Ferra knelt in the ash behind the ridge, bell-bronze glowing between her tongs, her knees already scorched.
The forge-line was only four anvils and a trough of coals, thrown together by Hans's smiths before the dawn. Ash drifted over every anvil, settling in her hair as if the sky itself were trying to bury it.
"Hold still, you useless lump, I'm not asking twice," she snarled at the bronze.
The bronze sagged in the tongs, sullen and half-formed, refusing every shape she hammered into it. Behind her the Zone roared like a hearth the size of a valley, rattling the coals.
The first bell cracked down the middle on the second blow, ringing flat as a dropped pot.
"Damn it, that's the third one," she growled, flinging the pieces into the snow. "Don't you crack on me too, you old slab," she added, slapping the anvil.
'That fire is singing the wrong note. Every dead man in it is humming along.'
