Michael Stackpole: Conan the Barbarian

Conan frowned deeply. “Yes, Father.”

Corin laughed, slapping his hand on the table. “Your mother had that look. I only saw it once directed at me and vowed never to earn it again. Restraining yourself will not be the hardest thing you do in life, Conan; just the hardest thing you’ve done up to now. Aggression is a warrior’s virtue. Restraint is a leader’s. You must promise me to do this.”

“I promise, Father.”

“Good.” The smith nodded. “You have half a bargain to keep, and I will offer you the other half. Tomorrow morning you’ll find your sword in the smithy. You’ll put an edge on it, only a hand span from the tip down.”

The boy’s face lit up as his heart began to pound. “And you will train me. We will fight?”

“We will, Conan, we will. I have much to teach you, but not immediately.”

Conan’s shoulders slumped. “Why not?”

“It’s very simple, my son.” Corin met his son’s blue gaze. “You’re growing, and soon will outgrow that Aquilonian toy. It’s time you learned to forge a blade, a proper Cimmerian blade.”

The boy stood, weariness forgotten. “Crom made me to wield swords, not to hammer them.”

“Crom has shaped you, as he shapes us all, to his own cold ends.” Corin shook his head. “But if you want a blade to be part of you, if you want it to live in your hands, then you’re going to help bring it to life.”

OVER THE NEXTsix weeks Corin marveled at the fact that his son had not bristled or broken, had not cried or complained. The smith had no desire to see his son break; nor did it surprise him when Conan pushed himself beyond where Corin wanted him to go. The boy learned quickly, and while little mistakes and little frustrations might coax an oath from him or a glower, he always returned to his tasks with a singular determination that Corin had never seen even an adult display.

The smith had not been easy on his son. He sent Conan out to the nearest mine to gather iron ore to smelt for the blade. Corin had borrowed a mule to aid him. Conan returned with two baskets of ore strapped to the beast, and another smaller one on his own back. The boy crushed the ore and prepared it for smelting, then worked the bellows until the iron became a red-gold river of molten metal.

Corin watched Conan’s pride rise to his face, lit by the iron’s backglow as it poured into the mold. The boy gathered wood while the metal cooled, and chose leather to wrap the oak on the hilt. The boy helped Corin pour the bronze for the pommel cap and cross hilt. Then the boy took the cooled steel and plunged it into the forge, burying it in charcoal. He pumped the bellows until the blade glowed, then brought it to the anvil to begin the shaping.

Here Conan encountered his greatest challenge, and watching him tightened a fist around Corin’s heart. The boy intended the sword to be perfect, but had no understanding of how much work that would entail.

The hammering on one side had to be matched equally on the other. Stretching the metal made it too thin. Cracks appeared. Pieces broke off. And while the metal could always be reheated, and the pieces folded back in, frustration led to hard blows where subtle were required . . . and subtle always seemed to take too long.

A boy forging a man’s weapon. Corin smiled as he watched, remembering his own first clumsy efforts. Connacht hadn’t been terribly patient with him, but that was because his father had assumed Corin intended to travel and see the world. Though Connacht had his reasons for remaining in Cimmeria, more than once, when he told tales, Corin was certain his father would vanish again if the slightest chance arose.

Corin’s father had been surprised when he realized the nature of Corin’s goal: it was not to create a sword he could take into battle, but to create the sword that was meant to be his in battle. Connacht could never understand that about his son, but at least he respected it. He was as proud of everything Corin did as he was of his own youthful adventuring.

Conan plunged his sword into a trough. The water bubbled and steamed. He pulled the blade out again, rivulets running. Corin felt certain that his son was seeing blood.

“Is it finished, Conan?”

Conan looked over at his father, then nodded.

Corin rose and crossed to the anvil. He took the blade from his son and turned it over. The boy had shaped it well. The forte would turn blades. The tang would not sheer off, yet was not so heavy as to unbalance the blade. It tapered to a point, but not too sharp a one.

“Nicely done, boy.”

Conan smiled, his soot-stained face streaked with sweat trails.

“But let me ask you this: Which is most important when forging a blade? Fire or ice?”

The boy snorted. “Fire.”

Corin raised an eyebrow as he continued to study his son’s handiwork.

“Ice?”

“Are you certain?”

Conan nodded, but hesitantly.

The smith smashed the blade against the anvil. It rang dully, then shivered into fragments. Conan stared down, his shocked expression mirrored in the metal shards. His expression darkened as he looked up at his father.

’Tis a lesson best learned now, my son. “We’ll begin again, Conan.” Corin knelt and began gathering metal shards. “You’ll learn what makes a great sword makes a great warrior. By the time you know that, you will be ready to wield the blade we shall make together.”

CHAPTER 5

CONAN WATCHED EXPECTANTLYas his father studied the blade. The boy had hoped it would be finished three weeks previously, but his father had made him rework the blade. “You’re growing too fast,” Corin had complained. He redesigned the blade, lengthening it, making the tang and forte more stout so it would be a worthy sword for the man Conan was to become.

But Conan wanted it now. “What do you think, Father?”

“Close, very close.” Corin bounced the blade on the anvil. The metal quivered and rang sweetly. He stabbed it into the fire again and nodded to his son. “A little more heat.”

Despite the aching in his limbs from all his chores and all the training, Conan pumped the bellows with all the vigor he could muster. Sparks flew and heat blossomed. Using tongs, his father turned the blade over amid the glowing coals, then drew it out. “Get the small hammer.”

Conan did as he was bidden and shaped the weapon where his father pointed. “Gently, boy, but firmly. A smith, a swordsman, must maintain control of his tools. Smooth that out. And there, and there.”

The boy hammered carefully, relishing the peal of metal on metal. Something about it bespoke strength. So unlike the hiss and skirl of steel on steel in battle, where strong blades became vipers. The sound coaxed from the sword and anvil by the hammer meant that he need never fear the blade betraying him. This he had come to understand.

Corin inspected his handiwork, then glanced at the cooling trough. “Go get more ice.”

Conan ran out and chipped ice from a block, then carried it back into the forge and dumped it into the trough. “When you asked me which is more important, fire or ice, you never told me the answer.”

Corin raised the blade, and in the shadows beneath the forge’s roof, the metal still glowed dully. “A blade must be like a swordsman. It must be flexible. A sword must bend, or it will break. And for that to happen, it must be tempered.”

The smith plunged the sword into the trough. Ice melted, and water bubbled and steamed with the hiss of a thousand snakes. “Fire and ice. Together. This is the mystery of steel.”

“Is it done, Father?”

Corin nodded. “Yes, but you’re not.”

“But you have taught me much.”