The Weeping Moon Lake shimmered with the reflections of stars on its emerald surface, as if the sky had spilled into its tranquil basin. They sat on its shore, a small fire between them, from which rose the scent of the beast meat that Arion had hunted and Evelyn had skillfully prepared. The rising smoke mingled with the lake's mist, forming transparent curtains dancing in the night air.
Arion sat leaning against a rock, his eyes still avoiding direct contact with the food. He was staring in the direction where the specter stood – a shadow from his past watching every morsel, every breath. Cain's horse was still in the background, chewing grass monotonously, like a silent guardian of this surreal scene.
The rustle of leaves under the star-studded sky was like a cosmic lullaby, trying to soothe the world into a quiet slumber. But not all souls are capable of rest.
Arion felt as if the stars themselves were staring at him, waiting for the story he would tell as he promised once. And Jacob's resentful gaze was like a knife in his side. Then... he heard it. That sound always associated with the stars in his memory: the sound of chains and droplets of water falling in a vast, ancient hall filled with statues.
As soon as he remembered the scene, his limbs began to tremble gently. He clenched his hands tightly and shook his head as if trying to shake off the memory.
But this tremor did not escape Evelyn's notice.
"What is it? Are you alright?"
With difficulty, Arion smiled and said, "Ah... I remembered something. Don't mind it, it's not important."
"Really? If it's not important, can you tell me what it is?" she persisted
Arion was silent for a moment, then said in a voice so faint it was almost inaudible: "The sound of chains..."
"Chains?" Evelyn wondered, her mind running through a thousand scenarios. How could chains be linked to something that troubles him that much?
Arion was silent for a moment, then smiled evasively: "Ah, I remembered! You don't know that I'm a blacksmith. Believe me, the sound of chains in a smithy is one of the most recurring sounds in your mind in that profession."
Evelyn's gaze deepened. For the first time since their conversation began, she felt that tremor in her mind: He's lying.
"What about the chains?" she replied, thinking silently. "He didn't even lie when talking about eating his friend!"
Her tone became slightly displeased: "A blacksmith? Then... I understand."
Arion smiled a proud smile, saying: "The best among them, not just a blacksmith."
"This time he's telling the truth," thought Evelyn. "So he really is a blacksmith. So what he was lying about was the sound of chains in the smithy. But I mustn't rush... If he wants to escape this topic, I'll open the door for him to pass through. He certainly doesn't trust me enough to talk about something that torments him so deeply yet. And I thought this Jacob would be the worst of it..."
Evelyn smiled gently to hide the storm raging in her mind and said in a somewhat sarcastic tone: "The best! I see you're confident."
Arion laughed: "Have you heard of the reputation of the Forge family before?"
Evelyn: "Forge... like the furnace that melts metals?"
Arion smiled a bitter smile and sighed: "The Forge family is an ancient family of blacksmiths. It's said their origins trace back to the dwarf race, and their techniques run in their blood. But I think it's just a legend, because many skilled blacksmiths emerged from that family. And the man who raised me was from this family."
Evelyn: "And what is the name of this blacksmith who raised you?"
Arion contemplated the fire for a moment, as if seeing his in the flames: "Isaac Forge... they called him the Blacksmith of Ashwood. They said his name was a prophecy – as if he was born to reshape broken things."
Then he added in a more bitter voice: "But if you want my opinion, his name isn't a prophecy in the literal sense; it might be ironic. Fate was stripping him of everything to laugh in his face."
"They called him Isaac... They said he used to laugh a lot before he lost his family, I mean, his real one. Then his name became a bitter joke – the man who forgot how to laugh."
Evelyn said apologetically, "I'm sorry... I shouldn't have asked."
"It's okay... If I didn't want to talk, I wouldn't have spoken about him."
"Can you tell me more about him if it's not bothering you?"
Arion smiled: "He wasn't the most cheerful of people..."
It was a rainy night when Isaac Forge was wandering the forest alone for the first time. The man had once been a prosperous blacksmith, turned into a wandering shadow, his eyes telling the story of a loss he could never forget. Searching for a place for his eternal demise, his feet carried him to the burning ashwood village.
**"Burn him! He's the devil's child!"** Suddenly, he heard a scream
The villagers' screams filled the square where they had gathered around a baby's cradle. Arion – that newborn whose arrival coincided with the mysterious crimson lightning showers.
Isaac, carrying his fresh wounds, stopped at the edge of the crowd. He could see the fear in the villagers' eyes, but something else caught his attention: **that hidden gleam in the baby's eyes.**
**"Stop!"**
His voice cut through the noise like an axe through wood. In a decisive moment, he grabbed the metal base of the cradle. Mana began to flow from his hands, and the iron transformed under his fingers into a sharp, glowing blade.
