Kael stood in front of a large stone building with two pillars of smoke climbing toward the sky.
Upon explaining to Yvette who he was meeting, she had decided to stay behind. Not unexpected, given that Rosalie had been exiled from the city. There was nothing written in stone about the consequences of maintaining contact with someone exiled, but the risk was real enough that most people didn't test it.
The hinges were rusty, but the handle was nearly polished smooth from regular use.
The heat reached him the moment he stepped inside. He removed his gloves as he continued deeper.
Was it a little rude to walk into someone's house uninvited? Yes. But he didn't have another option.
The interior was well kept and lived in. Colourful carpets covered the floor and the walls held everything from forged knives to shovels, arranged with care.
He pushed open a dark wooden door and another wave of heat washed over him, many times stronger than the first.
"Just make sure they're done before the ball."
A deep male voice, from somewhere around the corner.
"Shouldn't be a problem."
A woman answered.
Kael walked around the corner and folded his hands behind his back.
It was a forge, and a large one. The entire building had been constructed against the foot of a mountain, and the reason became immediately clear. Where the rock met the house a blue flame danced slowly in the open air, radiating heat that spread through every room. Around it the stone had crystallised into something clear and blue, close to tanzanite but not quite the same.
Both of them turned at the intrusion.
Rosalie's face was streaked with soot that did nothing to conceal her natural beauty. A well worn apron covered her front, with burn marks scattered across it. Her hair was brunette that shifted to blond toward the ends. Her green eyes found Kael and stayed there.
Kael's eyes moved over her once and settled on the man beside her.
He was considerably taller than Kael. Black hair parted cleanly down the middle, medium length. He couldn't have been many years older, but he looked like he had lived several lifetimes in those years. Dark circles sat deep beneath his eyes and a long scar ran across his face from cheekbone over the bridge of his nose.
But neither of them was what stopped Kael's gaze.
It was the cape.
It was covered in gold from collar to hem. Golden chains moved shoulder to shoulder in slow arcs. Polished amber stones caught the forge light and scattered it with every breath the man took. There was only one place on the entire garment left uncovered, a deliberate absence just above the chest.
Kael raised his chin slowly and lifted both hands.
"I'm here for personal business. Nothing else."
His eyes went cold.
The crest depicted an eclipsed sun wearing a crown. Unlike Kael's, it hadn't been woven from a single thread. Multiple threads had been used, red, gold and black intertwined to bring it to life in a way that no ordinary noble crest was permitted to replicate.
There was only one family allowed to do that without a death sentence attached to it.
The Royal Noble family.
A golden feather materialised around the man, a trail of gold dust falling from it like a waterfall moving at half the speed of the world.
The man snapped his fingers once.
The feather shot forward.
Kael snapped his head to the side and felt it whistle past his ear close enough to graze the air against his skin. It disappeared into the hallway. A beat of silence. Then a sharp turn and it was coming back, faster this time, aimed at the centre of his chest.
Kael shot his hand up and closed his fingers around it.
It squirmed. Twisted. Pulled against his grip with something that felt disturbingly like panic, almost a whimper compressed into movement rather than sound.
Then the cold arrived.
It started at his palm and spread outward slowly, moving up his fingers and across the back of his hand. The skin began to turn gold, layer by layer, each one flaking away as the next formed beneath it. An endless process. Like something that had no concept of being stopped.
Kael opened his fingers and let the feather go. He brushed the formed gold from his hand without urgency and watched it drift to the floor.
"Interesting mote." He said, his voice entirely level. "It shares some traits with a mote I once had"
He looked up at the man.
"Turning things gold isn't quite the same as turning them to gold though, is it. Otherwise that floor would be worth considerably more than it is."
Not a flicker of amusement crossed the man's face.
"Is it common practice to attack nobles without provocation?" Kael asked with complete confidence. "That's a crime, isn't it?"
The man was most likely a representative of the Royal Noble family rather than an actual member. They wouldn't spend their time visiting low ranking smiths. But even so, he carried the backing of one of the four superpowers behind every move he made.
"Seeking out someone who has been exiled is also a crime."
"And yet here you are." Kael said.
He was just about to activate a mote when he sighed inwardly.
"I'm so sorry. We've gotten off on entirely the wrong foot."
He said it with a warm smile and a soft laugh, extending his hand.
The man swatted it aside.
"You're beneath me."
The smile disappeared. Kael's eyes went the same empty cold and the warmth left his face as though it had never been there.
He folded his hands behind his back and took a few measured steps back.
"Very well. I won't argue with someone of your standing. But I do have personal business with Rosalie."
"She's exiled."
"Exiled?" Kael let a note of disbelief into his voice. "She was never convicted of anything. The only thing she ever did was win a competition that noble candidates also entered."
The man turned to Rosalie.
"Do you know him?"
"No, of course not!" She said it quickly, the panic visible.
"I'll make this quick." The man turned back.
Kael produced a card and rolled it between his fingers.
"The moment you move toward me, I kill Rosalie."
The man's eyes narrowed. "Is that a direct threat against the Royal Noble family?"
"Against the Royal Noble family? No. Against their lapdog? Yes."
A silence.
The man considered him for a long moment before his posture shifted, something in him relaxing into a more measured calm.
"You're right. Rosalie was never officially exiled. Killing you would be a technical error."
