Runic Apprentice

  Rune Mystic: Book One

  Author: D. L. Harrison

  Copyright 2020. This is a work of fiction. Names, Characters, Places and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales or persons living or dead, is entirely coincidental. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without permission.

  Table of Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Afterword:

  About the Author

  Other books by D. L. Harrison:

  Book Description

  Chapter One

  The waves of heat off the forge were suffocating, but Olin was well used to the sensation and had a smile on his face, even though his arms ached and he had a sheen of bright sweat covering his muscled body. The loud strikes of metal on metal reverberated as he held the cast iron tongs in his left hand to secure the cherry red steel, and as the hammer in his right hand fell over and over in quick succession. It was an almost Zen-like experience for the eighteen-year-old journeyman blacksmith.

  It’d been a long time coming, he’d managed to apprentice himself to the blacksmith four years ago. Apprentices got to do all the busy work, heating the forge, watching the master, keeping the place stocked with quenching oil and generally learning all the secrets of the trade, from the best color of red to work the steel, to the correct tones the metal made while being pounded.

  He’d learned how to mix the iron for the strongest steel swords and daggers, shields and armor, and many other small details required by the art which the average person in Bayside village knew nothing about. The secrets of the tradecraft that separated a dabbler from a true master smith.

  Two days ago, his master smith had declared him barely adequate to advance to journeyman, and he’d gotten started on his first sword. He’d made knives before, simple things, horseshoes, nails, hoes and other farming implements. This would be his first full sized weapon, and it was also the first time he’d be marking a creation of his with his chosen mark as a blacksmith.

  A blacksmith’s mark was something earned at the journeyman level, and only put on swords, armor, and daggers.

  He’d built the striker for that mark over the last year. A small metal rod, with an elaborate design on the end of it. During the finishing touches to the sword, he’d place the design end against the sword blade, hammer the end of the rod, and the sword while still malleable would be slightly indented in that design. His master had suggested he choose a simpler mark for his swords given the days of painstaking work he’d put into it, but his dedication and imagination had pushed him to create that mold the liquid metal had filled in to form the rod.

  The mark itself had a starburst pattern in the middle of it, surrounded by four other odd symbols, usually a maker’s mark was one symbol, not five tiny ones combined. The other four symbols spoke to him though, of sharpness, durability, speed, and strength, while the starburst pattern spoke of a joining of those four. Perhaps it was merely superstition, but Olin hadn’t given up on it.

  He cut no corners, and he poured his heart into each and every exacting detail of the process. He knew this first sword would make or break his reputation. A shoddy sword with his chosen symbol on it would mark him as a poor blacksmith to anyone that saw it. More than that though, his heart and mind wanted to make the best sword possible, and he didn’t begrudge the attention to detail or the backbreaking work to get it done. No, if anything being a blacksmith was a passion, a way of life for him, and he took pride and care in each stroke of the hammer.

  He needed it to be something he could be proud of having his mark on.

  He paused for a moment, the last strike of the hammer the sound was off, so he put the lump of metal being shaped into a sabre back into the fire and moved to pump the bellows and add new coal. The sword was almost finished, at least being shaped, he’d still need to temper it, sharpen it, polish it, and wrap the pommel.

  He reached out with his left hand, and he dipped the cup there into a bucket of water, and he drank his fill. A blacksmith’s shop was a hot place to work, and drinking enough water was paramount to the craft and keeping up his energy. A small detail he’d only skipped once as an apprentice, he’d never make that mistake again.

  Olin was six foot two, and had a wiry and quite defined body, being a blacksmith certainly led to having a healthy body. He had short brown hair, hazel eyes, and a naturally light tanned skin.

  He grimaced as his stomach gurgled, it was past dinnertime, but he didn’t want to quit until it was done. The steel had regained the perfect cherry glow he needed, and he lifted the tongs and hammer and got back to work. The rhythm of the strikes soothed his need, despite the pain in his arms, and less than an hour later the sword was finished.

  He lifted it with the tongs and dipped it into the oil, a loud hiss filled the room as the metal was quickly cooled. He lifted it out and dipped it into the water barrel next, to leach off the rest of the heat. He looked over at the grinding wheel, but he thought better of it. He was tired, hungry, and was loath to make a mistake. Even the greatest care and will toward detail could be overcome by a tired mind.

  He could finish it tomorrow.

  That first sword would be his to keep, and to display in the front of the store. He’d earned the materials as part of his apprenticeship along with the knowledge, food, and a place to lie his head at night, in trade of his hard labor the last three years.

  It would be more than just an advertising piece as well, but for protection. While most in the Kingdom of Reton were lawful, there were bandits and thieves about at times, and a blacksmith’s shop was full of valuable merchandise and tools of the trade. He’d not just learned forging the last three years, Master Cain had also taught him how to fight with weapons. Not like a true sword master in the military of course, but he knew enough to put down common rabble should they get up to mischief in their town.

