Anara had expected as much; in fact, she was hoping he would say that, for she had begun to feel the same kind of confidence. Even though Larkin was but a mere child, the longer she spent time with him the more she thought of him as a born leader. She felt an unexpected and inexplicable connection between them.

  They walked to the top of a hill; on one side was the village and the other was the ancient forge. Backwater teemed with life, while the temple sat as still as the stone that comprised it. Every so often, Larkin paced between the two opposing sights, his hands on his hips and his expression a scowl of deep, pensiveness. He looked more like a general comparing his own army to the enemy’s rather than the blacksmith his companions had come to know. His eyes then fell upon the enchanteress with a finality which made the woman grow cold despite the belting sun.

  “Can I trust you?” he asked.

  “Of course,” she said firmly, suppressing her jumping heart. “But we’re only crafters... there’s no way that we can go against those who can fight.”

  “The gods are on our side,” said Larkin.

  “But-”

  “If I run now then I’ll be forgotten – and so will all the troubles that I have faced. My parents will never return to me, nor will I earn the respect that is owed to a person of my ability,” interrupted the boy.

  Anara gazed at him with amazement. Instead of speaking, she stayed silent, allowing only a sigh to escape her lips. The orphan was still under the impression that his talent came from within, rather than from what he had found on the other side of the hill. Anara glanced at her hands. She, too, wanted to prove herself to the realm. But to have the gall to suggest that she actually stood a chance against the guild was a step too far. She shook her head. The only reason she went along with his delusion was because he needed a reality check. And now was the time for such a reality check.

  She stood up.

  But then she noticed Larkin had disappeared. She ran to the edge facing Backwater, and, seeing nothing but the forest below, her face worked with utter bewilderment.

  “Come on!” shouted Larkin.

  Anara turned around; only the unbroken pastel-blue of the sky was present. She ran to the other side of the hill.

  “What are you doing?” she cried.

  “You said it yourself – we're crafters at heart. Let’s craft a sword that will destroy our enemies.”

  “Our enemies,” Anara breathed in terror. “What have I got myself into?”

  But Larkin was already half-way down the hill, his Hammer held high.

  When he had reached the front of the temple, Larkin saw a man loitering at the entrance. He was cloaked as the Obsidian Watch were, but the boy spotted no gauntlet on his person; instead, the stranger carried a satchel. Regardless, the boy was on guard, gripping his Hammer tightly as he approached. As soon as he did so, however, the man flew at him like a swooping hawk. His cloak barely grazed the boy as he ran past and disappeared into the dense wood. A thousand thoughts rushed into the boy’s head, but all were swept aside when he heard the clang of metal at the temple’s doorstep. Intrigued, he sprinted to the entrance, his mind still a racket. He picked up the medallion; on it were two hammers in the shape of an ‘X’: the insignia of the Iron Guild. He was not at all surprised that it was his fellow blacksmiths behind the sabotage. But he was hurt.

  Anara caught up to him, out of breath and sweltering. “Are you okay, Larkin?” she said.

  “I knew I wouldn’t be safe, but to be this desperate...” Larkin said, shaking his head, “is this not more proof that I am closer to greatness? The guild has sent their hounds after me.”

  “But Larkin,” Anara said exasperatedly, “you have no choice now but to fight back. If you don’t, they’ll just keep coming back to sabotage you and your work... Give in, you can’t fight an empire on your own.”

  “I’m not alone though,” said Larkin.

  “Oh, give it a rest with these gods,” snapped Anara. “Gods don’t exist; they’re a lie made up by the empire...”

  Larkin glared at her. Anara laughed.

  “How-”

  Suddenly, there was a sound of rocks falling coming from inside the temple. Larkin shot down the hallway and into the chamber. The forge had collapsed; fire was everywhere. Despite the intense orange light, Larkin’s face remained pallid. Shadows flickered across the walls. His first thought – thieves; he had no defense against the skill that they possessed. In fact, as the confusion written on his face revealed, he did not know much about the skills of other classes. How was he to defend himself against an enemy he did not know? Nevertheless, he lifted his Hammer, ready to swing it at the first thing that came at him.

