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Weaponsmith

Age: 361 | Height: Kinda short | Race: Ascended | Nationality: Natural | Citizenship: Hollowed Grounds
Level: 2 - Strg: 14 - Dext: 17 - Endr: 16 - Luck: 11 - Int:
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Posts: 229 | Total: 642
MP: 970
#1
THE GHOST IN THE SHELL \\
He's down by the forge, working on Henry's sword. It's coming along quite nicely, and he has no doubt he'll be done before LongNight. Which, honestly, is a relief: he would've hated to not keep his word, and to leave the poor guy with a half-made sword if he were to go and die.

His hair's a wild mess, tendrils having escaped the thick braid, ears hidden behind what looks like ear-muffs; kind of ridiculous, but he doesn't want to go hard of hearing. They muffle the hammer blows well enough. He can live with looking ridiculous. Sweated-out fluids shimmer on his face and bare arms, both from the heat of the nearby forge and the work with shaping the sword.

On one of the furthest counters is a small bundle, wrapped up in thin leather and tied with a cord.

And on the table back at Mabel's farmstead a note:

Mabel,

Could you come down to my forge when you have a moment?

- Aamu


Aamu's bent closely over the sword, hammer nearby. He likes the way it is turning out, especially considering he hasn't done a proper sword in a while. The war kind of put a stop to anything like that. The shape's good, he thinks the balance will be good, and he managed to figure out fullering with quite limited tools and still get a satisfying result. He just needs to stare at it a little longer, to decide if he's content with it as it is.
Mabel Occidendum


Age: 23 | Height: 5'7" | Race: Ascended | Nationality: Natural | Citizenship: Hollowed Grounds
Level: 3 - Strg: 16 - Dext: 16 - Endr: 16 - Luck: 16 - Int:
Played by: Heather Offline
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#2
All expectations make her heart feel numb
Dusk filtered down below the horizon, the tree line beckoning with bright, illustrious colors, as she stepped through the house, floorboards creaking, watching the shadows play. She’d kept to the cover of the shelter for most of the day, keeping to her own tidings and misgivings, hadn’t noticed the note on the table until now. Fingers picked it up, snorting a little at the notions of a forge; slipping something else wrapped and adorned in the back of her pockets, before beginning her meander, her stroll, through the cluster and pockets of darkness.

She was familiar with the forge and its location, merely because her family had required items to be mended at one point or another; melded back into shape, into formation, to be utilized again. When she arrived, she barely recognized Aamu, given his painstaking efforts to usually look grand and regal – stifling a laugh at the ear muffs.

How to gain his attention while he worked was another semblance altogether, until she decided she wouldn’t. Eerie and enigmatic, eldritch and elfin, she maneuvered along the floor in near silence, over the pounding of metal, over the flush of suffused steel. Quick, exacting, she found a chair nearby, hovered along it, and made no show of sitting – merely watching like a curious cat, leaning her arms back upon another counter.
MABEL
Weaponsmith

Age: 361 | Height: Kinda short | Race: Ascended | Nationality: Natural | Citizenship: Hollowed Grounds
Level: 2 - Strg: 14 - Dext: 17 - Endr: 16 - Luck: 11 - Int:
Played by: Neowulf Offline
Change author:
Posts: 229 | Total: 642
MP: 970
#3
THE GHOST IN THE SHELL \\
He's not really aware of her. It's a bit odd, considering he's usually very alert, but between the hammer blows, his earmuffs, and his focus, he's stretched quite thin. His instincts are on the backburner, ready to kick in should something jump at his face, but a quiet Ascended girl slipping through the shadows behind his back? She eludes him entirely. He doesn't expect to be assassinated in the Grounds, after all.

Aamu chews slightly on his lip as he studies the blade laid out before him. It's still much too hot to touch, but he's forged enough swords to not need to touch them anymore. With a thick leather glove he grabs it by the hilt and lifts it, sighting down its edge. Turns it over, does the same. Feels how it handles as he moves it this way and that, slicing it through the air.

Hm. Yes.

