Drust's Arm

Now it was Kellen's turn to be surprised by a knock at his door in the middle of the night. He hated how something in his chest surged when he opened the door to see Drust standing there. The blacksmith had never been to his house before, though Kellen had been to his shop probably a dozen times in the last month alone. Drust said nothing when the door opened, though it didn't seem to be out of his normal stoicism. Instead he seemed to just be at a loss for how to explain his presence. Kellen, also at a loss to try to understand his presence, also said nothing. Finally, swallowing hard, Kellen stepped aside to make room in the doorway and Drust stepped inside.

He proceeded to wipe the early spring mud off his boots using the mat placed in the doorway, but did not remove his cloak. It remained hanging over one shoulder, concealing one half of his body Kellen stood there, suddenly very aware of how this was the least dressed he'd ever been in Drust's presence. His shirt was loose, untied at the collar and slouching down over a shoulder. He couldn't change it now, that would only draw more attention to it, he figured.

Drust looked around the small kitchen area that they'd stepped into. Kellen, despite being curious beyond all measure, waited for him to explain his presence. Finally, with a sigh, Drust spoke. "You have magic, don't you?"

Kellen blinked. This wasn't an accusation, this much he knew. It had become a somewhat common rumor amongst the people of the town that he had a small grasp on how to wield magic. It wasn't immensely uncommon, in all actuality. The witch had hers and that was fine. It was just that those with it tended to band together and form consortiums or guilds or schools. They didn't live out in the middle of nowhere in a half-falling apart house. But Kellen also had to laugh to himself a little bit. You have magic was such an understatement to describe the kind of immense power that Kellen was capable of. Was capable of. Almost two years out of practice without using a single bit of necromantic energy, who knew what he would actually still be able to do. "Some," is how he answered.

"I…" Drust paused and looked away from Kellen, not meeting his eyes as he spoke. "Hesitate to ask you for this. I don't know if you can even help."

With that, Drust pulled a satchel out from under his cloak and set it down on the kitchen table. It landed with a heavy thud. then he swept the cloak off of his shoulder and onto a chair, revealing his arm. Well what remained of an arm. He had the sleeve of his shirt rolled up and tied just above the elbow. The elbow that no longer existed. Instead there was a stump. The scarring was neatly healed and it looked as though it had been a wound for ten years at least. One thing Kellen couldn't quite figure out in this equation were symmetrically placed indents into the skin. As soon as Drust reached for the pack on the table with his left hand- his only hand- and spilled it's contents onto the table, Kellen understood immediately.

He realized, after a few seconds, he was staring, wide eyed and mouth agape. "it's …. Is it, uh… That's…" He struggled to figure out how to say it.

