Flashback A Day for the Forge

[Gadir Armband Pitrius]

Summer 56, 505 Gadir entered the forge, grabbing his hammer off the hook against the wall, and walking to his anvil. The forge belonged officially to the Pitrius clan, but in general it was run by a single family which had been in charge of the forge for generations. It was the main place to apprentice young children to, since it was regularly busy with orders either for the Silver Tower, for the inner city Pitrius vendors, or vendors abroad. Being one of the senior apprentices, Gadir was allowed somewhat free reign of his work, but it was all subject to review by the Master of the forge. Coming over to his anvil, he pulled down a small piece of parchment with his list of orders of the day. 5 spear heads. 2 pickax tops. And the piece of resistance, a pulverizer casing and handle. A rather typical day, Gadir pressed the bellows to stoke the already somewhat well lit fire, opened the metal door to the fire itself, and placed the first of the metal pieces for the spear heads in the fire. From there, it was just waiting, which for a blacksmith entailed cleaning. Grabbing an oiled rag, Gadir wiped down the anvil, followed by the tongs and hammers. Tossing the rag back into a communal bucket, Gadir grabbed the tongs again, and pulled his yellow-orange piece of metal out. It currently resembled half of a hexagon, a precut shape for making a spear head. Gadir placed most of the piece on top of the anvil face, with a triangular portion hanging over. Holding it with the tongs, Gadir then took a hammer in his right hand and hit the metal on the triangular portion twice, bending the metal into a rough 90 degree angle. Flipping the piece over and entirely on the anvil face, Gadir made quick work of hammering the triangle into a folded over section on the main spear head. He then took the opposite side of the piece, and hammered a similar triangular fold over the same direction. Placing the cooling single triangle pattern back into the fire, Gadir waited for it to resume the “forging color” before removing it. He began hammering the folds tight against the main spear point, giving it extra width. From there, Gadir hammered repeatedly around the very edges for the blade, pressing the metal thinner and thinner. Picking it up in the tongs, Gadir dipped it in the water bucket, steam instantly hissing as the hot metal touched. Giving it a minute, Gadir pulled the very basic spear head out and back on the anvil for the finishing process. After putting the spear head in the vice, Gadir took a file to the edges, shaving and thinning the blade even more, before placing it in a box for his complete projects. And he began on the next. His skin began to sweat in the hot forge, dripping annoyingly towards his eyes. More than once Gadir dunked his head in the water bucket for some relief after finishing his immediate project. Today promised to be a long day. Sooner then he knew however, the basic spear heads were complete, 5 of them in his box, waiting to be applied with a rust preventative glaze. Which meant it was time to create the pickax tops. Dropping several pieces of metal into the forge, Gadir waited. Then he pulled out two metal rods, and small rectangular flat piece from the forge, the coloring close to perfect. Taking first the rectangular piece, he hammered it around the horn, creating a small oval ring, roughly an inch tall. Hammering the two ends together took time, considering they had to fuse together. Tossing that piece back into the fire, he moved onto the rods, hammering one end of each down flat, before turning it sideways and hammering the spread out metal back down to form a blunt chisel edge. Repeating this process multiple times on each rod, he formed the pick ends, designed to penetrate and crack rock. But who knew how well it’d really go. From there, Gadir reheated the rods, and took the un-hammered ends and hammered them to his circle of metal, connecting the pick ends to the shaft connecter. Dipping the entire thing in water, it hissed and solidified, creating a pickax head. He repeated this process before groaning at his next challenge. The pulverizer handle was rather simple. Take a metal rod, heat it, bend it one, then again the other direction creating a crank style handle, and douse it. But the shell itself required a sheet of metal to be heated, and then worked. Taking the large sheet, Gadir used the forge’s fire gloves, and hammered the top two inches of it outward at a rough 60 degree angle. It took repeated tries to keep that angle consistent along the entire top edge, but it eventually was done. From there, Gadir reheated the sheet, and then using the fire gloves bent the metal into a tube shape, hammering the side of the tube to itself to hold. Taking some time to do this around the horn of the anvil, Gadir did finally manage a rough shell for the pulverizer, which he doused in water and placed in his work bin with the rest. Putting the communal fire gloves back on the hook, he took his works to the finishing station, and began the relaxing process of brushing the final glaze and waterproofing mixture over each of his pieces, before letting them dry in the heavy heat of the forge. Putting his basket of completed items, pinning the list to the front of it to identify it, he happily set his hammer up for the day and left the forge, his time for the anvil up, and open for the next apprentice’s work.