The Story of Now

The repetitive crash of metal upon an anvil echoed throughout the workshop.

Elaine Clade rose from her work bench, wiping the soot and grime from her hands on her apron as she surveyed her handiwork. The finished swords before her—short swords whose hilts had just been attached to the blade—gleamed in the dim light of her lantern. It was another successful day of work; the Deknavale Guard would be getting their shipment of swords right on time. Which meant the surplus swords would go to the hidden Storehouse—if everything went to plan, they would be ready by tomorrow night.

Ready for the sweet bitterness of justice to be served at last.

Another round of slow, repetitive hammering filled the air, and Elaine knew it was time to lock up for the night. The hour was late, and the apprentices would need their sleep for another restless day of work tomorrow. And plus, Master Tennyson Clade would need his rest too.

Maneuvering throughout the workshop complex, Elaine made her rounds to the different apprentice stations, letting them know it was time to close up shop. She saw relief flood the workers’ eyes.

Perhaps, Elaine thought, a younger version of me would be relieved as well. At last, once the auxiliary furnaces had been reduced to a dull glow and all the valuable raw goods were stored in the vault, Elaine headed for the main forge.

Once she arrived at the archway outside the chamber she stopped, wreathed in shadows as she watched Master Clade labor. The slow, deliberate hammering of metal upon metal reverberated throughout the forge as roiling waves of heat embraced Elaine, causing sweat to form upon her brow.

The man at the anvil was the iconic blacksmith—tall, burly, with calloused hands that handled the metal with practiced ease. He was older, his beard just beginning to gray around the wispy edges. His eyes were focused on the ruby red bar of metal resting upon the anvil; in his hands a hammer, ready for another round of repetition.

Elaine stood there, for just a moment longer, gazing at the man. Even in his age, he was still a renowned smith for his persistence and vigilance with every work, as if each was his final masterpiece. All the apprentices looked up to him—but not Elaine. Not any more.

“Master Clade?” Elaine announced, entering the room. The hammering paused, the dancing sparks disappearing into the stone ground.

“Ah, Elaine!” Master Clade replied, setting down his hammer on the tool rack. “How was your first day at the workshop?”

Elaine moved through the forge, using metal tongs to douse the molten bar in a barrel of water. “It was fine, Master Clade.” She replied, even though this was not her first day, but rather the twenty-sixth year of her apprenticeship. “It is time to close up the shop.”

“Already?” The blacksmith replied. “I suppose the late hour does warrant rest…”

Elaine maneuvered around the chamber, replacing and storing items that had been forgotten and strewn about the tables. “Master, would you mind dousing the furnace?”

“Oh yes, certainly!” Clade bobbed his head as he wandered over to the roaring flames. “You know, Elaine,” he began as he shut off the air vents. “Funnily enough, you actually have the same name as my daughter.”

Elaine felt a chill run through her as she stowed pieces of leather in a compartment.

“You two actually look pretty similar too; though my darling is still pretty young, you look like what she might turn out to be if she ever pursues smithing seriously.”

She gripped the edge of the counter tightly as she stood, her knuckles turning white. “What a coincidence,” she muttered, even though she was too far for him to hear.

In that moment, she felt a deep yearning for clarity, to give Master Clade the truth. All she wanted to do was embrace the man shutting down the furnace; hug him tight and tell him everything that he was oblivious to. And for a lone, precious moment, she knew he would realize the depth of his amnesia: how he had forgotten his wife’s death, his daughter’s smithing journey from after fifteen years of age, and the fact that he was not thirty one but seventy one.

And in that startling epiphany, that moment of stark clarity, Elaine knew that once Master Clade’s mind wandered and noticed some other detail, it would all be forgotten. He wouldn’t even remember that she was the same forty-one year old daughter he believed to still be nine.

“Elaine?”

The voice cut through the monotonous rambling of her mind. She glanced up, half dazed as she realized Master Tennyson Clade was standing before her, brow furrowed in concern. “Are you alright?”

Elaine dipped her head in a brusque nod. “Always have been,” she replied, her voice tight and controlled. All she needed to do was make it through tomorrow, finish the remaining amount of swords, and all the wrongs would be corrected.

Although, a sneaking voice in the back of her head told her that keeping her father in the dark was a cruel thing to do. If their plan failed, it would mean certainly the collapse of her father’s smithing business and his capture by the authorities. It would mean all their deaths.

But, another voice said as she finished cleaning off the last table. He wouldn’t even remember after five minutes. This is for the best; whether he would understand is irrelevant.

And the bitterness inside of Elaine hardened into a cold, steely resolve that tainted every word she spoke.

“You should head home, Master Clade.”

-

What Master Tennyson Clade dreamed the previous night, he did not know. As he entered wakefulness, the last thing he remembered was something dark. Cold, bleak, yet startlingly comforting. As he sat up in bed, the familiar aching of his joints greeting him, he tried to grasp for a fragment of illumination—to no avail. It was like a word on the tip of his tongue; a fleeting image that drifted away as other thoughts intruded, like a leaf blown through a maelstrom of sensations.

