Gold In the Wood, Prologue
Cairn Campaign Realplay Adaptation
Prologue
Borrid could not help but put his hammer down when he saw what was coming over the hill. He raised a soot-stained hand to his brow and squinted in the midday sun. Now Borrid was able to make out a cart, but he couldn’t see anyone at the reins. Whatever was pulling it was clearly not a pack animal. It was too small, and taking frequent stops.
Borrid returned to his anvil, clangs ringing out with satisfying uniformity. After fifty blows he paused again. The blacksmith stood still for a long moment, glowering at his work. Then Borrid straightened, and turned to peer back down the road.
The hazy outline of the individual pulling the cart was not as close as Borrid expected. The diminutive figure made agonizingly slow progress down the uneven dirt road through a novel technique where they would throw their back against the pullbar to wrench the stationary cart forward, then flip around to surge forth with head down and arms outstretched. Each time they gained a few steps of fleeting progress before the wheels would catch in the dry ruts and the cart would skid to a stop. Then the process was repeated.
Borrid’s anvil was growing cold by the time the cart and its hauler pulled even with his place on the road. The cart did not appear to carry the typical loads of grain or wood and it jumped and rattled each time the stranger heaved it over a groove or wayward stone. As it bounced, the cart emitted a vaguely melodic noise, like wind chimes if a child was violently banging them with a spoon. Borrid gave a raspy laugh, his first in recent memory.
“Can I help you?” spat the soldier, for now that they were closer, Borrid could see that she wore the chain shirt of the reachguards of Northern Rutne. He dropped his gaze, skin prickling. A vision of imminent detainment and eventual emaciation flashed in his mind. This is what you get for displaying mirth, he thought to himself ruefully.
Borrid gathered the nerve to glance back up at the traveler, holding his face as still as he could. When he did, he thought that she didn’t look much like a Rutnean guard at all. Her chain shirt fit poorly, the gloves and boots did not match, and she lacked the scaly gambeson favored by rangers in the Northern Reach.
“My apologies,” intoned Borrid cautiously, then ventured, “Is there something going on with your wagon? I’ve never heard it make a sound like that before.”
The traveler sighed and the malice drained from her face. Borrid had a feeling that she was the type to act stern on purpose.
“It’s a handpan,” muttered the mismatching soldier. Sweat sprung from under her short frizzy hair and ran down her brow. It was hot for the middle of fall, even this far north. It looked like she had been toiling all morning, and possibly through the previous night.
“Did you travel here from Fort Lune?” continued Borrid blankly.
“The road don’t go nowhere else”, replied the soldier with a tired shrug.
“This road goes westward to the Wood and beyond the Fort to Rutne proper,” said Borrid, pointing first in the direction the soldier was headed, then in the direction from which she had come. Borrid always spoke with a sort of dogged precision, as if his words were the strikes of a hammer on a miniature anvil in his throat.
“You can be obtuse if you’d like,” retorted the soldier, still attempting to catch her breath. Her face went through a sequence of fleeting expressions before landing on an apologetic smile. “Of course I came that way.” She straightened up, glancing over the covered workshop with its bare shelves and empty hooks.
“You’re a blacksmith?” she inquired, and pointed hastily to her torso. “Can you melt down this chain shirt?”
This time it was Borrid’s turn to glower. “Bad luck, I’m retired”, he replied with ire.
“Then what’s that?” She pointed indignantly at the metal object lying on the anvil.
“It’s a sword.”
“Who’s it for?”
“It’s mine.”
“So you’re a self-employed blacksmith then, is that right? Sounds like maybe you’re not very good”, laughed the cart-puller.
“I’m the best”, retorted Borrid with conviction. “But I can’t make a living at the anvil anymore. Look. Here’s the rest of my metal,” he spoke bitterly, gesturing to the sword. “Down to the bits and nuts, and the iron from my smithing tools as well. It’s all in there. So I can’t go back,” he said with finality.
Borrid was on edge. Reveal your anger, betray your weakness, his old master would have said.
Borrid sighed. “It’s not done yet,” he added sheepishly.
The traveling soldier was too exhausted to press further, instead turning to the row of white olive trees lining the back of the yard.
“Alright Sir former blacksmith, can I at least rest my cart in the shade over there?”, she inquired lightly, “Before you ask, I have my own food.”
The traveler faced the blacksmith and the blacksmith faced the traveler. The leaves rustled in the crisp breeze, the moment on edge, and then finally Borrid nodded stiffly. He watched as the traveler dragged the handcart to the trees before collapsing in the shade with a vigorous groan. A wheel promptly fell off its axle with a clatter, and the whole cart lurched to the side. Borrid turned back to his sword, eager to complete his work. He became engrossed in the task once more, and did not look up again until the next visitors were already upon his stoop.