  He moved into the back room of the shop, which was well ventilated and much cooler than the forge room, and he filled the tub with water from a basin that was flush with the back of the forge. Hot water filled the tub, and he stripped out of his sweat soaked clothes and slipped into the hot water. It helped to relax the hard-worked muscles, and of course he picked up the cake of soap and washed up.

  Ten minutes later, he felt much better, and cleaner, as he left the back of the shop and entered the house. The house was modest but nicer than most in the small village of Bayside. He was fortunate, most apprentices lived in the back of the forge room on a small cot with a bucket to clean up with. His master was generous, and as they had three bedrooms he’d been invited into the house as a young man.

  Blacksmiths, while not the wealthiest of merchants, did very well. The entry and living room had large windows, and well-built chairs from the carpenter down the street. Oil lamps hung on wall hooks, and there was even a small bookshelf on the wall, with a handful of books he’d read more than once.

  He moved through the room barely looking, and straight into the kitchen with sustenance on his mind. The table was bare, save a single plate with cold food, he must’ve worked later than he’d thought he had, since the blacksmith and his family had eaten already. He was sure to catch a reproving look for that, if not harsh words, in the morning.

  He’d just started to eat when Celane walked in, and she gave him a small but not cruel smirk. She was a year younger than him at seventeen, and quite attractive in his opinion, but also the master’s daughter. She had light blonde hair, warm gray eyes, high soft cheekbones, and lovely fair skin. More importantly, she was a good woman, there was no cruelty in her nature that he’d ever seen.

  They had somewhat of an understanding, but it was complicated, and he’d never even tasted her full tempting lips despite playing out that scenario in his mind more than once. Their society had strict courting rules, and he cared about her too much to damage her reputation, even if she was rather tempting at times. He couldn’t ask for her hand until he had money of his own to build them a home nearby. As a journeyman, he could start earning coin, and that wait wouldn’t be much longer.

  After a season’s work, he’d have more than enough to start laying a foundation.

  “Olin, I was beginning to think you’d left us,” she teased pointedly.

  He chuckled, “Sorry, Celane. Got a little caught up…”

  She interrupted playfully, “In your first sword ever, I get it.”

  “I missed you?” he teased back.

  In a way, she wasn’t ever very far from his thoughts, but when he was forging it was with focus, discipline, and a singlemindedness similar to a hunter’s focus while chasing his or her quarry. Daydreaming abo
ut Celane’s soft and alluring curves, and the mysteries under her dress while forging would only get him burned.

  She giggled, “Liar. Less silver-tongued talk, more eating.”

  He grinned, but he also started to eat.

  She sat down across from him with a relaxed smile, he wasn’t sure where his master Cain and his wife Evelyn were, but he didn’t sense them in the house. There was a trust in that, which he’d never betray, they’d treated him like family from the start, and he’d be forever grateful to that. He could still remember the time before he’d turned fourteen and talked an irascible Cain into taking him on as an apprentice.

  “What did I miss, that your parents aren’t home?”

  She grimaced, “Mages are in town, at the inn. They were summoned, I expect they’ll want weapons made.”

  Mages weren’t all that trusted by the common folk in the kingdom. However, true incidents were exceedingly rare, the mages worked directly for the king, and mages who abused their power weren’t tolerated. It was far more likely they’d have trouble with another commoner than with a mage. Despite that, mages were avoided whenever possible for good reason. He knew if a mage decided to kill him, for whatever reason, he’d be dead. A commoner had no chance in a fair fight against a mage, of any discipline. It was that nebulous fear more than anything real that led to that distrust and wariness in commoners, yet even knowing the source of that illogical fear didn’t make Olin immune to it himself.

  After all, that same fear should apply to the king’s soldiers, a normal man on the street had very little chance to defend against a man armed and armored, but it didn’t.

  “Do you know what kind?”

  He was just a little curious. There were seven types of mages, seven guilds. Every mage had a specialty. The most common were the four elements, water, earth, air, and fire. Although rarer, there were still plenty of life and death mages. The rarest mages were the rune mages, the seventh guild. There weren’t more than a couple of handfuls of rune mages currently known in the kingdom.

  She shook her head, “No. Life mage seems likely, if they’re looking for a blacksmith to make weapons.”

  Life mages made good healers, and they often were healers, but they were also powerful warriors. They could not only heal sickness or trauma, they could enhance their bodies with their magic, giving them more speed, accuracy, and strength, which made them absolutely deadly with any weapon, or even just hands and feet. They could also weaken their foes with a well-cast spell, or simply ensure their garden was healthy.