  “Larkin!” cried Anara from the corridor.

  “Stay back!” Larkin yelled, his eyes jerking from one wall to the other.

  A shudder passed through him. He heard the slapping sound of wet footsteps approach down the corridor, and he jerked his head to the exit. Larkin noticed that the shadows were still in the room with him. He slowly backed into a corner, his knees buckling terribly as though he was aboard a ship at sea, and made himself as small as possible. His eyes darted about the chamber, every slight movement demanding his immediate attention. He tried to still his hands by grasping the Hammer tighter, but evidently, he was out of his element. If he survived this, he told himself, he would strive to learn more skills. He had to.

  A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

  Save for the crackling fires which gathered around him like an angry mob, the chamber was eerily silent. But the flashing sigil was hard to ignore, and the boy’s heartbeat soon broke that suffocating silence. Although Larkin could feel his lungs wither from the thick smoke, he remained determined to save his forge. All he needed to do was to stop the fire. To do that, however, he needed to make sure the walls were free of the assassins sent tosteal his Hammer. Of course, if they decided to step out of their shadows and strike him, it would quickly be over; he had no idea how their skills worked, but he had no time to hesitate. Not only was he risking his life, but he was also risking the very life of his forge. But he had no choice. There was no forge without his Hammer. He had to defend what was his, else he could not claim his independence as a blacksmith in Backwater.

  The footsteps grew louder.

  He shot to his feet and swung it at the wall. The stone instantly collapsed, and with it his confidence in the integrity of the forge. As he watched the crumbling rock pour out of the temple, he felt his heart go along with it. And why not? He owed this building his life, for it had given it a new lease. There was nothing left for him without the Eternal Forge. It meant that much to the orphan. And because of this, he felt so much the angrier. Ignoring the fire lashing at his feet, Larkin continued to smash gaping holes in the structure. Every shadow he dispersed was one less potential thief who could steal his Hammer.

  Larkin flung himself into the flames. The fire intensified; his whole body looked like a matchstick. The Hammer glowed golden as it pulverised its home, exposing it to the contemporary world. He would never wrap his head around this fact: in order to protect his Hammer, he would have to use it for destruction. The more he pounded the ancient rock, the less this bothered him. To become a master craftsman in Backwater, and then in the empire beyond, he had to obliterate all that prevented from achieving greatness; even if that meant destroying what the gods had built.

  With savageness he decimated the forge. Larkin was responding to instinct now: a primitive feeling within his gut, which told him that what he was doing was okay. The Hammer protected his skin from the pain of first-degree burns. Once the forge had fallen, there was no turning back. He was not the least bit conscious now. Smashing the chamber to bits, he was unable to recollect any of the thoughts which had passed through his mind at the time, and only scarcely knew where he was at and what he was doing and why he had started in the first place. At last, he reached the final wall.

  Suddenly, a thief jumped out of the wall. He was six feet tall and very narrow. His cloak was purple, covering the entire length of his body, and stuck like a second skin. Already a knife, white as bone, protruded from underneath his garment. Larkin leapt backwards, wishing that he kept a sword. He knew he was a goner against a trained thief. The man flung at him and slashed. But at that instant Larkin raised his Hammer, intercepting the strike at the last moment. The short blade bounced off the Hammer’s head. Larkin was fighting by instinct, empowered by the Hammer of the Eternal Forge. His surprise quickly turned sour, however, as the man’s dagger flew at him again. To add to his misery, another thief jumped out of the wall. When Larkin tried to summon movement, his body failed him: his internal mana sources were drier than the Shadrah Wastes which boarded the empire. The Hammer had exhausted him. The dagger inched closer to his chest. Although it wouldn’t kill him, it would send him into shock – enough time to amputate his wrist and steal the Hammer.

