The Islix Sword : Chapter 2

    Chapter two

    The Islix sword



          When Rock pulled the wagon into the yard between the house and the smithy his twelve year old sister, Briz, came flying through the gate leading to the garden next to the house.

    “Rock, Rock, did you get my taffy?” she yelled as she ran toward the wagon, her long blonde hair flying out behind her.

    Rock jumped down from the wagon and caught the girl when she launched herself at him, wrapping her arms around his neck.  Rock spun her around twice and came to a stop with her legs wrapped tightly around his waist, his left arm supporting her back.

    “Did you ask me to get taffy?” Rock asked with an exaggerated look of surprise on his face.

    “Ro…ock, you didn’t forget, did you?” she whined, the joy draining from her face.

    “No, and I didn’t forget the blue ribbon you asked for either,” he said, kissing her on the forehead. “How could I forget anything my best girl asked for?” he asked as he pried her legs loose and placed her on the ground.

    While Rock was teasing Briz, his mother and his other sister, 15 year old Rayene, had also come down from the garden.

    “Mother, we have a guest”, Rock said.

    “I see that” she replied, nodding her head toward Kelvin who had just appeared from behind the wagon with a sack of dried beans over his shoulder and a sack of flour under his arm.

    “Mother, this is Kelvin Cooper”, Rock said.

    “Yes dear, I know who he is.  So you have finally apprenticed him, then?” she asked.

    “No, Kelvin volunteered to lend a hand around here until fath…..  until things get back to normal”, he explained.

    “That is very noble of you Kelvin, thank you”, she said.

    Kelvin stood rooted to the ground, the bag of beans and the sack of flour forgotten.  He had seen Rock’s mother and sisters from a distance but he had never met them.  Whenever men were gathered and the subject of beautiful women came up Mrs. Smith was sure to be mentioned, and lately Rayene too. He had attributed this mostly to Mrs. Smith’s wavy snow white hair but now that he stood before her he could see that it wasn’t just her hair.  She was a tall slender woman with large, wide set, coal black eyes; the slight slant of her almond shaped eyes combined with her high cheek bones and generous mouth made her look positively regal.  The contrast of her elegantly shaped white eye brows against her olive skin above those large black eyes was stunning.  Even in dirty home-spun rough cloth, sporting an apron, she had the air of a queen.  Rayene was no less beautiful in canvas pants and a loose fitting smock, with her thick auburn hair pulled into a ponytail. She had  the largest crystal blue eyes Kelvin had ever seen.  He understood how Rock could lose interest in Trysta Havenshere after being raised around such beauties.

    “I’m sorry” Kelvin said when he realized he had been spoken to and hadn’t responded.  “It’s nothing Mrs. Smith.  Rock is my friend, and like I told him, friends help each other.”

    “Rock has other friends, but you are the only one I see here” she told him.  “I still think it is noble of you, and call me Ali.  Mrs. Smith makes me feel old.”

    “Yes ma’am, Mrs.  … I mean Ali,” Kelvin said, blushing.

    “Rayene, go open the door for Kelvin and show him where to put those things before his arms go numb”, Ali instructed her daughter.

    “This way Kelvin,” Rayene said as she started walking toward the house.

    “Briz, you can help too.  Let’s get these things into the house, it looks like rain is coming and I don’t want them getting wet,” Ali said, looking to the sky.

    Rock handed Briz the bolt of cloth and the package containing the ribbon and taffy, she headed to the house with a smile on her face.

    “Briz,” Ali said, drawing her daughter up short.

    “Yes,” she answered, turning to face her mother.

    “No taffy until after supper,” Ali told her.

    “Yes ma’am,” Briz said, pouting.

    “If you keep that lip sticking out like that a bird is going to land on it,” her mother called out to her as she huffed away.

    Ali took the roll of leather and the side of bacon while Rock hefted the sack of sugar to his shoulder and took the wooden crate containing the salted fish under his arm.  They met Kelvin coming out of the door as they were about to enter.

