Herald of the Storm

FIVE

The song of steel was not a pretty tune. It rang out, discordant and loud, hammered in with muscle and sweat and dirt. Nobul Jacks performed the song like an artist, working his anvil as well as any fiddler at his bow, his powerful strokes expert in their precision. His formidable frame struck out the rhythm; hammer smashing white-hot steel, which sparked in quick quick time, filling the smithy with a dirge to rival any orchestra.

In the darkness of the forge a fierce fire burned, blades protruding like the spokes of a wheel, ready to be struck flat or quenched in water, ready to sing like the strings of a harp. Nearby stood the grinding stone whose voice called out as it sharpened and honed in a perfect falsetto.

For Nobul this was more than mere craft, more than a living. When working the forge he could forget what his life had become — all that existed was the song, the music of his labours, and it swept him from the world, his nightmares and his grief. Once he had closed the door behind him, he felt safe, deep in the sanctuary of his noisy, dirty, honest work.

But the door could not stay shut forever.

It opened, letting the sunlight from outside wash the interior of the forge and breach its sanctity. Nobul paused, hammer raised, as, with the opening of the door, the magic of the song was lost.

Two men entered; big men, burly men. Both taller than Nobul, with thick necks and shaved heads, but they were not lean like him, not hard, not wrought of iron sinew as he was. Nevertheless, Nobul placed his hammer down gently, and with a leather-gloved hand shoved the glowing steel back into the coals of the fire.

One man walked forward as the other closed the door behind them, shutting out the noise of the street. The first smiled, confident, his head slightly cocked to one side.

‘Hello again, Nobul,’ he said, in a deep, arrogant voice. ‘You know the drill.’

Nobul did not speak; he did not have to. Instead he moved to the back of the forge to the worktable that sat against the wall. It was scattered with cross-guards and pommel heads, some ornate and made from bronze or silver, others simpler, crafted from polished iron or other base metals. Whatever the material, they were all of the highest quality; Nobul never made second-rate gear. He was a craftsman: though his wares varied in price they were all finished with meticulous care.

A layman might have considered the table a mess, but Nobul knew where everything was, everything kept in its proper place. He reached for a small leather pouch secured by a drawstring. Still silent, he walked back across the forge and placed the pouch in the big man’s upturned palm. The brute smiled, weighing it in his hand and jingling the contents before untying the drawstring and glancing within.

‘Feels a little light. Do I have to count it?’

‘It’s all there,’ Nobul replied. There was no fear in his voice. These men didn’t inspire fear in him as they did in others. Nobul was too proud to be scared. He’d gone through too much to be afraid of men such as these, despite their size. Despite their reputation.

‘I’m sure it is,’ said the man, smiling again as he secured the drawstring and secreted the pouch within his jacket. ‘How’s business anyway? Good, I’ll bet. You must have more work than you can manage, what with the war coming.’

‘Business is fine,’ Nobul answered.

‘Come now, Nobul. It’s more than fine, we both know that. The Guild keeps abreast of these things. We’re always watching, even if you can’t see us. Weapons and armour for the soldiers at the front are in high demand, especially from a smith of your … talent. And a man of your talent needs protecting, needs looking after. You never know when an agent of the Khurtas might come knocking, might want to do you harm to sabotage the war effort. That’s why we’ll be taking extra special care of you over the coming months. And consequently this extra care will cost a premium.’

Nobul didn’t answer; there was little point. He paid his protection money to be left alone, not to be looked after.

With a nod, the big man turned. His burly friend opened the door, allowing the clangour in once more. ‘Be seeing you,’ said the brute, with a smile; then they were gone, letting the door slam shut behind them.

Nobul clenched his fists, feeling helpless, full of rage. Truth was he had received a big commission from the Crown, but he was only one man and he couldn’t afford an apprentice. His son was too young to work the forge, and this backbreaking work wasn’t something he wanted for the boy anyway. It was hard, dirty work, for hard, dirty men, and Markus was not suited to it. Though Nobul had raised him as best he could, their relationship was far from ideal. The last thing Nobul wanted was to make him work the forge and drive an even deeper wedge between them.

Yet what choice did he have? If he hadn’t got to pay back his loan for the forge, together with his stipend to the Guild for their ‘services’, he might have been able to get ahead. But if he now had to pay out even more, how could he keep a roof over his head and feed himself, let alone Markus?

Standing around lamenting wasn’t going to solve the problem. Nobul pulled the glove back onto his hand and picked up his hammer.

It was dark when he finally left the forge and ventured out into the cool of the street. Several people were busying themselves hanging banners and bunting for the Feast of Arlor, but Nobul wasn’t interested in any of that. What was the point?