There's nothing about it that makes him think I should do this or I should fix that. It just has that feeling, and Aamu puts it back on the table before tugging out an object from underneath it. He grabs it with a slight grunt and heaves it onto the counter. It looks like a cradle: a very long, very narrow cradle, and it's filled with sand. He checks the sword's length against it, nods to himself, and turns around—

Starts visibly at finding Mabel there—

Just stands there kind of awkwardly, half-made sword in one hand, ridiculous earmuffs on—

"Evening," he says smoothly after half a second, wiping his free hand on his leather apron before tugging the muffs off. Carefully he puts the sword back on the counter behind him and moves over to the forge. He starts stepping on the treadle, and the fire begins to heave and roar. "How long were you watching me?" It's not that he minds: he's just genuinely curious.
Mabel Occidendum


Age: 23 | Height: 5'7" | Race: Ascended | Nationality: Natural | Citizenship: Hollowed Grounds
Level: 3 - Strg: 16 - Dext: 16 - Endr: 16 - Luck: 16 - Int:
Played by: Heather Offline
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#4
All expectations make her heart feel numb
It amused her, to not be caught. To linger and slink, to be shrouded in some twist and turns of enigmas, unseen, unheard, unnoticed. Under normal circumstances, when he wasn’t busy or distracted, she likely wouldn’t have been successful at all – he had far more eons with experience in stealth than she. But sometimes it was fun, to do more than scrape the surface of wraith formations, to be a living phantom, reeling on the edges, waiting in the shadows. Complex, paradoxical, not something so readily understood – keeping the world on their toes. And maybe she would, eventually, if they all survived the ensuing plunge into darkness.

She watched for a few minutes more, and then became a little bored with the repetitive, redundant nature of hammers striking steel, eyes wandering over the rest of the remnants. Mabel caught the lines of both serrated and blunt edges, boundaries of persuasion with keen, instrumental force, and then down to other necessary tools – hammers, nails, axes, hatchets, laden around and around. She pondered adding and slipping some into her collection, just to try, just to see, when his movement was more abrupt, and she was forced to glance back his way.

He’d found her, even though she hadn’t really been hiding.

A snicker tucked wryly along her mouth and into her cheek, a half-smile that seemed a tad bit wild, at his curiosity, at his greeting. “Evening,” she echoed, before binding her hands together, folding them in her lap, sat upon her pedestal and throne – the dusty chair. “A few minutes,” she took a guess; the passing of time continuing to be difficult to fathom. “You left a note.”
MABEL
Weaponsmith

Age: 361 | Height: Kinda short | Race: Ascended | Nationality: Natural | Citizenship: Hollowed Grounds
Level: 2 - Strg: 14 - Dext: 17 - Endr: 16 - Luck: 11 - Int:
Played by: Neowulf Offline
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Posts: 229 | Total: 642
MP: 970
#5
THE GHOST IN THE SHELL \\
She's pretty regal like that, poised upon a dusty and rickety old chair. Neat, like a cat. He can't keep himself from smiling at it—at her. (Just as he can't keep himself from worrying about her. He knows about the darkness inside of her heart, and he fears it'll get her hurt.) And she'd only been there a few minutes? Well, not like he would've noticed if it had been hours, but he's glad it wasn't more than that. Even if it's just Mabel, the idea of someone getting away with spying on him for too long and so close is uncomfortable.

"I did," he confirms (uselessly), still stepping on the treadle and keeping half an eye on the color of the flames and coals. Even as an Ascended he can tell the air around the forge is hot, and his systems react accordingly to cool him off. Being a smith really isn't the most economic profession for an Ascended, but he's always enjoyed the art. "There." He points towards the little bundle on the other counter: it's maybe a foot long, four inches tall. The contents are hard, individual pieces of somethings wrapped protectively in leather. "A Deepfrost gift for you."

His rhythm on the treadle slows slightly as he only needs it to maintain temperature now. Normally he'd go back to his work, but he wants to see what Mabel will think of his gifts, so he lingers with his foot on the pedal and watches, fighting down his rising anxiety.
Mabel Occidendum


Age: 23 | Height: 5'7" | Race: Ascended | Nationality: Natural | Citizenship: Hollowed Grounds
Level: 3 - Strg: 16 - Dext: 16 - Endr: 16 - Luck: 16 - Int:
Played by: Heather Offline
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Posts: 425 | Total: 10,652
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#6
All expectations make her heart feel numb
The youth wondered how he could stand to be near the fire, the coals, the embers, for so long. Her own instinctual pull and inclinations to remain away, away, away kept her right in the same place – a surveyor, a witness, not comfortable with the tangible, deadly elements of flames. Maybe he had no choice, given this occupation, maybe he knew his own breaking point, where he could hover between misgivings and ominous, threatening potential.

