The day drew on, pale streaks of orange in the sky bringing about it's end. Tobias sighed and wiped his brow, his sleeves already soaked with perspiration from the days work. Leatherworking was a complex and demanding task, especially for an apprentice just beginning. He was a small boy, yet his summon let him manage to lift enough to be chosen as the chief apprentice in the workshop.
"Get back in here, boy." Sir's loud voice cracked Tobias' thoughts, and made him flinch. He should have been working, not daydreaming.
"C'mon, let's get back to work already" Gord turned to look at Tobias, his unblinking pebbles as emotionless as ever. Gord was Tobias' only contract, as he couldn't afford to find a better one with the time he had. He also never really wanted another one, as healready had enough. Whatever. He leaned back before hopping to his feet. Gord was a small Black Pebble Golem, and he boosted his contract's strength and vitality by a small but noticeable amount.
Tobias tugged his boots on as he hopped on towards his bench. His current task was to repair the vest ofa part of a dress set. The vest itself was... Odd. It appeared to have a pattern like a cows, with black spots covering the brown. The problem was that the leather appeared to have split in certain areas, so all it would take was some simple sewing to fix it. Other voices could be heard, as the four other apprentices worked hard on their seperate projects. Sir owned a very profitable shop so he could affor to sit back and watch as they thought about their tasks. Tobias reached across the desk and grabbed the dark brown thread, which was closest to the colour of the leather. Back and forth. Back and forth. His hands moved almost on their own, for he had repeated this so many times it was almost monotonous. But something was wrong, albeit faint, you could still see the woven threads throughout the vest.
"Maso, can I borrow your salamander for a second? I need to burn up some threads." This was the third time he'd had to reset his work, but none of the threads worked with the colour scheme. 'these dots almost look like burn marks so what if...' Tobias looked down at the Salamander in his palm. It was tiny, smaller than Gord, but it was a whole different class than his contract. Fire types were always better, because of their rarity after the purge.
"buddy, can I get you to burn the areas a little bit too?" The salamander happily obliged; curling it's tail and releasing short bursts of flame and turning the leather the same colour as the weird spots. The burnt smell of burning leather filled the air.
"Thanks buddy, I'll pass you back to Maso now." Tobias and Maso's slamander were quite close, because Tobias was so picky with his works that he constantly relied on different contracts to reset what he had done. Now he reached to his left, and grabbed the black thread which now matched the spots covering the splits. Now when he stood up and looked at his work, it looked as good as new. The thread matched the vest so finely you could only tell it was there from feel.
Sir came over and slapped Tobias hard on the back."Now that's why I'm so proud of you! That was a brilliant thing to do, although you do still need to concentrate on your threading." Tobias' teacher pointed out all of the small mistakes he made, and how to fix the problem when he didn't have a source of fire nearby.
"Next time, stitch it from the inside. This way works well, but you don't want to exhaust Suzie." Tobias' cheeks flared from how easy the task atcually was. He had spent so much effort on finding a solution, but it was that simple all along.
"It doesn't matter. Head on down to the dorm, Patricia wanted to speak to you about something. Now, I know what it is, but I'm in no position to talk about it. But I'll tell you this. I see you as my son." What did that mean?
"Sir...?" Tobias had known he was an orphan taken in by Sir for a long time, so what was this about?
"Sure thing Sir, I'll see you after tomorrow."
"No more Sir. Call me Bryce from now on. Run along now."
Tobias walked along the ground, his thoughts racing yet grounded. This was one of the passive abilities of Gord. He made sure that the contracted person never got too far ahead of themselves. Tobias was grateful of it, but it was sometimes a little depressing, as he never had grandeur ideas about who he could be... But he had stopped havng big ideas about that a long time ago. All he cared about was the fact that he haf a family who loved him, a job, and good friends.
As Tobias neared Sir's, no, Bryce's dorm house, he saw Patricia standing on the front porch. She had a sad yet caring smile, which set Tobias' mind racing again. She ushered him inside and pulled him over to the table, where she sat down and gazed at him with weary eyes.
"Do you remember when you were seven? ten years ago?"
"What about then?" What were they getting at?
"We told you that you were adopted after being orphaned, and that Gord came with you. You took it surprisingly well for your age." Where were they going with this? He had always known he was different, so bein told that he was adopted wasn't that hard to accept.
"The thing is... We think your parents are still alive." What?
"They abandoned you at birth. We don't know why but thought you should know." They're still alive? after seventeen years they're alive?
"Where are they!? Can I see them!? When can I!?" He was so excited for this! his whole life he had been disappointed he didn't have a family, but now... He remembered what Sir said to him, about why he saw them as his son, and a thought ocurred to him.
"Why did they abandon me?" With this thought he sombered up incredibly quick and anxiously awaited the answer."
'We... we don't know. We found you on our doorstep with a note, asking us to take care of you. We did, because how could we leave you in the cold?"
"Thank you... I suppose..." Tobias muttered his thanks, but his mind was in another place. Why had they abandoned him? Why? Why!?
"I'm going to see... Bryce. I want to... talk to him." He had too many questions too sleep.
"Sure thing sweetheart." She was so loving and kind, tobias was glad she adopted him.