He closed the heavy door behind him, turning the large iron keys in their mortise locks at the top and bottom of the door before taking the short walk to the small house he and Markus called home. Though the tiny space was cramped with the furniture they owned, it still felt empty without her there. He looked towards the hearth where she would have been … should have been sitting, but the chair was empty. The fire was lit though, and above it bubbled a pot of broth which filled the room with a rich smell that made his stomach rumble with approval.

‘Markus?’ Nobul called. He was answered by a clattering upstairs from their shared bedchamber, followed by his son’s muffled answer. The boy came down the stairs as quick as he could at his father’s call, stumbling halfway down. He was a clumsy child, gangly, thin, weak at the shoulders. Something inside Nobul resented him for that. If Nobul had been able to forge his son as he could forge weapons and armour, Markus would indeed have been a formidable child. It hadn’t worked out that way.

‘Father,’ Markus said, reaching the bottom of the stairs, and attempting to compose himself.

‘Asleep again?’ Nobul said, not expecting an answer. Markus only ever seemed happy when he was napping, only seemed to smile in his sleep. It was a laziness that Nobul should have beaten out of him. It was time Markus learned some of his father’s hard work ethic, but beating him never seemed to work. It certainly hadn’t toughened him up, and Nobul was loath to continue on that path. It might eventually drive his son away altogether, and Nobul had lost enough.

‘Lay the table,’ Nobul ordered as he kicked off his boots and sat by the fire.

‘I made the broth,’ Markus said, placing wooden trenchers on the table and laying out the spoons.

‘Yes, I can see that.’

‘And I went and got the bread like you asked. Baker said he was doing a deal on the soft kind, the stuff with no grainy bits in, so I got that.’

Nobul frowned. ‘Markus, how many times? The soft kind doesn’t last; it’ll be stale in a day. We need a loaf to last the week. I’m not made of-’ He stopped himself. It would do no good. Markus didn’t seem to pay heed to any chastisement; he just retreated further into himself.

Nobul lifted the lid of the stew pot, and picked up the wooden spoon that sat by the hearth. Then he stopped — the pot was filled to the brim. It looked like Markus had used their entire stock of meat and vegetables for the month.

‘What’s this?’ he demanded. Markus froze by the dinner table, transfixed. ‘When will you think, boy? Our food has to last. If you cook it all in one stew it’ll be bad in a few days.’

His son’s eyes began to well with tears, and Nobul suddenly found himself twisting the wooden spoon in his hands like a damp dishcloth. He must keep his temper, stay ahead, not let the daemons within rise up.

‘Never mind. We’ll just have to make do.’

They sat down to eat in silence, as always. No grace was said, no thanks to the gods. Why bother? It wasn’t them had paid for the food, it wasn’t them had cooked it.

Nobul was ravenous but he took his time, savouring the meat and the taste of the fresh bread. He had to give his son something — he could certainly cook a decent broth. Markus, however, gobbled his stew down faster than Nobul had ever seen him. Steam was coming from his mouth, and his cheeks were reddening with the heat; it was obviously burning as it went down, but the boy seemed heedless of the pain.

‘You in a rush?’ Nobul asked.

Markus looked up. It was a guilty look if ever Nobul had seen one, but his son shook his head nonetheless. He slowed his eating somewhat, but still finished well before Nobul, quickly getting up and taking his trencher and spoon to the bucket that stood in the corner. Nobul watched his son clean his plate, stack it by the windowsill to dry, then turn, anxiously.

‘Am I keeping you?’ Nobul asked.

Markus shook his head, but his leg was twitching, quivering like the hind end of a rutting stallion; it was obvious he wanted to be somewhere, anywhere, else.

‘It’s getting late. Sun’s gone down. You know I don’t like it when you-’

‘I’ll be careful,’ Markus said. ‘And I won’t be out later than last bell.’

Nobul nodded, then bent his head towards the door in a go on then, get out gesture.

Markus gave a half smile, and was rushing towards the door when Nobul suddenly reached out to stop him. He had only wanted to tell him to keep a lookout, and not stray too far, but when he grabbed his son’s arm he felt something hard beneath the sleeve.

Whatever he was going to say was forgotten as he pulled Markus towards him, dragging up the sleeve of his cotton shirt and seeing the tiny pouch tied to his forearm. He didn’t speak but pulled the pouch free and wrenched it open. He could already tell what was inside. Four tiny coins sat at the bottom: three coppers and one silver piece. Enough to feed them for a week.

Nobul stood up slowly as he poured the coins into his open hand.

