Page 44 of Forged in Fading

Orme’s voice rang through the trees, scaring off more than a few birds, and Alvara let loose a dramatic sigh. Kill me now, she mouthed to Boden, and his soft laugh drifted on the breeze as they made their way back through the woods.

They returned to find the council members had accomplished little other than pulling out small bits of food to munch on as they blathered on about political matters that held little interest for Alvara, leaving her and Boden to create a clearing for their tents. They placed them close together to preserve warmth and constructed a wall of snow around the perimeter to help shield them from the conditions.

They would be cold and likely wouldn’t sleep well, but with bedrolls and their layered clothing, they would survive the night. An inn wasn’t logical, seeing as she and Boden were both fugitives and the three council members would draw their own kinds of suspicion, but she would have loved a warm room for the night.

Just when Alvara had landed herself on a nearby stump, Boden spoke. “Training.”

Alvara held back a groan and followed him into the forest, her legs more unstable with every step she took. Gods, she was so sore. It appeared that Boden was far from it, because he had outpaced her and waited, surrounded by a loose circle of trees.

“You craft weapons for a living, and now I’d like you to do so with your magic.” He stated it as if it were something simple, not absolutely inconceivable for someone like Alvara who had struggled throughout the journey to clear snow out of their path without accidentally pelting the other elves in the face. She offered nothing but a nod, not willing to allow herself to be defeated before she even began. “You could start with a spear. Ice has a great capability for damage if you’re able to wield it in the right way.”

A spear. As if there was only one type that existed. Alvara let her thoughts skitter into the shadows and anchored herself as best she could in strong memories of her sister. She imagined an expertly fashioned weapon⁠—

“How did you become a blacksmith?”

Boden’s words stripped her of all concentration. She hung her head and glowered at the ground. “The more you talk, the harder it’s going to be for me to do this.”

He offered no reply, so she took a deep breath and began. She imagined the shaft of the weapon, something slim yet strong that could withstand a sizable amount of force. Her mind traveled up the spear, landing on the tip and honing it as sharp and lethal as she could forge herself. Alvara felt the tug of her magic, and a weight dropped into her hands. She looked down to find a decent, if not slightly crude, imitation of her weapon.

“Not terrible.” Boden reached out his hands. “May I?”

She tossed it toward him, and exhaustion trickled through her veins. “If you gave me metal to work with, it wouldn’t be nearly as ugly.”

“Perfection isn’t always the goal. Sometimes you simply need it to function. You prefer weapons over magic.” Boden didn’t phrase it as a question—she supposed her disdain for magic was glaringly apparent.

“Weapons allow anyone to gain the ability to fight and defend themselves through hard work and dedication. Magic is something given to us based on who we’re born to and when, which hardly seems fair. I’d rather not rely on the gods if I can help it.”

“That’s true to some extent, but if you regularly wield your magic, you will be able to learn how to do more with less, like any discipline. Though for how little you claim to use it, your magic is quite strong. I’m assuming you were born in dalvi.”

An unfair advantage over Eloisa, who deserved the stronger power of a Dalvian born in their own season. She had come into the world in valo which left her own magic fairly weak. “I was. And on a full moon with no extra power to speak of. Disappointing, I know.” Everyone who’d met her at birth saw her gray hair as a blessing from Kutamir, who had created the elves from moonlight of the very same color.

“Disappointing is not a word I would use to describe you.” Boden watched her as he spun the spear in his hands. “Craft another weapon, one you would enjoy forging.”

The final leg of the journey felt like an unfortunate duplicate of the day before, Orme’s idle chatter renewed with vigor, even after a mediocre night of sleep. Unsurprisingly, he snored the entire night, almost as loudly as he spoke.

Boden slowed his horse’s pace to walk beside her. “Do you have any interest in target practice?”

“There aren’t exactly any targets around.” He inclined his head toward Orme, and Alvara almost fell out of the saddle. “Boden, I almost killed Kat not too long ago. You want me to aim my magic at someone who’s not expecting it?”

An air of mischief swirled about him like the dalvi wind whistling through the trees. “I trust you not to lose control. You’ve already come this far. Are you telling me you wouldn’t like to throw snowballs at the back of Orme’s head?”

It sounded delightful when he put it that way. And he trusted her powers, probably more than she did. A strange part of her wanted to prove him right and earn his words. “Is that a challenge?”

Alvara spent the better part of the morning launching small clumps of snow in Orme’s direction and cringing every time one came close to hitting him. It was more difficult than she had imagined—the bumpy gait of the horses made accuracy almost impossible.

When she finally aimed true, she clamped a hand over her mouth to stifle her shocked laughter. Orme swore and whipped around, glaring at her and Boden while he dusted off the white powder covering his back.

Boden kept his face neutral, but his lips wiggled a little here and there. “A drift of snow just fell from one of the trees. If only we had seen it in time, Alvara could have stopped it. I sincerely apologize, Orme. It won’t happen again.” The elf huffed and shook out his coat.

A small bubble of pride floated in Alvara’s chest, even though using her magic to hurl snowballs was nothing impressive. But she had done it. Maybe Boden’s faith in her abilities wasn’t too far off.

“He finally stopped talking, so I’d say that was successful,” Boden said as he steered his horse closer to hers.

It had been a while, longer than Alvara cared to admit, since she had done something purely for her own enjoyment. Even blacksmithing and weapons training had become a means of escape, survival, not activities that were purely…fun.

“Your sister must have suffered with you as a brother.”

“Less than you might think. Lilja and I are fourteen years apart, so she was only four when I left home to work in the palace.”