The Hammer Unfalls

1.18 Limb from Limb

⋅.˳˳.⋅ॱ˙˙ॱ⋅.˳˳.⋅ॱ˙˙ॱᐧ.˳˳.⋅ॱ˙˙ॱᐧ.˳˳.⋅ॱ˙˙ॱᐧ.˳˳.⋅

Can nose hairs curl up and die? At this rate, Glim would surely find out.

The next few days became a dull routine of scrubbing vials. Occasionally Master Willow would join him in the basement and lecture him on polarities as he scrubbed. How to sense balance, or how to seek harmony. They’d practice the focusing ritual, and the restoration ritual. From time to time, Glim would attempt to freeze a cup of water, but it never amounted to anything.

Glim could not concentrate. The hinterjack’s attack had rattled him so thoroughly that his mind refused to cooperate.

“Be mindful!” his tutor said. “Clear your mind and settle your spirit.” But the words meant nothing. Despite his best efforts, Glim’s mind had remained the same level of clarity as it typically did, and his spirit just as unsettled as usual.

When father returned from patrol and came to fetch him from the tower basement that afternoon, Glim nearly wept with joy.

“Where are we going?” he asked, following his father to the guard’s headquarters, skipping along the path beside him.

“You’ll see. It’s a rite of passage. Don’t get too excited.”

“If it’s not scrubbing vials, that’s good enough for me.”

Father led him to the armory and picked up a sword. He knew it instantly. The one he’d killed the hinterjack with. Glim shivered, a sickening feeling coiling in his gut.

“Master Willow told me. You took a life with this.” He set the sword into its rack and took his son’s hands, looking at him with empathy brimming in his dark eyes. “It’s never easy, Glim. So we need to take the next step in your training. Give you more confidence. From what the Mage-at-Arms said, you would have gotten the hinterjack on your own, but it was a close call. We need to even those odds. Take this sword and come with me.”

Father belted a scabbard to Glim’s waist and watched as he sheathed the blade. They walked through the town until they reached the back gate. Through its bars Glim saw an open field bordered by young trees.

His father nodded to the guards and the gate swung open. They walked through the field and into the forest, where his father studied each tree, then settled upon a young maple.

“This one is perfect,” he said, looking up and down the straight, narrow trunk. Barely as big around as Glim’s forearm.

“What’s it for?”

“You need to practice your chops. The twenty-six and the eighty-four. One on each side. As you do so, keep the two sides consistent. You’re going to chop yourself a sword.”

“What do you mean?’

“You’re about to train even harder. You need a weapon that suits you.”

“But I don’t know how to make a sword!”

“That’s why I’m here,” Father took out a knife and carved the rough shape of a sword into the tree trunk. “Chop away at these outer parts, and leave the inner parts. But first, let’s clear this top out of the way. Stand back now.”

Father took the sword from Glim and sliced at the tree. First one cut from the lower left, then a second from the upper left, taking a wedge-shaped chunk out of the tree. Twice more he swung, biting deeper, until the tree shuddered and cracked.

“And now…” His father steadied himself, took a breath, and swung at the tree from the right, pulling the sword straight back in a long cut opposite the wedge. The fibers cleaved in half and the top part of the tree fell to the ground. “Your turn,” he said, handing the sword back.

Glim squared up to the tree and got into his ready stance.

“Shallow cuts. You don’t want the blade to bind. You want to shave off the wood, slice by slice, leaving the shape of the sword behind.”

Glim lined up the angle in his mind, snapped his hands in the push-pull, and sliced into the tree.

It was as though his bones had become a bell, and someone had just rung it with a mallet. His arms trembled from the impact.

“Shallow cuts, Glim! Just shave off a bit with each stroke.”

He tried again, completely missing the tree and slashing deep into the ground.

“Keep at it. By sundown you’ll have that chop strike firmly in your mind.”

Father walked away, whistling.

“Where are you going?”

“I already have a sword,” he said, laughing at Glim’s expression.

Glim sized up the tree trunk, took a deep breath to steady himself, then plunged his sword downward. It glanced off the side of the bark, taking out a chip. He swung to the opposite side. This time, a thin curl of bark peeled off beneath the edge of the blade. He watched it in satisfaction. The action felt smooth.

With his goal in mind, Glim found a rhythm of alternating strikes, peeling off curls of bark until the tree looked like a fern. The cadence of strikes pleased him, but something gnawed at the back of his mind. When the tree wobbled a bit, it became clear: he’d made a wedge. Not a sword.

