1
EDRIA
The plow blade is cracked straight through the iron, a clean split that means Aldric didn't bother sharpening it before forcing it through frozen ground. I could tell him that. I could explain exactly how he ruined a perfectly serviceable tool through pure impatience. Instead, I clamp the metal into the vice and reach for my tongs without a word.
He watches me work from the doorway, hat in hand, like hovering will somehow speed up the repair.
"How long?" he asks.
"Before midday." I don't look up. "Leave it."
He shuffles out, and I exhale through my nose. Three cracked blades this week alone. Three jobs I'll barely collect two copper pieces on each, because Aldric and the other farmers have even less than we do.
The forge breathes heat into the morning air, the fire snapping low and steady while I work. Papa sits on his stool near the wall, one leg stretched out in front of him, his heavy hands wrapped around a mug that stopped steaming an hour ago. The injury isn't healing the way it should. I can see it in how he holds himself—careful, tight, favoring the left without admitting it.
"The Henley order still needs finishing," he says.
"I know."
"The wheel fitting too."
"Papa." I set the tongs down and look at him. "I know."
He takes a slow drink of cold tea and says nothing else.
Finn appears in the back doorway, ducking under the low frame, hair sticking up on one side and soot already on his chin despite the early hour. At fourteen, he's all long limbs and restless energy, always moving, always curious, always finding ways to be underfoot.
"We're almost out of grain," he announces.
I pick the tongs back up. "How almost?"
"Like…" He scratches the back of his neck. "Three days, maybe. If we're careful."
Papa sets his mug down on the workbench with a quiet thud.
"We're not careful," I say flatly, "we're rationing. There's a difference."
"Edria." Papa's voice carries the weight he reserves for when he thinks I'm about to say something that will make trouble.
"I'm just noting the distinction."
"Note it quieter."
Finn drifts further into the forge, poking at a pile of scrap iron with his boot. "Sorella said the mill raised their prices again."
"Of course they did." I hammer the cracked section of the blade, letting the ring of iron fill the space where my opinion would go. The fire hisses when I pull the metal back. "Because why struggle alone when you can make sure everyone else struggles with you."
"Edria." Sterner this time.
"I'm working."
"You're grumbling."
"I'm doing both." I plunge the blade into the water barrel, and steam boils up between us. "Someone has to."
Papa pushes himself upright from the stool, slow and deliberate, and I watch his weight settle wrong on that leg before he catches himself. He crosses to the worktable and picks up Henley's unfinished wheel fitting, turning it in his thick fingers.
"Complaining about what nobles tax and what mills charge doesn't put coin in the box," he says. "Keeping your head down and your mouth shut does."