  Fire blinded Larkin to his fate. In that instant of horror and sheer panic, he heard over the sound of his heavy breathing the sound of footsteps.

  “Fire brigade is here!” yelled Bram jovially.

  At once the thieves turned around to face the new threat. They noticed that the warrior was carrying a bucket of water.

  Bram grinned. “Looks like you all need to cool off,” he said, before chucking the water all over them.

  Immediately, Larkin felt his skin cool as the water splashed over his body. But it did nothing to relieve his mana problem; the Hammer was too heavy to swing. That was something he would have to look at in the future.

  Bram unsheathed his greatsword and, with great effort, slashed down at the second thief. The latter jumped out of the way, slipping around the lumbering warrior with ease, and brought down her own dagger. It pierced Bram’s armour, lodging itself in his upper back, and released an avalanche of crimson onto the chamber floor; Bram staggered back, sliding all over the pool of blood.

  Larkin watched all this take place within a matter of seconds. With his heart in his mouth, and his throat dry, he tried to prevent the warrior from falling. But it was futile: he was sapped of all his energy. Perhaps this was because he tried to fight using a blacksmithing tool. Whatever the reason, it had doomed him.

  The first thief descended upon the warrior’s back.

  “No!” Larkin cried, reaching out to grasp the thief. But to his amazement, the cloak slipped off the man like a cobweb, revealing that the adversary was in fact a muscular woman.

  She then lowered her head and dashed off through the broken wall into the open, swaying field. The second thief, seeing his companion desert, made a run for it too in the same direction. Larkin limped forward, clutching his side, and fell to his knees besides Bram. The warrior was coughing up blood but nevertheless kept up his huge signature grin. His eyes, bloodshot, remained fixed at the retreating thieves.

  “We need to stop them,” Bram said.

  “We will,” Larkin replied, placing his hand underneath the soldier’s neck. “How long does the bleeding usually last?”

  “Until it does,” Bram chuckled. “I don’t know... you should get out here.”

  “Not without you.”

  “But they’ll come back with reinforcements... Larkin, please...”

  “No!” snapped Larkin, tears swelling in his eyes. “I’m not leaving a friend behind.”

  “But the Hammer...”

  “Not without my friends!”

  Bram’s face contorted violently as he gripped the boy’s forearm. “I’m sorry for not protecting you... I thought that by protecting you I could...”

  “What?” Larkin asked.

  “...I could redeem myself...” Bram’s eyes fell shut.

  “Bram!” Larkin cried, shaking the warrior vigorously. “Wake up!”

  Larkin had done this. Because he was so obsessed with his becoming a great blacksmith, he had inadvertently ended the career of a great and noble warrior. Sure, Bram was not dead, for no one could die in the Realm; but whether he would ever be able to walk again, who could say? He lowered his head and wept in frustration.

  Moments later, just as he finally gave up all hope, he heard a hissing noise next to him. It was Anara using her Rune Etching skill.

  “What are you doing?” asked Larkin, wiping his eyes.

  “Just wait and see,” she said.

  As soon as she said this, the rune flashed pink. Gradually, the pool of blood became smaller, returning to the hole in the man’s upper back. Bram’s eyes shot open, and he gasped huge swathes of air, more than Larkin could ever hope to breathe at one time. He jumped up, his eyes immediately scanning the field where the thieves had run off to, and he stomped the floor with his boot.

  “Damn it,” he snarled.

  Larkin felt the energy return to him, but his mood remained low.

  “Where’s Mira?”

  Without turning to Larkin, Bram answered, “She’s stalking the guild as we speak.”

  "Do we even stand a chance?”

  Anara stood at the doorway, shaking her head. She struggled to listen to their defeatist talk. Her eyes drifted to the sack Mira had brought earlier.

  “So, you’ve been bested by a pair of thieves, and you want to give up?” she asked with a frown.

  “I stand no chance,” Larkin said grimly. “I’m only a crafter, after all.”