A biosteel limb. Impeccably crafted. The detailing precise and intricate, Kellen could see even from a yard away as it sat motionless on the table. The proportions were perfect. The size of the forearm, the wrist, down to the fingers-- all matched Drust's left arm perfectly. This had been custom made just for him.
This explained the indentations at the end of what remained of Drust's arm- marks from where the limb attached to the actual flesh. He felt foolish not recognizing them earlier.
"You know what it is."
Kellen nodded.
"Can you… help?"
Kellen could. He knew he could. Animating the tech was the most basic of life manipulation possible. and now that he'd focused on it, he could feel the magic-aligned metals of the artificial arm vibrating with the potential of attaching to the life signatures of Drust. The two had clearly been acquainted for some time already.
it would be so easy. just to tap into that well of life energy within himself and pull out the smallest spark to attach them. It called to him. It irritated him that it wasn't already done. it was a scab waiting to be picked. It was a banquet before him when he'd been starving for years.
He thought for a second, it would be for a good cause. at that moment in time, there was no force in his life greater than Drust. he knew that there was pain associated with being magically disconnected from your biosteel prosthetic. Really, he tried to reason, it was more terrible of him not to help. How he hated Drust in that moment for bringing this to his doorstep, into his home. This knowledge that he existed in his everyday life dependant on the same force of magic that Kellen had sworn never to touch again.
"Didn't mean to be a burden," Drust said in his low rumble of a voice. "I'll be going." He reached out for the limb with his left hand.
"No," Kellen heard himself say. He felt very far away from himself. "I can."
"Not if it's trouble for you." Drust was looking down at him, his dark eyes soft with concern.
"It seems that it's more trouble for you if I don't."
Drust sighed, a tenseness in his shoulders going lax. "A wizard in the Port used to help when the magics became unaligned. I went there this morning, only to find that he died last spring. The witch doesn't have strong enough magic. Wizards consortium told me to fuck off. I'm …" He looked away from Kellen and shook his head softly. "If you're able. If it's not troubling for you."
"Sit," was all that Kellen said.
Drust pulled out one of the kitchen chairs and did as he was told. Kellen sat at another chair opposite side of the table, the biosteel forearm laying between them.
"Arm on table," he instructed, his voice harsh, and again Drust obeyed.
Kellen went to reach to touch the skin where Drust's arm ended and hesitated for a moment. He thought of the last time they'd touched, hands just barely resting together, Kellen unable to handle the sheer rush of emotion he felt from the first human contact he'd had in… in too, too long. Taking a breath in, he grazed his fingertips over the indentations that the biosteel had made when the physical aspect of the prosthetic latched onto his upper arm. He could feel the remnants of a spell that had been put in place to allow Drust control of the metal arm. It was old, worn out, and shoddily placed to begin with. Sloppy disgraceful work.
"Don't you need tools or herbs or--"
"No," Kellen said as he pressed against one of the connection points with his left thumb. He felt the spell press back weakly.
"The wizard always had a whole box of supplies set up to reattach--"
"The wizard who attached this before was a hack." Kellen looked up to stare Drust directly in the eye. His face was set firm and serious, a look Drust had only seen once before when Kellen charged past him towards the furnace back during their first meeting. "You're lucky you could even move the damn thing."
Kellen held out his own right hand and the metal limb slid across the table to meet his grasp as if it belonged there. still holding the unattached limb in his right hand, he gently pressed the smallest amount of magic against one of the connection points on Drust's arm. It felt… so full of relief to do so. It felt like not nearly enough. He wanted it to pour out of him again. He wanted to surge up on a tide of it. His head swam in the idea, the promise of power. The cold feeling of flames being pulled from their twigs and absorbed into his own. To feel that again…
A gentle shuddering gasp from Drust's lips broke Kellen from the daze he'd fallen into. "Cold," was all he said.
"Sorry," Kellen said out loud. and then to himself, he scolded out, Focus! Not even the small feeling of Drust's skin against his own was enough to distract him from the seductive pull of the necromantic energies lurking just within his grasp. Focus. "Right. Tell me where you feel press. Here," he said, indicating the flesh and blood upper arm, "or there," he said, nodding towards the biosteel one still resting on the table.
Drust nodded. Kellen pressed his thumb a little more firmly into the skin, and Drust said, "Here."
Slid a few inches to the right. Here. A few inches up. Here. A few inches down. Oh, there. A little further down. There again. How strange.
"Connection points are misaligned," Kellen declared
"How do you know how to do all this?"
Kellen said nothing, he just continued to stroke his thumb along the rough scarred skin. He became aware at some point that his movements were no longer to get a feel for the spell. He stopped. Kellen arranged the prosthetic on the table in front of Drust’s real arm. There was still a faint flow of magic inside of it. But the flow was recursive in some places and stagnant in others.
“Kellen,” Drust spoke his name softly.
“You ask me before what I did for the empire. This was it.” He ran his fingers gently along the smooth plates of the biosteel. Goosebumps broke out on Drust’s upper arm. Kellen couldn’t look up at him. “I was young. Struggling with freelance work. Imperial doctor comes to me, says they need someone like me. Someone who can manipulate life energy. And I, a great fool, say yes. Please hold still, this may feel a little numb.” Kellen had located a twist of a knot in the magic. And easier to cut it all out than to try to untangle.
Drust cried out a little as the whole thing went numb, but he remained still as Kellen had instructed.
"So I do this," he continued to explain. He grazed the tips of his fingers along the metal plates and fibers, and back up to Drust's elbow, along the scarred skin, then back down to the metal fingers, weaving the magic in as he went. "I stitch the biosteel to the bodies of imperial officers with too much money and power."