‘Where did you get these?’ Rage was building, and it wasn’t helped by the fact that Markus looked so guilty, like someone caught red-handed. There was no answer, and his anger bubbled up like that thick broth, in the stew pot. Nobul towered over the slight form of his son. ‘Tell me!’ he shouted. ‘Did you steal it? Who did you-’

Then he froze. It wasn’t possible, it couldn’t be, but deep down he already knew it was.

‘Did you get this from under my bed? For what? To give to those urchins you’ve taken up with? What have I told you about that street scum?’

The tear that suddenly ran down Markus’ cheek spoke the confession his lips didn’t dare.

The slap was loud as Nobul’s meaty palm struck his son’s cheek. It was hard enough to knock Markus off his feet and send him sprawling, his gangly limbs flailing. It had been instinctive, a result of the rage, and as Nobul watched his son fall he instantly regretted it.

He took a step forward, reaching out to pick the boy up, his mouth open to speak a word of regret, perhaps even to say he was sorry, but Markus was immediately up on his feet and at the door. Nobul didn’t even have time to call out before Markus had wrenched open the door and run out into the night.

Nobul could only watch him leave.

The coins were still in his hand. They seemed to burn in his palm like he was holding a searing brand, reminding him of his guilt. With a feral growl he flung the coins across the room where they bounced and scattered.

Slowly, with each breath, he calmed, the rage cooling, his eyes tightly shut. For another man, a weaker man, they might have been shut to quell the tears of his regret, but Nobul had done all his crying twelve years ago. He had no tears left.

He closed the door and went to the hearth to sit in the chair. Her chair.

Rona had been young when they met. Too young for Nobul, or so everyone had told him. At first he’d ignored them, just happy that she had shown him any attention, happy that they were together. He’d never met anyone like her before, anyone so innocent and sweet and kind. Eventually though he had listened to the voices: his old friends, or what Nobul had in the way of friends, and also her parents, though they had never spoken ill of him to his face. He’d responded by trying to put her off, tried to explain he was no good and she should find someone better, someone younger. It hadn’t worked at first, not until he got drunk one night and into a bar fight. Then she had seen the real Nobul Jacks, the fast Nobul Jacks, tough and ruthless. Yet two days after, when all the dust had settled, she’d come back to him. He hadn’t been able to turn her away, and he had promised, as she asked, not to fight any more.

They were married north of the city, just the two of them under an old elm tree. Just them and the druid, a wedding looked over by the Old Gods just as she’d wanted. They returned to the city and hadn’t been back more than a day before Nobul got the call up. There had been rumblings in the south for months. The Wardens of the South had come back with reports that there were Lion Men abroad, beating the drums of war with their eye on the Free States. As an ex-mercenary Nobul was expected to fight, expected to offer his sword arm to the cause, despite the promise he had made to Rona. He had no choice.

Before he travelled south with the armies, he promised Rona he would come back, promised he would return with everything he went with still intact. Nobul had asked nothing of her. How could he? She was young, and if he died she would have to move on, find someone new to take care of her.

War against the Aeslanti had been worse than any of them could have thought. They’d heard the tales that the beast warriors of Equ’un were giants who lived on the flesh of men. The truth had been much worse.

The Battle of Bakhaus Gate was legendary now; a thousand brave men holding the pass against a horde of roaring monsters. Fighting valiantly with the flags of the Free States held aloft with pride.

Reality was somewhat less glorious — it always was.

They had been closer to ten thousand, every one of them pissing in fear. No one gave a fuck about flags or pride or glory, they just wanted to run, and they would have if they hadn’t been more afraid of their commanding officers than the enemy. The vast host they faced had been enough to make them question that fear though, and their loyalty to officers or even the king. An armoured sea of bestial daemons, waving massive blades and roaring louder than a thunderstorm, had swept towards Bakhaus Gate.

But somehow they had won.

Nobul kept his promise to Rona, and brought himself back with all parts still working, but what he had seen down in the south, the slaughter and the cruelty, had deadened him inside. Deadened him to her joy at having a baby and deadened him to watching that child grow. Instead he had learned a trade, a hard punishing trade — and busied himself with it heart and soul. What heart and soul he had left.

When Rona fell ill with the Sweet Canker, Nobul only flung himself into his work still further.

Only when he found her corpse lying in bed, her blue eyes staring at the ceiling, her body eaten away by sickness, did he realise just what he had missed … what he had lost.

All he had left was Markus, and now it seemed he had managed to drive the boy away. He needed Rona, needed her sweet touch, her careful words and her kindness, but she was gone.

Now he had nothing.

Nobul picked himself up from the chair, pulled on his boots and walked the short distance to the forge. He was pleased to find the embers of the fire still burned.

With a heavy heart he picked up his hammer and began the song of steel anew. Perhaps, with luck, he might lose himself in it once more.