Her inward thoughts were broken away by something else though – eyes shifting quickly to the bundle he pointed out along the countertop, and then the quirk of her brow to follow, at the insinuation of its existence. “A gift?” Perplexed, there was an air of suspicion cast around her frame, not of distrust, but of the unknown, of the uncertainty; pretending as though she didn’t have something in return in her back pocket. And then she felt like she was being watched, under a scrutiny, and she slid off her chair, reaching for the bundle. “I haven’t done anything to deserve a gift.” Her hands slid under it, lifting the pieces contained together, and returning to her makeshift throne, fingers pressing over it, but not unwrapping it. Not yet.

On a second thought, she leaned, grabbing hold of the bound and wrapped bounty, and offering it to him silently.
MABEL
Weaponsmith

Age: 361 | Height: Kinda short | Race: Ascended | Nationality: Natural | Citizenship: Hollowed Grounds
Level: 2 - Strg: 14 - Dext: 17 - Endr: 16 - Luck: 11 - Int:
Played by: Neowulf Offline
Change author:
Posts: 229 | Total: 642
MP: 970
#7
THE GHOST IN THE SHELL \\
"A gift," he confirms, stepping rhythmically on the treadle and listening to the flames roar. In truth, his fondness of the forge has much to do with how controlled it is: contained, stoked with precision to specific temperatures, and if Aamu had always favored tools with extended handles to keep him away from their hungry bite..? Well, no one would've faulted him for not wanting to be set afire and die horribly. But in his experience, heat does not cause as much damage as light does.

Still, catching fire would be pretty bad news.

Her response saddens him, in a way. You exist he wants to tell her. Surely that's enough? She exists, she tolerates him, she brings him joy simply by being in his life: is she so blind to her own worth?

Instead he smiles, patient, fond, wry. "Too bad that's not up to you to decide." To me, you have.

Then she pulls something out and holds out to him—a return gift? He feels like he hasn't done much to deserve a gift either, but he's not going to argue. Touched, he steps off the treadle to take it with reverent fingers. "Thank you, Mabel." Quiet, heartfelt. Aamu retreats to place it on the counter by the cradle of sand, instead taking the half-made sword and simply sliding it into the forge and letting it bake in the heat. "You first," he says with a nod towards the bundle in her lap, a slight, teasing smile playing on his face.
Mabel Occidendum


Age: 23 | Height: 5'7" | Race: Ascended | Nationality: Natural | Citizenship: Hollowed Grounds
Level: 3 - Strg: 16 - Dext: 16 - Endr: 16 - Luck: 16 - Int:
Played by: Heather Offline
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Posts: 425 | Total: 10,652
MP: 0
#8
All expectations make her heart feel numb
An argument rested itself on her tongue, a huff and widening of her nostrils giving sway to a pending quarrel, but then her eyes darted downward, as if she truly had no more to say. Nothing that would likely segment him away anyway, to bombard with wayward adornments. It would be terribly rude to deny the gift; she knew that. Her parents had raised her better than a eldritch abomination, than a petty, insignificant little speck, but some days she truly was ash and dust. Her family already was.

But then he didn’t open hers, and there seemed to be some sort of stalemate. Another furrowing of her brows followed, as if she couldn’t quite contemplate where to gain the upper hand, and in the end, seemed resigned to the acceptance, the swallowing fate. “You’re welcome,” she obliged; but the words were toneless, empty, waiting until he opened it before deciding if it had been a good idea or not.

Thereafter, the glance receded to the gift in her lap, and she gingerly, hesitantly, began to pluck at the edges. Her fingers lined along the creases, gently pulling them apart, until the smaller packages came to light, and there was more to the order of things. Eventually, painstakingly, carefully, she came to find the three throwing knives, all serrated and edged and lovely, and the hairbrush, ornamental and adorned.

