IronBlood

By C. H. Knyght

Magic and iron don’t mix.
The balance is tentative, but in an era of peace comes progress.

Progress, success, is what Hezekiel strives for. Human through and through, his magic is that
of heated steel, the solid strike of his hammer, the rumble of a new engine. Hezekiel aims to
claim first prize at the expo with his revolutionary machine, the Crawler, and build a forge and a
name for himself; a name worthy of renown, and courting Ms. Baba.

But, an insidious darkness creeps through the night, leaving death in its wake.
When his neighbor dies, Hezekiel gets snared in the mystery as he tries desperately to protect his family, even from themselves, and find the source of the strange deaths before the city is crippled.

• Language: English
• Publisher: C. H. Knyght
• Release date: Aug 18, 2023
• ISBN: 9798215564400

C. H. Knyght

C. H. Knyght lives in Minnesota next door to her family with her critters: two dogs, a cat, and a horse. Her library takes up most of her home with eleven bookshelves and counting. (She dreads ever moving for this reason.) When she’s not writing, she’s drawing.Magic is what you choose to create of it.

Book preview

IronBlood

©C. H. Knyght 2021

Edited by Charlie Knight

Illustrated by INKmagine and Create

ISBN: 9798499426371

Imprint: Independently published

Adventure forth!

Chapter One

Smoke belched out as he opened the furnace to shovel in more coal. Hezekiel tilted his face out of the direct blast of heat and stirred the coals to mix in the new with the hot. Metal ingots waited in the smelting pot for the heat to burn evenly. Pale smoke wisped from the red-hot coals. Hezekiel gave the billows a pump, and the embers flared white as the air gushed over them. Iron groaned as he swung the smelting bucket over the flames.

Hezekiel hurried to prepare the anvil with the right stands for shaping. He had to get the pauldron piece shaped and finished before Boss came in and the workday officially began. Being the lowest smith in the hierarchy, it was his task to get the fires hot. Not that he minded. The early start gave him time to pursue his personal project.

This was his favorite part of the morning. The smithy was peaceful without the weight of Boss’ expectations and Victor annoying him. He was first in and usually last out. It was his chance to tinker on his own projects before the commissioned jobs. Today, as every day for the recent months, that project was his machine. If it worked, the Crawler would be the first vehicle to move without rail tracks or wheels. Many had tried and few had succeeded, at least with anything strong enough to be used for mining—the Crawler’s intended purpose.

He’d scavenged up a decent chunk of metal from the scrapped ships out in the bloodfields. This would be the first shoulder pauldron if he got it right. Older metal could be finicky to reheat and shape; he didn’t want to melt it down to liquid. The pauldrons would shield vulnerable hoses and gears from rock damage while being broad enough that any miners in the vicinity could take shelter against the machine. They paid miners well for risking their lives in the most dangerous job in Iron City, but it needed to be made safer.

While the main forge heated, Hezekiel set to shaping his metal, falling into the rhythm of his hammer as he pounded it concave. His soul sang to the steady beat. Smithing was the only time he ever felt truly capable, like creating was what he was meant to. Put tools in his hands and the world came together. He saw the project as a finished piece and how to get it there. It was easier than words and people.

This machine held his hopes and dreams between its nuts and bolts. His plan for his future. As much as he loved this place, it was destined to be Victor’s, Boss’s son.

The front bell dinged. Hezekiel glanced at the mirror, angled to see the door, and confirmed that it was Boss coming in. He cast a quick look to ensure the main fire burned steady before he bent back over his work.

Mornin’, he greeted as Boss reached the smithy. He shifted the metal to the last stand to get the exact curvature he wanted.

Boss grunted acknowledgement, exchanging his hat for a coal-smudged leather apron.

That was the extent of the conversation until Victor strolled in mid-morning. What’s on the docket today? Hope it’s not more of those pots. Didn’t we have an order of silverware? I’ll work on those. Victor rolled up his sleeves, preparing for work.

Hezekiel groaned, the complaint thankfully lost in the wheeze of the bellows as he coaxed the coals to burn hotter. The peace was gone for the day. Victor liked to talk. All. Day. Long. From the breath he came in on to the exhale as he left. It was great when he had customers up front to entertain, but it was one of the things that drove Hezekiel slightly crazy with Victor. A lot of their fraught relationship related back to Victor’s tongue.

Hezekiel didn’t know how Boss, a man of few to no words, tolerated it. It was as though Boss had given his remaining allotment of words in life to his son, and Victor was determined to burn through them all before he was thirty, such was the dramatic difference between them.

And, Victor thought he was better than he was. Hezekiel cringed in internal horror whenever Victor sought to claim any of the jobs that required a steady, delicate touch. There was a reason Boss was boss. He was a master of metal craft in the city and by all rights should have had a shop in the market’s center with the other engineers of society’s note. It was by choice that he didn’t, much to Victor’s never-ending dismay. Boss didn’t care for the high-brow attitudes and demands. As he put it, he liked to keep his hands dirty and his heart clean.

