Standard disclaimers apply. All BG characters belong to Bioware except for Irse and Okami who sprang fully-grown and stocked with kaffa from the author's regulatory audit-weary mind. An inordinate amount of events will not be following the in-game story.
Many thanks to all readers and reviewers. Your kind words are a constant source of motivation. I hope this story brings a smile to your day as writing this has brought one to mine. ^_^
THE HIDDEN SWORD: A TALE OF BALDUR'S GATE
Book One : From the Earth | Chapter 2 : Taking Root
For a moment she was confused. Instead of wooden beams above and bare stone walls around, she was greeted by the open sky - a quiet expanse of pale rose behind clouds tinged with the gold of the rising sun.
Irse sat up, rubbing the sleep from her eyes and glanced around. Where was she again?
All around her the horizon and trees and a view of the road not too far off. A moment more and she remembered she was no longer in Candlekeep. Even with the days between its gates and the morning now, the Keep's walls sometimes still cast a shadow on her waking.
A savory aroma drifted over from a kettle sitting atop a small fire. Okami stirred the porridge and sprinkled in some salt and herbs.
"Good morning," he hailed with a slight nod of his head.
"Good morning as well," she yawned with a wave of her hand. Irse got up and collected her bedroll, dusting and shaking the cloth before folding and tucking it into her pack. She walked over to Okami who ladled the porridge into a wooden bowl which he handed to her. The elf settled herself cross-legged by the fire.
Murmuring her thanks, she cupped the warm bowl in her hands and breathed in the steam. "We're heading north, Teacher?" she asked.
"We are. I have traversed the Coast Way before. Between here and the Gate we will find a few farms where we may seek shelter or coin in exchange for whatever service I can provide according to my skills."
"And I'll be helping," she reminded him with an eager grin before slurping the porridge.
"Of course." He poured some of the gruel for himself. "Though not fully until your hands have healed."
Irse nestled the bowl on her lap and held up both bandaged palms. "Is there anything a hammer and nails can't fix?" she teased.
The blacksmith smiled and shook his head.
Breakfast was quickly finished, the remains of the small campfire cleaned. Man and elf set off for the road, bellies full and spirits high with the day's promise of good weather for traveling. Spring had already rolled into summer, the skies infinitely clear and the meadows by the road spread out like a sea of green dotted with the pinks and blues and yellows of wildflowers before ending at the borders of the thick woodlands beyond.
Every other hour they met other travelers – smaller merchant caravans of less than a half dozen wagons, or farmers ambling alongside hay-filled carts pulled by the most-tired looking mules in the realm.
Nothing more than passing glances were thrown their way – for what threat could be posed by a lean foreigner in humble travel-worn clothes, and a scrawny and lanky elf with bandages?
But there were other trekkers making their way north, perhaps to Baldur's Gate or further to Waterdeep or all the way to Neverwinter, and even Icewind Dale. Places she had never seen, all mere names on a map she once saw spread across Gorion's desk back at home in Candlekeep.
Home. Candlekeep. But to these other travelers, also another name on the map.
Northbound folks who passed them by, of them she took no more notice. But with those heading south, she would turn her head and followed them with her eyes until her neck hurt or her foot stumbled on a rock she should have seen ahead. But she couldn't help herself.
In her few days with the merchant caravan, she had always looked to the road behind them. Fearful that the Watchers would suddenly appear, her juvenile imagination always pictured them carrying chains and manacles; though they were mostly kind to her, they still answered to Master Ulraunt, Keeper of the Tomes. Each time, a little lump of fear crept up to her chest that she worked hard to smother with thoughts of freedom and adventure. But none of them ever came for her. Perhaps Gorion had accepted her decision or that Ulraunt was only too happy to be rid of her.
But now, each step felt like a thousand leagues and a hundred days; each time she looked back, the cord seemed to stretch tighter and tighter between her and the horizon to the south. But what else could she do then?
Another merchant caravan passed them by, going the opposite direction. Her head turned to look at them, then back to the road before her, then to them again.