Tennyson ate breakfast before dressing for the day. Once he had finished, he couldn’t remember whether he had eaten already. A funny thing, like a strange itch he couldn’t satisfy…

He went and began making breakfast for his wife, Marjorie, ignoring the dirty pans in the sink. The sizzle of bacon and eggs frying filled the air as Tennyson added oil to the iron skillet. Once he was done with the skillet, he went over to the cabinet and procured a loaf of bread, setting it down on a serving plate. Elaine was going to be so excited for breakfast—it was all of her favorites, and he knew that Marjorie would appreciate it as well.

“Breakfast is ready!” Tennyson called. He waited, but no shuffle of feet nor reply came in response. Only silence greeted him, cold and ashen. He assumed that Marjorie had gone to work early that day, perhaps taking Elaine to school already. And, in that lone moment of the scent of breakfast fading, he felt a strange urge to stop. To stand still, and not move. Like a sixth sense he could use, an attribute he was able to utilize, it was something he could do if he willed himself to. To just stop; an urge for stillness.

But Tennyson suppressed the urge; today was the day he would finish the prototype blade for the Deknavale Guard; he hoped the sword would be received well by the authorities—the Keep would pay well for good craftsmanship to outfit their men.

As Tennyson departed his home and wandered down the cobblestone streets of Deknavale, he breathed in the chilly air of pre-dawn. He began to hum to himself a little tune, making it up as he traveled, often stopping and greeting other pre-dawn goers. Most of them he didn’t recognize, yet there was a strange sensation he felt when he saw them. Almost like he should know them.

As he approached the shop, he came across a handful of guards from the city’s watch, dressed in the iconic blue crest of the ruling family.

“Hey, it’s the smith, Master Clade!” One of the guards said and pointed him out. Acknowledgement dawned on the faces of the soldiers, and they all nodded at Tennyson with respect. One of the men raised his sword—which upon a cursory glance seemed hauntingly familiar in design—and gestured to the smith. “Are you still making that first blade?”

Tennyson bobbed his head in reply. “Today’s the first day of my—”

But as the guards weren’t paying attention anymore; they were walking away now, laughing amongst themselves. And, as Tennyson thought about it, the guards hadn’t looked at him with respect, but rather grins and smirks.

Soldiers these days, he muttered as he focused his attention on other things. The thought quickly disappeared, leaving no recollection of its trace in his mind. It was as if he hadn’t even run into the men in the first place.

As Tennyson traveled through the streets, his eyes caught the reflection of a glass display in a storefront window. It wasn’t what was inside that mattered to him—he didn’t care much for wedding dresses, considering Elaine was still nine—but what he saw in the reflection was what bothered him.

Instead of a well maintained man creeping on his middle years, he saw an old one. Scruffy beard and exaggerated wrinkles, with eyes yellowing from age, he looked completely unrecognizable. How was that him? How could it be him?

He was a thirty-one year old married man with a nine year old daughter, not some ancient crone out of touch with the world! So what was—

And crashing into him came that sensation to stop. A plea for stillness, for simply letting go and standing still. To just let go, disassociate, and become an observer of the world. Like a sense he needed to exercise, a joint needing movement, a word needing saying, he needed to desperately do it. To be still.

“Master Tennyson!” A familiar voice shouted impatiently. Master Clade turned—his previous ruminations slipping away—and saw Elaine was further down the street, waving him toward her. “Seminar starts soon!”

And with that, Master Clade left the glass display—promptly forgetting the entire incident—and traveled the remaining distance to his workshop.

“G’morning, Master Clade,” the apprentices murmured to Tennyson as he entered the large stone archway.

“Well how do you do!” He exclaimed, smiling jovially at the assembled craftsmen and women. “First day of smithing apprenticeship!” The apprentices inclined their heads slightly as they dispersed throughout the workshop.

How did they know where to go? Tennyson wondered as he headed off to the forge to prepare the morning seminar. It’s their first day, after all.

The thought slipped away as Tennyson lit the forge and began pumping the bellows. Once a suitable flame had sprung up in the bed of coals, he went over and began collecting his tools for the day, humming a made up tune. As the heat from the furnace began to banish the dampness from the room, Master Clade heard someone calling his name.

He looked up; Elaine was at the archway, staring at him with a contemptuous look. “Hey there, Elaine!” He exclaimed, immediately forgetting about the tools he was collecting. “Ready for the first seminar?”

“Sure,” she replied curtly as she slipped into the room. She began straightening things up around the chamber. “Seminar starts in thirty minutes, Clade.”

“Thank you, but I know,” he responded as he remembered he was still collecting tools. “And I’d prefer master, if you will—smithing is a delicate art with levels.”

“Sure, Master Clade.”