    “That’s everything,” Rock told him.

    Kelvin held the door for them and took the side of bacon from Mrs. Smith after he had closed it.

    “Thank you Kelvin, you’re such a gentleman. Rock will show you where it goes,” Ali said.

    When Rock and Kelvin came back into the great room Ali said “I thought we might put a pallet in here for Kelvin, over by the hearth.”

    “If it’s all the same to you Mrs. … Ali, I think I would be more comfortable sleeping in the barn, or the smithy,” Kelvin said.

    “I understand.  Perhaps a little privacy would be better,” Ali said.  “Rock, why don’t you put him in your father’s office,” Ali suggested.

    “I was going to put him in the hay loft but father’s office would be much better, we’ll just have to move some things around to make room” Rock said.  “The office is a much better idea, mother.”

    “That’s what I’m here for Rock, good ideas,” she said, smiling broadly. “And to cook, of course. Speaking of which, supper will be ready shortly.”

    Rock helped Kelvin gather his things from the wagon and carry them into the smithy.  The smithy was a tall building with two large barn-like doors in the front.  Rock opened both of these and hooked them to catches on the wall that were there to hold the doors open.  This allowed enough light in for them to see what they were doing.  The office was a low roofed section that ran along one side of the smithy.  It had a wide doorway with a half door that left the top half of the doorway open.  To the left of the doorway there was a desk built onto the smithy wall with a wooden chair at it.  The end of the wall was covered with pigeon holes and there was a bench under the window across from the desk.  The office had two doors that lead to the outside, one faced out the road the way they had come in and the other faced across the yard to the house.  The other side of the office was used for storage and there were barrels and stacks of iron ingot everywhere.  They moved most of the barrels and the iron ingot out to a corner of the smithy near the forge.  Kelvin felt a bit embarrassed, while it was all he could do to lift one of the bars of iron while Rock easily carried one in each hand.  He could lift the barrels with horse shoes in them but the barrels full of chain he had to roll out.  Rock looked like he was straining a bit with the barrels of chain, but he carried them out two at a time, too.  When they had cleared a space next to the door that faced the house, Rock nailed boards to the walls to make a frame.  They took a wheelbarrow up to the barn and got straw to fill the frame.

    “There is good hunting in the woods behind the barn here,” Rock said, pointing at the back of the barn with the pitch fork he was holding.

    “It looks like it would be a good place to hunt,” Kelvin said.

    “There are a lot of grouse and squirrels, some rabbits and a small herd of deer.  If you angle to your right as you go into the woods there is a fair sized meadow where you can always find quail.”

    “That sounds good, maybe I can help provide some of the food while I’m here,” Kelvin said.

    “Your father seemed to think feeding you should be a major concern for me,” Rock said, smiling.

    “Listening to Pa you would think I weighed four hundred pounds.  He tells all his boy that they eat too much, and anybody else who will listen, for that matter,” Kelvin told him.

    “If you angle a little to your left and walk about a half a mile you will come to Miller’s Creek.  It’s full of trout.  If you want to get on mother’s good side bring her a couple of nice fat trout.  She loves fish,” Rock told him.

    Rock had brought a large piece of canvas when they went to the barn.  They loaded the wheelbarrow as high as they could with straw and draped the canvas over it to help keep it from tumbling out of the wheelbarrow.  They piled the straw into the wood frame Rock had made, distributing it as evenly as they could, and then covered it with the piece of canvas.  As they were finishing with Kelvin’s pallet Rayene and Briz came in.

    “Mother thought these would make you more comfortable,” Rayene said, handing Kelvin two quilted blankets, a feather pillow, and a towel.

    “And supper is ready,” Briz said, placing a basin and a pitcher of water on the desk.  After wriggling around a bit she pried a piece of soap from the coin pocket sewn to the outside of her dress and placed it next to the basin.  “Mother thought you might want to clean up a little before supper,” then added in a whisper “She always makes us wash before we eat.”