Okami seemed to have taken notice of her habit. He cleared his throat. "In my homeland of Kozakura, we have a proverb– 'He who looks not to where he began, shall never find the path to his journey's end'."
"Oh, that's… wise," Irse agreed absently, her eyes still following the other group, casting unthinking glances in front of her every other second.
"Yes, a wisdom you are demonstrating now. For the mark of a great sage is inattention to the road, most especially to an imminent pile of dung ahead."
"Wha-?" Irse stammered as she finally looked down at her feet, inches before she nearly stomped on a mound of cow dung right in front of her. Without thinking, she overstepped to keep from tramping through the slurry but lost her balance as she pitched forward.
She was sure her face was about to make friends with the rocky ground but Okami suddenly extended his arm before her. Instinctively her hands reached out to grasp at him and though her knees buckled ungainly, her feet connected again with the earth.
"Thanks," she wheezed as she straightened herself and let go of him.
"Do not thank me. Thank the beast that dropped only one in your path," Okami replied, his expression indifferent. The man resumed his walk without another glance at her.
A flush ran up her cheeks, embarrassment curling her stomach. The elf snorted indignantly and quickened her steps.
"I assume Candlekeep has its own forge and that you have seen its smith engaged in metalwork? I wish to know how familiar you are with the practice," Okami inquired, adjusting his conical woven hat to shield his face from the sun.
Irse pulled back the hood from her face as she turned to him to reply. "We do have a smithy and it's run by one of the Avowed." Her eyes suddenly became downcast. "But I'm forbidden to ever step foot inside."
Okami seemed puzzled. "I understand if such were to protect you when you were a child, but your words suggest the command holds until now."
"There was a bit of an accident, Teacher," she explained, trying to sound nonchalant though with effort. After all, it had happened so long ago that hopefully it wouldn't matter anymore, especially to her new mentor.
"A very minor accident. You see…"
It was years ago. Irse was about ten and Imoen may have been seven then. While Brother Albert was busy pottering about inside the smithy, she had sneaked in to grab a pair of pincers and a small hammer in a rack by the doorway, then quietly ran back to an eagerly waiting little Imoen.
"You take the pincers, imagine it's a dragon's mouth," Irse had coached her friend, showing her how to scissor the tool as if it were the snapping jaws of a great monster.
Imoen, ever keen for pretend play, giddily received the pincers from the older girl. "Yay! But what're you gonna be?"
Proudly, Irse had rested the small rusty mallet on her shoulder. "Me? I'm the fearless paladin that's why I get this shiny holy silver hammer!"
With giggles and shrieks the two girls played heroes and magical beasts. But a greater threat to the little adventurers suddenly appeared in the horizon.
"You two! Return those tools this instant!" Brother Albert scolded at them, standing at the doorway. "And get over here! You will sweep the floor and clean the smithy as punishment unless you prefer a sentence from Master Ulraunt! Or perhaps I should brand you with a flaming poker to warn the world for the miniature miscreants that you are!" And then the monk retreated back inside to make good his threat.
The two girls had stared at the doorway, shrugged their shoulders and resumed their play.
"How'd the knights say it in the books? Oh, yeah - Die, Evil Dragon!" Irse shouted as she swung the hammer at the snapping pincers, taking great care not to hit her little friend.
"I smite you in the name of - Whoops!"
But not enough care to keep the hammer from slipping from her hands. The tool sailed away, spinning through the air and straight for the smithy's window where it smashed through glass.
With open mouths the girls listened in to the clattering of metal implements and a pitched scream. Brother Albert had suddenly run outside, his robes smoking. He had jumped into a long wooden trough, posterior first. With legs dangling out, he sat there as he frantically splashed murky water all over his lower half. Poor monk had accidentally branded himself with a hot poker after having been startled by the hammer crashing through the window.
The hole in the window had earned them a week without supper. The burn hole in his robes near where his manhood would be had earned her a lifetime ban from the Keep's smithy.
But it was worth it. Brother Albert was one of those monks always brownnosing to Ulraunt, who for some reason had always been ill-disposed towards the young elf. At the time, Gorion lectured on her with extra sternness, the expression on his face strangely contorted, his shoulders shaking, words almost stammering with forced coughing. Only then after a few years did she realize her foster father may had been trying to suppress his own amusement over the incident.