Kael flicked the card into the flame with a crack and crossed his arms.
"So you're a man of reason after all."
"I'll leave you both to it. But know that she is to prioritise the Royal Noble family's wishes above all else."
"Naturally." Kael said, with a small bow.
He watched the man disappear into the hallway before turning to Rosalie. She was visibly shaken, still holding whatever she had been holding before all of it started.
"I apologise for that." Kael said quietly, sitting down on the anvil beside her. "He said something disrespectful about my family. I had to be a little loud."
An obvious lie. Kael couldn't have cared less what anyone said about him or his family.
"Are you alright?"
It took her a moment to collect herself. Eventually she nodded.
She was completely different from what he had expected. Perhaps because of the Royal Noble family's involvement, or because an entire city had turned against her, he had imagined someone hardened by accumulated hardship. What he found instead was a girl in her late teens who looked like she might still be finding her footing in the world.
Everything made more sense now. Her craft was already beginning to carry real value on its own, and the Royal Noble family had taken personal interest in protecting that value. Hence the house built carefully around an ember moth's flame to give her the exact conditions her work required. Hence the quality of the building itself. Something most people spent their lives dreaming about and never reached.
Kael gave her shoulder a brief gentle squeeze and stood.
"I'll make some tea."
Standing in the kitchen he found himself thinking about Jian's tea. How, genuinely, did the man always manage to make it bitter? Every single time.
He carried the cups back and handed one to her.
"What are the Royals pushing on you at the moment?"
She fiddled with the cup. "Just some cutlery for an event."
Kael shook his head slowly. "Give me a break. How shameless can they be!"
Rosalie didn't quite know how to respond. She wasn't brave enough or foolish enough to complain about the Royal Noble family openly, but she didn't want to contradict him either. He was a complete stranger who had just threatened to kill her in her own forge.
"They treat me well. And the event matters a great deal to them. I don't really mind."
"You're just too kind." Kael said. "That's all."
He kept the conversation light as they talked, and she opened up gradually like people do when they realise nobody is going to use what they say against them. Almost an hour passed without either of them noticing.
"Yeah…" Rosalie said with a small sigh. "That's what my father always told me."
Kael studied her for a moment.
"I've looked into some of your work. I'm genuinely in awe of what you can do."
She blushed and scratched the back of her neck. "No, nothing like that. I just get lucky with the metal sometimes."
"Everyone thinks talent is a matter of luck." Kael said with a quiet smile. "Nobody thinks luck could be a matter of talent."
He flicked her forehead gently.
She gasped and pressed both hands to the spot. "Hey! What was that for?"
"Just forcing some sense into you."
"So." She composed herself. "You had some work you wanted done?"
"Right." Kael reached out his hand and summoned the Asterite from the Stone Coffin. She was rank one, so he was confident she wouldn't detect the soul pathway aura. He was also testing her.
"Are you familiar with Asterite?"
"I— yes. Of course I am! How could I not be?" She grabbed the metal and her eyes lit up immediately. "You want me to work with this?"
"If it's possible. I'll pay, of course."
She shook her head hard enough that her ponytail whipped around.
"No. Absolutely not. I never get the chance to work with this."
Kael didn't argue. Cheaper for him, and it wasn't as though she had anywhere to spend it out here anyway.
"Think you can do it?"
She nodded eagerly and fell into thought.
"What do you want made?"
"A sword."
She paused. "A sword? Decorative?"
"Fully functional."
She stood up and began pacing in tight circles.
"Did you know Asterite is almost never actually used for weapons?"
Kael leaned back and looked up at her. He hadn't known that.
"Is that so?"
She nodded. "Because Asterite is so demanding when it comes to forging conditions, you almost never get it to reach its full hardness."
"I've read that even below full hardness it still surpasses every other material considerably."
"It does!" Rosalie's eyes lit up again. "But it behaves like tempered glass. The moment it chips it tends to shatter entirely on the next impact."
"So it's unusable for practical weapons?"
"Not entirely. Nobles carry Asterite pieces for more than decoration. But never in blade form. A blade would be almost impossible." She paused. "Do you know what they do to make it hold together at all?"
Kael leaned forward.
"They wrap it in tungsten. A layer around the entire blade to prevent chipping. That way the Asterite keeps its hardness while the tungsten absorbs the impact stress." She continued. "But that also means cutting weapons are essentially off the table. Well… kind off, it would become a blunt weapon. At least for me. Honestly I don't think anyone on the western continent could do it."
Kael stood up.
"A blunt weapon works for me."
"Are you sure? We're talking about a tungsten wrapped sword. Do you have any idea how heavy that would be?"
Kael waved a hand. "Don't worry about me. I don't think you could make a sword I wouldn't be able to swing." He paused. "No offence."
She practically vibrated with excitement and stepped closer. "There is one problem though!" She said it with considerably more enthusiasm than the situation called for. "I don't have any tungsten. None at all. BUT."
"But?"
"There's a cave the Smolten used not far from here. It has tungsten deposits that can still be mined."
Kael pinched the bridge of his nose. "How much do you need?"
"Likeee." She stretched the word out. "Fifteen armfuls?"
Kael looked at her. "Wouldn't that be roughly the weight of a young pine tree?"
"Mhm." She nodded without any apparent concern. "That's what I'm saying. You'd be swinging around a sword worth the weight of an ox."
"I'll see what I can do."