Now that she had a little more privacy, she decided to remove her woolen gown so she could give it a much-needed wash. All of her clothing and belongings had been stolen along with their loaded-down horse. She had nothing to change into. She loosened the strings at her waist so she might pull it off.
She stood in the late-morning sunlight holding the folds of yellow wool against her stomach as she stood in her linen kirtle. Her underdress would need a wash soon, but not today. Morgen enjoyed the warm rays of the sun touching her cheeks, and she stepped into the chilly water.
It would take her a while to finish the cleaning, so she got to work. Her hands thrust her dress into the water, dunking it several times until it was fully soaked. She rubbed sections against each other and wrung it repeatedly, watching a brown stream of water pour from it. Once the water ran clear, she squeezed it out and spread it in a sunny patch of grass to dry.
Her afternoon continued in the same manner, though Emich’s clothing was far dirtier than her woolen dress and was more challenging to clean. She managed to improve its smell, but it remained a light brown hue.
Every so often she would pause to listen and glance to the heavens, wary of flying serpents. She could not shake the feeling she was being watched.
8
For the second time, he’d caught her watching him. If she were infatuated with him, it would make sense, but he was confident she disliked him. He was a frightful smith who controlled the devil’s fire to forge dangerous weapons. He was a far cry from a knight or even a common man.
No. She could not be infatuated. So, what then?
Emich finished drawing out his forge-welded billet. It had the shape of a blade, but he still needed to grind it smooth and build its edge. He set the blade on his anvil and went to the threshold of his workshop to rest for a moment, leaning against the frame.
He could see Tybalt holding the handle of his rod while lying back in the grass beside the lake. Emich scanned the shore for Morgen, wondering if she had accompanied her father outside. All of his clothing and bedding had been laid across the meadow, and there she stood between some trees in the shallows. Her hair shined nearly white in the sunlight as she stooped in the water while scrubbing a handful of fabric. He realized she was wading in her underclothes, noticing the sun illuminating her linen kirtle, and he pinched his eyes shut.
He took another deep breath before looking again. She had stopped her work to dive into the water. From where he stood he could hear her gasp from the chilly water, though it didn’t chase her back to the rocks she’d been standing upon. She dipped her head under again, and when she came up for air, she yelped. Tybalt sat upright and called out to her, and she answered back.
Emich found himself entirely absorbed. It had been so long since he’d had company. He told himself he preferred it that way, but it was lonely. He might not like most of the people in the village, but even if he did, it would be dangerous to invite anyone up there. His secret was worth protecting. That’s what he’d been told at least.
His father had found a woman he could trust, and they had lived happily until they’d died together under the mountain. Not many of their kind still knew of his family’s existence, and they hadn’t had a visitor since his youth. If only Emich had been given a sister or a brother, he wouldn’t have been so lonely.
He sighed and lifted his apron from his neck. With it clutched in his hand, he returned to the house with one purpose. His loneliness was pushing him to make poor choices. What was one more?
Emich went into his darkened room and opened the shutters, letting in more light. He went to the heavy wardrobe and looked inside. Clothes that hadn’t been touched for years were folded on shelves and hung from hooks. He had nothing else to do with them but sell them in the village, but he was not in want of money.
His father had been a near-enough build to Tybalt, and he could imagine his mother being the same shape as Morgen. He plucked a maroon dress and cream kirtle from a hook and shook them out. Dust filled the air, and he coughed. Emich spent less time picking out a shirt and breeches for her father and simply added them to his pile.
He took them out to the main hall and set them on the dining table in a place they wouldn’t be missed. He stood back and stared at the jumble, wondering if he should do anything else. Emich picked up the dress and tried folding it, which turned it into a rolled-up ball. He set it down and tried the kirtle next, lifting it up.
Just as he was about to attempt folding it, he heard their voices and dropped the undergarment to the floor. Morgen helped Tybalt through the threshold. He noticed she’d put on her dress again, and it seemed a brighter yellow. She held a few folded garments which were in a far better shape than when they’d been collected from the floor.
When she saw the pile on the table, she frowned and sighed. “If you need me to wash them, I will, but do not leave them about the kitchen.”
“No, I—” He cleared his throat and leaned down to pick up the dropped kirtle to hand it to her. “I thought you might need these. They are only taking space in the wardrobe.”
Morgen was visibly surprised. Her eyes widened, and she stood still for a few moments before stepping forward and accepting the undergarment from him. “Thank you.”
Tybalt stood balanced in the doorway where Morgen had left him, holding a large trout by its mouth. He lifted it up and said, “Would you accept our thanks and this big fellow in repayment of your generosity?”
There was nothing Emich needed from them. He’d made the offer without wanting anything in return. He looked at the fish dangling from Tybalt’s hooked finger. “I accept.”
“Here, liebling.” He held it out to Morgen, who set the kirtle on the table along with the folded, cleaned clothing and came to take the trout from her father. Tybalt grinned at Emich. “It is good my leg was injured and not hers. She is far more useful than I am.”
Emich noticed Morgen give her father a disapproving look as she set the fish on the worktable beside the hearth. “You know that is not true.”