Irse snickered quietly at the memory then stopped at the sight of her teacher giving her a wry look.
"A pity for a child to be deprived of the opportunity to learn a craft," he remarked as he smiled knowingly. "Yet one cannot blame them for decreeing that sharp, pointy, burning objects are not playthings to be dangled in front of a young fox."
Irse could only grin, a toothy admission of guilt.
They turned from the road and into a beaten pathway that veered east. It led to a hamlet, a cluster of small houses adjacent to a field of scattered vegetable patches. A few farmers carrying rakes and baskets walked past the pair, hailing them with stiff nods and curious whispers behind their backs.
"They've got one of their own already!" A scowl spread over her face at the sight of the smithy. Though a mere door-less shack with an anvil and a forge – it was clearly well used with a small fire starting at the hearth and tools neatly arranged upon a rack.
Her teacher tutted at her. "Dismiss not the first hill standing in your path. Perhaps a valley of gold lies beyond the mound?"
They stopped at the threshold and waited for the master of the forge. It wasn't long before he emerged from a homely hut beside the smithy. A middle-aged man, robust from years of toil. His arm was bound in a sling.
"And what can I do for a chap from the east and an elf lass?" he greeted them amiably.
Okami bowed deeply before the man, Irse glancing at her teacher before abruptly following in his gesture.
"We are humble travelers making our way north. I am also a smith and this is my apprentice. If you have need of able hands at the moment, we will gladly lend our services."
The man scratched the stubble on his chin as he pondered the offer. "Matter of fact, I do need some help with my work." He canted his head towards the forge. "Got a commission to make a batch of nails for a merchant friend coming in tomorrow. But see here, I hurt my arm. Fell off a ladder the other day thatching my roof, and my son's gone off to Beregost with his mam so I've no help around."
After a quick exchange between the two men on the amount of work to be done, they immediately set about to prepare for the day's labors. Okami guided the young elf to the forge which appeared to be an open brick hearth raised above the ground. He showed her how to stoke the fires with a handheld bellows. They took turns with the implement, Okami allowing his student to acquire a feel of the effort to operate the contraption.
The smith, Filmon, went to an adjoining shed to fetch the iron rods. He returned with a half-filled wheelbarrow. As Irse continued to work on the forge, the two men unloaded the metal on to a worktable.
"There be another pile in the shed, could you get it too?" Filmon told Okami who promptly took the wheelbarrow and left.
"Been wanting to ask. What happened to you, lass?" Filmon asked as soon as the other man had gone.
Irse turned to him, rubbing the bandage bundled on her ear and held in place by a gauze wrapped around her forehead. It had only been a couple of days since the attack.
"Bandits, sir," she simply replied.
The man spat on the ground. "Aye! Scum of the Coast. I dunno why the Fist don't send more of their numbers to watch the roads. Too comfy sitting on their arse all holed up behind the Gate, I'd say. Sorry 'bout your ear, though," he muttered.
"Yes, well. I could've lost… a nose," she remarked brightly. Filmon grunted in agreement and with his free hand pulled out a few tools from the rack for their use.
Okami returned with more of the rods. He speedily unloaded them on to the table and replaced the wheelbarrow by the entrance. Then he walked over to the forge, slipping his left hand into a thick leather glove.
"Our first task is to heat the iron stock to the correct forging temperature. See that the tip is bright, like the color of the sun rising. Only then will it be ready to be shaped by the hammer. I will forge the nails myself but you must observe and learn," he commenced explaining to his apprentice as he scraped some of the live coals over the iron with a long-handled spatula.
"And take care when you are handling the workpiece once you have put it to the fire. Regardless of its color, the heat remains for some time. Always clasp it with pincers or tongs, or with a gloved hand if the length of the stock does not require a tool such as what we are working on now. Never with your bare hands lest you burn yourself," he added as a warning.
Irse bobbed her head in understanding. Hot things burn – something quite obvious to anyone, she dismissed in her mind.
