Open Blacksmith and a Black Bird

[Fiachra]

28th day of Summer, 515AV

'Chra was beginning to have to make an effort to find places she'd never been before, aside from the ever present mystery of the forbidden airspace of course. It was this and her ever present curiosity, her drive to find that which was new and novel that saw her circling over Winthrop Alley. Not that it was really an Alley as she understood the term, but there you were. Naming rarely made sense.

Smoke was billowing up from the Ironworks, as usual. There was almost never an hour when no one was working, be it day or night. While it wasn't a place 'Chra had been yet, since what she imagined smithing to be like was exceptionally boring. Of course having no experience with it, she assumed it was mostly just men in leather aprons hitting things with hammers for a couple of hours until Tada! the finished product.

Still, she at least knew enough to know how very little she knew, so perhaps it was worth looking. Maybe it was secretly exciting in there. Perhaps they perpetuated the boring banging myth to keep people out. That seemed perfectly reasonable and plausible. Enough that it was worth a look in any case. She could always leave again afterwards.

In was not much trouble. Unlike some places where she had to wait patiently for someone to open a door or window, the Ironworks was large, and clearly housed people who were firm believers in good ventilation. Plus with all the prospective buyers, employees and so on coming and going, there were lots of avenues to enter. Finding a good perch where she wasn't going to get smoked out, sparked at and had a good view of what was going on took a little more work.

[Terag]

Terag shook his hand, shaking off the sweat he had wiped from his brow. Regardless of how much of his life he had spent in front of an open forge the heat would always get to him eventually. In front of him lay an unfinished mace, which looked still more like a solid slab of steel rather than a rounded mace. He brought his left hand up, and the hammer in it, and then back down to strike the red-hot metal. Over and over again he hit the metal, to a steady rhythm. And to this rhythm he sang his song: "...In the heart of the mountain, we make our home. In the heart of our city, we make our home. In the forges where we work, we make our home. From stone and steel, we make our home..." As he sang the mace began to take shape atop of the anvil. The faces of the metal began to bend and the corners with the edges began to smooth out. His movements stayed steady as he worked, his body moving in time with the song he sang in Isurian. The music filled his area, and while it was obviously sung by a beginner it was still full of passion. His love of the craft, both music and metal, shone through - to him it did at least. His music did not carry far though as the sound of hammers crashing on metal and the grinding of swords would drown out his music before it would reach the city. "...Our home, will be protected with stone and steel. Our home, will be saved with the work of our forge. Our home, will be defended by the city we love. Our home, will be safe in the heart of the mountain..." Eventually the solid piece of steel began to look more like a mace: It had changed shape from a block to a sphere. There were still flat parts to the metal, at regular intervals along the weapon, so that holes could be drilled into the weapon and spikes could be attached to it to make it even more deadly. With a smile of approval he picked up the metal in his left hand, the hot metal had cooled too much to be worked now, and set it onto the table beside his tool rack. To his eye he could see the imperfections in it; the slight unevenness of the sizes of the faces of the weapon, where the metal sat nearly flat but had just a little curve, where his hammer had hit the metal with just a little bit more or less force than his last strike. It would do its job, but he still had yet to reach the perfection and beauty of his master's and he was much too far from his eventual goal. "...We fight, to keep our mountains safe. We fight, to protect our city. We fight, to keep the forges lit. We fight, with stone and Steel. Yeah we fight, to protect our loves..." Since he had been too absorbed in his work Terag never noticed anything, let alone a bird, make its way into The Ironworks. It would have been hard enough to catch something coming in the front door, let alone fly in through a different entrance and settle itself high in the building to watch the going-ons below. He continued to stare at the mace head, the metal looked dull as it had yet to be cleaned, as he thought about the next step in the process as his song came to an end. As he though he crossed his arms, left over right, and furrowed his brow. Perhaps Isurians were thought of antisocial because when they were thinking or waiting they didn't exactly look like they were the happiest people on the planet. The ridged brow even sometimes made it looked like they were constantly in deep thought or angry to the other races of Mizahar.

[Fiachra]

There was in fact an awfully lot of people standing about hitting things with hammers. But there were also lots of fires and glowing things and sparks. In short, the kind of thing that could and did amuse a fairly uncomplicated mind. And then one of them started to sing. That was certainly one way to get 'Chras attention. She did not value singing over other forms of entertainment, tumblers and painters were just as likely to catch her attention, for that matter so was a good sparring session, but she did enjoy it. It was not one of her strong points. She could mimic a large variety of noises, to greater or lesser degrees of accuracy, she could even mimic short arias or a single sound from a specific instrument, a Ravens range was varied, but to put those things together consecutively in a way that made music.. She made noises, not music. Sometimes the noises were musical, but this was as close as she could.

Still, the singing and the fact that she had no idea what he was singing caught her attention. The arm above all else marked him as Isurian, so that was likely the language he sang in, though it might not be. Throughout his crafting she listened, head cocking occasionally to watch him from different angles.

Eventually the song and hammering both stopped, and he stood, back to her, arms crossed examining the fruits of his labour. Semi-menacing body language did not deter 'Chra, experience said if she peeved anyone too much she could always just fly away. Since said experiences were fairly limited she'd not really run into anything that was a danger to her yet, her actions were not tempered by caution.

Which helped explain why she thought it would be a good idea and definitely not one that was going to wind up with her getting backhanded, possibly with an Isurian arm, to flap off her perch and land on Terags shoulder, getting a closer view of this singing smith and his creation, crooning as she did.

<"Our home.">

No idea what it meant, this was fine. He'd repeated it enough times for her to memorize it.

[Terag]

Terag heard a flutter of wings and turned his head just in time to see the Raven perch itself onto his shoulder. He was aware of what it was, he had seen pictures of birds and Ravens as a child growing up. Since his father was part of the silver tower there was a lot of information he shared with him. Ravens held a slight fancy for Terag too, their feathers matching the color of his arm after all. However, he was not prepared for one to just land on his shoulder, especially since he had never seen one in real life. So he did what came first, jumped and quickly moved away from the bird. "Izurdin give me strength, that was scary." After a few moments of letting his heartbeat steady out, he looked at the bird again. He even went as far to reach out with his left hand, the one darkened due to his birth, in an attempt to touch the creature. "A Raven, huh? Wow I never thought I'd actually get to see one... I wonder if you understand what I am saying in either language? I think you are a smart species. But all the same, it is strange seeing you in person. Are you lost, little bird?" If the bird hadn't moved away yet, Terag would wipe his right hand off on his apron - a habit most smiths had before interacting with something that wasn't their work - before trying to shoo the bird onto his metal hand to pick it up and get a better look. If anything else happened he would stand there bewildered that a bird, or something else, had managed its way into The Ironworks.