Glim moved around the tree and started the process over, hacking away at a different angle so as to make a blade shape emerge from the wood. Strike after strike he hacked at the tree, sending chips flying. Until one errant strike sent the weakened trunk crashing to the ground.

Uncertain of what else to do, he cleaned his sword as best he could, sheathed it, and carried the freshly-carved stake home. When he walked into the tower, his father handed him a bowl, and he handed father the stick.

“Not bad, not bad,” he said. “You’ll refine it with this.” He handed Glim the dagger he’d taken to the rift. “Hold the limb in your left hand, and cut from the base downward. Always make sure no fingers or legs are downstream of your blade’s path. It can easily slip. Hold the branch firm and still, and draw the knife along it smoothly.”

He illustrated the movements, whittling away at the blade.

“Don’t make the edges too sharp. They need to be blunt so they don’t split. Eat your soup. I’ll show you how to clean your sword.”

Glim shoveled the soup into his mouth, suddenly ravenous. He watched as father pulled his sword from its scabbard and inspected it. He pinched the blade carefully with a clean rag and drew it along the edge.

“Slow and smooth. Feel the blade between your fingers and keep your palm well clear. This is not a time to rush. One slip and you’ll cut your hand in half. Pinch, feel the thickness of the blade, and maintain that same distance as you clean the blade. If you feel the blade slicing the threads of the rag, stop immediately. If your palm touches the rag, stop immediately. Do not let your palm dangle towards the blade as you move the rag. Always keep a loose pinch, and maintain your distance.”

He cleaned each edge of the blade, folding the rag to keep clean cloth at the top each time.

“As for oil, you use a fresh cloth, fold it up, and rub in circles, like this.”

He pulled a small vial from a nearby shelf and poured a thin stream of oil in the center of the blade. Keeping his fingers clumped together, away from his palm, he whisked the rag in tiny circles, pushing the oil all along the length of the blade. “Right?”

Glim nodded and held his bowl out. Father chuckled and gave him a second helping. “Worked up an appetite, eh?”

He mumbled “uh-huh” around a mouthful of soup. When he’d finished and cleaned his bowl, they went outside. The moon and sun shared the sky. Glim took the tree limb and the dagger, and started whittling the blade.

An hour passed. He could no longer see well, and stopped carving. Glim sheathed the dagger, set the wooden sword on the ground, and tumbled into his bedroll.

In the dark, he sensed a presence. Glim grabbed a nearby tree and yanked it from the ground. Looking around for the threat, he heard a low growl and spun. The sapling felt heavy in his hands. He shook dirt from its roots and tried to swing it. His arms felt like they’d been plunged into thick mud, and would not move. The hinterjack leapt, baring its fangs with a snarl and clamped its jaws around his throat. It pinched with the force of a butterfly’s wing, but Glim screamed and swung the tree. It bumped helplessly against the hinterjack, who dropped from his throat and looked at him in disdain.

“I thought you’d be more of a challenge,” the hinterjack said, in Master Willow’s reedy voice. “Pity.”

It turned and walked away on two legs, with Glim trying to swing the tree trunk at its retreating back.

He woke up screaming. His father approached in the dimness of the tower and wrapped Glim in his arms. “It’s okay, Glim. You are safe.”

Glim thought of the hinterjack, the real one, and sobbed. His father brushed his hair back and kissed his forehead, murmuring soft words of encouragement.

“I keep seeing the blood,” he cried. “Why didn’t it just stay away from us?”

Father kept quiet a long time until his sobs quieted. “That’s not in their nature. You seemed small enough for it to kill. Hinterjacks don’t know about swords or spells. Only what prey has a good chance of being dragged off to their lair.”

“I don’t want to kill.”

“Of course you don’t! I wish it were easier. The truth is, these mountains are treacherous. Life is hard won here.”

He sighed. “You can’t spend your entire life within these walls, though. Especially not you. You’re way too curious for that. As long as you defend when you must and never attack without cause, you can sleep clearly at night knowing that you did what you could. You’ll never erase that blood from your mind. I’m asking you to be gracious with yourself and realize that life is a balance. If things attack when they shouldn’t, they will pay the price. It has to be that simple or you will drive yourself mad.”

“I’m frightened,” Glim said, feeling the chill of fear douse him. “I’m not sure I’ll draw my sword quickly enough next time.”

“That’s why you’re making this.” Father picked up the half-finished sword and handed it to him. “Come on. I’ll show you how to carve the guard and handle.”

With trembling hands, Glim whittled away at the wood. With each cut, he imagined unseen enemies in the shadows attacking.