Filmon watched them for a moment. "Seems you know what to do. Well, I'll be leaving the two of you here for now as I need to help my own mam. If you need anything just holler at us in that yonder field," Filmon said as he pointed at a small house where an old woman came out and stood by a mule and a cart of hay. With that, the smith left them to their work.
"So, just nails? I thought he'd ask us to make something bigger – like a sword," Irse said with disappointment. She held a pair of the rods in her hands, idly tapping them one against the other.
"Before you can forge a sword, you must first learn to shape a nail," Okami admonished sharply.
The elf hunched her shoulders and grinned apologetically at his chiding and gingerly replaced the rods on the worktable.
Okami explained further, "By heating the metal, you make it pliable to be fashioned to the form you require. This is known as the heat. Try to count the number of times I do this. First, we are to shape the point, next we fashion the shank - the body of the nail, so that it tapers from head to tip. Lastly, we separate the nail from the rest of the stock and form its head."
Okami slid the iron out of the fire to check the temperature and was rewarded with the telltale bright yellow-orange glow. With the gloved hand holding the unheated half, he laid the workpiece on the anvil face and hammered at the glowing tip which he raised at a slight angle. Four times he turned and made a few strong taps. Then he started hammering at the area a bit away from the tip, both rotating and drawing the rod towards him to stretch the iron and create a taper.
Then he placed a steel wedge, a hardy, upon the anvil face, fastening its square-pegged bottom to the hardy hole at the far end of the surface. He held a sample of a finished nail against the stock to check for length, then laid it against the hardy. Several strong blows were made at the spot placed above the hardy's sharp edge as he rotated the rod. With the remaining glow on the metal, Irse could see a dent deepening round the piece, almost expecting it to fall off and separate from the rest. But just when she thought it would, Okami lifted the stock, clamped the thinned section with a pincer-like tool, a header, and twisted the iron against header's grip until it broke off. Okami inserted the newly broken-off piece into a pritchel hole on the anvil face and pounded at the exposed and still radiant end. Then he dipped the nail into a trough of water, the metal cooling with a satisfying hiss.
He held up the workpiece to show her the result. A nail indeed – a sharp four-sided tip, tapered shank and a flattened head. "How many heats were made to produce one nail?" he quizzed his apprentice.
"One heat, Teacher," Irse answered. As with his movement and his strides, the whole process under his hands seemed quick and efficient. Nothing, whether heat or effort, was wasted in producing a simple nail.
"Correct. Iron can only be shaped while it is still hot. As it cools, it becomes difficult to mold until it finally hardens on its own. Know the course of your actions before you execute the work. Otherwise, hesitation and unnecessary movement will cost you the opportunity."
Okami repeated the process for a dozen more nails with Irse preparing the rods for shaping, finally arranging the finished work into a separate pile. As she watched him, her hand would unconsciously imitate the way he wielded the hammer. Finally, the elf worked up the courage to ask.
"Can I try to make one by myself, Teacher?"
Okami looked up from his work and beamed. "Certainly. Here, the next one is yours."
Gripping the newly heated iron with one gloved hand and laying it against the anvil face, she pounded at the metal, excitement and eagerness driving the force in her blows. Okami stood by and observed in silence, arms crossed over his chest.
Yet the hammer seemed to be hitting the anvil more than the rod. A miss, one after the other. How many times has she turned the workpiece? She forgot. Does it have the four-sided point now? At first, she could almost feel the iron bend from her strikes but why is it getting harder and harder to hit it?
After a while, Irse paused and frowned.
"Teacher," she said unsurely. "I'm not certain I'm doing this correctly." She held up her work. Tip unevenly formed and shank unequal from the hammer landing without focus. More like a slightly kinked root.
Okami raised an eyebrow, though his expression was more of amusement. "Perhaps among other worlds the gods have seeded, we may find a crooked people living in crooked houses having need for your crooked nail."
The elf rested the stock on the anvil with a sigh. Gone was its glow, the iron now gray and dull.
"I was so slow that it must have hardened before I'm through. I bet it's already as cold as ice," Irse grumbled as she reached over to poke at the rod with the tips of her fingers.
