Chapter 1

Looking back I wonder what my life could have been like. How things could have been different, but I know that there is nothing that I can change about the past. My past has made me the man that I am, with all the good and bad that has come with it. But I digress. I should explain how things began, so that you can understand how I wound up here. I spent the early years of my life in the small village of Cartha. It was a quiet place, found within the Tranik Forests of Bardack Province. The village was not bothered much by the Dran that governs the province, with the taxes low and manageable based on what my father would say. The village was filled with little homes making the outer ring of the village, while the shops and stores made up the interior.

The northern area of the village was set aside as the home of the Patron, with a multi-level house, a stable, out buildings, and a lot of land surrounding it. To the south of the Patrons estate was the village square.This area of the village was home to the marketplace, where the village would buy and sell goods each day. Within the very center of the market place was a large fountain, built by my ancestors, which gave the village water. To the south of the village square was the school and church. There were around five hundred people living in the village and it was a happy place. Everyone knew everyone, and everyone seemed happy to be living there. You would think our home was perfect, and for the most part, you would be right. It was a great place to live until the day after my eighth birthday, and the night of the blood moon.

My birthday seemed to start like any other day. School had just finished, and all the other kids had gone off to have fun. I on the other hand had gone out to the woods to play with my best friend Violet and some of the other kids. Violet had been my best friend since I could remember, since our parents seemed to be close friends. We had spent every class together, played together and even had dinner together on occasion. We had spent the afternoon running through the woods, playing tag in the forest with our friends. While we were playing, Violet and I found the best spot for a tree fort for us to play in. The tree was taller than most around it, standing at least twenty meters tall. Now where most trees went straight up, this one stopped, branched out a little in each direction, before reaching for the sky. This left a flat area that would be perfect to build the tree house on. Violet agreed with my idea, and we both agreed that our dads would be perfect to help us build it. First we would have to ask them, and both of them were rather busy with their jobs.

When we entered the city gates, which were on the west side of the village, we said our goodbyes and parted ways. I headed to my home to talk to my father, and she headed home to do the same. Her fathers house was on the western side of the ring of stores that made up the inner ring of the village. My house was on the south eastern side of that ring of buildings. There were around twenty or thirty of them at this point of the village’s life. I made my way through the market area and after a few moments arrived at our house. I took off my boots at the entrance and greeted my mother as I always did. I kissed her cheek, and gave her a big hug causing her to laugh. She was in the kitchen working on our evening meal, which looked to be my favorite stew. My mother looked young for her age and always seemed to radiate joy. She was tall for a woman, standing to father’s shoulders, who was rather tall himself. She had golden blonde hair, which curled down to her shoulders, and the warmest smile you have ever seen. To my father, and to me, she was the most beautiful woman in the whole village. She had always been warm and caring all my life, and I tried not to frustrate her too much with my antics.

“How was your day, Davik?” She asked while she cleaned off her hands with her apron. “Did you, and Violet, have a good day at school? What did you and your little friends do today?

She always asked the same thing every day with a smile on her face. Seeing that smile always seemed to make things better, no matter if it was a good day or bad. I filled her in on the things we did in school, and afterwards, telling her about the tree we had found a hundred paces north of the village.

I scratched the back of my head and asked, “Mother, do you know where father is? I would like to ask him to help us with making a tree fort.”

She shook her head and replied, “You know your father is in the shop working. The Patron asked him to make a special item for his son’s sixteenth birthday.”

I thanked her as I always did, and made my way across the room to the back door of the house. We were not rich by any means, but we had enough to live rather comfortably. Our house was one level tall, but had plenty of space inside. We had a kitchen, eating area and two bedrooms. Most of the items my mother used to cook with were made by my father. They had all been trial items, and father had always planned to start selling the perfected product. Mother never seemed to mind if they were imperfect, but always loved that his first finished product was always gifted to her. The table, chairs and other wooden objects of the house were one of a kind, made by the carpenter of the village for us. Ruben was not only the carpenter for our village, but als Violet’s father. Each piece he made were accented with unique designs that you would never find anywhere else, as a signature and gift from him. We never paid for any of them and in most cases we never had asked for it. Ruben just dropped off the piece when it was completed, taking the older or worn item to be disposed of or repurposed. In return, Father kept him supplied with all the tools and supplies he would need for his shop. They had a perfect partnership, and both families did a lot for each other.

Ruben had built the house for my parents as a wedding gift two years before I had been born. Father had made his shop as a part of the house so that he could always be close to mother and me. The shop was larger than the house, but that was because of the forge and press that father needed to smith with. Our family had been smiths since the founding of the village, and soon, father would teach me all he knew. The original shop had grown too small for my father’s needs and so it had been decided to make a new one. They took everything they needed from the old shop and tore down the remains before planning and building the new one. Once we got through our next winter, I would be old enough to become father’s apprentice. When I opened the door, I began hearing the distinctive sound of a hammer striking metal. The resounding hum filled the air with each strike. They had made sure to insulate the walls as much as they could to limit the noise that would come through the walls. Stepping through the doorway, I closed the door behind me, and made my way towards the origin of the sound.

I found my father hammering away at a thin piece of metal. Sparks were flying from the point of impact on the glowing orange object in his hands. The low light emanating from the forge made him look somewhat menacing. My father had to be the tallest person in the village. He always had to bend down to enter the door of any building in the village, save for when he was in our home. He and Ruben had made sure that they were large enough for father to move with ease. Father was also very strong, sometimes working on his various jobs without a shirt on. He was covered in muscles, no doubt from the physical labor he had done all his life as a smith. Despite his size and height, father was the kindest person you could meet. Mother always called him her gentle giant. He always helped the people of our village when he could, sometimes doing things for free if they had trouble paying for it. I only saw him get mad once, and it scared me to death.

When I got closer, I recognized the shape of the metal to be that of a sword. It was two thumbs wide at the base, and half a thumb wide at the tip. My father would put the blade in the furnace until it was red, and then hammer the metal, sending sparks flying in all directions. He would then lift the blade and look along the surface of it. He would continue until the color in the metal had faded. The next step would put the metal back into the forge and heat it up again. This process was repeated a few times. Heat, hammer, inspect, reheat - until a smile came across his face. Father only made this smile when he had gotten his work to the perfect shape. When he no longer needed to shape the metal, the next step was to temper it. He placed the blade in the water basin, cooling the metal quickly. My father would spend the morning tomorrow making the blade ready to be used. He had a unique way of tempering the steel that he would not tell me, yet. It had been something he had found out by accident, and refused to tell anyone. Only when I was his apprentice would he allow me to learn his new technique.

He turned to see me and smiled, waving me over to give him a hug. Mom hated it when he did that, because it made my clothes get covered in soot, and it took forever to wash it out. Once we stopped hugging, dad showed me what he was working on. He had the forge at maximum heat: getting close to it always made me woozy. I could see a partially finished blade, resting on my father’s anvil, the metal still dull, as it had not been tempered or sharpened. He told me how the Patron’s son was turning sixteen and his father planned for him to join the Imperial Guard. New guardsmen were required to bring a sword with them, unique to their village, and be of good standing within the village. As such, the Patron commissioned the sword to be quite extravagant, while at the same time refined, and not too gaudy.

Father expected it to be done by tomorrow afternoon - so long as he had no distractions - just in time for the evening festivities. He hoped to spend as much of the evening’s festivities with mother and me in celebration for my birthday. Father then asked why I was in the shop, since he did not want me around things that could hurt me.