The rest of the time passed in silence as Tennyson prepared for the introductory seminar into bladesmithing. With a pep in his step, he bustled around the room, collecting the final things he would need. And, when the clock finally signaled it was time to begin, he stood by his anvil. The apprentices filed in, sitting in sporadically scattered stools and chairs, often carrying different knicknacks or tools.

Master Clade gave them a wide smile. “Good morning, class!”

A faint murmur came in reply.

As Tennyson went on to explain the basics of smithing, the anatomy of the different tools, and the essential protocols to follow during the process, several apprentices walked out. He simply brushed it off as people who just needed to relieve themselves.

Once all the boring instructions had passed—he swore the crowd was much smaller now—he began heating up the first bar of metal. The heat from the furnace was intense now; standing too close made Tennyson’s skin prickle in an all too familiar sensation.

And when it came time to hammer the blood red bar into shape, Tennyson Clade felt the urge to slip into stillness overpower his mind. Every part of his body screamed for a release into stillness, an urge to pause. To be silent and still. With one hand holding his hammer, just beginning to arc downwards, he lost precious control of his thoughts.

And he gave into the sensation.

Silence.

The first thing Tennyson noticed as he crashed his hammer into the bar was the silence. Yes—the bar reverberated with a metal clanging—but there was a quietness following it. Usually, the scuffling of feet and breathing would fill the space. But, as Tennyson strained his ears, all he was met with was silence.

The second thing he noticed was the coldness. One moment before, the heat had been a roiling wall that had repulsed him with every step. But now it was cold; a chill that set into his flesh, touching his bones and etching them with frost. He glanced at the furnace, curious to see if it had been doused. But the flames were still there, orange and fiery.

Yet, oddly enough, they did not flicker and warp as a normal fire would. They remained static; like a painter’s rendition of a flame.

And lastly, Tennyson turned towards the apprentices.

The crowd had thinned out during Clade’s monologue, but not all the apprentices had vanished. Some still remained; sitting in chairs and on stools, fiddling with things in their hands. Or they were in the process of fiddling with things, as they were all frozen. Unmoving. Suspended in a silent animation. Elaine was also there, sitting at a work station, all by herself, with a collection of unfinished blades upon the table.

The only sound within the chamber was Tennyson’s breathing, slow and even, as he curiously surveyed the frozen audience. A strange prickling sensation formed at the base of his neck, traveling throughout his brain until it felt like a thousand pins and needles were all trapped within.

And then, like the wind from a passing train or the momentary incapacity from a gut punch, Tennyson was hit with a dreadful realization.

Elaine sitting at the bench wasn’t just any other apprentice. It was his daughter.

Memories flooded into his consciousness, thousands of forgotten sensations and emotions that each nestled themselves in the appropriate nook and cranny of his mind. The fuzzy gap of dullness in his memory shattered before an onslaught of clarity. He staggered, dropping his hammer, only listening faintly to its clatter.

Forty years of memories came back to him, and in that moment, Tennyson realized the depth of his loss.

He rushed over to his daughter and embraced her, not missing the fact her skin was cold and lifeless, her eyes trained forever downward on her craft. Tears sprang from his eyes as he wept upon the ground, lamenting the death of his wife, Marjorie, and the father he hadn’t been for Elaine.

How could he live in the past? How could he still live as if he was thirty-one years old? He looked at her, finally understanding the snide remarks and bitterness behind every word.

“She hates me,” he muttered to himself. “After the age thirty-one, she only had one parent still there.”

And, as more ghostly voices and phantom images flooded into the recesses of his mind, he remembered the conversations he had unintentionally listened in on. The meticulous planning Elaine had made to right the wrongs of her mother’s death from soldier brutality. The careful manipulation of the Deknavale Guard to lull them into a false sense of security. It was truly a stroke of genius, yet it was doomed to fail.

“Dear gods above,” Tennyson mumbled to himself. “She’s going to get herself killed.” The entire plan revolved around the manufacturing of weapons for the Deknavale Guard to appease their suspicions; that would be the front of the operation, as the surplus they crafted would be locked up in hidden Storehouses. A secret method to arm the rebellion in the city against the gilded hands of the ruling family.

But, if anything would ever go wrong, they would all be executed for treason.

“Dearest Elaine,” he whispered, futilely trying to brush a strand of hair from her face. His hands trembled, and as the hair remained motionless, he added, “Your mother would be proud… I will never forget. No longer.”

As the urge to return to motion, to unpause time and move into the chaos, welled up in Tennyson, he allowed it to take fruition, never leaving Elaine’s side. And, in the subsequent blast of heat and noise as the world corrected itself, Tennyson held on to one single thought.

I will never forget.

Searing light blinded Tennyson, yet he forced his eyes to stay open. Pins and needles flooded his brain once more as he felt memories slip into nothingness. Faces flashed across his vision before fading into smudgy light. He felt the familiar weight of a hammer in his hand.

I will never forget.