by K T Findlay
They looked at him in silent astonishment.
‘I never said it would be easy.’ he shrugged. ‘I just said that it would be worth it for the end result.’
For the rest of the day Freawaru and Storm worked together on the ingot, teaching Topaz and Jade to work it in the fire, and hold it correctly on the anvil while it was being hit.
Then, after six hours work they learned a very hard lesson. Hot, tired, and frustrated with the slow progress, Freawaru hit a bit harder than usual and the ingot cracked. Aghast, she and Storm turned the ingot crack side up and tried to hammer it back together again, before Thomas stopped them.
‘Sorry folks. That one’s ruined. We’ll need to give it back to Smith and Buck to re-melt. Start again with a new ingot.’ he said.
Freawaru gave him a ferocious look. ‘We can fix it! We can hammer it back together again! There’s six hours of my life in that!’
Thomas shook his head. ‘Nope. Even if you manage to make it look okay, it won’t be. That crack will never really go away. It will kill the sword’s owner. Start again.’
At dinner that evening the chastened team worked out a rota that would use the entire coterie to run both forges without anyone getting too tired and making another mistake. It worked well, but it still took some days before they had twelve sword blanks ready for the next stage.
‘Okay, time to make proper blades.’ said Thomas at the beginning of his next lesson. ‘Ideally we’ll continue to work with it between blue, and bright cherry red, the same as we’ve been doing.’
‘But this gives us very little time to work it before it gets too cold!’ complained Freawaru.
‘True enough. but that’s the way this steel needs to be worked. The good news is that you can hit it harder now you’ve got it to this point. However, I want you to make a new kind of sword, not the big double edged ones you’re familiar with.’
‘Really?’ asked Storm, her tone highly dubious.
‘Really. We know what weight each of us can handle, so step one is to chop off the excess steel to get each bar to the right weight. Then I want you to remember that the balance point of the sword is to be a couple of inches above the guard. We can use the weight of the pommel to help, and the guard will be bigger than you’re used to, but if the pommel’s too big the vibrations can be awful, so try and get the weight as right as you can with the blade and tang.’
‘But that means the sword will be short! A man has longer arms than us to start with, give him a longer sword than us and we’ll never get through!’ complained Rowena.
Thomas nodded. ‘Normally yes, but with this steel we can make a narrower blade, so you won’t lose as much as you think you’re going to. Also, this one is to be single edged, so it will be narrower and you’ll get most of the length back.’
‘But-!’ started Berthilda.
‘A single edge! It won’t work! It can’t work!’ cried Topaz, cutting her off.
Thomas held up his hands. ‘Remember that we’re not going to be slashing away with it. Most of the time you’ll be thrusting. The edge is important, but it’ll do its damage on the way in and out, not just by slashing.’
They looked at him uncertainly.
‘Also, the sword is just part of the equipment. You’ll have something in the left hand to help.’ he added.
‘What exactly?’ asked Storm.
‘You’ll have to wait and see. If I told you without being able to show you, you’d think I was crazy.’
Storm’s expression indicated she had some doubts about his sanity already, but she didn’t say so.
While work continued on the blades, Smith and Buck carried on producing more steel until Thomas felt they had enough, and switched them over to using it to make a new kind of shield. He drew them a picture on a roof shingle, with accurate measurements.
‘But this is very small my Lord! I know the women are smaller than the men they’ll be fighting, but all the same…’ said Smith, looking shocked at a picture of a shield less than half the normal diameter.
‘Against a hail of spears or arrows, it’s not much use I’ll grant you, but in one on one combat it has some advantages. It’s called a buckler, and it won’t be used like a normal shield.’ said Thomas.
For the next two days Smith and Buck worked in parallel with the two sword teams, and they’d just created the final shape of the first one when Deena and Deana walked in to say hello.
‘That’s a cute little thing!’ cried Deana. ‘Is that for the children to play with?’
‘It’s yours!’ laughed Buck.
‘What?!’ shouted Deena. ‘No way!’
‘Yep, especially built, just for you!’ said Smith.
