Edges withing Edges...

He grinned and hummed to himself, each blow of his hammer pounding out a counterbeat that made some small sense to him. Even a trained blacksmith might consider his actions chaotic while he worked, but there was no denying that this was a Master at work.

The Master shaped the demunative piece of metal quickly, more quickly than a human would for eons to come, when steam powered mechantry might come close, but even with such machinery, it would be a while before any human would be able to control the heat, the mixture of alloy, the rate of cooling and more while losing as little steel to firescale as possible. The Trolls had asaying, "Forge Thick, Grind Thin" that had become a fundamental Rule of the Forge. Most ordinary beings had to follow this rule, as the balace between heat, speed, and oxidation was a delicate dance that would result in the ruination of a blade if a metalsmith pushed too far. For this old Master, grinding was a waste of fine steel, and indeed if he could not finish a piece with a simple polishing and sharpening if it needed it, the piece would simply become feedstock for the next workpiece, regardless of the number of work-hours that were spent on it.

Two moons ago, a rather ornate piece he had spent the better part of the last turn of the seasons on went into the melting pot due to a small inclusion on an inside leg. The imperfection would have gone unnoticed by anyone: it was almost too small to see, it did not weaken the peice at all, and the time invested was beyond significant. While difficult to say what the object was intended to do, it was a thing of beauty, flowing lines folded in and among themselves in layers of brightmetal, bronze, gold, and even inlaid silver filegri... and would have brought tears to anyone as he lowered it into his foundry, smelting it into a new ingot, which became his current workpiece.

It was small. Very small. Even by Elvin standards it seemed more ornamental than functional, but it gleamed even as he beat it into shape.

He plunged it into the slack tank and set down to inspect and polish it. He rubbed it here and there, evening out a slight distortion in the surface only he could see. When he was satisfied, he dug out a stone and a leather strap, and proceeded to put an edge on the blade.

Continuing on with his work, he placed an unusual handle on the tang. Apparently, this blade was intended to be wielded from between two fingers, allowing the user to extend it straight out from their body without straining their wrist.

The handle had been preformed at an earlier time, and the twisted face of the old master broke into a toothy smile as he attached it, pinned it, bound it, and finally placed the finished tool in a scabbard he had aleady made for it, as though this was a replacement blade he had made before.

It went without saying the old Master was a bellows short of a proper hearth, making things out of order in a workspace both cramped and spacious, organized and disordered, his body both whole and broken. One could not expect such a creature to make much sense, which made it all the more disturbing to see what he could create. Things of such beauty and utility in perfect balance... it might drive another to drink to ponder such things.

He mumbled some cheery thing to himself. Some part of him actually enjoyed making gifts for others, even if such gifts held such dubious gains as he intended. His mind swam with the duality of possibilities that the finder of this item might consider for it. The Trolls would find value in it, for certain, as they valued everything: intrinsic value, lessons to be learned from him, utility. The Elves would find some utility, and perhaps some symbolic value as well. The Humans might grunt a lot and fight over it, or throw it away fir being too small.... none of them would guess what secrets it held. Few things he left for other to find were what they seemed.

He chuckled. This 'Second Moon' indeed had secrets, and its own hidden treasure, free for those who could see it. A gift that seemed to have one edge, but had two, like its creator....

This was a great read. I've always enjoyed your stories about Two Edge. You really capture him well.

Wow. Do you know blacksmithing yourself or did you research it for your writing? I love to see that kind of detail.

And I want to see what havoc this Second Moon will create.

Thanks Luna!

I have a bit of interest in metalworking but Im not quite set up yet to tackle it. I have ground a few knife blades but dont have a forge set up yet. I do like beating metal, though, and do my own body work on my jeeps. Im glad you enjoyed it, Manga.

Encourages me to write some more. As I have a blank cut out for a New Moon replica I started a couple of years ago, perhaps Ill have to dig it out and see where it takes me.

Gotta second what manga pointed out Do you do this stuff for a living!?

There is some Japanese metal art where they aneal (if I'm remembering the term right) several sheets of different metals together, then heat and twist and heat and twist until they've got a hunk of metal as grained as wood. It's fascinating and I wish I remembered what it is called. I think you and Two-Edge would love it.

I do want to develop metal forging as a hobby, but Im not there yet. I tried hammer-welding a couple of pieces of nickle steel together, but failed miserably... though from what I understand the steel I tried to use is the hardest type of steel to work with: if it gets too hot it "hot shorts" and fractures, too cold and it doesnt do anything at all.

My co-worker' father is a knifemaker and gave me several pieces of nickle steel of the type they use in modern "damascus" type knife making (also known as pattern welding, similar to the Japanese method you mentioned), which I would love to master, but it is daunting to know he has spent 450 hours on a single blade witbout any garantee it would come out right. He has spent similar amounts of time on knives he has had to throw away because the metal didnt form right. Still, the amazing patterns that can be formed through pattern welding is amazing.

If you look up pattern welded knives or pick up a copy of Blade magazine, jist a note: those patterns you see in the steel are actually IN the metal: two or more types of carbon and nickle steels layered together, beaten into a single piece, cut and re-welded or folded, and acid washed to show the grain structure: the bright areas are nickle, the dark areas are carbon steel, and the pattern goes through the blade: grind half the metal away and the pattern would still be there!

I do have some cheesy blades I started (most on my thread at the old forums), Ill try to get pictures of if you want.