[Sultros Blades] The Mirrored Blade

by **Eanos** on September 9th, 2013, 4:41 pm

10 Fall, 513

Eanos hummed softly to himself, a subtle counterpoint to the hiss of charcoal against parchment. He had set himself a new task; that of replacing some of the display stock in the shop. This was likely to be a never ending process for it was important that the stock, which was not for sale, demonstrated the quality of what could be bought here. As his skill and knowledge expanded so too did the stock of demonstration weapons need to be refreshed to show it.

Currently the stock focused most heavily on daggers for they were quicker to make and yet demanded a similar level of skill in the making. In fact this was not entirely true yet those issues were not especially relevant as far as buyers were concerned and it was easier to make several daggers in a variety of finishes with a smaller number of swords to show off his abilities at there.

Simplicity of line was to be the touchstone of the new weapons. Weapons almost plain in their lines, ruthlessly efficient and yet outstanding in detail. It was an ongoing thorn in his side that he had not access to Isurian steel and one of these seasons he was going to have to rectify that lack. Until that point he was going to have to rely upon the skill of the miners and foundry workers that Ros employed to ensure that he had the best steels available to anyone on this continent. Fortunately both he and Ros shared the same employers so this was achievable.

This design was a continuation of one he had made before. In future he would also need to update the design that appealed most to the Knights so that their support was ongoing and continued.

The task was one that he looked forward to as sometimes the need to focus upon his djed studies distracted him from the purity of working on steel. He laid aside the charcoal stick and reviewed his list, mentally ticking off the items that he needed. All were routine and yet sometimes even the most obvious could be overlooked. Not this time though, and already he could see the finished item in his mind though as ever the exact pattern of the blade would only be revealed once the scale was removed and the surface ground out.

In one corner of the courtyard which contained the main forge stood a small shrine to Izurdin. It wasn’t fancy, in fact it was quite plain, but in there a small forge fire was always lit, at least when Eanos was in the city and keeping the flame pure was a task that he turned to without fail when he rose in the morning and the last thing at night.

”Lord Izurdin, I pray for your guidance in this task and I ask for your help in ensuring that it will be worthy of your name. I ask that you keep my mind clear and my hand firm and in return I will keep all distractions from my mind. Praise be to you Lord and let the time come when all will recognise you and offer you gratitude for your work.”

He stayed still for a short while as he attempted to clear his mind of all distractions and focus instead on the flame and heat of the small fire.

by **Eanos** on September 10th, 2013, 11:28 am

Out in the courtyard the forge flickered gently, the red light reflecting through the doorway and into the workshop where most of the finishing work was done. The morning was still quiet elsewhere in the Castle but Eanos paid it no mind for his quarters were here and except for the occasional purpose driven journey had little interest in what went on outside of his shop.

Clamped in his vice the file rasped loudly along the edges as the last of the forging scale and rust from storage was removed from the pieces of steel which had been sawn down to size. The metal glinted in the gloom, a flickering ruddy light which others might find oppressive and yet was comfortable to Eanos; yet another reason for not leaving the comforts of his forge where conditions reminded him well of his old home in far off Sultros.

The bright surface would already be rusting ever so lightly were he to look closely with his auristic vision and when he added heat the problem would accelerate and yet this was one of the facts of life for any smith, what mattered at this stage was that the metal was as clean enough that the flux which stood in a pot by the forge would suffice to remove the worst of what might now be created.

He laid the steel plates on the anvil and tapped his fingers on its surface, listening to the metallic chime that sounded from its depths in response. He cast his eye over the tools which awaited his need, each already checked, cleaned and with surfaces redressed as needed, and placed back in their alloted place; a task which closed each and every day, and nodded in satisfaction that tongs, files, chisels, hammers and the like were all ready.

A day like this was a just reward for a smith and his heart sang with joy at the prospect of simple yet careful work. The plates were the usual ones that he used for this and would allow the creation of several daggers or knives depending on the designs that took his fancy. The first was longer for it would serve as a handle, a convenience for the working rather than for any other purpose, and yet such were the parts of a smiths craft which might not be guessed by the one who might eventually own the weapons created.

The other pieces were as long as his hand, as wide as his finger and thin enough to bend with his left hand. The steel was of two forms of varying carbon content, their alloys clear in his minds eye from the previous day when he had inspected them for flaws. He brushed flux onto the handle plate and then coated also the first of the plates to be added alternately into a stack, the flux there to assist with keeping each plate to plate contact clean so that the metals could melt together without any flaws or intrusions which would ruin the integrity of the finished blade.

