The Smith and a Lady (Tag: Liesel Mormont)

[Tobias Snow]

Free from the bonds of a sick bed the young Smith was left to seek some task that might suit his abilities. For that purpose alone he sought out the part of the camp that held the smiths. It was not like it had been that hard to find that night but a week or so before. The sounds of hammers striking iron and steel and the glow of embers lead him to the comforting warmth of the smiths... for their were hardly just a single smith there fixing helms and plate for the lords. He found among them a small hut, with a small leather bed and chair... It was roofed in old straw and he was sure the roof was likely full of leaks... but it was the only forge that did not have a master, and his apprentices.

Oh he hardly was about to deny that he was a master but he held more skill in a hand than many of those apprentices and many of those fools had the desire to show off their skills with pointless ornamentation on the armors. So it was that when the fires were stoked and he managed to pull what little iron he had in his pack from it. He knew that he would have to show them that while he might not care for the frills and ornamentation that they seemed to clamor about. The gold and silver inlays that did nothing to the metal but perhaps leave it weaker for the fact of it all.

So it was that in the red glow and the pervading heat of flame the hammer struck iron. The cycle taking him over as he forged into the night and soon enough he had proof that he could make the weapons the masters did. but more than that the word spread as people saw the thin stilleto knife that he had made... The simple blade that held no ornament and yet had a full tang and soft black leather as it glittered in proof that his hammer was sure and his skills nothing to scoff at.

The Masters disliked him, simply put they doubted a boy had a right to work at their sides... Yet he was able to get what he needed and he got orders. Perhaps not many... but those that cared for function rather than gold filigreed suits masquerading as armor came. He worked and sweat their in the heat as it broiled through the ancient worn wooden floor, as the smoke wrapped up through the small chimney and the thin straw roof. The room, was dark and the flames danced around him as his hammer struck the steel of the Longsword that he worked at. The blade glittered red as his eyes looked at the blade as he held it out, judging the feel of the sword.

The weight and size, the balance and more things than many might thought whispered through his mind as he settled the sword, almost perfect in his mind into the vat to cool. The water roiled and bubbled as he studied the blade as it cooled. He ran a dirt coated hand through the tangles of his sweat curled hair. His back to the door and his apron falling across his front even as his arms stood bare and scared by burns along their corded length.

[Liesel Mormont]

When Liesel Mormont first caught sight of the young blacksmith, she had to take a second look to be certain it was not the King-in-the-North himself labouring over a new-forged sword. He had that same dark hair, but it was not that led to her mistake so much as the way he was standing, something in his carriage. Then her gaze fell upon his arms and the fanciful notion was dismissed. Robb Stark bore no old burn-scars, they weren't a hazard of his line of work.

Liesel cleared her throat. She had chosen this small hut from among those of the smiths' encampment for no reason other than that it had caught her eye, and she had to choose somewhere. Her hauberk was badly in need of repair, she'd been putting it off for long enough and now several links in the mail were broken apart entirely, and more still bent to strange angles. She'd been wearing the same armour for years, it was made-to-fit and fell to just above her knees. Liesel was shorter than the average fighter, and an ill-fitting hauberk was something she couldn't stand.

She carried it now over one arm, and had pushed open the door to the hut where this young man was working. Atypically for Liesel, she was actually in skirts, a light brown kirtle under a forest-green apron dress. Mormont colors. There wasn't much to be done that day except attend meetings that were all speculation, people arguing over the minutiae of strategy for engagements that would likely never even happen. She found it dull. She'd leave all that to Dacey, who, impossibly, seemed to be fascinated by it all.

When she had the blacksmith's attention, she gave him a cheerful smile and lifted the arm over which her chainmail rested a fraction, drawing his eye to it. 'I hope I'm not interrupting,' she said, 'but I'm looking for someone who can repair this. Someone who has both the time to do it and the experience to know how, and I shan't be offended if you're lacking either, so do be honest.' As usual, she didn't waste time on pretty pleasantries, but got to the heart of the matter.

[Tobias Snow]

He had no idea how long she had been their, framed by the light of the outer world in the door as the dark of the hut tried to reach out and swallow her. It was never all that bright within a Forge, or rather not in the forges he worked in, glass would likely melt under the heat that radiated outwards that was not to consider the possibilities of burning the building down... though he was hardly about to do his work out under the son where every person around could learn how he forged his steel and then steel his skill and ability. It was why most hid within a building while working their craft. The sword itself was nearly finished, he needed to finish up the hilt and pommel of course and ensure that the crossguard was fixed properly upon the blade. But the blade itself was finished... sharpen the steel and finish the hilt and pommel and he would be ready to sent it to its new master.