Once the twins were certain it wasn’t a joke, they rushed off to tell the others, and it was a deeply unhappy coterie who greeted Thomas when he arrived to check progress later that day.
‘We don’t understand Your Highness. It seems like madness to have small bodies, skinny swords and now a tiny shield.’ said Deana bluntly.
Thomas managed to keep his face straight. Now was not the time for flippancy, when they were genuinely worried about being hacked to pieces.
‘Well, now you know why I didn’t want to tell you before I could show you. A wise woman once said, “Fools and bairns shouldna see a thing half finished!” And she was absolutely right. Oh well, seeing as you all know, let’s go and watch it being finished, so you can see the quality of what you’re getting.’
He led them into Smith’s smithy where the buckler was being heated slowly on top of the coals.
‘Smith’s taking it up very slowly through the colours to avoid heat shocking the steel.’ explained Thomas.
When parts of it began to turn cherry red, Smith worked hard, moving it around above the coals to get it all cherry red as fast as possible.
‘When the steel is cherry red, crystals are forming inside it.’ explained Thomas. ‘They form fast, and they grow. They make the steel look pretty, but big crystals will make it weak, so that’s why he’s working so quickly.’
Smith dunked it carefully into a barrel of cod liver oil to quench it, and left it there, despite the appalling smell. He was even more careful when he pulled it out again and rested it on the floor.
‘He’s quenching it in oil, because if we did it in water the steel could crack. In fact it’s so hard, that if Smith dropped it at this point it would shatter.’ said Thomas. ‘We need to temper it to make it usable. Once it’s cooled back to room temperature, Buck is going to polish it until it’s nice and shiny, getting rid of that pretty marbling we can see, then we’ll come back and do the actual tempering.’
They spent the rest of the day practicing, and it wasn’t until evening that they reassembled in the smithy. Smith placed the tiny shield above the coals and carefully warmed it.
‘Now watch the steel change colour.’ said Thomas. ‘It’s going to go through pale yellow, bright yellow, straw yellow, dark straw yellow, brown, purple, violet, dark blue, bright blue and blue grey. If we were making a blade, the colour we stop at depends on what the blade is for. An everyday knife needs bright yellow, a fighting knife or a normal sword needs dark straw or brown, but our buckler here, and our special swords need to be done in the blue range. That’s because they both need to be springy to do their job.’
‘For the buckler,’ he went on, ‘we’re looking for a nice dark blue, over as much of the steel as possible. Smith has to take care not to go beyond that colour.’ said Thomas. ‘There we go! That’s it! Quench it now Smith, like I told you!’
Smith picked the buckler up in his tongs and plunged it back into the barrel of oil for just five seconds before pulling it out again.
‘And that ladies, is that!’ said a very pleased Thomas. ‘That shield is now the toughest shield anyone on Earth has ever seen, but on its own that isn’t enough. You need to know how to use it in combination with the swords you’re making.’
Once the buckler had cooled enough to handle, the coter
ie clustered around to look at their new toy. They were astonished at its lightness, and how hard it was when they knocked it with their knuckles.
‘That’s amazing…’ murmured Topaz. ‘It’s so light and strong!’
‘So it’s like the swords.’ added Melody. ‘Everything’s light so we can move much more quickly than anyone else.’
‘But it’s too small!’ cried Deena. ‘How can anything that size keep a sword or a spear off us, let alone an arrow shower?’
‘You must have patience grasshopper.' said Thomas, making an allusion they hadn’t a hope of understanding.
‘And a whole lot of luck!’ whispered Wulfstan, who like Deena, didn’t believe what he was seeing.
The following day, Thomas took them through the hardening and tempering of the first completed blade. It was hardened just like the buckler, the sword being plunged vertically, point first into the oil and held there. When it came to the tempering though, Thomas had another trick up his sleeve.
‘We’re just going to drop the back of the blade into the heat, not the edge. We’ll slowly take it up past brown to blue, then quench it. That will make the back of the blade flexible, but keep the cutting edge nice and hard and sharp.’ He said. ‘If we do that three times, re-polishing it between each heat cycle, we’ll end up with a blade that’s the best of both worlds. A really flexible creature, with a sharp edge.’
