Riftside 3 - Chapter 27

The officials and Harold left, leaving me to stand with Pa, Ma, and Edwin on the plot of land behind the smithy.

The commander clapped a hand on my shoulder.

“You’re not wrong, Ash,” Edwin said, his voice low enough that only I could hear. “About going on the offensive. At least, not in my view. But Central Command… they see a much larger map than we do. Not saying they are right, but maybe there’s a piece of it we’re missing.” He sighed, the sound of a man caught between his duty and his gut. “For now, we defend. But don’t lose that fire. We will definitely need it.”

“I won’t,” I promised.

“Good. And congratulations on the breakthrough. And the kill.” He grinned a rare, genuine flash of warmth. “That Queen sure is one beast of a monster. I’m just glad I didn’t have to fight it. How’d you even get the damned thing back?”

A smirk touched my lips and I activated my sigil and its newly extended tattoo.

Edwin’s eyes widened, and he let out a short, good-natured curse. 

“You bastard. Guess I’m no longer the only Dawnwatcher with a maxed-out spatial.” He shook his head, a real chuckle rumbling in his chest. “Of course you’d be the second. Well, congratulations, Ash. You earned it.” With a final, firm squeeze of my shoulder, he followed the officials, leaving me there with Ma and Pa.

The space behind the smithy felt small with the Emmet Queen’s corpse dominating it. Somehow the victory already felt like a lifetime ago.

“You sticking around for a bit, son?” Pa asked, his gaze fixed on the monster, but his question was for me.

“Yeah,” I said, the tension of the Guild meeting finally draining away, leaving a bone-deep weariness. “Wouldn’t mind staying for dinner, if you’ll have me.”

“That’s good,” Pa said, a smile crinkling the corners of his eyes. He finally tore his gaze from the Queen and looked at me. “Because I’ve got some ideas about your new gear. With monsters like this running around, I can’t afford to let my son wear anything but the best.”

Ma simply nodded and headed inside. 

“I’ll go get dinner started. You two try not to forge anything that’ll bring the smithy down.”

Pa and I shared a look.

“Feel up to helping your old man fill the order of armor reinforcement kits from the guard?” he asked.

I nodded gratefully.

I swiped the Queen back into my spatial and we headed into the smithy where we fell into an easy rhythm, heating, hammering, and shaping the reinforcements from Steel Scuttler carcasses from the raid. It was simple, repetitive work. Roq complained a bit at first, but after a while he yawned and settled.

The rhythmic clang of hammer on steel was a conversation in itself, but today, Pa had more on his mind than just metal.

He quenched a glowing plate with a hiss of steam.

“When we forge,” he began, “We heat metal, we hammer it, but we give it time to cool and settle. Your breakthroughs… you’re reforging yourself, son. I see how much taller you are, how much stronger.” He turned from the slack tub, his face serious, his gaze searching mine. “But does a part of you break each time that can’t be fixed? What’s the price your body is paying for all this speed?”

“The price is nothing when compared to victory,” Roq said, waking to the subject. “I have sculpted your rascal into a masterpiece of destruction. A flawless vessel for my kingly might. You should be thanking me, Smith.”

“How about you let the lad answer for himself, king?” Pa said, pointing at Roq with his own legendary hammer. “Don’t forget that my smithy is where you were born. If you are a king, what does that make me, eh? Kingmaker?”

I chuckled and rested Roq on the anvil. 

“Every breakthrough hurts,” I admitted. “Worse than anything. It feels like I’m being unmade and put back together wrong. But the pain fades, Pa. What’s left… is strength. The strength to keep you and Ma safe. To keep Eryn safe. If that’s the price, then Roq isn’t wrong.”

“See?” Roq said.

“I’ll gladly pay it every time,” I said. “All the way up to sixty.”

Pa nodded slowly, accepting the answer, but his brow remained furrowed. He picked up another piece of Scuttler shell, turning it over in his hands. “You two. A blacksmith, adventurer, a human, and a… warhammer. You’re bonded deeper than any weld I could make. When you stand up to men like Vos and talk about taking the fight to the Hive Mind, whose voice is it I’m hearing, Ash? Yours, or the ‘king’s’? I need to know the man is still in charge of the weapon.”