  It wasn’t something he thought about all that much though, it was just what it was. A mage of one of the four elements could be a swordsman or swordswoman too, but at no greater a proficiency than a commoner, so most of those didn’t bother. Their whole advantage was in throwing around their element using spells.

  Death mages freaked him out a bit, but they were no less respected than the others, as they had the power to talk to the dead, raise and control zombies, and other things.

  Rune mages were the most diverse, they could create rune spells in any of the other six spheres, but in a way, they were also the weakest as a result. They couldn’t cast spells at all, they could only power runes. If they didn’t have an object with a rune to do something they needed to do, they couldn’t do it. A rune mage stripped of their items would be helpless, but a naked fire mage could still roast an enemy with a few words and gestures.

  “You’re probably right.”

  He finished up dinner, and a warm lassitude from the full stomach and warm fire in the cast iron stove stole his wakefulness. He spent a little more time talking with Celane, but in the end he decided finding out what kind of deal Cain had made and the work ahead of them could wait until the morning. He said goodnight, and he made his way to his bedroom.

  There was a simple palette with bed linens in the corner, a small lockbox he’d built last season in anticipation of the time he’d start earning coin. There was also a small wardrobe with a few changes of clothes, and a small table with a candle. It wasn’t much, but it was home, and enough. He estimated it would take a couple of seasons, before he could start on his own house, and ask Cain for his daughter’s hand.

  It wasn’t much, but it was more than enough at the same time. He loved the work, the satisfaction at making something on the forge, and his place in the family and the village was almost assured. One day he’d inherit the forge, when Cain retired, and he’d truly be part of the family soon.

  Life was hard, but it was good, and he was more than content with his lot, gained through hard work and the sweat of his brow.

  Chapter Two

  “Good morning, master.”

  Cain replied, “Olin, nice work so far. I’ll need to use the forge today. Thanks for getting it ready.”

  He may have been a journeyman at that point, but he saw no reason at all not to continue to get the forge ready for work every morning. He wasn’t an apprentice, but Cain was most certainly still his master, and the master smith in the family. It’d take him years as a journeyman before he was declared a master smith. Although it was mostly practice to gain experience and to show competency to gain that appellation, strictly speaking his learning days as far as knowledge were behind him.

  He nodded, “Of course, master. I won’t need it until later, and even then, just to temper the blade.”

  There was only one anvil, but his master working on a project wouldn’t stop him from using the second set of tongs just to heat and cool his sword a few times. As it was, he needed to use the grinding wheel to sharpen the relatively dull edges and remove any small imperfections before doing that, so he grabbed the sword and sat at the wheel. His legs started to pump the pedals that turned the stone wheel.

  “What are you working on?”

  Cain replied, “A sword and dagger, for a new life mage. A slip of a girl named Caley. She hasn’t even been to the capital guild yet, some peacock life mage named Neal is escorting her there.”

  He snickered, then refocused before he started to grind off the least imperfection on his first sabre. The guilds had a shared small building in every village in Reton, but their major guild home was in the capital city where the king ruled from, Highspire. All seven of the guilds had a vast common rounded building, where food, supplies, workrooms, and the libraries for their arts were. There were seven towers evenly spaced around the large round building, which held the living areas for the members of the seven guilds. He wasn’t sure why they were kept separate like that, but they were.

  “Pretty feathers?”

  Cain snorted, “Like you wouldn’t believe, the idiot obviously sculpted himself with magic. He doesn’t even look real. He’s prettier than Evelyn for goodness sake.”

  Obviously, what was said in the forge room, stayed in the forge room. It wasn’t wise to disrespect a mage. Nor was it wise to tell a wife a male mage was prettier. He snickered, then he laughed rather hard, carefully holding the sword away from the grind stone until he got control of himself.

  He pushed the visual that brought up in his head away, and then got to work on his sword again. It took a few hours of painstaking work in detail, but he was finally satisfied with it, and walked over and placed it in the fire. After being tempered for most of the rest of the day, he’d sharpen it once more, attach the hilt for fine balance, do some stress tests to make sure it tempered correctly and would bend but not break, and then finally stamp his mark on the base of the blade.

  The two of them had been together for over three years, and they worked almost as one in the relatively small forge, not getting in each other’s way. He filled up the quiet parts by doing some prep work for his master, as he’d always done in the past. That didn’t change, but the fact that he’d be earning money for his labor was a new concept for him.

  At the end of the day, the sword looked just about perfect, and to his relief it didn’t break when put into the vise and stress tested. It was thirty-three and a half inches long of shining steel, the perfect size for his height, for a sabre anyway. It was light, compared to a hammer, but it definitely had some weight. He’d be very fast with it, if the occasion to fight ever arose. Much faster than with a longsword, which was important. If he ever needed to defend his life, it wasn’t as if he wore armor, which meant he needed to be light and nimble.