With startling speed, Okami's hand darted out, swiftly grasping her wrist before she could touch the workpiece.
Her eyes widened in surprise as she turned to look at him. "But it seems like –," she blurted out.
Okami released his grip on her. He dipped a hand into the trough and flicked a few drops of water at the iron. Vapor escaped its surface with a hiss.
"My earlier warning still holds. It may no longer be as radiant as the sun, but it will burn just as much." He turned to her with a stern gaze as if to impose the lesson of her carelessness. "Do not be deceived by appearances, for the false safety you see with your plain eyes will cause you twice the harm."
Irse bowed meekly. "Yes, Teacher." She scratched at her head. "But I wasted one stock. Now Mister Filmon will take it out of the pay!" she exclaimed with dismay.
Okami's expression suddenly softened. "Ah, but such is the beauty of working with metal. With wood and stone, a mistake is permanent and must be carved away and then you are left with less. Not so with iron. Though among the strongest of materials, it is malleable to any shape you please - but only when put through the hottest of fires. With iron, there are no mistakes – only a call to return to the forge once again." He motioned for her to replace the workpiece into the hearth.
"Now as we wait for the iron, show me again how you attempt to reshape the anvil."
Irse pouted peevishly at the apparent jibe but obeyed nonetheless. She returned to the anvil with an unheated rod and held the hammer high in the air, knuckles white with the tightest grip that she could manage.
"No. Loosen your hold slightly. Yet with sufficient grip that it does not fall from your hands," Okami said, then looked up at the roof. "And that neither will it fly to the heavens again. Wait, you are holding at the end of the handle and standing as far as you can from the anvil."
She looked at her hand gripping the hammer. "Oh, how close should I be? Won't I smack my own face by accident if I'm too near?"
"Your method and pose will result to your body absorbing the strain because your wrists are forced to pivot a heavy tool. You will tire easily and hurt yourself. Instead, grip the middle of the handle but place your body directly over your work like so," Okami said as he positioned himself by the anvil as he did before, grasping another hammer to show her.
"In this manner, your arm as the bigger and stronger muscle will be doing the work instead of your wrists. With a grip closer to the head, you are better able to control where it lands," he added, demonstrating his grip and softly smacking the hammer against his palm.
After she performed a few practice motions, Okami signaled for her to take out the stock from the forge. As she did so, she was delighted at seeing the rod bright once more. She had thought it could be melted only once and like potter's clay would eventually harden to a permanent state. Quickly she brought it back to the anvil. Holding the hammer in the manner instructed, the elf looked first to her teacher for permission.
"Now strike while the iron is hot," he commanded.
Her jaw set with renewed determination, Irse aligned herself directly over the workpiece and began to hammer as directed. Sweat poured in beads from her temples as if the very fires of the forge engulfed her. Still unused to the motions, her arm protested at the weight of the tool. But now more of the blows struck true and her heart swelled with joy at the sense of control she had gained.
"Look, Teacher! A point!" she cheered as she held up the piece, turning it around and proudly displaying what would pass for an angled tip.
Okami peered at her work, an approving smile on his face. "You are learning. But the metal has begun to cool again. What is to be done, then?"
Irse looked up, in her eyes a spark newly kindled.
"Put the iron to the fire once more."
It took her twelve more heats to complete, but she was happy with her first nail. No longer a wobbly mess though the taper still uneven and the head flattened more like an irregular flower than a circle, yet surely a pointy thing it was. Into the pile of finished work it went, though Irse wondered if her mentor would've approved of including such an aberrant in the tally.
Okami allowed her to make a few more, each a slight improvement over the one before, but insisted on finishing the whole commission himself. Whether it was because it would take them a day to be done if she was to contribute more to the work, or the idea of her hand wounds reopening and bleeding all over the anvil was an unsavory consequence, Irse didn't care too much. Though thrilled and proud of her first forging, she was just glad to be allowed to rest from working with the hammer.
It was nearly dusk by the time Filmon returned to the smithy. Irse dusted the anvil and swept the floor as the two men inspected the nails and discussed payment.