He laid the two plates, handle down in the forge, into a space cleared especially of the cooler surface coals, careful to minimise the dust and dirt of the fire. The bellows were pumped carefully as he watched the metals heat, the handle of the bottom piece drawing away some heat so that both changed colour at slightly different rates whilst the flux bubbled and boiled away. When he judged the colours right he squeezed the two together in the heat, carefully massaging them so that they fused and then pulled it back to the anvil where he worked it lightly back into shape and ready for the next piece.

by **Eanos** on September 10th, 2013, 1:01 pm

Slowly he added the remainder of the plates, following the same procedure with each until he had a sandwich of eight plates, all of which were now lightly welded together.

Now was the time when the real work began for he would transform this crude pile of welded plates into a thin blade made up of many, many layers, each so thin that they could barely be seen. He placed the billet of metal back in to heat and watched it carefully, turning it over so that it did so evenly, but it wasn’t welding heat that he needed this time, just hot enough to be able to work it.

As it heated he measured it carefully and made a mark along the top edge which was halfway along it’s edge. He slipped a hot cut chisel into the hardy hole of the anvil and brought the metal off the heat. After scrubbing it clean of scale and dirt he placed it face down on the chisel with the mark carefully aligned and hammered it down until it was nearly all the way cut through. He shifted it onto the edge of the anvil with the cut level and struck it cleanly with his left hand, bending it round, hit after hit and repositioning it as he did so until it was bent nearly double, the cut spread open. He scattered flux into where the metal was bent double and nearly touching and hammered the metal the last of the way so that the fluxed gap closed.

Now the handle projected out from the centre of a much shorter billet and he placed it back on the forge to heat close to white heat, this time back to welding temperature so that the billet could be welded back into a single mass and then hammered out back into the longer and thinner shape it had started.

The process was repeated, each fold doubling the number of layers, from eight through sixteen, then thirty two, then sixty four and finally a hundred and twenty eight. He could have continued but it became harder each time to keep things neat and eventually there was a risk that the folded layers would simply merge into a new alloy, losing the advantages that he sought, the primary of which for this piece was the visibility and decorative effect in the blade.

Satisfied with the overall dimensions and welding he brought the steel back up to heat and set it aside to cool in its own time so that the crystals which had been twisted and split apart would reform through the metal and be aligned with its new shape.

With the metal cooled and reset it was time to move on to the final preparation stage for now it was time to transform billet into blade. He placed it back on to heat and then with careful hammering drew it out so that it stretched, being careful to reduce it only in depth for he needed to keep the width the same as this was already close to the final dimension.

Stretching was a process that was hard to reverse and so he also kept a careful eye on all dimensions especially once the depth began to reduce. He struck off with the chisel the final length, putting the metal back in to heat and then normalise so that he could start to work on the blade itself. He tidied up the area and returned tools to their places, whispering a prayer of thanks to Izurdin for the successful completion of the task.

by **Eanos** on September 10th, 2013, 3:15 pm

The process so far was familiar and comfortable to the Isur, indeed the aim was not to learn something new, but rather to ensure that it was done to a higher level of skill than previously achieved.

With this in mind he concentrated as he pushed the metal around, changing the shape from a flat bar to one which had the profiles which would allow a cutting edge. In this he worked initially less with the hammer than he was wont and more with his hand, leaving the hammer for finer finishing work for this type of blade was not made without thought, it was the finest blade that Eanos could make and by using his arm he was able to incorporate an element of gnosis into the blade.

This blade was no mere cutting tool for the dining table, nor was it intended for cutting rope or shaving wood. This dagger was the counterpart to a much longer blade, a sword in fact. This dagger though, was independent, unlike the set which was very much on the mind of the smith as his next creation. It was not that a set could not be used independently, rather more that they all shared the same soul - for those who might believe in such things. More prosaically they should be created from the same batch of steel so that the patterns matched and share the same gnosis.

Since this dagger was in part a test run for that creation Eanos was more conscious than usual of his link with Izurdin as he worked and indeed deliberately used the arm more than he would have done. One day he might be favoured by a stronger link with the god and if he was then this would also become stronger as his ability to work steel was limited to when the metal was hot and thus softer - but no Isur, no matter how close to the God could finish fine work without resorting to tools for the final shaping.

The steel sat on his anvil the metal cool from the annealing, the bevels roughly shaped under the fingers of his left hand. He closed his eyes and concentrated, clearing his mind of all extraneous thoughts, at least for a few moments. He stayed still and waited for the new thoughts to occur and allowed them to drift away. He gave his concentration to his breathing, to the feel of the floor under his feet and the weight that pressed down, to the bones of his legs and the touch of the steel under his fingers, of the arm that linked them and the touch of the God.

He felt the warmth of that touch in his arm and he thought of the connection with the metal, linking in his mind that touch of the God with the metal. It was merely the first step, but when he lifted his fingers from the metal he could almost feel the faintest of links, could feel where the blade was, knew exactly how to move his fingers so that he would be touching it again.

