I had no other way; I could only add wood to the handle structure. ‘But how am I supposed to keep aether flowing into the blade?’ I flipped the skin over to see its backside. It was well tanned; the only issue was using it.

  The scales weren’t like those armoring plates often depicted in fiction or on dragons, they were more bulbous outgrowths of the skin, hard parts with great rigidity. ‘I’m getting ahead of myself…’ I had to take things one step at a time. I took a piece of wood and processed it as usual, then continued some more to thin it up to make space for the thickness of the skin.

  After that was done, I placed the handle over the skin and took a knife. Just as I was about to start cutting, I stopped. ‘I should look for the ‘channels’, the places where aether flows best’. I closed my eyes and concentrated on the skin.

  Afterwards I used the knife to draw contours of the pieces on the skin. I also crested the wooden handle here and there, marking where each piece had to come in. As I got to the folds that would cover the sides I stopped.

  I rose from the table. I took a billet and rapidly beat its tip, spinning it around. As it thinned and started to glow with heat created by the impacts, I grabbed two tongs and twisted the flattened tip. After two twists, I hurriedly lowered it into the oil.

  The ground trembled slightly, a familiar sensation.

  “I finished setting the tiles. Hope they dry by the time we open the kiln.” Magnar said from behind me.

  The oil hissed, thin smoke coiling in the air as I stirred the oil with the billet.

  “I sure hope they do too, but the first batch should be enough to finish the three chimneys of the tower. We can turn them into heat banks slowly later.” I answered him calmly.

  “I don’t think so, the height is too big, and you mentioned creating some air stops using them, to increase heat retention.”

  “I change my mind about those, they will be made of metal and will be similar to the stove mechanism, this way I can choose where most of the heat stops.” I said while taking the billet out and brushing the soot gathered on it. I turned around, facing Magnar and then went past him to reach the grind stones, to start sharpening its tip.

  “I still don’t think those will be enough.” He insisted.

  “And what do you want me to do? It’s not like I can shorten the time it takes to make them… If we don’t leave them with heat enough time, they won’t be properly baked, if we take them out too soon, they will shatter. If they are not enough, we build with what we have, then wait to get the next batch out and so on…” I reply feeling a bit annoyed with his insistence.

  “I understand that, just wanted you to have a realistic idea…”

  “Alright. Sorry, I’m jumpy, I’m thinking… I want to make a smelter; I know it’s working principles, just having a bit of trouble figuring out how to make it here… It is hard considering I haven’t seen wires or anything I need for sale anywhere, so I have to figure out how to make those…”

  As the end grows sharper, pressed upon the grindstone I fall silent for a short moment.

  “I think we still need to make the big, coal burning smelter… Too bad I don’t need its capacity…”

  “What do you mean?”

  “It is a big structure that can smelt down a lot of material, if I am to use it intermittently, then I’m burning more coal than it’s worth. That’s because each time I make a batch of billets I’d need to heat it up again…”

  “Then? You still need to smelt… What are you going to use then, you make it sound like you got a way better idea!”

  “Because I do, it’s like with the aether gathering formation. There’s too much to explain for you to understand in a short amount of time, and it would not bring you any real benefit either way.”

  This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

  “If you say so… I have to go now. We’ll talk more tomorrow.”

  “Sure!” As I said this, I took the billet off the grindstone. It was sharpened well. This way I had made a primitive short drill.

  I put a thin piece of wood in some water and used aether to force the absorption. With the humidified wood and a piece of string I made a small bow. I twisted the rope of the bow on the billet with the drill on its end and obtained in this way a way to carve a hole through wood and metal. I needed this to make a rivet binding.

  This stabilized the wood on the tang and created a more solid connection. However the holes were also places where stress concentrated. It was a method of binding I considered inferior to the hot fixing, since there weren’t many materials that once stabbed would clench the blade hard enough to dislodge it from the handle, but there were plenty of slashes that could snap the metal.

  For this case, it was the best I could do however, so I took a piece of wood, fixed the handle, hammered the drill lightly to bite into the handle and, while pressing onto its upper end with the wood piece, I used the bow to make the drill spin.