“The days before a closed bud finally spreads its petals to the sun—that is what you are, liebling. A flower ready to bloom.” The pride was apparent in Tybalt’s gaze. He loved his daughter dearly.
Emich knew that look. Many a time he’d seen it light his mother’s eyes— and even, on occasion, his father’s— when they looked at him. He sniffed and noticed the man hop forward, reaching out to the nearest table. Emich stepped toward him with his hand out to help Tybalt to his place on the bench.
“Start a fire in the hearth if you would? I will return in a moment,” Morgen said to Emich, leaving the fish on the worktable and picking up a paring knife.
Emich nodded and watched her step outside as he grabbed some firewood from a bin. He wondered where she’d gone off to, but did as she’d asked, striking his flint and steel to start a flame. By the time she returned, he’d started a small fire.
In her arms she carried something leafy and bulbous. She held it up and said, “It is a waste not to eat your cabbage.”
He looked at the floor to avoid eye contact, and she brushed past him to return to the worktable where she began to pluck the exterior leaves from the veg. While she busied herself preparing a meal of fish and cabbage, Emich wiped his hands off on his breeches and went to his stack of clean clothes. He picked them up and mumbled, “Thank you.”
She said over her shoulder, “I have never seen a shirt so dirty, but I tried my best.”
“I do not see the point of it when I will get it sooty when I wear it next,” he answered and took the stack into his living quarters to set them on the chest at the foot of his bed.
When he walked back into the hall, Tybalt was holding up the shirt Emich had pulled from his father’s wardrobe. “This will do just fine. Are you sure you have no need for it?”
“My father is not here to wear it, nor will my mother ever don her dresses. You might as well get use from them,” Emich said and went to collect some cups to fil
l with ale. The barrel was at its dregs, and he had to tip it to get the last drops from the tap. He noted that he’d have to bring in the new barrel from the back of the cart and load the old one up. He handed a drink to both Tybalt and Morgen before taking a sip.
“They passed away?” she asked, watching him swirl the liquid in his cup.
He felt her eyes on him. His instinct was to snap back, but he took a breath and mumbled, “I have lost count how many years have passed. Seven? Six?”
“You have lived alone since then?” Tybalt looked around the place. “That is a long time without someone to talk to.”
Emich sat near the worktable. He glanced at Morgen, who had poured some water into a pot and lowered in the skinned, salted and cabbage-wrapped trout. Then she hung the kettle from a hook over the fire. It was a simple action, placing their meal in the hearth, but it was something he hadn’t seen done over his solitary years, and it brought him up short.
Morgen went to the stone washbasin to clean her hands. From the shadow of the dark end of the hall, she said, “It is your mother’s garden outside, then?”
He nodded and couldn’t seem to tamp the flow of words from his lips. “She would sing to herself when she tended it.”
Tybalt said with a wistful look in his eye, “My mother had a small garden of cabbage and spinach in the dirt outside our door. Could never get her beans to climb the way she wanted. Pottage of all sorts from spring to the first snows.”
As the contents of the kettle warmed, a delicious smell filled the house. Emich closed his eyes and breathed deep. For a moment he could imagine a time from his youth when he would follow his nose from the workshop with his father close behind just to discover what delicious meal had been prepared for them.
The evening went by quickly. The fish and cabbage were devoured, leaving only the bones on the plates. Emich went to bed with his stomach full and with a strange warmth in his chest. He said very little when he departed and had said even less through the course of the night, though it didn’t seem to bother Tybalt, who carried on chatting despite it.
Emich imagined he wouldn’t have anything in common with the father and daughter and tried to avoid any connection with them. He supposed a stronger sort might have been able to steer clear of entanglement. Apparently, he was no such man.
Morgen held up the maroon dress in the dimly lit room to get a better look. It was modest and simple and the appropriate attire for living in the mountains. It seemed to be close enough to her size. However, it was the kirtle she was eager to change into. It had lost all roughness to it, having been worn and washed numerous times. Most of all, it was clean.
She had already helped her father into the hall and had provided him some hot morning cereal. Morgen now stood alone in the confined room that held their box-bed. She glanced toward the doorway before slipping out of her underdress to put on the secondhand undergarment.
Next she pulled on the maroon dress and cinched the waist. The square neckline pressed into her breasts, holding them snugly. The kirtle’s poufy sleeves had a tiny slit that ran from the shoulder to her upper arm, letting in some air. Its low neckline dropped below the front of her gown, revealing some cleavage. She presumed Emich’s mother must have been smaller chested—that or she wasn’t ashamed of the shape of her body.
When she breezed into the hall, Tybalt was just taking a bite of his food. He finished it and seemed to consider something of deep importance. His bushy brows furrowed. “Some vogelbeere jam added to this bland gruel would take me to heaven.”
Morgen raised her eyebrow. “Well, good thing there is none.”
He sniffed, set down his bowl and lifted his leg from the bench before trying to bend it. A wince pinched his face and he muttered, “Oooh, still sore. I must think healing thoughts so I may get back to the business of finding emeralds.”