    “I have to go clean up too,” Rock told him. “Come over to the house when you get done here.”  Rock left with his two sisters and a moment later Kelvin heard a high pitched squeal from Briz followed by the melodic tinkle of her laughter, he wondered what Rock had done to elicit it.

    Kelvin walked over and opened the window across from his pallet to let in more light.  There was no glass in the windows, just wood shutters to secure them.  When he saw there were eaves built over the windows to keep out the rain he opened the one across from the desk too.  He walked over to the desk and picked up the pitcher of water and was surprised to find it warm to the touch.  As he stripped off his shirt he heard the first pitter-patter of rain on the smithy’s tin roof.  He poured the warm water into the basin and picked up the small piece of soap Briz had brought him and stared at it for a moment.  It felt like satin in his hand.  The soap he had used all his life was white and had an astringent smell to it.  This soap was light blue and smelled of flower blossoms.  He washed himself, enjoying the feel and smell of the soap as well as the way it frothed when he rubbed it between his hands.  He was putting on a fresh shirt when the pitter-patter of rain turned to a loud drumming as it began to rain in earnest.  He pulled the shirt back off and dashed through the smithy and out into the rain.  He found the latch on the back of the first big door, released it and pulled it closed.  As he was releasing the second door’s latch when he heard a shouted “Thank you” over the drumming of the rain and turned to see Rock standing in the doorway of the house waving and smiling.  See, I’m being of use already, he thought as he waved back. He went back into the office; made sure the rain wasn’t coming in through the open windows and toweled the rain from his torso and hair the best he could.  He donned his fresh shirt, draped the towel over his head and shoulders, and bolted through the door next to his pallet and dashed for the house as fast as his legs would carry him.

    He put his hands out and caught himself against the door to stop his momentum, grateful for the small roof that protected the doorway and kept the rain off of him.  He didn’t think it would be proper to just walk in so he knocked.

    “Oh my, who could that possibly be,” came Briz’s voice, followed by her infectious laughter.  “Just come in, silly.  You live here now.”

    He let himself in and, finding no one there, he stood just inside the door, not knowing where to go.  On his left was the great room where several comfortable looking chairs sat facing one another on rugs with scenes embroidered on them.  There was a couch with tables on either side holding ornate lamps, sitting in front of a cut stone fireplace that took up the entire far wall.  The wall opposite the door had cabinets up to about four feet from the floor; from the tops of the cabinets to the ceiling were shelves full of books.  More book than Kelvin had ever imagined existed.  This wall ran two thirds the length of the room where it gave way to a stone topped half-wall the same height as the cabinets.  Across from where the half-wall ended was a wide stairway that led to the upper part of the house.  When he and Rock had brought the stores in they had gone through the opening between the half-wall and the stairway to a storage room on the left.  Kelvin was about to go see what was on the other side of the storage room when Briz appeared from it carrying a small canister.  She smiled at him and crooked a finger for him to follow her.  They went down a short hall with a closed door at the end and turned left into another hall that led them into a room with a large trestle table at its center.

    The table was of a dark wood with chairs at both ends and benches down both sides.  When Kelvin entered the dining room his senses were assaulted by a barrage of heavenly aromas, many he didn’t recognize.  The table held a large wooden bowl filled with what he assumed was mashed potatoes and an earthenware bowl that contained a steaming pile of green beans.  Rock came in from a long covered walkway, that led to the outdoor kitchen, carrying a platter with four golden brown birds on it, followed closely by Rayene with a basket of freshly baked bread.  Ali entered the room at the same time from the opposite direction, wearing a simple white dress with a high neck that was clasped with a gold eagle talon, there were little blue flowers embroidered around the neckline of the dress.

    “Kelvin, why don’t you sit here with Rayene,” Ali said, indicating one of the benches.

    “Mother!  I wanted Kelvin to sit with me,” Briz complained.