Pots, Boss grunted, or horseshoes. He didn’t look up from his work. Victor’s late appearance was nothing remarkable.

Guessing Victor’s answer, Hezekiel resigned himself to a long day of wrestling heavy pot molds around. He should have known. Victor came over to the anvil, and Hezekiel handed over the hammer and gave up the job he’d taken on. Never mind that the farrier was his customer specifically and he was already well into the order while the pots and pans hadn’t been started.

No matter. Boss’s son got choice, of course.

Old resentment curdled Hezekiel’s gut, and he sucked in a deep breath before he even thought about touching the smelting pot. One did not slam things around in fits of temper when working with boiling metal.

Victor took over the half-finished order and completed it well before closing. Father, I have friends waiting for me, if I may? It’s only a few minutes early, he pleaded even as he edged towards the door. Boss sighed and waved a hand, not bothering to stop him. Hezekiel rolled his eyes but was glad anyway. A bored Victor was a complaining Victor.

Hezekiel finished up the last of the pot repairs. It was nearly dinner time, but Boss still bent over the tedious detail work for the silverware, and there were more to unmold. It was a massive order for a dowry due the day after tomorrow. If he helped, he could get it down to a manageable workload for tomorrow. Victor could have helped before he hared off, but no, his friends’ parties were more important. As though they wouldn’t be going well into the night anyway.

Up the mountain, the whistles blew, announcing the end of the mining workday. Most people were free for the evening now.

Coming for dinner tonight?

No, sir. I have a new piece to install.

It’s been a while. You’d best be over for Sunday dinner or the missus will have both our heads.

Yes, sir.

Locking the shop, Hezekiel hefted the cooled pauldron onto his back. First in, last out as usual. Didn’t that say volumes about the state of his life? It wasn’t as though he wanted to go out and party with Victor. All the hubbub wore on his nerves.

By rights, closing up should have been Victor’s job, but more often than not, it fell to Hezekiel. Boss would stay if he didn’t practically shove the man out the door, but Hezekiel could do at least this much to repay the man that had saved him, raised him, and gave him something other than an early death in the mines or earlier death in the streets.

Boss wasn’t getting younger. The detail work strained his eyes and the long days dragged at his bones. Not that he ever said either, but Hezekiel had seen him rubbing sore eyes and aching joints.

He kept only half a thought on the shadows of the alleys as he headed toward the outer ring, the warehouse district in the shadow of the Wall. He wasn’t a small man. Few dared tangle with him. Just as well—he didn’t enjoy tangling with people. Violence sickened him. He preferred to build things up, not tear them down. He hated conflict, and the sight of blood made his stomach churn.

His home was a warehouse—the only place big enough and cheap enough for him to bring his work home. And yet, the machine crouched in the center still took up the bulk of his living space.

It wasn’t as grand and imposing as the Ironguards, but then, few things were. His Crawler was something new. It wasn’t meant to challenge the war-machines for defense of the city against marauding fae—though the war was over, that didn’t mean everyone agreed with the treaty. The Crawler was a mining machine. It wasn’t confined to railways or even roads. It would save lives. It would dig through tunnel collapses like a gopher through a field, allowing them to get to trapped miners. Adaptable to many situations, it would be capable of going over the shifting sands of the bloodfields or climbing over rock falls that would block up tracks and anything with wheels. It had to be finished in time for the expo. He’d missed last year’s deadline because the Crawler wasn’t complete enough for entry.

Even if he was doing this to make his own shadow to cast, it wasn’t just his own reputation that he would tarnish if he didn’t put the right foot forward. He’d had a full extra year since, and it still wasn’t completed. Progress around working at the shop was ponderously slow.

The expo was only a couple months out, so he needed every spare minute to finish the machine. If he won, the prize purse and ensuing commissions would be sufficient to either buy the forge from Victor after Boss passed or begin his own smithy. He didn’t want to do that, though. He loved the shop and grew up sorting the bolt bins until he was old enough to make the bolts that went into them. The forge was his home. The crawler was his only hope of keeping it.

Chapter Two

It was hard to roll out of bed the next morning after the late hours he’d put into the Crawler. Hezekiel rubbed the grit out of his eyes and chugged the half cream half coffee slug mixture he’d brewed up to get moving.

He chased it with a swallow of juice just this side of too sharp. He shuddered. Definitely time to go shopping. After work. If Victor didn’t skive off again and leave them with his share of the workload.

The warehouse bordered on the lower side—hence, the affordable rent for the size. It showed in the general state of the drab buildings, the brick greyed from caked layers of coal dust and missing stones in the cobbles of the street. Here, everyone looked out for their neighbors. They all struggled and all understood the struggle.

Ms. Baba stood at the end of the walk next door, frowning at the house. She was a young nurse that lived a few blocks over and often came to check on Mr. Agnes’ health. The old man suffered from a late onset of rustlung. The neighborhood took turns checking on him and making sure he had food and pain medications. It was the best they could do for a cruel disease that corrupted, ruined, and stifled the lungs. Miners were the most likely to succumb, their exposure significantly higher, but the rust could take any of them.

