15 years have passed since Vareth, and Lily found that baby boy. They took him in and raised him. The boy was now a young man. He had grown tall, already hitting 6 foot and he was strong. Spending his childhood helping his father with the forge and mining gave him defined muscles. The name he was given was Jason. It was early in the morning. The sun was barely cresting the mountains. The forge glowed a bright red as it burned to give off a sweltering heat as Jason worked the forge. Two men watched him work. One was his father. The other he did not know. His father only told him that he was a fellow blacksmith. He tried not to pay them any attention as he carefully watched the cold iron ingot in the forge. He could feel it. It would almost call to him when it was exactly right to be hammered into a thin sheet of metal, ready to be worked into a blade.
Hotter, hotter! It chanted to him in his mind. Then he heard it was almost like the iron told him it was ready, not too hot to become brittle but just the right temperature to make it strong.
He quickly pulled the glowing ingot from the flames and started hammering away on the anvil until it whispered into his mind that it was getting too cold, so he thrust it back into the fire.
He repeatedly heated and hammered the ingot. It eventually formed a long flat thin piece of metal. Once it was done, he set to work on an Orichalcum ingot. That was a much softer metal and took less time but required more care. Once that was done, he threw both pieces back into the forge until they told him they were ready. Then he hammered them together, folding them over each other, creating a perfect union—the hard cold iron on the outside and the soft orichalcum on the inside. The metal followed his will and became stronger for him. Once formed the cooled the newly formed blade in the salt brine, then reheated and cooled, tempering the edge to become even stronger.
The sun was already setting when Jason put the last touches on the sword. It was a gorgeous blade. The silvery grey of the cold iron and the golden color of the orichalcum could still be seen, lines as clear as day. He set it down and looked at it. It had become precisely how he pictured it when he drew the design a few days before.
"That's a mighty fine sword you made today, son, but you still have a lot of room for improvement. " his father's voice drifted over to Jason's ear, shattering concentration.
Improve? How? He had been trying for years to gain his father's approval on his work. But every time, his father would harden his eyes and say he needed to improve.
"Yes, father," was he could grumble out. He was determined to be a great blacksmith, even better than his father. He picked up the sword and handed it off to his father. His mind raced on how he could have made it better, stronger, and sharper.
After a while, he gave up. He had thought about it so hard his head was hurting.
"Father, I'm going to eat and then head off to rest. That took a lot out of me."
"You'd better clean up before eating, or your mom will have your hide!" His father called as Jason was heading into the house.
It was a lie. Really he felt fine and was not tired but knew that he should be after all the physical work. It had always been this way. He could work for longer hours and harder than anyone else, it seemed. It was just like his forging, the fire would burn hotter for him, and the metal would almost seem to whisper to him when it was at the best point to be worked. He would stay up late thinking about new ways to improve, or he would just sneak out to strengthen his body's strength. He felt like he could do better at anything that he did because his parents had always made him believe that he could. It drove him mad sometimes, but he excelled at his studies too. His parents had paid for a private tutor to give him the best education they could afford. It must have cost them a fortune to do it. So, he had decided not to waste it. He had put in long hours to learn everything. He did not sleep a lot, maybe a couple of hours a night. This played a massive part in what his parents believed was his natural talent. His body and mind only needed a few hours to recover.
After Jason left, Vareth and the other man started to talk.
"How old is your boy?" The man asked.
"15 years old."
The man's eyes went wide in shock then a smile broke across his face. He held the sword Jason had crafted, carefully inspecting it.
"15, you say? and he's already this skilled at forging?" The man chuckled as his eyes twinkled with greed.
"Yes, it is hard to believe, though. It doesn't matter how many times I see him forge."
"He'd definitely pass the journeyman blacksmithing test in any of the guilds. The strength of the blade is comparable to that of masters, but it is the details of the rest that he lacks." The man looked at Vareth. He seemed to hesitate as if he wanted to say more but chose not to continue.
"He has definitely surpassed me in some regards, but he still needs to keep working at it," Vareth grunted, unwilling to let his son and successor's skills stagnate.
"Maybe he should come back with me and work at the Black Anvil Guild? The man proposed.
"No, it's sad for me to say it. The boy has shown great talent in many things. Blacksmithing included, but his path is a different one than mine. Unless he abandons it, which would lead to a life of regret. But he is my successor nevertheless! and the craft will grant him great benefits if he allows it."
Vareth's reply was cryptic to the man. The man looked at Vareth, his eyes full of questions about what Vareth had meant, but Vareth had moved on.
"Thanks for coming down here, Master Gillis, but I don't think you made this trip just to visit me nor see my son's forging skills alone." Vareth's voice had become cold and his eyes hard.
"You know me too well, Vareth, however, about your son," Gillis reached into his pocket and pulled out a token with the Black Anvil Guild's symbol on it.
"This may prove to be of use to him still even if you say that he won't be a blacksmith, but this will make it, so the guilds will recognize him as a journeyman blacksmith and give him the benefits of one."
Surprise and gratitude filled Vareth's face. He knew Master Gillis wanted something in exchange, and this was to just soften him up. He was willing to let Jason become a journeyman without taking the test in the guild to get it. For it was no small matter to certify someone as a journeyman blacksmith without the difficulty of bringing them back to the guild to test them there.
