There has to be some special property to it. Something I’m not seeing. My knuckles turn white and my brow furrows as I stare at the two pieces of metal in my hand. They do nothing.
I either have no idea what I’m doing, or my theory is totally wrong. Either is possible. I purse my lips and think back to the door. A piece that large… I drop the ingot I just made. It rings out with the pitch of pure silver and dents just as easily. I didn’t change the properties of it at all with my blood.
The door had some other alloy in the metal to strengthen it. It must’ve. This time I put the bar back into the crucible along with iron, carbon, and limestone. More blood. And back on the heat.
As I’m waiting for the metal to rise to temp and meld together, I walk the perimeter of the smithy, repeating the thoughts of the woman from my dream.
“The smith has the right alloy now. We can test it with new daggers during the next full moon.”
Folding my arms, I lean against one of the walls in the back corner, tapping against my biceps.
“All right, Floriane, accept that your blood holds magic as much as theirs does.” I hammer the kinks of my doubt away with forceful words. “Good. Now, what do you know about magic in the blood?”
Two things—that all vampir can see the future using it, and that some vampir have unique abilities beyond that.
“But you are not a vampir,” I continue over the crackling of the hearth. Drew told me once about the record keepers in the fortress, using their quills to record and sort their thoughts. For me, the sound of my own voice is far better than any pen and parchment. “You cannot see the future…but you might still have some innate ability?” I’m not sure, but the logic seems sound since I am bloodsworn to Ruvan. That might have awoken some power within me.
“If that dream wasn’t the future…then perhaps it was the past?” I push away from the wall.
The smith has the right alloy now. Was that person referencing the smith who worked this smithy? I begin walking again, running my fingertips lightly along the walls, feeling for any changes in the stone.
A few stones jut out awkwardly, but result in nothing. I need to run back to my metal work before I can continue searching.
Trial and error. I spend the day bouncing between tending to the forge and scanning the walls as my silver supply dwindles. As the sun begins to set, I wipe sweat from my brow. I’m close, I can hear the whispers of my ancestors saying so. I’m on the cusp of something great.
When I run out of silver, I only have a small back corner of the room left to inspect. I don’t expect much when my fingers fall into a lock set deep in the stone—hidden by shadow. Heart racing, I inspect it and quickly set about breaking it. It’s nothing compared to my grandmother’s lock in my family’s smithy.
A concealed door swings open, revealing a narrow space lit amber by the day’s last rays filtering through a dusty window high up in the back of the room. I had been hunting for a storeroom like my family’s—somewhere that might be holding extra silver—but this is even better. It’s an office.
Unlike my family, which passed down all our techniques and recipes orally, this past smith seemed to be as much of a record keeper as the woman in the workshop. Dusty tomes are stacked on shelves above an orderly desk. Two leather books slumber side by side underneath a heavy blanket of dust.
“And what are you?” I whisper.
The ledger to the right is a record of all the metals heading in and out of the smithy.
But, to the left… “A record book.”
I slowly leaf through the pages. My chest grows tight. I shift my weight restlessly from foot to foot.This is it, this is it!I scream inside.
Sure enough, laid out neatly is a series of notes on how to make the blood silver—a metal designed to both channel and store magic in the blood. I wasn’t too far off in my attempts, all things considered. Only one or two adjustments. I would’ve been able to make it on my own, but this saves so much time.
I bite my lip and scan the office, though there’s not much to be found other than the books. No silver. Each experiment took only a little of the metal, but I’ve been working as though I’m possessed. I worry the ring around my pinky. Sliding it off feels like I’m removing a piece of myself. Like I am betraying my family.
“You’d understand, right?” I whisper to the piece, wondering if Drew can somehow hear me. “You would,” I reassure myself before I head back to the forge to place the ring into the crucible, and put the crucible on the fire before I can second-guess myself.
My chest is tight as I watch the ring melt—the first piece I ever made, a gift for my brother and me to share. Emotion fills me and pours out with the blood from my arm. As I work, I weep for my family. Every strike of my hammer is a worry. Again and again they repeat.
Will Drew forgive me for all I’ve done? Will Mother? Will they recognize me when I return?IfI return…
I’m not even striking the metal anymore. I’m hitting the anvil. Vision blurry. I wipe my eyes and nose, sniffling heavily.
I don’t even remember making the blood steel dagger when I’m done. It’s not my best work, but it doesn’t need to be. I’m not going to spend time honing a weapon made purely for experimentation.
I drop the dagger first. It doesn’t dent; it holds its shape. The resonance it makes is delightfully similar to the disk. I try not to allow myself to get too excited, but it’s hard not to when the fruits of my labors are taking shape right before my eyes.
The color is off, slightly. The disk is a brighter silver—slightly duller than a pure silver ingot, and the lines in it are subtle. But my dagger is boldly swirled with what looks almost like rust. I hold up my left arm, dagger in my right hand. I’ve cut myself more times tonight than a bad night sparring with Drew. But every wound has been worth it, even if my healing has slowed as the hours ticked by and Ruvan’s blood has begun to fade from my veins.
But even without his blood in me, there is still magic. I just need the right tool to harness it. I draw the blade against my forearm. I gasp sharply, but not with pain.
