Chapter Three
Requiem Of Death
 

The day after the incident with Zarrov in the market Alex is awoken by his father yelling “You will get your slothful tail out of this bed! I know what happened yesterday. What do you think you are?” Alex quietly gets up and starts getting dressed. “I am a protector and a warrior.” Alex puts his sword on his back again. “I’m going out to find work as a mercenary.” From behind him on the bed a sweet and strong voice shocks both Alex and his father Cartolas. “What’s all the shouting about, I was right in the middle of a wet dream.” Alex realises that Moon had not left. “Uh… father this is Moon Shadow…” Cartolas takes a deep breath through his teeth. “Where did you find such a disrespectful harlet.” Alex turns to his father with a serious face. “If you call her that again, I’ll cut off your toes in your sleep.” Cartolas lets out an exasperated sigh and grabs the dagger from Alex’s hand as he picks it up. “This is not who you are, it is a dream! Nothing more than a child’s fantasy!” Cartolas’ hand glows a bright orange as he melts the blade. Alexander tries to stop him, but Cartolas pushes him against the wardrobe.

Cartolas leans over a vase and the iron drips of of his hand into the bottom of the vase. “I will have no more childish games! You will present yourself at breakfast properly dressed and without this woman!” Alex is silent for a second, then his fist catches fire and he puts it through the stone wall. “You think you can control me like that? I’m not going to come to breakfast, in fact I’ll be leaving with the ‘disrespectful harlet.’ If you try to stop me, this blade will be your fate.” Alex grabs the hilt of his sword on his back. Cartolas scoffs “Don’t make me laugh, boy. You may be able to strike down a thug but I am a classically trained warrior.” Cartolas leaves the room as a completely nude Moon gets out of bed and starts to get dressed. “Geez he really is a dickhead. By the way if you looking for a place to stay, I’ve got an extra room above the forge.”

Alex turns away from her, not realising she was unclothed. “I’m sorry I didn’t think you were nude” Moon laughs “You had your face in it last night, so I don’t think it matters anymore.” Alex’s face drains of color as he feels his face get very warm. Moon comes over to him in a robe and gives him a kiss on the cheek. “I plan on doing that again. I’m going to get my clothes from the bath house and go back to the forge. Bye Alex.” She walks out and closes the door. Alex looks in the trunk at the end of his bed and throws out things that are not important, then he begins packing his clothes and tools. As he is about to close it, he looks over his bed and opens it back up. He grabs his bedding and pillows and stuffs them in. 

Alex leans out the door and scopes out the hallway. He sees one of the servitors from the dining hall on the balcony smoking something. Alex tries to get his attention. “Hey pst! Wanna make ten shils? Help me get this trunk to my wagon. The servitor flicks the last bit of smoky paper off the balcony and comes towards Alex. “As long as you don’t tell the kitchen master where I smoke at.” Alex nods as he picks up one end and the servitor picks up the other. As they carry it around the estate they keep to the less active halls eventually making it to the stables. Alex helps the servitor put the trunk into the back of the wagon. Alex turns to the servitor and gives him the shils he owes him, then leads one of the bisen over and hooks it up to the wagon.

“Mind taking me home, Alex?” Alex turns to see Moon dressed in her tight leather clothes. Alex reaches an arm down and pulls her onto the front bench, then he whips the reigns and they start moving. As they roll past the front gate, Lilliana watches from the tower balcony. “Thus it begins, the end of existence. I hope he can change the fate of the world.” A hooded figure with a black scythe and a green glow steps onto the balcony behind her. “It means the end of your family to change the fate of the world. If  Lord Gadray and myself are able to find him soon we may be able to stop him. But he is growing stronger with each moment he hides. We have to find him soon.” A silent tear falls down Lilliana’s face. “I have not yet come to terms with this…” The hooded figure steps closer and reaches out, placing a skeletal hand on her shoulder. “You must let go, my dear Lilliana…” 

In town, Alex pulls up to the back of the forge and takes the bisen over to the stable. When he gets back to the wagon he grabs the trunk and pulls it onto his shoulder. Moon unlocks the door to her forge and lets Alex in. “The stairs are to the left, just put it anywhere” Alex walks up the stairs and finds there is only one bedroom with a closet and bathroom. He puts the trunk down at the top of the stairs then goes back down to talk to Moon. She has already put on her apron and is trying to prep the forge. The pile of black coal on the inside is too cold to light properly, but she tries anyway. Alex walks over and lights his hand with his power then buries his hand in the coal on the inside of the stone forge. The coals around his hand start to glow red, then yellow. They glow even brighter before the pressure of the forge ignites into flame. Alex takes his hand out and wipes off the coal dust, then looks at a confused Moon.