It pained Hezekiel because he saw in the elderly man what awaited the Boss. Rustlung was slow and painful. The disease didn’t care for the rich or poor, and only the rich could afford medicine that did more than control the pain of your lungs, seizing like a machine rusted solid.

Oh, Mr. Rowe, would you come here? I’m going to be late for work if I don’t skedaddle, but Mr. Agnes isn’t answering the door. If I’m late again, they will dock me. Would you make sure he gets this? A tight bun bound her kinky hair that refused to be tamed. Escaped curls bobbed around the edges of her cap.

Yes, miss. He would lose his extra work time while the forges heated, but Boss would understand where Ms. Baba’s employers would not.

Bless you. She passed over the basket. Bunching up her white skirts in a fist, she scurried to the trolley station.

Hezekiel tromped up the stairs and pounded on the door in announcement before he opened it. Mr. Agnes! he called as he entered, hoping the man hadn’t fallen down again.

The floorboards creaked loudly in the dead silence. The kettle sat cold on the stove. Odd. The man usually rose with the first bells, the early hour entrenched by long years of leaving for the mines at dawn.

Hezekiel set the basket down and then tea water to heating. Mr. Agnes always wanted a good strong cuppa first thing. The handle wobbled on the kettle, showing its age. He should steal it to the shop one of these days and get it all tightened up. It only needed a patch job to re-secure the screws.

Mr. Agnes?

Silence. The only noise was the hissing of the blue, gas-fueled flames licking dully at the tarnished bottom of the kettle. Hezekiel left the kitchen for the depths of the private rooms. Trepidation chilled his blood. He didn’t want to look. He knew what waited. The house was just too quiet.

No, Mr. Agnes merely slept in, that’s all. A well-deserved rest. Everyone liked a good lie in.

A hunched form lay in the shadow dimmed bedroom, lit only by the daylight around the curtain over the open window. Hezekiel rapped lightly on the doorframe, trying not to startle the old man into the grave. Nothing. He shivered. Mr Agnes didn’t sleep quietly. His wheezing, raspy snores were usually loud enough to be heard from outside due to the thin walls and the fight to breathe through the rust.

Hezekiel closed his eyes and drew in a steadying breath. He jiggered the temperamental light switch on; the bulb clicked and hummed as the filament heated to brighten the room. Mr. Agnes, he tried, one more time, not expecting an answer, and he didn’t get one. Hezekiel reached out and drew the blankets away. Stars! He jolted back, nearly falling in his haste to retreat as though a slag bucket had sloshed out molten metal.

The body in the bed looked like a weathered mummy, decayed and decades old. Red crystals clustered from every orifice, lining his mouth and nose. Tall, cobalt shards jutted from the man’s eye sockets like stalagmites. Hezekiel backed away. The body, unrecognizable in its state, looked diseased and wrong. This was not rustlung.

Hezekiel stumbled out of the house and a few blocks over before he found a phone box to summon the constables. He fumbled with the receiver, dropping it to fall into its cord. The operator was sharply inquiring information before he got it picked up and turned the right way around. I’m here! I’m here. I need the constables.

The operator’s voice changed pitch from annoyance to softened concern. Of course, sir, transferring the call. Please, hold.

By the time he made his way back to the house, constables were already cordoning off the walkway to keep the gathering onlookers at bay while they worked. Hezekiel made to step in, and a baton barred his way.

No one in. What are you, thick? The constable gestured at the rope.

But I’m the one who called you. Why had he tried to go in? He didn’t want to see that again. He’s…was my friend.

The baton lowered, but the constable didn’t move aside. Not anymore. There’s nothing here for you to do. The van is on the way. Move on about your business.

But… The man was right. There wasn’t even any family to be informed. Half the block was staring, and the other half would know by evening. His shoulders sagged. Just make sure they are respectful? He was a good man.

Sympathy creased the man’s face. Of course. All care will be taken.

Hezekiel started to leave before turning back. Do you know what happened to him? It didn’t look...natural.

Shrugging, the constable shook his head. That’s the doc’s job.

Even though he was beyond late, Hezekiel shuffled toward the shop, too shocked to make any appropriate speed.

Boss cast a dark frown at him when he entered. Everything alright, boy? Not like you to be late. He didn’t mention Victor, who wasn’t here either. He was always late anyway.

Yes, sir. Hezekiel pulled on his apron. No, Boss. I’m sorry. My neighbor, Mr. Agnes, passed away. I found him and had to alert the authorities.

Ah, sympathies, Boss said.

He couldn’t hold it in any longer. It was strange, Hezekiel blurted. There was this purple stuff on his face, like mold, and he was all shriveled.

Huh. Sure, he hasn’t been gone for a while?

I just talked to him. He was fine. Hezekiel picked up his awls, but they shook in his grasp. Why? Mr. Agnes wasn’t the first dead person he’d ever seen or the goriest. Still, he laid the fine tools down and picked up his hammer.

Boss grunted. "Don’t know what to tell you.