Morgen pressed her hands along the folds of her skirt, secretly pleased with the fact she had a second dress to change into. She looked up at her father, knowing he was oblivious to her change of clothing. “I am sure you will feel better soon. Then we can take to the trails.”
“It does bother me there are men preying upon the innocent in our beautiful Alps. I am much relieved you were not present when those scoundrels arrived, or who knows what would have happened.” Tybalt seemed distracted and worried as he spoke his thoughts aloud.
“I heard their voices and crept closer. I was prepared to wallop them when Emich stopped me.”
Her father looked to her with widened eyes. “Remind me to thank him for doing so. Your curious and courageous soul leads you into trouble sometimes.”
Though he didn’t often worry, when he did, it was always in regard to her. She looked out the window at the sunny meadow and decided to get some fresh air. “Do you wish me to move your seat outside so you may get some sun on your face?”
“Nein, I fear I would heat up too quickly without being able to move about. You may leave me here in the cool shade.”
“Very well.” She turned toward the threshold leading into the byre. “I will be back in a while—going to see what else I can find in the garden.”
Morgen walked into the shadowy animal shed. The horses stood quietly near the outer double doors. She brushed her hand down their manes. Their wide, round eyes stared at her while her focus was turned to the worktables for tools. She found a utility blade with a rough wooden handle as well as a spade. In moments, she’d slipped outside, latching the doors shut behind her.
White clouds spread across the blue sky, providing little protection from the strength of the sun. She set the spade down at the edge of the overgrown garden and began cutting away the old, dead growth with the blade. Morgen uncovered purple blooms hidden by an overgrown mountain ash. She breathed in the flower’s sweet scent before stopping to take a rest. Maybe her father was wise to stay inside where the sun’s rays couldn’t reach him.
She thought of all the cleaning that still waited for her. The water in the washtub needed changing, and the hall could use a good dusting. But there would be time for that before dinner. She might be able to just take a quick peek at Emich in his workshop.
She gathered the tools she’d brought to the garden and walked around the home, approaching the other building from one of its windowless sides. As quietly as she could, she set down the spade and knife and crept to the doorway.
As on the other days, she found Emich busy at the forge, pumping the bellows to keep the charcoal’s embers glowing bright. He wiped the sweat from his brow with the sleeve of his shirt, lifted his chin and said over his shoulder, “I know you are there.”
Morgen held her breath and stepped back. Her heartbeat thundered in her ears as she realized she’d been caught. There was nothing to do about it now, so she sighed and stepped into the open.
9
Emich glanced up, noticing her change of clothing. The dress fit her very differently than it had his mother. The fullness of Morgen’s breasts couldn’t be hidden from view, and it caught him by surprise. He wrenched his gaze away from her downcast eyes to look again at the embers in the forge.
The whole time he’d known them, he’d evaded their questions, but it was his turn to get answers. “I have seen you at my door every day. Explain yourself.”
He didn’t want to look at her until she answered, uncertain of her response. She made him wait a few moments before she spoke. “I do not wish to be scolded or laughed at.”
“Are you plotting to steal my tools, then?” He squinted at her and continued to lift and lower the handle to the bellows, not having forgotten why he was there to begin with. He glanced at her while she took a step into the darkened workshop.
“I am without a skill,” she said with a shrug. “I can cook a meal, wash clothes and clean—but that is not what I mean. When I was young I tried apprenticing with a weaver. Unfortunately, these hands were not meant for fine details.” Morgen looked over her shoulder though the doorway to the house. “Father has put me on a pedes
tal on which I do not belong. From the time I was a small girl, I watched him take ore from the earth. And it has always fascinated me how it could be melted, forged, twisted and polished to become weapons that cut, tools that make our lives easier, and ornaments that are both beautiful and useful. I have dreamed of learning the craft, but have accepted the impossibility of my dream.”
Emich realized he’d stopped pumping the bellows and was staring at her in the dim light. He never could have imagined her reason for hanging around his door. He had never heard of a woman smith.
“Why a woman would wish to bend iron is beyond me,” he muttered more to himself than anything.
She folded her arms. “I imagine many things are.”
Based on her narrowed glare, he’d angered her. She ran as hot as the embers in the forge. His skills for putting out the flames of a fire wouldn’t help him now.
Morgen must have realized he wasn’t going to answer and started up again. “What did you think I was doing standing at your door? Did you think me an infatuated maiden?”
“I knew that could not be the reason,” he answered all too quickly, breaking his silence. “For are not all smiths mysterious men who use hell’s fire, bending iron to their will?”
At this Morgen sniffed and lifted her chin. “Nein. It was not the church or aristocracy who forged the world around us but the smiths—they were the ones who armored knights, who in turn go to battle and determine our fates.”
He lifted his eyes to watch her as she traced her fingers over the tools on his worktable when she didn’t think he was watching. She had a bright mind and was fearless. He’d never met her like before.
“Smiths must be strong enough to lift a hammer over their heads all day,” he said, eyeing her feminine form. “They must be able to take the heat and persevere.”
“I am fortunate,” she answered, lifting her gaze to meet his. “For I have all of those qualities.”
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