    “Perhaps at breakfast, dear,” Ali told her with a gentle smile.

    “Rayene, give Rock and Kelvin a bird of their own, you and I will split the other two with Briz,” Ali instructed.

    Kelvin waited until everyone else started eating before he tried his food.  He was a little self conscious; he had never eaten like this in his life.  The green beans were covered with melted butter and had little pieces of nut mixed in that gave them such a good flavor he had to make an effort to keep from wolfing them down.  He was surprised to find something had been stuffed inside the bodies of the birds, he wasn’t sure if he was supposed to eat it so he waited until he saw Briz eat some before he tried it.  He pulled some of it out of the bird and examined it on his plate before he tasted it.  It was mostly wild rice with bits of chopped up mushroom, wild onion, and what he thought must be more of the nuts that were in the string beans.  When he put a spoonful in his mouth he couldn’t suppress a moan of delight.

    “Is there something wrong, Kelvin?” Ali asked.

    “Oh, no ma’am.  Everything is excellent.  I have never tasted food like this, my ma boils near about everything,” Kelvin told her.

    “Ah, well thank you Kelvin.  I’m glad you are enjoying your meal,” Ali said.

    “Yes ma’am, Mrs. Smi…. excuse me, Ali, this is the best chicken I have ever tasted,” Kelvin told her.

    “They’re not chickens, dear, they’re grouse.  Briz got them from the woods behind the barn yesterday with her sling,” Ali told him.

    “You killed all four of these with your sling?” Kelvin asked Briz.

    “Yes,” she told him, blushing but sitting up straighter and grinning from ear to ear.  “I cleaned them and plucked them too,” she added.

    “You must really be something with that sling,” Kelvin said.

    “I do okay, I guess,” Briz said, looking down demurely but still grinning from ear to ear.

    “Ha!” Rock cut in.  “Kelvin, you see that little girl right there,” he said, pointing at Briz with the drumstick of the grouse he was eating.  “I have seen her knock a flying quail from the air at thirty paces with that sling.”

    “Really!  I’m sorry, Rock, I find that a little hard to believe,” Kelvin said.

    “She’s fast too,” Rock added.  “We’ll flush a covey of quail and I’ll be lucky to get one, Briz will usually get two, sometimes three.”

    “I’m sorry, I’ll have to see that to believe it,” Kelvin said, causing Briz to raise one eye brow and curl her lip at him.

    “Just get her really mad one time and you’ll find out what she can do with that sling,” Rock told him, laughing.

    “I’ll show you,” Briz told Kelvin, looking defiant and crestfallen at the same time.

    “Uh oh, you’ve gone and got her dander up now,” Rayene said, turning to Kelvin.  “You won’t hear the end of this until you tell her how good she is with her sling.  I’m glad I’m not in your shoes.”

    This brought a laugh from everyone, even Briz.  Once the conversation had begun everyone seemed to relax and they chatted amiably while they ate.  Eventually the conversation came around to Mangus Smith, the family’s missing patriarch.

    “Mangus has many responsibilities that take him far from Brenshire,” Ali said.  “This wouldn’t be the first time he has had to go away on short notice and didn’t have time to tell me, but he should have gotten word to me by now.  What makes me worry the most is the way he left Buck and the wagon on the road.”

    “He probably thought Buck would bring the wagon home eventually,” Rock said.

    “Yes dear, that could be it,” Ali said, looking off into space as if her thoughts were elsewhere.

    “Well I still think we should ask Moriangus to help us find father,” Briz said, quickly clamping her hands over her mouth.

    Everyone at the table fell silent; Ali sighed and looked down at the table shaking her head.

    “I’m sorry, mother,” Briz said, tears welling in her eyes.

    “Don’t fret darling, It’s not that much of a concern,” Ali said, reaching over and caressing her daughter’s cheek.

    Kelvin had seen the glances exchanged about the table but he didn’t know what to make of it.

