Moon’s been up near two hours when I finally staggered out of the East Mine tunnel, pickaxe slung over my shoulder and nearly fifty ingots clanking in my pack. The air was thick with dust and the damp chill of deep stone, and my arms burned like I’d been wrestling drakes instead of swinging iron. Minoc’s torches flickered in the distance, golden and warm against the dark hills, and I kept my eyes on them like a drunkard on his last pint. Forty-seven trips to the vein, I reckon, and not once did the rock give easy. That last swing—I remember it clear—my pick struck true, sparked blue off the seam, and the ore cracked loose with a sound like a dry bone snapping. Felt good. Felt earned.
I hauled the ore to the mine forge just past the picket gate, where the heat still hums even at this hour. The firepit was low, but I coaxed it up with kindling and bellows, sweat already stinging my eyes. Twenty-four ingots the first melt, then twenty-two more—glowing yellow-orange, bubbling like angry soup. The tongs slipped once, damn near lost a bar into the ash, and I cursed loud enough to wake the goats on the ridge. Third batch failed, though. Cold iron. I stared into the flames, wondering if it was the ore or my hands that had gone weak. Maybe both.
Sitting now at the tavern bench, I can still feel the weight of those ingots—how they pulled at my shoulders, how they clinked like promises with every step toward the blacksmith’s stall. Old Man Harken took them without counting, just nodded and slipped me gold—enough to eat, to drink, to sharpen my pick again tomorrow.
Come dawn, I’m heading back. There’s a new seam singing under my boots when I walk that tunnel. I hear it. And Harken’s never turned down good iron.
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