As soon as it was finished, Freawaru used it to take out her frustrations. She didn’t trust this overly fragile thing a bit and thrust it into a shield with every ounce of strength she had, trying her hardest to break it. There was a collective gasp as it bent two inches out of shape before snapping back straight and true.
‘That’s miraculous…’ murmured Storm.
‘Which means you’re all miracle workers!’ laughed Thomas. ‘Okay, we know it’s flexible, now it’s time to get edgy!’
14 The game’s afoot
If you’d asked Fulton to name a creature that was highly flexible with a sharp edge, he would almost certainly have said ‘Cuthbert!’
The priest had been careful to avoid having to push the handcart any more than he absolutely had to, which worked out to be about one mile in every twenty. He was also wilfully blind about sharing out the food and comfort whenever they stopped to refresh themselves. Cuthbert made sure he got the pick of whatever was on offer, while Fulton got the leftovers, if he was lucky. Fulton had lost quite a bit of weight on the journey, while Cuthbert looked if anything, a little plumper than when they’d left.
The one thing Fulton felt happy about, was that he’d managed to keep Wulfstan’s money a secret. He was quite certain that Cuthbert would have found a way to trick him out of it. In fact, over the many days and miles, listening to the priest’s endless rants and complaints, and watching his inhumanity to practically every life form he came across, Fulton had come to appreciate Prince Wulfstan’s stance on Cuthbert. He was also thinking fondly of his old home, and wondering if the Prince would have him back. It was in this happy state of mind that he pushed the hand cart into sight of Canterbury.
Cuthbert’s smile had never seemed so full of cunning as he took off his shoes and hid them deep at the bottom of the cart.
‘It’s time for revenge my friend. Bring the cart.’ he said to Fulton, and strode off down the road, feet twitching as the sharp stones bit into his tender flesh. By the time they actually entered the town, Cuthbert’s feet were bleeding freely over the ground, and he was genuinely hobbling, leaning on his staff.
‘Well Fulton, this is where our journey together ends.’ he said. ‘I’ll take the handcart from here. Remove your things and we can go our separate ways.’
Fulton looked at him in astonishment. ‘What do you mean? Aren’t you going to at least give me a meal and a bed after I’ve pushed it all this way for you?’ he asked.
Cuthbert just smiled, and handed Fulton his small bundle of goods. ‘God has told me that our paths diverge from now on. Only he knows where you are to go, but separate we must. I am sad of course, but we must obey.’ he said. Then without so much as a backwards glance, he hobbled away, silent but grimacing for all he was worth, trying to drum up sympathy from any onlookers.
Abandoned in a strange town, many miles from home, Fulton had no idea what to do, and found himself shuffling after Cuthbert. Perhaps there would be a market near the cathedral where he could at least buy something to eat.
Cuthbert went into full performance mode as he staggered up the road towards a group of priests chatting by the cathedral doors. One of them rushed inside to spread the news of his arrival, while the others ran over to help their limping colleague.
As Cuthbert was sat down on the steps and offered a bowl of water, Fulton edged closer, close enough to hear the conversation when the Archbishop himself came out of the cathedral to see what the fuss was about.
‘Cuthbert!’ cried Jaenberht. ‘What are you doing so far away from your manor?’
‘My Lord, I have been sorely wronged.’ sighed Cuthbert. ‘The Prince threw me out with no good reason, denying me both servant and beast. I have had to push my own handcart all the way here. My shoes fell apart some days ago, but with God’s help I have managed to reach you.’
Jaenberht looked down at Cuthbert’s bloody feet, then back to his pain etched face. ‘This is appalling!’ he said. ‘I must speak to the King, and see that justice is done! We will force the Prince to take you back, and to humble himself in sorrow. Come into the cathedral and we can pray together while they bring the herbalist to see to you!’
Even after days of close exposure to Cuthbert, Fulton was still staggered by the audacity of the man. How could he believe in God and still tell such barefaced lies, knowing the day of judgement was coming?
