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Ting! Ting! Ting!
The rhythm of metal being pounded into shape atop a familiar anvil was one Four had missed dearly. The feeling of his favorite hammer in one hand and his well-loved tongs in the other doubly so.
It had been nearly two months since he last worked in his own forge.
Two months since he’d been home.
Two months since his grandfather lost his helper.
And it showed.
Their pile of commissions had grown taller than him. Horseshoes, daggers, knives, swords, shields, axes, pots, pans, helmets, handles, hooks, nails, chainmail …and that was just what he gathered from a cursory glance. There was no way Grandpa could have hoped to keep up, especially with his arthritis.
Luckily, Four was home now and more than eager to work.
He held up the glowing piece of metal, a self-satisfied smile alighting on his face at the sight of its newfound flat edge. Perfect.
Four swiveled from the anvil over to the furnace, relishing in the heat of the fire as he thrust the half-finished blade inside. The steel warmed from red to orange to yellow, and he felt his entire being warm with it.
It was good to be home.
Even better to be smithing at his own forge. Although, that wasn’t to say he hadn’t kept his blacksmithing skills sharp during his time away. Quite the opposite. Traveling with a band of heroes across time and space granted him the unique opportunity to visit various smithies and observe techniques that would never be invented in his time or had otherwise been lost to the ages. It was fascinating how much he could learn, and keeping his fellow heroes’ weapons and equipment maintained ensured his skills never rusted.
But there always seemed to be an element missing, a hole in an otherwise perfect painting, that prevented every job he finished from feeling truly satisfying.
Now, as he quenched the blade and set it aside, he felt no such sting.
Only pride and the sheen of sweat on his brow that belied a job well done.
Wiping flyaways from his eyes, Four readjusted his headband and threw himself into the next project.
Ting! Ting! Ting!
Then the next.
Ting! Ting! Ting!
And another.
Ting! Ting! Ting!
“Four!”
Ting! Ting! Ting!
“FOUR!”
Ting! Ting—!
“FOUR!!!”
His next swing fell short, the hammer head settling on the anvil with a gentle ping as he turned his attention to the entrance of the smithy.
Wind stood there, hands on hips and face slightly red from screaming.
“Yes?”
“It’s dinnertime.”
“Oh, alright,” Four’s gaze wandered back to his current project. He couldn’t exactly just stop in the middle… “Hey, if it’s not too much trouble, could you send a plate in here?”
Wind’s face fell. “You don’t want to eat with us? Or your grandpa?”
“It’s not that,” Four hastened to reassure the sailor, recommencing his previous ministrations and raising his voice to be heard. “I do want to eat with you all. It’s just that I’m in the zone right now, and this is delicate so…”
He trailed off, tongue in cheek as he bent the metal just-so.
“Got it!” Wind chirped. “I’ll get you a plate.”
“Thanks,” he mumbled, lifting his work off the anvil to appraise it. Hmm. Not quite there.
Wind left, and Four returned to his hammering and bending and tempering and quenching. Every tool became an extension of his arm, the fire a roaring inferno that raced through his veins and became one with his soul. To separate the two would mean death. How he had lived without it for so long, he didn’t know.
Ting! Ting! Ting!
Each blow rang up his arm to his shoulder in a comforting shudder. He smiled. If all your muscles weren’t aching at the end of a day of smithing, you were doing it wrong.
Ting! Ting! Ting!
“Link!”
Ting! Ting! Ting!
“Link!”
Ting! Ting—!
“LINK!”
He started, nearly fumbling his hammer.
“What?” he demanded, whipping his head around to glare at whoever had disturbed him.
Grandpa stared back from the doorway, unimpressed. “Wrap it up. It’s getting late.”
“It’s not that late,” he mumbled, gaze drifting to the window. The darkness gave him pause. Huh, he could have sworn the sun had barely been on its way to setting last time he looked. “Okay…maybe it’s a little late,” he admitted, turning back to his grandfather with a sheepish smile.
“It is,” Grandpa agreed with a knowing look. “Work will be there in the morning, lad.”
