To Bleed a Crystal Bloom by Sarah A. Parker

Ilower the heavy lid on the wooden chest and clank the deadlock into place, feeling Greywin’s nervous assessment, hot like the heat spilling from his kiln. I taste his tempered excitement in the dense, smoky air.

Despite the sweltering atmosphere, I’ve always liked this space. The smell of grit and determination has seeped into the stone walls and the wooden tables nesting about. You can see it in the worn utensils and the battered anvil—in the old, weather-beaten man who has a cot set up deeper in the cave so he never has to leave.

Greywin’s looking at me over the top of his cluttered workstation, a bushy mantle of silver brows shadowing his eyes. The forge is blazing behind him, casting the cavern chamber in a red glow.

Okay?he signs with fingers knotted from old age.

His entire family was slaughtered in a Vruk raid over forty years ago, after which he gouged his own eardrums with a stick as self-punishment for not being there.

This is all he has left. His craft.

I make a fist and nod it, pushing to a stand, stamping my thumb to the flat of my palm then twisting both hands in opposite directions to signal how impressed I am.

He grunts.

Barely smothering a smile, he slips his gloves back on and turns, using tongs to remove a long, fiery blade from the kiln before forcing it into submission with a hammer.

Ting-ting-ting.

Clang.

I lean against the wall, watching him work. His quarters used to be stationed on the castle grounds until I moved him out here nineteen years ago. This cave digs deep underground, so none of his sound spills into the forest or makes its way up to Orlaith’s tower.

Heavy footfalls echo down the throat of the cave in alternate rhythm to the jarring, metallic strikes. The reek of whiskey and whatever female wet Baze’s cock last night hits me before he emerges into the workshop glow—hair a mess, dark circles beneath his eyes. His top is loosely buttoned, and he didn’t even bother with his boots.

Two days off, and he’s fallen into old habits.

I arch a brow. “Good night?”

He avoids eye contact, scratching the back of his head and repressing a yawn. “You wanted to see me?”

I watch him for a long moment.

Clang.

Clang.

Clearing my throat, I push off the wall, reaching for one of the two swords laid out on Greywin’s work table, both made from an almost black wood with leather-bound pommels.

Simple, well-made weapons.

I hand the smaller one to Baze, his brow buckling as he studies it with eyes more vigilant than they were seconds ago.

“Wait ...” He steals a glance over his shoulder to our master plan—different colored logs stacked against the far wall. Stepping stones to edge Orlaith closer to an eventual metal blade. “Ebonwood?”

I nod.

He looks at the blade like it’s going to twist out of his hand and slit his throat. “You’re pushing her too fast.”

He’s right, of course. But patience is a luxury I’ve been sipping on for years; a luxury I can no longer afford.

Not when it comes to her.

“No. I’m not pushing her fast enough.”

He sighs, weighing the weapon in both hands. “She barely withstands the draw of a metal blade at dinner, and you think she’s ready for this? It’s over double the density of her last sword. The sound difference—”

“May be jarring,” I finish for him.

He looks at me through his tangled mop of hair. “Exactly. We agreed to move onto walnut after she got used to the Petrified Pine. Which she wasn’t, by the way. If we hadn’t lost the set to that selkie hovel, I’d have kept her on the pine for the next six months.”

Six mon—

“She seemed to cope just fine the other day.”

“Because she was fucking jacked.”

An image I’ll carry to my grave.

I clear my throat.

“Be that as it may, we don’t have time for walnut anymore. We barely have time for Ebonwood. I was tempted to move right onto Silver Olivewood ...” I shrug; the heavy pelt draped around my shoulders having nothing on the weight that’s been stacked there for years. “I had Greywin thin the hilt on hers instead.”

“I can see that,” Baze replies, swinging the blade and making it sing. “She’ll grumble ...”

“Undoubtedly.”

He picks up the slightly bigger sword I had forged for him in the same wood, and strikes them against each other, splitting the air with a sharp sound.

He winces.

Internally, I do the same.

“And I’m free to hold you accountable?” he grits out, eyeing me over the crossed weapons. “I’ll be taking full advantage of that because I’ll tell you now, she is not going to like this.”

I fold my arms and lean against the wall. “My decision. I’m happy to take the fall.”

Take her hate.