It was at this point that he was accosted by a nobleman on a horse.
‘It’s Fulton isn’t it?’
Fulton looked up into the rider’s face, and recognised Earl Marwig, one of the Queen’s closest advisors.
‘Yes my Lord. That’s me, Fulton.’
‘I remember you took extra good care of my lame horse the last time I was visiting Hengist. He recovered completely thanks to you, when we might well have lost him. I was most impressed! What brings you to Canterbury?’
Fulton dropped his head.
‘I am no longer at the manor my Lord. I am a free man in search of a home.’
Marwig’s eyebrows rose markedly. He hadn’t been at Tamworth when Hengist fell from grace, but he knew all about it, and about the Prince’s rejection of Jaenberht’s offer to join the Church. There might well be something worth learning from this peasant.
‘It sounds as if you have a story to tell, and I would welcome a beer and a tale. Come, there’s a tavern around the corner, and I owe you a drink!’ he said.
An hour later, Fulton’s appetite had been sated, and Marwig’s decidedly piqued.
‘So he let the whole village decide, slaves and all? Well, well, well. Remarkable…’
‘He was right to do it, and I was wrong to object.’ said Fulton sadly. ‘He saw instantly what kind of man Cuthbert was. I needed days on the road to see the same thing. I wish I’d never left. I don’t know what to do now.’
Marwig nodded. ‘We all make mistakes. Sometimes we get lucky, and sometimes we don’t. Today you got lucky.’
Fulton looked up at him hopefully.
‘I think the Queen should hear what you have to say. The King too come to that. I think there’s going to be real trouble with the Archbishop, and they need to be warned.’
Fulton’s face filled with fear, but Marwig held up his hand soothingly.
‘Relax! You’ve done nothing wrong. They won’t do anything to you, but they will want to hear your story. Then we’ll see about finding you a home. In the meantime, you can join my retinue and we’ll go to Court together.’
✽✽✽
For the next five days, Topaz and Jade focussed completely on polishing and sharpening the finished sword, w
hile Rowena and Berthilda took over their forge duties to make the remaining blades. The coterie members not on forge duty, watched and learned the art of polishing in order to be able to finish the swords as fast as possible.
Thomas spent some of his time in the school, and some of it with Ashlin. The bow maker was getting very frustrated.
‘I have found all the wood I need my Lord, and I’ve got the hang of cutting the horn, and hammering out the tendons, but the glue…’
‘Well, I did warn you that’s where the trouble would lie. What specific issues are you getting?’ asked Thomas.
‘Two. Some of the glues just aren’t strong enough, and the bow… what was the word you taught me? Delaminates? Yes, that was it, it delaminates, falls apart. I have made up some glues that are strong enough, at least up until they get wet. Then the glue breaks down and the bow delaminates again. It’s maddening!’
‘What glues have worked, at least until they get wet?’
‘Fish glue my Lord. It’s fabulous. The only downside is that the smell is threatening my marriage. Maeve says it’s almost as vile as Cuthbert!’
Thomas laughed heartily.
‘Okay,’ he said when he got his breath back, ‘fish glue it is. If we can’t get a waterproof glue, we’ll just have to waterproof the bow somehow.’
By the end of the sixth day, the sword was complete, and fitted with hilt and guard. Thomas held it in his hand, revelling in its lightness and perfect balance, then walked over to where a fresh pig carcass was hanging and addressed the whole group, including Smith, Buck, Hengist and Kelsey.
‘Fantastic effort everyone, I’m really pleased! It’s beautifully balanced, and we know it’s springy. The question now is, will it cut? Will it thrust?’
Fifteen faces looked back at him, their feelings writ large in their expressions. Deena, Deana and Scarlett looked doubtful. Freawaru, Storm, Smith and Buck were serious, as would be anyone with their reputations on the line. Rowena, Berthilda and Melody were hopeful out of loyalty to their Prince, but Topaz and Jade looked completely confident because they knew exactly what kind of an edge they’d managed to create, and couldn’t wait to see it in action. Hengist and Kelsey looked serious, aware that what they were about to see could change everything they knew.