“I know, it’s just that we’re supposed to be moving on in the morning, and I wanted to get as much done as possible.”
Grandpa sighed and came around to clap a calloused hand on Four’s shoulder. “I appreciate the help, but you’ve done plenty. I can take it from here.”
Four bit his lip, eyes flicking to the pile of commissions. He’d barely made a dent. A squeeze on his shoulder brought his attention back to Grandpa. “I know that look. Stop it. There’s always work to do and good thing too! Otherwise, I’d be out of a business.”
He didn’t think it wise to point out that his grandfather would be out of a business if he didn’t produce results in a timely manner. So, instead, Four put a hint of a whine into his voice with a healthy dose of puppy dog eyes for good measure and begged.
“Five more minutes?”
Grandpa glanced at the tip of an iron ingot quickly cooling from orange-red to red-grey on the anvil.
He sighed. “Five more minutes.”
“Thank you, Grandpa!”
The man wagged a finger in his face. “Only five! You better be in bed after that.”
He laughed at the blatant distrust “I will! I’m just going to finish this nail.”
With a nod, and one final warning look, Grandpa left the forge, and Four returned to his work. Having made nails since he was small, it only took him about a minute to complete one. He could easily make five, then hang his tools and apron up for the night.
In fact, he planned on doing just that. Except sometime around three or four he lost count. He figured it didn’t matter. They were so easy for him to make that he could probably get ten done in five minutes. There was no harm in making a few extra.
And okay, maybe he did start making some hooks next but there were only a handful needed, and he knew Grandpa found them particularly fiddly with the way he had to manipulate the metal. They took practically no time or effort for Four, so it was best he got them out of the way.
By the time he was done with that, he realized, the blades he’d made earlier were ready for sharpening, and he knew for a fact holding a whetstone or file for too long made his Grandpa’s arthritic hands cramp. It’d be cruel to let his grandfather take on the job, so Four grabbed his whetstone and file and went to work. He’d go to bed after this, he promised himself. He just had to finish these blades.
He just had to craft a few hilts and pommels—the pommels were very important for weight distribution.
He just had to finish off the swords, wrap their handles in leather to ensure a good grip.
He just had to forge a few handles for the pots and pans.
Oh wait, he still had to make those…
Okay! He just had to bang out a couple skillets.
A wok.
More nails. They needed so many nails…
“Four?”
Oh, no, much more than four. More like four hundred. Or well, maybe a little less now that he’d made some.
“Hey!” He glanced up at the shout, vaguely noting it belonged to their temperamental veteran. To be honest, he wasn’t overly interested in whatever had the Hero of Legend’s tunic in a twist now. He had a lot of work left to do.
Nonetheless, he wasn’t going to be overtly rude. Setting down his hammer, Four moved to the furnace to reheat the soon to be nail.
“What?”
“ What?! ” Legend screeched, “I’ll tell you what! Some of us are trying to sleep and you’re hammering at the butt crack of dawn!”
…Dawn?
He blinked into the flames, watching as the metal changed color, its hue shifting from drab darks to bright orange-yellow-white. It matched the morning light filtering in from the windows.
Four snapped his head up at the realization with a gasp, vision soft and blurry. He furiously blinked it clear and swiveled to face Legend. The rod of heated metal swung with him, and Legend jumped back with a curse.
“Watch it!”
“Sorry I—sorry.” He hastily stepped back to the anvil and placed the nail in the nail header. Might as well finish this... “I didn’t realize.”
“That you have hot metal in your hands?” Legend demanded, hands on hips and face rightfully furious.
“No—I—yes?” He shook his head, his brain feeling too fuzzy to properly articulate his thoughts.
Legend seemed to notice. “Wait…were you up working all night?”
“Didn’t mean to,” he mumbled, shame heating the tips of his ears. He couldn’t quite look at Legend, although he was sure Grandpa’s face of disapproval would be much scarier.
Legend sucked in a breath. “Okay. You’re done.”