“You say that now,” he mumbles, inspecting the swords from all angles, “but last time we changed, she spiked my tea with something that made my piss turn green for a week. Just so you’re aware.”

Greywin lets out a hearty chortle, leading Baze to narrow his eyes on the old man.

“I thought he was deaf.”

“He can lip-read just fine ...” the corner of my mouth threatens to bounce up into a half smile, “though he rarely bothers.”

Clang.

Clang.

Clang.

“I’m going to take that as a compliment.”

“Good for you.”

He jerks his chin at the chest. “What’s in there?”

“A contingency I hope we don’t require,” I mutter, sweeping past Baze on my way into the cave’s gloomy length.

He swears, low and sharp, before his hurried footsteps follow.

“She needs to know, Rhor.” He shadows me through the waterfall of vines that act as a natural door into the dewy forest lit by blades of dull morning light.

“About?”

He slays me with a condemning glower. “Everything. Or at least the fucking basics.”

“No.”

I let the vines fall back into place behind him and spin on my heel, stepping over mossy boulders and tree roots that twist out of the soil.

“You’re fucking brutal. I was hoping you’d soften with age, but every year that passes, you just seem to get worse.”

I brush my hand against a tree. “I’m choosing to take that as a compliment.”

“Good for you,” he says, matching me stride for stride while we marinate in a stretch of silence. “I hope you’re prepared to pick up the pieces if everything unravels.”

“That girl has been in pieces since I lifted her from the rubble,” I mutter, watching him veer around a deeper pocket of shadow. “There’s nothing nearby. You don’t have to dodge the dark.”

He takes the long way around the shadow of a boulder taller than us both, traipsing knee-deep through a rushing brook. “With all due respect, I’m not prepared to take my chances. Have you seen the one she feeds on the edge of your scent line recently?” He shivers, leaping onto dry land. “It’s almost doubled in size.”

“I have, yes.”

“And you’re still not concerned?”

Catching the sound of a distant flutter, I look east, seeing a small, misty orb darting toward me. “It won’t hurt her,” I tell him, shoving my hand out like a perch.

A female sprite no taller than my index finger lands in the middle of my palm, pointy ears poking through her straight, white hair. With skin so pale it’s almost see-through, her inky eyes make a bold statement on her small face.

Opaline wings stick out from her back like tapered leaves, dusting my hand in powder as they flick about, then sink to garnish her gauzy dress.

She pulls a scroll from her chest holster and hands it to me, bouncing up and down, clapping her hands.

Baze snort-laughs from his spot perched against a tree in a muddy beam of light, swords resting against a rock before him. “You spoil them.”

I reach into the pocket of my cloak, retrieve a pale gem no larger than a pinhead, and hold it out.

The sprite makes a sharp trilling sound and snatches the gift so fast I can barely trace the movement. “Happy sprites make for reliable service,” I say, watching her dart off through the forest with her plunder. She’ll go straight to her den in a tree somewhere and grind that diamond down to dust, use it to coat her wings, then spend hours admiring her reflection in a pond somewhere.

“An aggressive service. I got bitten the other day because all I had to offer was a nut.”

I drop my attention to the scroll, unraveling it. “I hardly see how that’s my fault.”

“They’re spoiled from your pocket diamonds. Anything important?”

“An update from the regiment. It was a hard winter, and they’re running low on game. I’m having them shift closer to Quoth Point.” I roll the scroll and pocket it. “They can make use of the old barracks there, and there’s plenty of fish in the ocean to keep them fed.”

Baze’s eyes widen. “Quoth Point?”

“It’s precautionary.”

“Precautionary ...” he mimics, drawing a deep breath and pushing it out fast.

I let the silence stretch while he digests. When he finally shoves off the trunk, his shoulders appear heavier. Even the smudges beneath his eyes look darker.

“Well, in that case, the Ebonwood was a wise choice,” he says, looking at the swords. “Speaking of which, I better get back.”

He retrieves both weapons and heads west, weaving between ancient trees that bear their shadows down around him.

“Baze?”

He pauses, regarding me over his shoulder, brow raised.

“Clean yourself up. You smell like a tavern.”

Get a handle on it before I end up scraping you off the masonry.

He lowers his eyes and nods, continuing toward the castle.

He’d never admit to it if I asked, but he relies on her just as much as I do.