"Eh, what's this?" Filmon held up a piece much different from the others. Irse's first nail.
The elf dropped the broom and ran over to them, clasping her hands in a genuine apology. "I'm sorry, Mister Filmon. It's my first work. I'll do extra chores in the smithy or the field to make up for it."
"No, please charge it against me. I am accountable for her," Okami humbly offered.
The smith rolled the nail in his palm, quietly examining the somewhat warped piece. "Well, I'll be! It's an elven nail! Just as I had imagined you fancy elves would make it!" he laughed good-naturedly. "If you had made this with silver, I might even think to sell it as a trinket."
Master and student sighed in relief as Filmon handed the nail to the young elf. "You can keep it, girl. For good luck, or to remind you to give it a bit more practice!" he chuckled and winked.
Irse accepted the nail with both hands and beamed shyly. "Thank you, Sir. I'll always keep that in mind." She tucked the nail into a pocket and patted at it.
"You're welcome to stay in the smithy for the night. And join us for supper, will you? Mam's cooking up a feast, especially after she heard we're having guests from – well, not here."
Okami bowed before their host, Irse doing likewise. "We would be honored, Master Filmon," he accepted.
They had dinner at the house of Filmon's mother, a spritely old lady named Sarra. Despite the simple spread of chicken and vegetable stew, bread and watered-down wine, Irse thought it a feast; finally, being able to sit in a chair, eat on a table with plates and cutlery after days of taking her meals by the side of the highway. Conversation often turned to news of the road, work at the farm and the smithy, and passing mention of other small villages along the Coast.
Sarra seemed to take a special interest in the young elf. "How old are you, dearie? Eighty? A hundred and twenty?"
Irse blinked, puzzled at the old woman's guess way off the mark. "I'm fifteen now, ma'am," she responded politely, covering her mouth as she chewed on a turnip in the stew.
"Fifteen? Just a mere babe out and about wandering these roads! But you'll always look like that, won't you? Oh, I wish I could stay forever the pretty lass that I was in my youth - just like you fey folk!" Sarra gushed, a wistful look on her cloudy eyes.
"You, Mam? Pretty? Didn't Pa, bless his soul, always said you blinded him with a barrel of stout twice – once in that midwinter feast when you roped him in the barn, and then at your wedding day. Maybe thrice, including the wedding night!" Filmon piped in with a guffaw.
Sarra wagged a soup ladle at her son. "Shush, you! Don't tell me your pocky face got Elena to pull up her skirts! You put a sack on your head or hers?"
As mother and son hurled savory insults over the stew, teacher and student traded amused glances and quietly ate their portions.
Supper was cleared away and after profuse expressions of gratitude, Okami had requested that he and his apprentice be allowed to retire for the night. Filmon hung a thick blanket at the entrance of the smithy to keep out the draft, spread a dense carpet of straw all over the dirt floor and left them more blankets and two lanterns for the night.
Irse took her place by a lamp, sitting cross-legged on the straw. She would be on guard until an hour past moondark, then her teacher would take over until sunrise.
Okami knelt beside her. "There is no need to keep watch. We are safe here for the farmers take turns in guarding the village in the hours before dawn. You must rest for you have labored much today," he said gently.
Irse nodded and stood to get her pack and set down her bedroll. It was just as well, for her shoulders ached, her arms sore, and her neck felt stiff from all the hammering and carrying and watching. Better to rest through the night now for tomorrow would certainly mark the start of another long stretch of walking and camping.
But sleep didn't come right away. Irse took out the nail from her pocket. Staring blankly at the ceiling, she held it like a feather pen, tracing her name, trees, clouds, the moon in the air.
Her gaze fell upon her teacher, still in a sitting kneel by the lantern. His own eyes were half-closed, hands resting upon his thighs, his striking features now relaxed and serene by the dim light.
She looked up again at the wooden beams above, her hand unconsciously changing its grip on the nail, from that of a pen to a hammer. And as she did, something stirred within her, a mingling of elation, sureness, and purpose.
Then she laid down her hand and closed her eyes.