicate, perfect work. If one small piece is misshapen, the tiniest dent or flaw, the weapon could fail at a most inopportune moment. I do not have the skill right now to pull this off.”
“Then practice until you do,” Khollo growled. “We have time.”
“You led me to believe that we had no time when we started this!” Tarrik shouted, rounding on Khollo. “What has changed?”
Khollo turned away. “Nothing,” he muttered. “Not yet. What I meant was, we have nothing else going on, so we might as well keep going.”
“You’re waiting for something to happen,” Tarrik said. “Expecting something, more like. What is it you know that the rest of us don’t?”
“You’ll find out,” Khollo told him. “Soon. No more than four or five days, and everyone will know.”
Tarrik stomped over to the forge, muttering darkly about know-it-all apprentices and superior squires. Khollo chose to ignore the comments. He knew the frustration of failure and the results all too well.
He’ll make it work, Khollo thought, moving back to the bellows and feeding the flames with fresh air again. There’s a reason he’s in charge of the smithy.
The rest of the day passed slowly. The weather had gone from dreary to dismal, snow piling up everywhere, low, gray clouds blocking out the sun and drifting across the sky. Patches of ice had formed on the battlements and on the stairs of the keep, causing many guardsmen and servants to slip and fall. In the late afternoon, another storm roared over the walls and the snow began to fall in earnest. Khollo slept closer to the forges that night, huddled in his bedroll, trying to stay warm.
Late in the night, Khollo woke with a start.
At first he thought that the change in weather had woken him, for the storm was not blowing as fiercely now. His next guess was that one of the other smiths had snored particularly loudly. Aaron was especially accomplished at drowning out every other sound as he slept. Then, Khollo heard the snort of a large, heavy animal, and the crunch of hooves in the snow.
Throwing aside his blankets, Khollo buckled on his weapons belt and slipped towards the entrance to the smithy. He could hear the jingle of harnesses, and low voices arguing. A horse nickered softly, and snorted again.
Khollo stepped outside and turned towards the stables. Dark shadows were there, wrestling with a pair of horses, their breath creating gray clouds in the night air. Khollo heard a low curse and smiled in recognition.
He stepped further into the stables. “Need any help?”
The shadows turned quickly. One of them dropped a hand to the sword belted at his side. Then they both relaxed. “I’m never one to refuse a helping hand,” Ondus said, stepping out of the shadows. “You’re a sight for sore eyes, lad. But why aren’t you in the barracks?”
“Long story,” Khollo muttered. “I’ll fill you in later. Did you find them?”
“Long story,” Janis grunted as he stepped out of the shadows as well, having returned his horse to a stall. “Come on. We have a lot to talk about.”
Does that mean they found the vertaga? Khollo wondered as they set off for the keep. Or did they not find them and Janis thinks they missed something?
As Khollo followed along in the trench the two men were plowing through the snow, he noticed that their equipment was crusted with snow and dirt. Ondus’ cloak was in tatters and there was a suspicious dark stain on it. Janis was walking with a pronounced limp, and, looking down, Khollo noticed that his ankle was wrapped in several layers of rags.
Janis led the way up the steps and into the keep, clumping across the great hall, heedless of the footprints of dirty snow he was leaving behind. Ondus followed, after stomping the worst of the snow off of his boots, forcing Khollo to jog to keep up. With each step, Khollo suspected more and more that trouble was afoot.
In no time at all they were at the top of the spiraling stairs, standing before the two guards posted at the door to the council room. The two soldiers snapped to attention, despite their