“In a sec,” Four agreed. “I just need to fini—”
“ Nope. You’re done.” In the blink of an eye Legend had swiped the hammer from his hand and slotted it into its resting place beside the anvil. “Go to bed, Four.”
“Alright, alright, I will,” he promised, clumsily removing his apron and tugging his gloves off with throbbing fingers. He raised a hand to rub at his blurry eyes. “Can you at least let me mark down what I got done?”
“No,” Legend refused, taking the protective gear from him to hang on a nearby hook. “Your eye bags have eye bags. Go. To. Sleep.”
He rolled his eyes, the motion almost too much for the weight of them and moved to leave. To an outsider he must have looked drunk, unable to properly walk in a straight line, but he c ould walk, so he waved off Legend’s helping hand and hid a yawn behind his own.
That didn’t stop Legend from following him out of the smithy, though. It was like he didn’t trust him to make it to his own bed and actually sleep—which considering he had accidentally pulled an all-nighter—was fair. But! It was also unnecessary since he was well aware of his folly and feeling every minute of overtime with each successive blink.
Wild greeted them when they walked—or well, stumbled in Four’s case—into the house, but Four could barely muster up a sentence at this point, let alone a “good morning.”
Legend wasted no time explaining Four’s current condition to Wild, which earned him a scolding from the cook (“Why didn’t you eat dinner?!”) and a glass of water because he had forgotten to drink that entire time as well. Probably the reason his head was throbbing now, to be honest.
He took a sip, quickly realizing how thirsty he’d been as soon as the first drop hit his tongue.
As he chugged the glass of water, Legend huffed. “Honestly, how do you forget to drink?”
“Or eat?!” Wild wanted to know, eyes wide with horror. “Didn’t your stomach grumble at all?”
Four shrugged. “Dunno.” He honestly hadn’t noticed.
“Right. Well, you’re officially the worst at taking care of yourself,” Legend declared. “These are basic needs , Four.” He drove home the point with two chops to his palm.
“I know,” he whined, letting his tired limbs go boneless and sliding down in his seat so his chin was level with the table. His eyes slipped shut. “I didn’t mean to forget. I just wanted to help my grandpa. There’s way too many commissions for one person to handle.”
“Then why did you try to handle them yourself?” Wild wondered.
“‘Cause I’m younger. And I wasn’t trying to get them all done. Just a good chunk before we had to leave.”
“You could’ve asked for help then, dummy,” A finger flicked his forehead and he wrinkled his nose, slitting one eye open to glare at Legend. “I’m a blacksmith’s apprentice.”
“Oh yeah…I—”
“Forgot. I know,” Legend quipped. “That seems to be the trend.”
“If I wasn’t so tired, I’d punch you,” Four murmured, letting both eyes fall shut again.
Legend snorted.
“You know, I doubt we’re going anywhere with him like this,” Wild mentioned from somewhere above his head.
“Even if we are, he’s not,” Legend returned.
“What can we even do without him?”
“Shopping.”
“This is his Hyrule, though. We don’t know where anything is.”
“And that, my dear champion, is why maps exist.”
“Is it?”
Four began to drift then, the sounds of Wild puttering around the kitchen and chatting with Legend swiftly lulling him to sleep. Before he could fall too far, though, a rough hand shook his shoulder.
“Don’t fall asleep there,” Legend admonished. “You’ll hate yourself later, trust me.”
He groaned. Moving didn’t even feel like an option anymore, but Legend persisted, grabbing him by the elbow and tugging. “Come on. Up. At least pass out on the couch.”
With Legend’s help, he hobbled, squinty-eyed and aching, to a plush surface that cradled his sore body much nicer than the old, rickety dining chair did. He melted into the familiar softness with a sigh, only half aware as someone tugged his hair free of its messy tie and slipped off his boots.
A grumble drifted down from somewhere above along with a waft of cool air. “You’re hopeless.”
Normally, he’d argue his case. He was quite capable of a lot of things, thank you very much. But at the moment he was far too tired. Later, his hazy brain decided. He could do it later.
Letting that thought comfort him, Four snuggled into the blanket that had settled around his body and gave in to sleep.