His hand had forged the blade in the heart of the fire, had held it as it was shaped from sheets of metal into one and then into a bar and then a blade. Now it was the time for the first shaping, the time for care and the longest part of this journey. Now was when the blade would start to emerge from the darkness of the forge and shine with its own light.

by **Eanos** on September 12th, 2013, 2:00 pm

The steel was still relatively soft at that point in the process which was a necessary fact since there was still the final shaping to be completed. The overall profile was complete so now it actually looked like a blade, but it was a rough and misshapen one. The surface of the steel was marred by hammer blows and the thickness varied from one place to another. Since it was not possible at this stage to add metal at the thinner points, it would be necessary to remove metal from the thicker parts until the blade was as thin as the thinnest point. He hoped that he’d allowed enough metal for this to happen and had been careful in the later stages not to strike too hard so no deep hammer marks were left.

Accurate and level removal of metal with a file was one of the very first jobs that any Smith was required to master and Eanos was very confident in his abilities at it. He started with the bevel and mounted the spine of the blade in the jaws of the vice, then holding the handle and tip of the file carefully started making cutting strokes so that the fist base line was established. He didn’t want to remove too much metal at this point but he did want to give himself a guide line to work from.

Removing it from the vice he clamped it down to the workbench with a holdfast and set to work on the side of the spine. Keeping the file perfectly flat was always a challenge at first because the surface was rough, but he ensured that the movement all came from his hips and none from his arms. Quickly bright spots appeared along the spine as the file took metal from the high points. He worked at a measured pace, the file working smoothly across the surface, each time the bright areas becoming larger until they started to merge.

From time to time he stopped to check his progress and to ensure that the filing was producing not just a flat surface but one which was perfectly parralel to the other side, which was one reason he’d squared the back first. The spine would be reshaped before he was done but for now it was a key reference and for that reason he worked both sides until he had a measurable surface on each side which would lay flat on the bench and not tilt the blade or allow it to rock, neither of which would be conducive to accuracy on the other side.

With the spine and blade flat now created, albeit roughly and with minor marks that still needed to be worked out it was time to turn his attention to the bevel, deciding where to create the blade ridge and what the final shape of the point would be. There were many choices in blade point, which was a major reason that he preferred to craft weapons for owners and not for stock since it would be the owner who would dictate many of the design choices. This one he decided would have an armour piercing point, not so much to defeat the plate that the Knights might wear since few would have the strength of arm or wrist to do so, though it would punch through mail if the plate were carefully avoided, but rather to overcome the leather armour of the average brigand or raiding Drykas in the lands outside the Castle walls.

by **Eanos** on September 18th, 2013, 4:05 pm

For many a sword was just a sword, the differences between one or another a matter of weight or the way it was used. In many ways this was true, but expert swordsmen and smiths would probably disagree. Most swords were in fact made for inexpert swordsmen and ultimately were just sharpened steel sticks which were used to bludgeon other people, mostly where those people were not also armed with a sword and had even less training. In those situations the sword alone was often enough to swing the balance enough to allow the swordsman to win.

Some swords though had over the years seen improvements, both in design and construction, and it was such a design improvement that also carried down into this Tanto, benefiting from the advances in its bigger brothers.

Inherent in any blade was a design conflict. To cut and keep a sharp edge the blade needed to be hard, but hard steel was brittle and could shatter or chip. Soft steel would not break during a battle but might get cut through and might not be able to cut through armour. Various solutions were available to overcome this, but the most effective, at least in the opinion of Eanos was to use a differential hardening in the forging, not least because unlike the others the treatment was very controllable and could be repeated. No system was perfect, but the better smiths could ensure that a particular blade was as close to perfect as possible. This was of course an aim of Eanos; to be the best bladesmith at least this side of the Suvan Sea.

With the blade laid out in front of him with the still unsharpened edge towards him Eanos mixed the darker coloured clay thinly and spread it carefully along the edge. It was worth spending time to do this carefully as it was the first rough outline of the harmon, that part of the blade which would be of hardened steel. He worked the edge into a wave shape so that it would interlock with the softer steel then repeated it on the other side.

The thin coat of clay would encourage that side of the blade to cool quickly and he mixed the redder clay more thickly as it would provide a heat shield which would delay the water from cooling the blade giving a softer steel. He worked along the edge of the black clay first, creating more detail as he did so, allowing the red clay to overlap the black in places. A very good smith could do this without clay but Eanos was not yet confident enough to try that and in any case the smith lost control of the pattern when he did that.

With the overlap of the two clays done, he applied the clay thickly over the back of the blade so that it was completely covered in clay. A final rework of the red clay to include some fine runs down to the blade edge to limit the damage from chips and he was done and the clay left to dry overnight.

by **Perplexity** on October 18th, 2013, 2:43 pm

Riddled with Rewards!

Eanos

Organization	+2 XP
Planning	+1 XP
Philosophy	+1 XP
Blacksmithing	+2 XP
Weaponsmithing	+4 XP

Lores :

Notes :

Solo [Sultros Blades] The Mirrored Blade