    “Moriangus, the witch of Deepmist Forest, Moriangus?  I shouldn’t think anyone would want to ask her anything  about anything,” Kelvin said with a shudder.

    Ali let out another deep sigh, this time casting her eyes toward the ceiling.

    “Mr. Smith and Moriangus were very close at one time,” Ali told Kelvin, looking him directly in the eye.  “They had a falling out and haven’t spoken in years.”

      “Mr. Smith knows the witch,” Kelvin said, his amazement apparent in his voice.

    “She was just Moriangus when we knew her,” Ali said.

    “You knew the witch too?” Kelvin asked, his eyes getting even wider.

    “Ahem,” Rock interrupted “Kelvin, we don’t call her the witch, just Moriangus.  And when father comes home you dare not call her the witch in front of him.  It makes him very cross, very quickly.”

    “She was just Moriangus until Baywin decided to rid Koth of magic.  Moriangus has lived in Deepmist forest all her life and a decree from that little popinjay Baywin wasn’t about to make her leave it.  Baywin sent four soldiers accompanied by a wizard into the forest with orders to bring Moriangus back to him in chains.”

    “What happened?” Kelvin asked.

    “No one knows, none of them was ever heard from again.  Baywin sent ten men and two wizards for her the next day and they vanished too.  Enraged, Baywin sent fifty men and his five best wizards into Deepmist after Moriangus.  There were reports of screams from the forest; lightning bolts shooting up into the sky from the ground, people even swear that they felt the earth itself shudder that day.  Not one of Baywin’s men or his wizards ever returned.  Baywin gave up; I think he was tired of losing his wizards.  They proclaimed Moriangus a witch that day, and as far as I know no one has ventured into Deepmist Forest since.”

    “And you know her. What’s she like,” Kelvin wanted to know.

    “Very stubborn,” Ali said right away.  “Probably the strongest willed person I have ever met.  I liked her very much.”

    “Well if she isn’t a witch she must be a powerful sorceress, to have defeated so many wizards,” Kelvin said.

    “Of a sort, I suppose.  Let’s just say she has some very unique abilities, and leave it at that,” Ali said.

    “Kelvin, it’s not that we are ashamed of Moriangus that we don’t talk about her,” Rock said.  “It’s just that people think of her in a bad way, they think she is a witch, and we don’t know how they would react to people who are friends with a witch.”

    “I understand,” he told Rock.  Turning to Ali, placing his right hand over his heart, he said “On my word, I’ll tell no one.”  Then, without turning, he thrust his arm out and pointed at Rock and said “And not a word out of you about me being a gossip.”

    Rock burst out laughing at Kelvin’s admonishment causing everyone else to laugh along with him.  They sat about the table and talked of other things for a while then they all pitched in to clean up after supper. 

    They retired to the great room where Rayene sat on the couch and used a small knife to pick the stitches out of an old pair of gloves so she could use the pieces as a pattern to make new ones.  Briz and Ali both sat in chairs reading books, Ali with a cup of tea and Briz chewing on a piece of taffy.  Rock and Kelvin poured over the many books on the wall.

    “Most of them are histories,” Rock told Kelvin.

    “Histories of what?” Kelvin asked.

    “There are all kinds of histories, dwarf histories, elf histories, accounts of wars,” Rock told him.  “Some of them are written in Elfish and some are written in the old Dwarven rune alphabet, I can’t read any of those but most of them are in common tongue.”

    “Accounts of wars, huh,” Kelvin said.

    “Yeah, one of my favorite books is the account of the war with Lorath,” Rock told him.

    “Maybe I’ll try reading that one sometime, but right now I think I am going to get some sleep,” Kelvin said.

    “Okay, let me get you a lamp,” Rock said, he walked to the rear of the house and came back a minute later with a shuttered oil lamp.  He opened the front of the lamp and put his fisted hand in front of the door and sparks flew into the lamp lighting its wick.

