The morning sun rose over Deepwood Keep, casting long shadows across the snow.
The air in the courtyard was different today. It no longer smelled just of pine needles and rotting leaves. It smelled of sulfur, charcoal, and the sharp, metallic tang of industry.
Andar stood by the molds. The iron had cooled overnight.
He kicked one of the sand molds, breaking the crust. Inside lay a rough, grey bar of metal. It was not pretty. It was pitted and uneven. But to Andar, it was beautiful.
"Pig iron," he whispered. "High carbon content. Brittle, but a thousand times better than the scrap you were using."
Mott the blacksmith was hovering nearby, looking at the metal like a hungry dog eyeing a bone. He had not slept. He had spent the entire night just staring at the furnace, terrified that the fire would go out.
"My Lord," Mott asked, his voice hoarse. "What... what do we do with it? It is too hard. My hammer will bounce off it."
"We melt it again," Andar explained patiently. "We refine it. We pump air through it to burn off the carbon. Then we have steel."
He looked at the pile of ingots. There were twenty of them.
"But first, we need money. And we need food."
"My Lord!"
A shout came from the gate tower.
"Riders approaching! It is the merchant caravan from House Glover!"
Cullen, the old steward, hurried into the courtyard. His face was pale again. "They are early. They are here for the tax collection, and we have... we have nothing, My Lord. We have no coin, and the furs are not ready."
Andar wiped the soot from his hands onto his cloak.
"Open the gates," he said calmly.
"But My Lord..." Cullen stammered.
"Open them."
The gates groaned open.
Three wagons rolled into the muddy courtyard, followed by six mounted guards. The lead rider was a fat man wrapped in expensive seal furs. He had a gold ring on his thumb and a look of utter boredom on his face.
This was Moreo, a merchant who worked for the Deepwood Motte administrators. Technically, Andar was a bannerman to the Glovers, but this merchant acted like he owned the place.
Moreo looked around the courtyard, wrinkling his nose at the smell of sulfur. His eyes lingered on the strange mud tower for a second, then dismissed it as some peasant nonsense.
"Lord Andar," Moreo did not dismount. He looked down from his horse. "You look... dirty."
Andar stood his ground. He did not bow.
"Moreo. You are here early."
"Winter is coming, little Lord," Moreo chuckled. "The roads will be closed soon. I came to collect the yearly timber tax. And to buy whatever pathetic furs your hunters have managed to scrape together."
He gestured to his men.
"Load the timber. I will give you the usual price. Two copper stars per log."
The villagers watched in silence, their heads bowed. Two coppers was robbery. It was not even enough to buy a loaf of black bread.
"No," Andar said.
The courtyard went quiet. Even the wind seemed to stop.
Moreo blinked. He dug a finger into his ear. "I must have hearing damage from the cold. Did you say no?"
"I said no," Andar walked forward. He patted the neck of Moreo's horse, making the beast nervous. "We are not selling timber this year. And we are not paying the tax in wood."
Moreo's face turned red. "You insolent boy. If you do not pay, I will report this to Galbart Glover. You will be stripped of your titles. You will be thrown into the snow."
"I am paying the tax," Andar interrupted. "But not with wood."
He gestured to Mott.
"Bring it."
The blacksmith ran to the sand pit and grabbed one of the grey iron bars. He struggled with the weight, hauling it over to the merchant's horse.
Thud.
He dropped the heavy ingot into the mud at Moreo's feet.
Moreo frowned. He looked at the ugly grey bar.
"What is this? Rocks? You want to pay taxes with rocks?"
"Iron," Andar corrected.
Moreo laughed. A loud, wet laugh. "Iron? This lump? Lord Andar, iron needs to be mined. It needs to be forged. You think you can just dig up some heavy stones and call it iron? This is slag. It is trash."
"Pick it up," Andar said.
Moreo stopped laughing. He looked at Andar's cold eyes. He motioned to one of his guards.
The guard dismounted and bent down. He grabbed the bar with one hand, expecting it to be a light stone.
He grunted. He could not lift it. He had to use both hands to heave it up.
"It... it is heavy, Master Moreo," the guard said, surprised. "It is metal. Solid metal."
