Minoc’s forge was quieter than usual tonight, just the crackle of coals and the occasional groan of the bellows breathing its last heat into the dark. I sat on the anvil’s edge, boots scuffed with dust from the mines near the mountain pass, pack heavy with nearly fifty ingots I’d wrestled from the stone all afternoon. My arms ached in that honest way—not the sharp sting of injury, but the deep, dull throb that says you’ve earned your supper. The weight in my pack pulled at my shoulders even now, a steady companion, like the memory of each strike of the pickaxe biting into the seam of iron deep beneath the earth.
I can still feel it—the jolt up the shaft when the pick hit just right, that solid clang echoing in the narrow tunnel, sending sparks flying even in the dark. My hands knew the rhythm: swing, chip, gather, repeat. One pocket of ore resisted harder than the rest, stubborn as a mule in a mud pit. I must’ve struck it a dozen times before it cracked open, revealing that rich, dark seam glistening like wet stone in my lantern’s glow. That moment—when the rock gives way and the metal shines back at you—it’s like the mountain itself is whispering secrets. I knelt there, brushing dust from the vein with my glove, thinking how strange it is that something so cold and hard can feel so alive when it finally yields.
I sold most of the lot to Old Brannon at the smithy near the stables. He didn’t haggle much, just grunted and weighed them on his rusty scale, the chain creaking under the load. “Good weight, Grimm,” he said, sliding the gold across the counter—thirteen pieces, enough to keep the forge fed and my belly fuller than most nights. There’s comfort in that exchange, in the clink of coin traded for honest labor. It’s not just gold—it’s proof the work mattered.
Tomorrow, I think I’ll take the path west, past the old quarry. Rumor says there’s a fresh seam opening near there, less picked-over than Minoc’s bones. My pick’s chipped, but it’s still got life. And so do I.
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