**"Whoever touches the child, I'll cut off his hand!"**
His movement was swift as lightning. One villager charged recklessly, and his hand was severed in a single strike. But the numbers were great. The exhausted Isaac finally fell, his body covered with wounds, while protecting the child with his own body.
**"If you are going to kill him, you'll have to kill me first."**
He whispered as he lost consciousness, holding the infant in his arms.
Arion looks at his intertwined hands. "That day, a broken man decided to save a hated child. Not because he was brave, but because he understood what it meant to lose everything."
Evelyn wipes a hidden tear. "Why did he do that?"
"Later, I knew the answer," Arion smiles. "He used to tell me: 'When you save something broken, you also save a part of your own broken self.'"
And when I think about it, he was the most broken thing at that time. Arion leaned back as he remembered.
He was a child not yet seven, standing behind the cracked wooden door, hearing Isaac's whispers intertwined with the sound of rain.
"Why did I survive alone?" Isaac's voice vibrated like an over-tightened string.
Arion could see through the cracks the shadow of the giant man bending under the weight of his memories.
**"But you weren't alone."** Arion wished he could have said that back then.
"So the relationship between you became strained after Jacob?"
Arion gets up and approaches the lake's edge. "Isaac saw the change in my eyes. He knew I was no longer the child he raised. But he, as usual, chose silence. He taught me all the family techniques, as if giving me a weapon to face the world."
He turns to face Evelyn. "On the night I left the village, he came to my workshop. He gave me this sword we made together," he gently touches the sword at his side. "And said: 'Go, but always remember: fire doesn't just burn metal, it tempers it.'"
Evelyn smiles. "So that's the secret of your exceptional weapons."
"Yes," Arion laughs. "I don't make swords from iron alone; I make them from memories. Every piece carries a story of Isaac Forge. Plus, I possess something no one before me had... let's say I have a special touch."
Arion said with a sad smile: "In the end, I learned from him the most important lesson: how to reshape ourselves from the ashes."
He falls silent for a moment, then adds in a lighter tone: "And also how to make the best swords in the region!"
Evelyn laughs, grateful for breaking the heavy atmosphere. "So that's the secret to your excellence!"
"Exactly," he laughs too.
In the silence of the night, it seemed as if Isaac's spirit was blessing this moment, satisfied with the boy who had become a man, and the outcast child who turned out to be his own savior.
After a few moments, Evelyn whispered as if speaking to a frightened child: "We've neglected the food, it will get cold..."
Arion froze in his place. His eyes shifted between the plate of warm food and the specter of Jacob standing in the darkness, that specter who for eight full years had been staring at him with those resentful eyes, as if every morsel he took would cost him a part of his soul.
The air around them carried an ancient whisper, a whisper of hunger, pain, and regret.
Arion didn't want to touch the food, but when he looked into Evelyn's hoopful eyes waiting for him to reach for the food...
As if something broke inside his weary soul, Arion stretched his trembling hand towards the knife.
The movement was slow, as if he was cutting the strings of his heart instead of cutting the meat. He sliced a piece of food as if slicing through eight years of self-imposed hunger, eight years of punishment, eight years of fleeing from the taste of life.
He placed the piece aside on a green leaf, as a final offering to a specter who would never be satisfied. That piece was more than just food – it was an apology, a farewell, an acknowledgment that life must go on even among the ruins.
Then he raised the first morsel to his lips.
His hands were trembling like a butterfly trapped in a storm. He closed his eyes for a moment, as if gathering strength from the depths of his exhausted soul. When he opened them again, there was a new gleam – a gleam of acceptance.
He chewed slowly, as if tasting the flavor of life for the first time. For a fleeting moment, his eyes swelled with tears without him feeling, but no tears fell as if he had forgotten how to cry, slowly munching on the food, as if he was tearing down years of pain with every bite.
Jacob was still there, but his anger began to melt like morning fog under the sun. Sadly, Arion didn't dare to raise his eyes to look at him.
This wasn't a defeat of the specter, but a reconciliation with the self.
Evelyn looked at him, her eyes swimming in a sea of emotions. She saw how the broken man before her began to mend, piece by piece, with every morsel he ate.
Arion whispered as if addressing the distant specter: "Enough... I've punished myself enough."
Those words were lighter than a feather, but they carried the weight of eight years. They were a liberation from a prison he built for himself; they were a healing for wounds he thought would never mend.
And the stars above were witnessing, and the lake was gazing, and the whole universe was whispering: "Finally... he has returned to eat."
And for the first time in eight years, he returned to eat... but the price had not yet been paid.