Moreo's eyes narrowed. He took a small knife from his belt and scratched the surface of the bar. It made a screeching sound, leaving a shiny silver scratch mark.
It was iron. And it was pure.
"Where did you get this?" Moreo demanded, his voice dropping to a whisper. "Did you steal it? Did you find a stash from the Old Kings?"
"I made it," Andar said. He pointed to the smoking tower in the center of the yard. "And I have twenty more just like it. And tomorrow, I will have fifty."
Moreo looked at the furnace, then back at the iron. The boredom was gone from his face. In its place was pure greed.
Iron was expensive in the North. It had to be imported from White Harbor or the Iron Islands. A single bar of this size was worth more than a hundred logs of timber.
"I will take it," Moreo said quickly. "I will be generous. I will accept this... scrap metal... in place of the timber tax. Consider your debt paid."
He waved his hand at his guards. "Load it up."
"Stop," Andar said.
The guards froze.
"That bar is not for the tax," Andar said softly. "That bar is a sample."
He walked up to Moreo, staring up at the fat merchant.
"The tax is five gold dragons worth of value. That bar is worth ten. If you want it, you buy it."
"Ten dragons?!" Moreo shrieked. "You are insane! I can buy a suit of armor for ten dragons!"
"Not in the North," Andar replied calmly. "And certainly not now, with winter coming. Iron prices have tripled in the last month. You know this. You are a merchant."
He leaned in closer.
"I will sell you these bars. But I do not want coin."
"Then what do you want?" Moreo hissed.
"Grain," Andar said. "I want every sack of grain in your wagons. Barley, wheat, dried corn. All of it. And I want the dried meat."
Moreo's eyes bulged. "That is my entire shipment! That is food for a whole village!"
"Yes. My village," Andar gestured to the starving people behind him. "Twenty bars of high quality pig iron. For three wagons of food. That is the deal."
Moreo did the math in his head.
The food was worth maybe thirty dragons. The iron... if he took it south to White Harbor and sold it to the armorers preparing for war... he could sell these bars for sixty. Maybe eighty.
It was a steal.
But he hated being dictated to by a boy.
"Fine," Moreo spat. "But if the iron is brittle inside, I will come back with soldiers and burn this keep to the ground."
Andar smiled. "Deal."
An hour later.
The wagons were empty of food and loaded with iron. Moreo rode away quickly, eager to secure his profit, leaving behind a confused but ecstatic Deepwood Keep.
The courtyard was piled high with sacks.
The villagers stared at the mountain of food. They had never seen so much grain in one place.
"My Lord..." Cullen was weeping. He touched a sack of flour as if it were holy. "We... we are saved."
Andar did not celebrate. He watched the merchant's caravan disappear into the trees.
"We are not saved yet, Cullen," Andar said. "We just bought time."
He turned back to the furnace.
"Mott! Why have you stopped pumping? The fire is dying!"
"But My Lord," Mott stammered. "We sold all the iron. We have no more ore ready."
"Then dig more!" Andar shouted. "And this time, we are not making bars for trade."
He walked over to a table and unrolled a piece of parchment. It was the blueprint the System had given him.
[Blueprint: Flintlock Musket (Type 1)]
[Required Materials: High Grade Steel, Wood, Spring Mechanism]
[Crafting Difficulty: High]
Andar's eyes gleamed.
"The merchant will talk," Andar said to himself. "He will tell people that Deepwood Keep has iron. Soon, bandits will come. Then other Lords will come. They will want to take what we have."
He picked up a piece of charcoal and drew a long, thin tube on the table.
"By the time they get here," Andar whispered. "I will have a surprise for them."
He looked at Mott.
"Mott, have you ever made a pipe? A seamless iron pipe?"
Mott shook his head. "No, My Lord."
"Learn," Andar said. "Fast."
.....
Author Note
Hi guys! Thank you for reading my fanfiction.
I wanted to let you know that I'm releasing bonus chapters for Power Stones. Here are the goals:
25 Power Stones: 1 Bonus Chapters
50 Power Stones: 1 Bonus Chapters
75 Power Stones: 2 Bonus Chapters
100 Power Stones: 2 Bonus Chapters
Thanks for the support!