For a heartbeat, I hesitated. 

I thought of the rage I felt in combat, and the satisfaction of killing monsters. 

Is that all me? Or is Roq’s leveling catching up? Has his influence grown stronger after he broke through, even though I’m still ahead? 

I met Pa’s gaze and pushed the thought away. 

“It’s me, Pa,” I said. “Roq gives me the strength, but I choose the direction we swing.”

“Nonsense. You are my most trusted advisor and second-in-command,” Roq said. “I offer my vast strategic wisdom, and you, in your own… limited way, attempt to implement it. It is a perfectly functional hierarchy.”

“It’s a partnership,” I said. “He’s the rage, I’m the reason. Without me, he’s just a bloodthirsty monster. Without him, I’m just a… normal adventurer. One who would be in way over his head. I’m aware of that. Which is why I keep my hammer well fed with monsters and pie.”

Pa seemed to accept that, too, turning his attention to my new abilities. “These new skills you forged for yourself…”

“Forged by me, actually,” Roq said, interrupting. “And speaking of, we have not yet discussed the two outstanding skills I have yet to develop. I must remind you that being level nineteen now, we have abilities for both level fifteen and eighteen to create. It is a matter of some urgency.”

“Tomorrow, Roq,” I said. “You remember when I talked of the quenching during forging?”

“Yes. You prattling on about feelings and other crap is how you don’t go insane. But, that doesn’t mean we should delay forging my new abilities.”

“But we need time to think about what happened on this quest. Are there any weaknesses to shore up?” I sighed. “Just give me a day, alright?”

“Fine. You will have your day, servant.”

“So, back to your abilities,” Pa said. “What do they feel like to use? The way you hit, the way you move. Is it like a tool you command, or a storm you just try to aim? I need to understand the forces at play if I’m going to build a shell to contain and support them.”

“It’s… both. Explosive Strike is like letting a captured lightning bolt go. Resonance, though… let me show you.” I activated the skill, making Roq’s head swell with translucent force, forming it to have the exact fit of the part I was working on. With a single strike on the anvil, I’d shaped the metal.

“Handy,” Pa said, nodding. 

“It was. Squashed more than a few bugs. It feels like an extension of my will. Like I’m bending reality around the hammer,” I said. “Counter is different again. It’s pure instinct. I don’t even think, my body just moves. It’s fast. Much faster than I could ever be.”

Pa finished off one piece and threw it onto the pile. We made a few more, and I lost myself in the work. The fear, the tightness between my shoulders which had been there since Eryn and the others dropped into the colony with me, finally started to evaporate.

“You’ve gone from being a scavenger,” Pa said after a while. “Lowest of those heading Riftside. Then you got a party. Now you’ve been in charge of fifteen lives, all looking to you for what to do.”

“Yup,” I said, quenching another piece.

“When you’re out there… how do you decide whose life is worth risking? How will you live with it when you’re wrong, because eventually, you will?”

The question made me pause, keeping the shaped metal in the barrel far longer than it needed to. The image of Garret’s mangled limbs flashed in my mind, then the remains of the scouts, and Knut’s blood soaked armor after we were ambushed by the Gnash monster. 

“It matters not,” Roq said, breaking me from my thoughts. For once, he spoke softly. Almost calmly. “As the king, the ultimate burden of command rests upon my haft. Ash is merely the field commander. Any guilt for losses can flow up to me. I have already lost an entire civilization. The weight of a few more bipeds is inconsequential. As long as it is nobody I care for, of course.”

“Thanks, Roq,” I chuckled. “That really helps.” I looked at Pa and rolled my eyes and got back to work. “And, honestly, Pa, I don’t know. I just try my best to make the right call and get everyone home. When Wade was monster bait, I knew if he stumbled, he’d die. I sent him anyway, because the raid’s success depended on it. When Garret was surrounded, I had to focus on the Scrambler. I chose the mission over the man.” The admission tasted bitter. “I’ll live with it because…” I froze, my warhammer raised. Slowly, I lowered it. “I think I might be good at this, Pa. I kind of stumbled into it all, but now that you ask, I think… if I don’t do this, I’m confident more people will die.” I tilted my head. “Does that make sense?”