Kellen stood up from his chair and walked over to the other side of the table. Leaning above Drust's right shoulder, he reached forward and repeated the motion: fingertips grazing from the ends of the biosteel limb, up to the elbow, over the scarred stump, and this time further, over the rolled up sleeve, and up to Drust's shoulder and shirt collar. Kellen swallowed hard. He'd broken his focus and the stitch was incomplete. Back down the arm, to fingertips. Deep breath in. And again. Up the arm, over the sleeve, to the shoulder, past the shirt collar to the skin of his neck. The skin was red and flushed, and as Kellen slid more and more of his hand along the back of Drust's neck, he could feel how warm he was. Finally, his palm laid flat along the side of the neck, and he could feel the pounding pulse underneath. The thickest vein of magic was attached now. It was all easier work from here on out.
"So now I wonder," he said in a voice barely above a whisper. Kellen slid his hand back down the path he'd followed up, but this time, he felt braver about it. No longer was it just a faint drag of fingertips. He ran his palm along Drust's shoulder and all the way back down. As he reached forward to get to the hand and fingertips of the biosteel arm, he leaned his whole body forward, pressing against the back of the chair, his chest pressed onto Drust's shoulder. "I wonder how a smith from a small annexed town come to have custom fit biosteel."
He pulled away quickly, and the edge of the prosthetic suddenly snapped back to feeling and latched onto the end of the scarred limb. Drust cried out as feeling returned to his arm, and the hand quickly curled into a fist.
"Ah, I …" Drust started to say, but didn't seem to find the right words.
Kellen walked over to the side of the table. "Can you raise it, please?"
Drust lifted the artificial arm up off of the table.
"Palm flat, please?"
Drust unfolded his fist and held his palm out flat.
Kellen asked for an array of test, touch the table with one finger, two fingers. Make a fist. Hold out thumb and pinky only.
Drust obeyed and performed each one perfectly.
"Feels better now than when I first got it."
"Not quite done yet. Hand flat on table please. Palm up. Close your eyes."
Drust looked at Kellen for a moment. Kellen couldn't quite figure out what the look was. Not quite fear. Maybe… a plea? But he obeyed, palm up, eyes closed.
"Tell me which finger you feel me touching."
Kellen gently grazed his fingertips along the pointer finger, which Drust correctly identified. He repeated the test, and Drust correctly told him which finger it was.
Kellen tried to remember the next test. It had been so long since he administered one like this. It felt surreal to be doing it again. It all felt like memories from another life, someone who wasn't him. "Keep your eyes closed."
Drust, with eyes still closed, nodded.
Kellen sat down across the table from him again. A biosteel prosthetic… How indeed.
He remembered the next test. He swallowed hard and rested his own forearm on Drust's open palm. "I need you to squeeze hard as you can until I tell you to stop."
He felt the smooth fibrous fingers clasp around his wrist, slow and deliberate at first, then they tightened all at once. It felt like a real hand clad in a strange flexible metal glove. He braced himself as the hand gripped tighter and tighter.
"Stop." He looked to see if Drust's eyes were still closed. They were. "Now same position, push up on my arm, try try to move it up." He spoke in a tone that was all business, words he’d said before.
Drust nodded and Kellen felt the hand pushing up against his wrist trying to move him. Kellen pressed down against the hand trying to keep from being lifted.
"Should I…"
"Push up as much as you can. Try to move me."
Kellen had to strain a little to keep Drust from lifting his arm.
"Fuck," he muttered after a bit. Another hard push to lift. "Is it broken?"
"You're doing well. Stop."
Drust relaxed his arm, and the biosteel clattered against the table as it rested back down. Kellen pulled his own arm out of the prosthetic's grasp.
"Open your eyes."
Drust obeyed, and blinked a few times readjusting to the light.
"I'll need to make few minor adjustments then it is finished."
Kellen took a hold of the hand and nudged it to flip over so it was palm downward. He made a small arch out of his own left hand, and rested the fingertips on the back of the biosteel hand.
"Kellen," Drust said softly. "I don't know how to thank you."
Kellen shook his head.
"I knew you had some magic, but this?"
His pinky finger involuntarily twitched as Kellen's magic coursed through it, a small nudge of power here, a little less there.
"Tell me then," Kellen said. "I've told you how I come to have this knowledge. You tell me how you come to have this arm."
Drust was silent for a moment. "The empire," he said eventually.
"No shit the empire," Kellen grumbled. He gave a playful slap on the back of the biosteel hand before returning to perfecting the energy flow. "You don't buy biosteel at fucking butcher shop."
Drust laughed. The hearty sound filled the kitchen and made Kellen laugh in turn.
"Once," Drust said, his smile fading. "I might have made you a sword of legend. Your Gerardsoen blade would look like scrap metal compared to what I would give you. In your hands, there would be a blade that could cleave the One Flame into two.
"I was still technically in an apprenticeship when the Empire heard of my work. Generals requested commissions. Admirals. Left home and went to the Empire Proper. Worked in Morvern until." Drust trailed off.
Kellen looked up from the hand he'd been staring at. Drust's head was hung low, his hair hanging over his eyes. Morvern. Ten years ago. Kellen remembered. "Separatist rebellion."
Drust looked up and nodded. "Spent two days buried in rubble from a mana bomb exploding. Arm, completely crushed." [/color] Kellen sighed. He hesitated for a second before covering the back of Drust's metal hand with his own. He hoped it felt comforting.
"My patron took pity on me. Commissioned the biosteel match. Or maybe he just hoped to get more masterpieces out of me. Just don't have the dexterity anymore. Biosteel helps, but it isn't the same."
"They sent you here," Kellen guessed.
"Empire needed someone to make decent blades to be sent up north. Vallikas is close to a port for shipping, and far enough from the fighting to keep manufacturing safe."
Kellen looked down, realizing his hand was still wrapped around Drust’s. He could feel his pulse thump against the biosteel. He had finished stitching the metal to flesh with his magic, but didn’t move.
“Your hand. It’s warm,” Drust muttered. “I can’t remember…” He bit his bottom lip. “I’ve only ever felt drastic temperature differences. Freezing cold or. But your hand is warm.” Without pulling away from Kellan’s touch, he used his left hand to brush against the metal biosteel forearm. “This is.” But he never finished saying what it was. Kellen had absent-mindedly tucked his thumb underneath, resting it under Drust’s large metallic palm.
They sat in silence for a long while before Kellen said, “It is complete,” but he didn’t move.
“Then I should leave,” Drust said but he didn’t move.