"What do you want for this? For surely this is not out of kindness no matter how special my son's forging is," Vareth stated.
"Cold iron."
Those words cared a lot of weight. It was a rare metal. Any metal with a magic element enhancing it was, but Vareth had a source, and it was not the first time someone came seeking it. They always came with bribes or came to force it out of him, but those never made it out of the dark forest alive. Not that Vareth had killed them personally, but those in the dark forest do not allow trespassers.
When Jason goes to his room, he sat down at his desk. He laid papers on his desk and around his bed with inked-out designs and notes for ideas to better his craft or other things he wanted to make and books. A few of them had additional notes from his past studies. He had finished his lessons with the tutor last year, but he would still practice and review his old notes, for he had been raised to work towards a steady improvement and not settle.
Jason pulled out a key, unlocked the drawer at the desk, and pulled out a detailed drawing of a girl. No matter how much he focused on studies, forging, and combat skills, he was still a 15-year-old boy. This was a drawing he had done himself of a girl named Sophia. It was a drawing of her when she walked the town market, focusing her attention on the various goods. She was the daughter of the local alchemist. And was one of the few people that treated him kindly. The others tended to ignore him or attempt to bully him.
Although not physically, swinging a hammer all day made him a lot stronger naturally over the others. Well, this only helped cover up his unnatural strength. No, they would shout rude comments and keep their distance while doing so, for they could still remember the pain they had felt when they had tried to get physical with him. Jason's father has punished him still for the sake of keeping the peace with the other families. Although the cold iron has made them one of the wealthier families in the town, they still acted like the middle class.
Jason was still the outcast of the village's youth, his upbringing had not allowed for a lot of time to socialize with other kids growing up, and the few times he had tried to be and was met with cold shoulders and whispers. His education had taught him how to socialize with all classes, including nobles. It made him a great businessman when his mother could not handle the storefront of the smithy.
He had heard all the different rumors about himself that the other youths spread about him. When he was younger, he had asked his parents about them. They had only told him that he was not their child, and they would say to him more when he was older and that most of the rumors were precisely that rumors. His hair was unnaturally black, so they would tease him about needed to go to the church and get looked at for signs of corruption. His eyes were a dark amber, which was also an oddity. They would tell him that the mage hunters were coming for him because only a magical influence would cause that. Luckily, the church ignored the rumors about him, probably because his parents and he attended the rites and rituals just like everyone else and made generous donations. The mage hunters rarely came through town, and when they did, everyone became quiet, so they had never come to perform an inspection on him for magic.
Jason eventually put the picture back with a longing sigh, making sure to lock the drawer again. and got ready for a nap since he could never sleep for more than a few hours. When he removed his shirt, a large black mark could be seen on his back left shoulder. It was something only his parents and he knew about.
A few hours later, Jason rolled out of bed and made light practiced steps as he moved about the room. He got dressed and put on his old boots, and grabbed a heavy practice sword that he had made. It was large and crude. It weighed enough that most grown men required two hands to lift it, Jason however, only needed one hand. Then he snuck downstairs, and then he headed towards the back door. He was good at not getting caught and making it out without waking anyone up after years of doing it to continue his usual morning routine. But tonight, he had been almost to the door when paused. He could hear his parents talking, although he could not hear what they were saying. His parents never stayed up late or woke up this early in the morning. They would always wake up at the crack of dawn no earlier. Oh well, he would just have to make sure that the door did not make a sound.
Once he was outside, he slipped into the storage shed. It was large enough and open in the center for Jason to swing the weapons around without knocking anything. Gripping the practice sword with a two-handed grip, he started working through the swordsmanship basics that his father had taught him. Using the heavier practice sword, he trained his body even more than he could by swinging a hammer away at the foraging all day or in the dark forest mining raw ore. After working on his basics, he then moved on to some of the moves he had learned from mercenaries and guards or other customers that offered him pointers and training for discounted repairs and new weapons as well as armor. These are the ones he had to focus more on since he was not as practiced in them. It was hard remembering every detail of them. He was unsure if he had recalled them wrong or was taught a bad move, to begin with. While practicing those moves, he would often lose his balance and feel clumsy and almost silly swinging the sword around, the movements felt off, and his body showed its discomfort.
If he could, he would spend all his time smithing or practicing his swordsmanship. He liked reading and learning about magic and the world too, but that was just wishful thinking. He knew that he would have to apply to a formal apprenticeship within the next year and possibly leave the town. His father had already denied him a traditional apprenticeship as a blacksmith. He had been told he had a different path in life to take, and they have been preparing him for it as best they could. When it was time, though, they would suggest to him apprenticeships that would train him more. Again, it was cryptic like always, but swinging a big heavy sword helped him vent any building frustrations.
It was not long before Jason heard the wooden door creak open, and his father, Vareth, stepped inside.
"Jason, it is time. Please follow me inside the house so your mother and I can finally answer the questions that you have had and that we have been avoiding answering your whole life, it seems."
Vareth's words hit Jason like a rock. He had stood there in shock, watching his father silently turn and leave before overcoming his nerves and following his father inside the house.