The western tool house had grown quiet as full dark settled over Alderfast Basin. Outside the thick cedar-plank door, the high mountain wind whistled across the hard speckled granite cliffs two thousand feet above. But inside the sheltered hollow, the air was still and cool. He carried the familiar scents of animal fat, dried sage, pine-scented pitch, and damp iron filings.
A single animal fat dip flickered in an iron saucer at the center of the split-pine worktable. Its yellow flame threw long, trembling shadows across the whitewashed stone walls and lit up the rough tools of two different trades laid out side by side. Davren’s steel files, small bone wrenches, and leather punch, and Kezra’s brass sounding collar, wooden ruler, hair-lead pencil, and leather-bound compilation ledger.
Davren sat on a three-legged stool on the opposite side of the table, his shirtsleeves rolled to his elbows. He was working with careful, unrushed patience, a greased rag in one hand and a horn of neat’s-foot oil in the other. Piece by piece, he was stripping and re-oiling the articulating ash-and-iron brace that Master Orlen had helped forge for his shattered right leg. Every hinge pin, copper rivet, and stiffened calf-cuff received a thin, protective coat to ward off the acid-burning mountain water drops that gathered in the basin overnight. The faint, rhythmic click of iron catches and the soft drag of cloth over polished metal were the only sounds in the room, steady and companionable.