“It does,” Pa said, his hammer coming down with a sharp clang. “The way you stood up to those officials, and how you negotiated and dealt with the guild… It makes me proud. But you’re starting to get harder, sharper.”

“I have to be,” I said. 

“That’s what I’m afraid of,” Pa replied. “I’d hate to lose my boy.”

“I think that gem’s melted, Pa, but I’ll always be your son, no matter how many monsters I slay. Right?”

“That you will, son. That you will,” Pa said, nodding and changing the topic. “So, you’ve brought me one fourth of a Queen. And I’ve been playing around with the Scrambler already. Your new armor, I’ll build it to last. To protect you in the future. But what does that look like to you?”

“You mean the armor?” I asked.

“No. The future. Are you able to look beyond the battles?”

Waking up with Eryn in my arms had instantly become the best part of my day, and I thought of the ring I needed to forge. 

“How did you know it was the right time to ask Ma?”

Pa chuckled, a warm, fond sound. 

“Your Ma? I knew from the day I saw her throw a drunk out of her father’s tavern. The when was the hard part. I waited until I had a forge of my own, something to offer, a foundation to build on. A man needs to know what he’s building towards, son.”

“That is what I want,” I told Pa, and my certainty nearly surprised me. “A home. A family with Eryn. A life where the loudest sound is… well, not the screams of monsters at least. That’s what I’m fighting for. A future where I can lay my warhammer down. Metaphorically, of course. You’re not getting rid of me so easily.” 

I held Roq up before my face.

“Well, in case anyone is interested, I took my mate after a glorious battle where I single-handedly slew the last of the Ice-shard Mountain Snakes,” Roq said. “I presented her with its still-beating heart as a token of my affection. She was most impressed.”

“With all of your past power, they still won,” Pa said. “It’s almost enough to make a man give up. Almost.”

“Revenge is a powerful motivator,” Roq said grimly. “It is a fire that does not require fuel. Unfortunately it requires loss. I do not recommend it.”

“For me,” I said, “It’s Eryn’s laugh. It’s knowing you and Ma are safe. Knut’s stupid jokes and Nabeeh’s sarcasm." I shrugged. “Let the Hive Mind have its thousands of worlds. I’m fighting for this one. For our home. That’s big enough for me.”

“And for me, only a universe cleansed of the Hive Minds’ filth will do,” Roq hissed. “One in which new kings may rise on worlds that are free. And where pie is plentiful. Once I have defeated the last Hive Mind, I think I might take up baking.”

Pa and I chuckled just as Ma’s voice cut through the heat of the forge. “Thomas! Ash! Dinner’s ready! Wash your hands!”

We headed inside, a familiar, delicious aroma meeting us. And on the table, next to Ma’s hearty stew, sat a large, perfect lemon pie from the Timberline.

“What’s that for?” I asked, looking at Ma.

She smiled, a knowing look in her eyes. 

“I have a feeling Roq earned his pie today, didn’t he?”

“Yes I did. I really did. Tell her, Ash. Oh, nevermind. I can tell Ma myself. Yes I did. Now, you tell her too, Ash!”

I laughed, a real, unburdened sound. 

“Yeah, Ma. I guess he kind of did.” I glanced down at the warhammer in my hand. “Would you like to join us in…well, person?”

“It would be my honor,” Roq replied, his voice uncharacteristically formal.

“Oh, that would be nice,” Ma said. “Let’s move upstairs, then. More room. Less prying eyes.”

After I’d secured the shop, closing the heavy shutters and barring the door, the three of us carried the food upstairs. It felt weird being back there, where I’d slept for so long. It looked small, even tiny compared to my private room. No, not private. Mine and Eryn’s. 

I took out my warhammer and placed him on the floor where Pa had removed a chair.

“No scuffing the floorboards or breaking the ceiling,” I warned.

“I shall be the very model of decorum,” he promised.

“Primal Form.”

With a puff of odorless black smoke, the warhammer was gone, replaced by the massive, scaled form of Vannash. He appeared, legs crossed beneath him, and he still had to hunch, but he fit, barely.

Ma just smiled and ladled stew into four bowls. Pa uncorked a bottle of ale. Then the four of us, a smith, his wife, their warrior son, and an ancient, vengeful king trapped in the body of a warhammer, dug into our meal.