    “What did you just do,” Kelvin asked, wide eyed.

    The look on Kelvin’s face made Rock start to laugh.  He thrust his hand at Kelvin and said “Magic” and the sparks flew from his hand again.  Kelvin backed away looking frightened and confused.  Rock laughed harder and stumbled forward and put his arm around Kelvin’s neck, “Come see, you idgit” he said as he led Kelvin back to the lamp he had lit.  When he held out his hand in the light Kelvin could see that he held a rectangular piece of flint in his palm and his thumb was wearing what looked like a little helmet.

    “It’s something father came up with, he calls it a lamp lighter because that is what he made it for, but you can light anything with it” Rock told him.  When he turned his hand over Kelvin could see that the little helmet on his thumb was crosshatched, like a file.

    “See, you just grip the flint in your palm, put the coarse part of the iron on the flint, and then kick out with your thumb,” he did this as he was speaking and the sparks flew from his fist again.

    “Here, you take this one, I have several,” rock said, pressing the flint and the little helmet into Kelvin’s hand.  Kelvin put the helmet on his thumb and gave it a try, on his third attempt he got sparks.  He was surprised how hard he had to push down to make a spark.

    “Don’t go playing with it in the night and set your pallet on fire,” Rock told him.

    “I won’t, I promise.  Thanks Rock, I’ll see you in the morning,” he said, giving him a slap on the back.

    “Oh, Kelvin … wait,” Rayene said, jumping up from the couch.  “Wait, wait, wait,” she repeated as she ran across the floor, scooped up the lamp that Rock had just lit and dashed up the stairs.  She came down moments later with something draped over her shoulder.

    “This feather comforter is too warm for this time of year, but if you put it on top of the canvas it might pad you from some of the lumps in your pallet,” she said, handing it to Kelvin.

    Kelvin held it out in front of him and looked at it in the light from the lamp.  One side was made up of blue, green, and white squares all carefully stitched together.  Some of the squares had intricate scenes stitched into them and some were patterns of blue, green, and white pieces sewn together to form a square and some were solid colors.  The other side was a solid blue field of the softest cloth he had ever felt.  It had all been quilted to help keep the feathers inside from shifting around.

    “Rayene, it’s beautiful.  I can’t take this, it will get all dirty,” he said attempting to hand it back to her.

    “Then I will wash it,” she said firmly.  “It will hurt my feelings if you don’t take it,” she added.

    He thought he would rather cut off his own foot than hurt this girl so he said, “If you’re sure you don’t mind.”

    “You didn’t ask for it, I offered it.  If I minded I wouldn’t have offered it,” she said, then she went back to the couch and continued dismantling the pair of gloves.

    Kelvin walked over to the smithy and let himself into the office.  It was still raining but it had slowed to a drizzle.  He opened the door facing the house and latched it open.  He got the chair from the desk and placed it in front of the open door and rummaged around in his bag until he found his pipe and tobacco.  He loaded his pipe and leaned the chair back against the wall and marveled at the house across from him.  From the stonework that rose five feet and ended with a little ledge that ran all the way around the house, to the slate roof, everything was perfect.  The way the stones fit together, the large beam of wood that held the roof trusses was as seamless as a single piece of wood, yet he knew it couldn’t be, it was too long.

    He felt like he had been transported to another world.  From boiled mutton to the sumptuous meal he had eaten tonight.  From sleeping on rushes full of bugs that should have been thrown out months ago, with a boot for a pillow and at least two other people sharing it with him,  to a pallet of his own with quilted blankets and a feather pillow.

    He leaned over and pulled a straw from his pallet, set it ablaze with the lamp wick then used it to light his pipe.  Kelvin didn’t smoke often, mostly when he had something to think about.  He leaned the chair back against the wall and sat watching the rain dripping from the roof and the lightning of the retreating storm flickering beyond the house across the way.    He smiled to himself as the smoke flowed past his lips.  He certainly had plenty to think about this night.