[Ironworks] Forging Alliances, ii. (Eanos)

[Hadrian]

3rd Fall, 510 A.V As good as his word, Hadrian returned to the Ironworks the next day to complete what he had begun with Eanos. Even an experiment or a lesson should be completed to the best of one's abilities, or such was Hadrian's mindset. Perfectionism. As soon as he walked into the room with all the forges, he began to sweat. A helpful apprentice directed him toward Eanos, and he went carefully through the place until he found the skilled Isur. "Hello again," he said with a faint smile. Generally he got on well with Isur. They were less emotive than most humans, and Hadrian was uncomfortable with excesses of emotion. It worked out. His clothes were a bit lighter today since he knew he would be in that great oven of a workplace, but otherwise he looked much the same as he had the day before. "Reporting for duty, sir."

[Eanos]

During the dark hours of the night which the Isur tended to use for his own work he'd given some thought to the lesson he'd taught the day before. Now he was slightly tired but pleased with the dedication that Hadrian had shown and was looking forward to the day, though it would take a little to actually finish the piece. "Izurdins blessings to you," he replied in greeting with just a nod in reply to the humans smile. "You did well yesterday. You demonstrated that you have the ability to heat and bend metal into a specific shape. Today you will need to ensure that the spike has the strength to be driven into something hard, and perhaps to work on the finishing of the piece." He was curious as to how much effort Hadrian would be willing to put into the finishing of the hook. It wasn't necessary, and it was hard work. What would the man do? He pulled the hook off the workbench and laid it on the anvil. "Did you have any questions before we started?"

[Hadrian]

"Izurdin willing," he murmured. Perhaps someday he would curry the favor of the Isur god. Hadrian's dedication to craft was certainly one of his most obvious features. If the god marked Hadrian's arm with gnosis the way he had most of his children in Sultros, perhaps they would even deign to welcome him into their ancestral home. "Excellent," he said after Eanos gave a brief outline of the plan of action. "No, no questions, I don't think. I'm ready to continue work on the hook. Don't like to leave work half-finished, you know. Even little things like this." Such was true of his magical endeavors as well. He had Animated those little animal golems with Jilitse, and even made the learning experiments to a purpose, later donating them to the orphanage. In doing that, he had met a fellow aurist, which, while strange, had been someone illuminating as well. Perhaps Izurdin was rewarding him in a small way for his industry.

[Eanos]

This day Eanos was leery about using his auristic abilities having experienced more of a reaction the previous night than he'd been willing to tolerate. Everything in him, especially in his educated drive to succeed, to be the best and to outdo his peers, screamed in his mind to give in to the desire to transmute djed and allow his senses to absorb into the iron as he demonstrated the lessons of the day. He started talking in order to distract himself, going far deeper than he'd planned and revealing things he'd seen for himself. "Here, look at this." He took a thin stip of iron and bent it in two then folded it back on itself. He repeated the process until the metal fractured. He handed half to Hadrian. "Have a look at the break. You can see how the metal looks like crystals or grains." He waited for Hadrian to look before continuing. "Iron is not as solid as you might think. It has grains to it like sand. When you heat the metal the grains move in the metal." It wasn't exactly how it had been explained to him, but it was how he had rationalised it in his mind. "But the iron doesn't like to change. When we bend the metal like I just did the grains come apart under the strain. If we heat it, the metal can bend but still the strain is still there. Last night we heated it and allowed it to cool very slowly. When we do that the grains can form a new pattern in the metal, one without any strain or weakness." He shrugged as he realised he might be leaving Hadrian behind on this unexpected diversion into theory. "Heating doesn't just do that though. As we heat the metal the grains form new patterns. If we cool the metal quickly, say by quenching it into water then the grains don't have time to move back and remain set in those patterns." "This is what we will do today. To heat the metal until it forms a new pattern, one which is harder." He glanced back at Hadrian. "If you have the ability to see djed then you may see it happen," it was a reasonable assumption for a magecrafter, but if not then it doesn't matter for smiths have been doing this for uncounted generations without knowing."

[Hadrian]

Hadrian understood more than Eanos might have guessed, but he didn't make a big show of it. There had been repetition at the University as well, but he found that new explanations gave him a new perspective and often deepened his understanding of things he already knew. "I can See," he affirmed quietly. The Isur knew he was a magecrafter, so knowing he was a bit of an aurist too was not giving away too much information. After all, Eanos wanted to study the same discipline. There was less danger to magi in Syliras than in other places, and while they might end up rivals in the future, for now they were fine. "What about with molds?" he asked. "When one melts down the liquid and pours it into a mold, does that allow for a strong pattern to set?" There were some things he felt he should see to learn, others he wanted to do in order to learn, but there were some facts that he just wanted to hear. If an expert in a field told him something, he might double-check it later, but he didn't require baby steps through every idea.