Alex is quiet for a second. “There’s only one bed upstairs…” Moon grabs an ingot and puts it in a stone pot, then puts it on the shelf in the forge to melt. “Yeah, I sleep down here, There’s a cot in the other room” Alex looks around and grabs a hammer. “Look, my father won’t let me have any more money, so Why don’t you hire me, I’ll have something to do, and it would pay for my room and board. You could teach me how to forge.” Moon laughs and takes the hammer from him. “Not just yet, big guy. I mean, yeah you have a job, but You don’t have any experience with a forge. The front needs to be cleaned, there’s a broom and mop in the closet. Oh and you can run the front when customers show up.”

After a few hours of cleaning the floors walls and weapons, Alex sits behind the front desk and props his feet onto the desk. Moon walks over and sticks a dagger into the table next to his foot, to which alex sits up. “Sorry I’ll find something to do.” Moon laughs and pushes him back into the chair. “It’s for you idiot. You wanted to learn, this is how high I set the bar.” She grabs the dagger and gives it to him. “Six inch double edged blade, three alloys inlaid and folded in iron, hand stitched leather grip, and to top it all off, I stitched your name into the hilt.” Alex looks at the piece of art closely, between the leather and the blade, where the hilt crosses over on the guard, he sees his name in beautiful gold silk thread

‘Alexander’ 

“May I try the forge then?” Moon takes the dagger and sets it down on the table “Sure, I don’t have anything else until tomorrow.” Alex gets up and takes Moon’s apron. Moon stops him before he walks into the back and gives him a kiss on the cheek. Alex looks her in the eyes. “You know we only met yesterday.” Moon laughs and leans back. “That was yesterday, you’re mine from now on. You’d better do that thing again tonight. Now go make me something” Alexander goes to the forge and grabs a few things and tosses them in the forge pot. He wonders to himself why she thinks he has no knowledge of the forge. He grabs a second forge pot and drops some gold in. Before the gold is molten, he takes it out and starts making the handle. After the alloys are molten he takes them out and pours them into a moulding he found for a single sided knife about four inches long.

The carbon black steel cools into the moulding, he takes the extra time to sand out the flaws. When the blade and handle are put together, he puts the leftover gold in the forge in a stone bucket to melt as he starts making an etching of an eastern dragon on the blade and moulds a mouth around the base of the blade. Around the base of the tiger head, he wraps the handle in a high quality redish-brown leather. The end of the handle he carves into a ball, then etches a lotus into it. The gold for the blade etchings was melted by this point, so Alex pours it in one drop at a time. After it has cooled he sharpens the rounded side, then polishes it to a fine sheen. He takes a minute to take it in as he makes the leather holster.

After finishing the holster, washes his hands and goes up to his trunk then gets a crimson silk pillow with gold stitching, then he puts the holster under the blade and carries it down to Moon. Alex realises this nearly took him all day, the sun was in the west and shown directly into the front windows. He looks at Moon, and business was apparently slow enough she had fallen asleep. He sat the crimson pillow on the desk, making sure to not touch the blade any more than necessary. He takes off the apron and hangs it on the hook, then gently picks up a sleeping moon and takes her up to the bed. He covers her up and head back downstairs and starts to organise the shop, he even takes to time to touch up the paint on the walls and makes a couple new signs. He puts his carbon steel blade on a pedestal in the front window. A few people stop to look at the magnificent blade as Alex is putting it on display. After a few more hours of waiting at the front desk, Alex closes the front and locks up. Then he goes to the cot in the side room beside the cleaning supplies, takes off his boots and tunic. He lays down and finds no trouble going to sleep.