  Vex dragged Hargrave over. “We’re leaving. I’m tired of staring at this guy do nothing but fail and throw money out the window. Here’s for the stones he broke, don’t worry if it’s too much, he’ll break more tomorrow. And don’t worry about him not paying me. I can make him.”

  “Just give me half an hour more, I’m sure! I’m close to a breakthrough! Just half an hour more!” Hargrave was desperately clawing at the air towards the device.

  Alright, just take care to restrain him well while passing through the gate… Last thing I need is for you guys to pull it out of the ground or make the hinges snap or something.”

  “Good call, I’ll make sure.” Replied Vex.

  “What am I? A dog to you? Let go! I really can make it!” He kept shrieking as Vex started pulling him towards the gate.

  I shook my head amused by the entire ordeal. The impromptu drill slowly but surely dug through the wood, then with stops for oil baths, it dug through the tang and slowly through the other piece of wood. Sweat was trickling down my forehead. With the others gone, I was alone, working on my handle.

  Two more drills through the wood and tang and I was done. Completely spent, but this part was finished. I went back to the skin. The reason I stopped earlier was an idea about how to bind the leather. ‘Thin straps will go in the rivet holes and wrap the interior, connecting the skin directly to the metal.’

  I continued tracing the contours with great concentration. It was a delicate job for several reasons. One, I had to cut out for each of the rivet pieces a channel, two, I had to choose the skin pieces so that once I placed them on the handle, the channels would flow from the leather, towards the edges and towards the rivet holes, the place where the leather piece met the metal.

  The places with the greatest importance were the rivet hole pieces. After several tries, I managed to get a good selection, with which I was happy. I started cutting. If you ever thought using scissors to cut was hard, imagine that the knife was worse, especially when there are a lot of hard pieces on what you’re trying to cut.

  With the pieces out I needed to first make a bonding agent. I had some resin and resinous pieces of wood I heated those up in a small jar. I gathered all the scales I had cleaned off the leather pieces, from the edges, to make patterns that would fit well together when assembled, and to thin out the rivet hole pieces.

  After crushing the scales into thin powder, another time-consuming thing, I poured the dust in the hot resin and started mixing. This would turn into an aether conducting adhesive for the handle. I put the skin pieces in the scale dust mixed resin to simmer in it a bit.

  As I was taking them out, I carefully, using sticks, positioned the pieces of leather on the hilt, in their deserving positions. As all the pieces, six in total were put on, I started tying the handle up with rope. I pushed aether through the skin the entire time after it was boiled, to maintain and improve its aether conductivity.

  With the handle tightly bound, I took the resin jar and placed the entire handle inside. I put it over the fire and started meditating. After another five failed attempts at creating the damned inner gathering formation, I opened my eyes and took the resin jar off the fire.

  I pulled the handle out, untied it, placed the blade with the tang in and then beat the rivets in one by one, each of them made with care so that they’d be as conductive as possible. I tied the handle tight again, and after a bit of work made a bolster that I fitted on top.

  The bolster, a cap that is placed on the handle with a gap for the blade, protecting the handle from the impact of a deep plunge, or from bodily fluids trickling down on the blade. I put it on still hot, before quenching, and beat it to grip the leather well.

  I plunged the dagger in oil again and it was technically finished. I took some more scale dust and rolled the handle in it, to seal whatever resin was on the surface in, so it would have no stickiness or slippery issue. Both of these depended on how the resin turned when it cooled.

  If the dagger turned sticky, it meant I hadn’t boiled the resin enough and should’ve baked the handle. Baking took a long time however, so I hoped the full resin bath would remove the need for it. With more aether aligning the dust on the handle, I was sure not many would achieve a binding as good as this.

  It needed to cool off, and I had to etch it, but my job for today was done. I set the dagger aside and wearily got out. I took a shower and got back in, with heavy steps and threw myself into the bed. I was not ready for what was to come this night, however.

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  ?? Author's Question:

  What do you think of the handle making method?

  ?? Author's Note:

  Chapter three is now rewritten. Check it out!