Her knees drew themselves up against her chest, the throne much less now; hiding the smile and delight behind her limbs, the choked back nuances of so many other manifestations. “Thank you,” she whispered, struggling not to burst at the seams from a streamline of bizarre emotions she had difficulty naming. “Your turn.”
MABEL
Weaponsmith

Age: 361 | Height: Kinda short | Race: Ascended | Nationality: Natural | Citizenship: Hollowed Grounds
Level: 2 - Strg: 14 - Dext: 17 - Endr: 16 - Luck: 11 - Int:
Played by: Neowulf Offline
Change author:
Posts: 229 | Total: 642
MP: 970
#9
THE GHOST IN THE SHELL \\
It's the soft and the hard: tools of murder, and the mundane. Perhaps a strange gift for a girl of seventeen, but she has revenge to exact, vengeance and payback to visit on someone.

And besides, she needs something better to practice throwing with.

The claw clutching at Aamu's chest relaxes, eases back, when he catches a glimpse of her smile. It's in the way her cheeks change, the way she's drawing up her knees and hiding behind them, as if the world can't know what a lovely and radiant smile she has. The corner of Aamu's mouth quirks and he hides it by looking down at his hands, clasped together and held in front of him. "I'm glad you like them," he says, quiet but carrying over the occasional hiss from the forge.

Then he puts his hands against the counter he's leaning against (quickly checking over one shoulder that it's clear) and lifts himself onto it, dangling his feet and placing her gift in his lap. He's touched that she cares at all—cares enough to want to give him something.

Carefully he unwraps it, until he sits there with a whetstone in one hand and a small knife in the other. They're very thoughtful gifts for someone like him, and he looks up with a small, touched smile. "Thank you," he echoes her sincerely, putting down the whetstone and feeling the balance and make of the dagger. "They're very nice gifts."
Mabel Occidendum


Age: 23 | Height: 5'7" | Race: Ascended | Nationality: Natural | Citizenship: Hollowed Grounds
Level: 3 - Strg: 16 - Dext: 16 - Endr: 16 - Luck: 16 - Int:
Played by: Heather Offline
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Posts: 425 | Total: 10,652
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#10
All expectations make her heart feel numb
Another waiting game, another press and zeal of something foreign in her heart. Patience schooled her features into a blank canvas, but it was a rogue façade, imploring, eyes seeking out his reactions around the top of her knees. It seemed to take a laborious amount of time, and her hands, her arms, wrapped around her legs further, all attempts at cool indifference beginning to wear her apart.

And thereafter, when he finally unwrapped it, she wondered if it’d been enough. Compared to the offerings he’d given her, the parcel felt inadequate. Her brows furrowed together, without truly meaning to, some level and layer of emotion giving her away, until Aamu finally managed to unfurl the strands. The small smile might’ve been enough, and she eased a sigh across the tops of her form. “You’re welcome,” she echoed again, uncertain when and where and how to play this game of compassion and beneficence, when it often fluttered and flickered away. The navigation of kindness shouldn’t have been strange or bizarre, but there it was, embedded in her entity. “As long as they’re useful,” and she shrugged her shoulders. Uncertain what to do or where to go from there.
MABEL
Weaponsmith

Age: 361 | Height: Kinda short | Race: Ascended | Nationality: Natural | Citizenship: Hollowed Grounds
Level: 2 - Strg: 14 - Dext: 17 - Endr: 16 - Luck: 11 - Int:
Played by: Neowulf Offline
Change author:
Posts: 229 | Total: 642
MP: 970
#11
THE GHOST IN THE SHELL \\
Useful? Aamu's eyebrows rise slightly, a complicated thing that's not sure if it wants to be a frown or just surprise: why does something need to be useful to have merit? She could've given him pretty pebbles and he would've been happy, warmed by the intention, and they would always remind him of her.

But he doesn't think this is the time for taking hold of that tangle of emotions, that snarl of barbed wire. "Yes," he says instead, gentle, warm, still smiling that slight smile. "They are." Like a baker forgetting his bread Aamu suddenly snaps his head slightly to the side to peer at the forge, before carefully laying aside the gifts—far out of harm's way. "I'll be done here in a moment." He's not sure why he says it: she doesn't need him for anything, really, but perhaps they could go try their new knives out.

Elegantly he hops down from the worktable and turns around, scooping sand out of the trough. Then he grabs his long tongs and pulls the sword out of the forge: it gleams white-hot and orange, almost alive with the shifting heat. Carefully he places it in the sand, pouring that which he previously removed over it. Satisfied it is all covered by a thick enough layer he nods to himself and closes down the forge for the night.

( Fin <3 )


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