“Must you joke about everything?”
“Life is easier with a sense of humor, don’t you think?” His familiar lopsided smile and easy manner make my heart squeeze. Sands, I’ve missed them both. Fighting the urge to throw myself athim like a desperate fool, I reach for a nearby cloth and drag it across my face.
“Need some help?” he asks, eyeing the metal that I’ve just stuck back into the forge and the plethora of tools spread out around me.
After a beat of hesitation, I nod. I’ve been trying to hammer this sword for the better part of an hour and failing. While blacksmithing takes brute strength, it also takes finesse, and I’m sorely lacking in the latter at the moment.
Licking dry lips, I clear my throat. “Something’s wrong with the kiln. Or the metal. All I’m managing to do is leave hammer prints instead of flattening it, and I end up breaking it. The heat isn’t distributed like my forge in Coban.”
He cocks his head in thought. “That could be. Different cities have different types of design and fuel. Maybe it’s not hot enough. Or this metal might have a higher vanadium content, which makes it tough and fine-grained.” Roshan squints at the fire. “You have to look at the color.”
I lift an irritated brow. “I know. It’s red.”
“Can I...?” Roshan stoops down, crouching in front of the forge, wedging himself between the wall and me. I try not to notice how crammed we are in the narrow space, but it’s nearly impossible not to be aware of his long, lean body hunched down next to mine. He grabs one of my tongs and reaches into the kiln, poking at the glowing blade. “With this particular kiln, I think we should wait until the blade gets to dark orange.”
“Be careful,” I tell him, my eyes narrowing as a few embers pop. “It’s been sparking like that all morning. I wouldn’t want you to get burned.”
At that, I cringe in mortification. Ashes below, how fucking oblivious am I?
“Me, either.” Though he says it with a smile in his voice. “Have you cleaned out the ash trap? That can increase the sparks.”
“Yes. Twice.”
I suck in a breath as he shifts the metal, but Roshan does everything with an innate confidence and ease. I wonder if the man even knows how to fail. That gnawing sense of despair burrows through me again... probably the whole reason I keep breaking the sandsdamned steel. I bet if he had this magic, he’d have learned how to control it, wield it, and master it by now.
Roshan’s attention is currently occupied with the blade in the furnace, but we’ve danced around the star-cursed monster I am for days. A Starkeeper with a simurgh as its immortal, magical form. A firebird of death and rebirth. Destruction and hope tangled in one. The significance of the creature doesn’t escape my notice—my mother had called me that ever since I was a little girl. How I wish she were here now.
“See? That’s now a nice burnt orange color,” Roshan announces, drawing my attention back to him. “Guess we’ll know once we start hammering. May I?”
He grins at me, and warmth unspools in my belly. Deep down, I know I’m being selfish by not pushing him away more firmly, but I can’t bring myself to do it. I watch as he carefully removes the glowing shaft and places it onto the anvil. The muscles in his back and arms flex as he hammers the hot steel with an even, consistent stroke.
“Roshan,” I ask softly, “did your stories ever mention what happened after the star warrior purged the evil from the world during the war of the gods?”
He falters midstrike as if surprised at the question. “The world was reborn anew.”
“But did everyone... die... for that to happen?”
“I don’t know.” He glances at me, his brow furrowing, and resumes his hammering one inch at a time along the length of the steel, flipping it over every few strokes. “It’s probably metaphorical, phoenix rising from the ashes and all that. Why? What’s wrong?”
I’m startled by his mention of the phoenix and the crone’s mention of the simurgh, both similar legendary, mystical creatures. I take a beat and ask the question that’s been bothering me the most. “What do you know of Fero?”
His gaze is troubled when it lifts to mine. “He was Saru’s twin brother—the god of destruction and darkness. He was the one the Starkeeper banished with his magic.”
The knots in my stomach turn into full-on serpentine coils.
“Why do you ask?” Roshan asks.
“No reason.”
He will be reborn from the void and wreak his vengeance.
Roshan looks unconvinced but lets it go. Finishing the round of hammering, he holds the thinned metal up. “This looks good, I think.”
I give it a critical once-over but see no obvious faults. His smirk is triumphant.
“Behold, the lord of steel,” he says, winking at me.
“The ego on you,” I say with a small smile. “But yes, well done.”