[Eanos]

Eanos pondered the question for a moment because he didn't cast things very often, and certainly not in iron. The question though resolved itself once he'd considered it for a moment.

"With iron at least, you'd be looking for something like a sand cast, and that cast, which acts as an insulation, isn't broken off normally until the iron has had chance to cool, so I'd say that yes, in most cases the iron would be able to achieve it's full strength and not be especially hard."

"You might as well put your hook in the fire so that the spike gets the maximum heat. What we want is for the spike to be a deep red orange in colour. When you feel it is right then take it out of the heat and plunge it into that bucket of water there." He pointed at the metal bucket which stood back near the workbench.

[Hadrian]

Hadrian nodded after a moment, accepting Eanos' answer and his instructions. When he activated his auristic vision, he tried to give Eanos a good look without staring, quick, but to the point. The djed bent strangely around his arm, and especially his shoulder. Was that glow, that higher resonance, a mark of Izurdin? Suddenly jealous, he looked quickly away, staring at the patterns of energy around the worn leather apron and gloves that he donned again. Their patterns were set and worn, as their purpose had long ago been beaten into them time after time. They were starting to feel comfortable. Just to be safe, he took the cold iron in the tongs to set it in the fires of the forge again. He said nothing as he waited, watching the fire, wondering again if there was some connection between the patterns of energy within the searing fire and the patterns that would denote Ivak. It was not exactly an idle thought. He had been thinking more and more about the favor of gods and goddesses of late. Once the iron had picked up some of the fire's djed, its own energies quickened with borrowed heat, he took it out. A dull red, almost orange. He looked to Eanos for approval and then thrust it into the bucket of water, head cocked to the side for perspective as a jet of steam rose up to wreath around them once the violence of its creation petered out.

[Eanos]

Happy in the silence and not feeling the need to fill it Eanos watched the iron heat in the forge. He called upon his mortal skills as he did so as he was having quite enough trouble as it was with thinking that he was seeing auras without actually seeing them. It wasn't that he was unaware of the cause of the problem for all that the Whispers suggested slyly to him that it would go away if he were to just transmute just the smallest amount of his djed. No, he'd been warned well enough in his training in the Silver Tower to know when to push his luck and when to refrain from it. Iron hissed into the bucket and steam enveloped it whilst he merely nodded in satisfaction. "Good work," he complimented Hadrian. "When it's cooled it needs to go back on the fire, but just for a short time. This time we want to temper it, so that the grains of the iron have chance to relax just a little bit so that the metal is flexible but still strong." "Watch it carefully, and when you see a blue colour start to run up from the point then pull it off and set it aside to cool. All that will remain after that is any final work with the file that you care to do to make it look a little prettier."

[Hadrian]

If Eanos and Hadrian were more talkative fellows, they might have had a deal to say to each other over pints of ale or something, but time would have to tell if they ever did. When Hadrian pulled the hook out of the water, he held it in front of his eyes to peruse the changes to its outward physical appearance as well as the deeper flows of its personal energy signature. He caught glimpses of the invisible things of which Eanos spoke, and was pleased that his senses were beginning to apprehend hidden things on a level that might prove useful to him in the future. Taking the cool iron in his gloved hand, he wiped the moisture away on his sleeve, not sure how steam would alter the processing of the iron in the fire. Transferring it back to the grasp of the tongs, he held it in the fire. The process reminded him of the repetitions inherent in magecrafting, too; how each subsequent strike of the manifold hammers aligned the energies within his creations to a new level of complexity. His eyes were fixed keenly on the point of the hook in fire until the blue Eanos predicted began to crawl up the iron. He took it out of the fire and looked for a place to set it aside. "Is this all right?" he asked, indicating a spot with a gesture. "And I don't mind doing a bit more filing. I'm sure there's a new technique to this step."

[Eanos]

The work progressed well and Eanos was pleased again with attention that his student was paying to the work. Had it been necessary to intervene or to warn Hadrian that something needed to be done then he would have done so, but it wasn't necessary. Steam hissed from the bucket in audible protest to the unwelcome introduction of hot metal. When it had cooled a little he nodded in agreement to the question. "Yes, there is fine. When it is cooled enough for you to be able to touch then you can start on the filing." He had to smile though and shook his head. "No new technique now I'm afraid. But it will be a valuable lesson even so. The file will clean off the scale from the forge and you will be able to tell the difference from before I'm sure in how hard the work will be, but more to the point," he let the pun slip past without the elaboration some might have chosen to employ, when you come to sharpen that point a little more you will see how much harder it is compared to the hook part which did not get the same heat treatment as you employed on the point."