He is awoken a few hours later by someone sitting in the chair beside the cot. He rolls over to look and a hooded figure with a green aural glow places his scythe against the wall. “Hello Alexander, my name is Morgan.” Alex sits up quickly. “Mind telling me how you got in?” Morgan grabs one of Alex’s boots with a skeletal hand. “I willed it. You need new clothes, and perhaps some armor.”Alex takes the boot from morgan and tosses it next to the other one. “ I’ve never had armor before, what makes you think I need it now.” Morgan shrugs. “Well you’ll be fighting a war soon.” Alex rolls his eyes. “I’m not going to be in a war, I already stopped Zarrov.” Morgan stands and grabs his scythe. “If you think Zarrov is the only follower of the dark lord, you are very mistaken. Heed what I tell you Alexander.”

Alex rolls over and crosses his arms as he tries to go back to sleep. “Yeah whatever Morgue man.” Morgan exits the small room and chuckles. “Morgue man… Haven’t heard that one before. Very amusing.” Morgan wave a skeletal hand over the front door and it slowly opens for him, after he steps through, it follows him shut and locks itself.

In the morning, Alex is jolted awake by the excited shriek of Moon. Alex jumps out of the cot in his undergarments and runs to check on her, tripping up the stairs. He reaches the top and looks around, seeing her by the window doing what could only be explained as a happy dance. “I heard you from downstairs, what happened?” Moon runs over and gives him a kiss on the lips. “I don’t know what you did, but there are customers line up around the side of the building to get in! Let’s get down there and open!” Alex lets out a sigh of relief and goes back downstairs to get dressed. Moon comes downstairs and looks at the magnificent job Alex did spiffing up the place, she even takes a second to look at the shine job he did for the weapons.

When she sees the black carbon steel knife that Alex made, her jaw drops and she reaches out to touch  it but stops herself when she sees the perfect sheen on it. The blade sharpened to the point where just resting the edge of it on the pillow is cutting into the crimson silk. Alex Prepares to be up front, but Moon takes off her apron and gives it to him. “Oh no, you’re not sitting around today, get back there and make more like that. Now I know why we have so many customers” Alex grabs the apron and steps into the forge “Didn’t think I was that good. I just liked to do it as a kid, because it was one of the few things I couldn’t burn with fire.” Moon pushes him through the doorway. “That doesn’t matter now, just get in there and do more.” 

Alex starts making weapons of all kinds, not putting as much effort as the first one, but still putting thought and care into them. While Moon is up front making sale after sale, she couldn’t be more happy. Later in the evening Alex comes out to see a couple people browsing a nearly bare shop, but the Carbon steel knife still unsold. He walks over and puts the iron longsword he had been making on display, and it is immediately picked up by a customer that saw him come out of the forge with it. “Anything from this place must be the best in the world” Alex looks confused. “I wouldn’t say that, friend. I’m really only an amateur.” The customer scoffs as he tosses down a couple hundred shil in front of Moon who sweeps it into a bucket.

Moon smile and holds out the bucket full of thousands of shils. “After the drawer filled up I had to use the cleaning buckets, you can have this whole bucket because I have one too.” She scoots out her chair and picks up a second bucketful of shils. “We’re rich, Alex. Well… you’re rich again.” Alex laughs and sets his bucket of money on the ground. “I don’t care about the money, seeing you smile is enough for me. What say we close early and go have dinner looks like everyone left anyway.” Moon gives him the key and goes upstairs to change, Alex locks up and cleans before going and changing into his nice clothes. When he opens his trunk he hears whispering from inside, so he moves some stuff around and finds his sword, all the while hearing a hushed voice. “Come to me, toy take me into your hands and strike for blood.”

He realises he is holding the sword extended towards a dark corner of the room. Alex shakes off the weird feeling and puts it back into its sheath, then grabs his clothes and proceeds to the bathroom to change. He walks in to see Moon bathing in crystal clear water, everything was visible. Alex covers his eyes and turns around. “I’m so sorry, I didn’t know you were bathing.” Moon laughs mockingly. “You’ve already seen it, why do you get so embarrassed by me?” Alex steps out of the bathroom and gets dressed in the bedroom.

“Because seeing the body of someone you aren’t seeing romantically is wrong. At least that’s what I’ve been taught.” Moon scoffs “Who said we weren’t dating?” Alex stops for a second. “Uh…” Moon gets out and walks into the bedroom nude then leans on the doorway. “I say you’re my man, prove me wrong.” She walks past him and puts on a beautiful blue dress that Felicity helped her pick out. “Now let’s go eat like rich people.” Moon grabs Alex by the and and pulls him along with her.