But the woman, seemed to have caught his eye, or rather forcibly drawn his own to her. He took note of the way she stood, not so much taller than other women but the bearing reminded him of a warrior, one of the idiots that would come to have a sword fixed after a battle but also something more was their a quality of softness under the iron that few could see... But then the warrior was the real weapon... It was the weapon that was just part of what they were and the perfect weapon was just an extension of the person that carried it into battle... or so his grandfather had once said as he looked at a mans hand and told him that a long sword was wasted on the hands it was a greatsword he was meant for...

That was neither here nor their as she decided to break the silence with her words.

“I hope I'm not interrupting, but I'm looking for someone who can repair this. Someone who has both the time to do it and the experience to know how, and I shan't be offended if you're lacking either, so do be honest.”

His eyes shifted slightly turning from her eyes to linger upon the mail that lingered upon her shoulder. He wondered what a woman was doing toting around some knights mail when their was so many men running about the camp, surely she would not have taken the mail from some knight she happened to be bedding when he wandered back to camp after battle.

“To what purpose did your Lord send you with his armor to have it repaired... and why bring it to me... I am perhaps the youngest of the smiths... but doubt not the skill to which I forge steel,”

He stated, nodding to his personal blades hanging near the bed on the opposite side of the room, in their leather sheaths and simple in the beauty and yet he hated all the excesses mounted upon the knighly lords helms and blades. It made them stand out in a crowd and gave a man a target upon their golden back sides as they sat astride their demonic beasts.

[Liesel Mormont]

Liesel looked the smith up and down, a quick appraising glance. He couldn't be much younger than her, at worst. As her eyes adjusted to the darker environment of the hut, she saw that he didn't resemble the Young Wolf quite as much as she had first thought. There was a slight resemblance, yes, but much of the rest was likely in her imagination, seeking out familiar features.

He had likely made a set of assumptions about Liesel which, if she couldn't find amusement in them, would drive her to constant irritation. She was more than used to it now, though, and only smirked at him. 'My Lord didn't send me, as it happens,' she remarked, and left it at that. Let him be confused by it, if he couldn't figure it out.

Placing one hand on her hip, she addressed him again. 'I've seen apprentice-boys that had to be half your age. You're old enough.' With that, she stepped forward to examine the blades he had indicated, pulling one out from its sheath with the ease of one long-comfortable with handling weapons. It was well-made. Simplistic, without any of the ostentatious decoration most men went for, but that only seemed to highlight the elegance of his work.

Liesel replaced it, neatly, and turned back to the dark-haired smith. 'And you've got skill, I'll give you that. If I needed a sword forged, maybe I'd pick you on the strength of that. Except today I don't - just this armor repaired. Take a look, will you?' She held it out to him expectantly.

[Tobias Snow]

Sometimes, people were not all that they might appear to be, he was after just another smith within the armies of the North. It was not like he was anything special compared to a knight or lord. Yet it still felt odd to have a woman within his Smithy requesting that he fix the armor of some unknown warrior. Yet she claimed no lord had sent her and so that added some added question to how had the damsel acquired the armor... it was not as if women were warriors or anything. It was just not something that a woman, or rather Lady ever did.

As she asked him to look at the armor, he accepted the praise about his swords without really blinking about it. Yet it struck him odd that the woman knew the difference between a good blade and a bad one. The fact that she had almost seemed to know how to wield it as she pulled if from its scabbard. Accepting the mail, he walked to the only window, covered for the moment as he had been working and he shifted the boards from in front of it to allow in more and better light so that he could see the steel better.

He looked at the rings, he noted a few that the welds had weakened and others that were gone or bent from blows from one weapon or another. He said nothing though, his eyes noting that the mail was not normal mail. It was forged for a woman rather than a man, which lead to him glancing at her for a moment in the dim light of the room. Their could not possibly be many women warriors within the camp... Yet something told him that he was correct that the mail was in fact the ladies... which also likely meant she was no common lady. It also made him feel stupid as he returned his look to the mail to study the rings, it would not do to repair it incorrectly. If he made the rings the wrong size, and did not weld them back together properly then their would be no point, but that was assuming, that he could manage to emulate the work of whomever made the shirt... since smiths often worked differently the quirks within the steel tend to come out based upon who made the shirt and how.

“I can make the repairs, Though my manners are rather horrible it seems, You may call me Tobias if you so wish,”