#In the version appearing in “The Archivist's Journal” the bandits are censored/editorialized to be “malevolent spirits”.

[autumnalwalker]

The Tale of the Merchant and the Blacksmith's Daughter

Wordcount: 2,682 (Story is below the "Keep Reading" line if you want to skip the introduction of meta context.)

This is a story that appeared in @thearchivistsjournal, split into two parts, the first half on Day 98 and the second half on Day 364 as a sort of "story within a story" that the titular Archivist winds up telling. I liked it well enough and it works well enough as a standalone story that it neither dependent on nor particularly spoils anything in The Archivist's Journal that I figured I'd give it its own post with the whole story all in one place (and with some of the Archivist's parenthetical commentary stripped out).

The original way this story came about was that several years ago a friend of mine invited me to a concert/show that a coworker of ours was involved in. The concert was 95% instrumental and 5% chorus singing in a language I don't speak, but the individual songs had English-translation titles in the program pamphlet and a couple of them had brief introductions about the larger works or stories the individual pieces originated from. The two that stood out in my memory (or maybe it was both the same one, like I said, it's been several years) were one involving a blacksmith and his white-haired daughter and one having something to do with a gift found/given during winter. Anyway, this story is the story I made up in my head to go along with the music as the concert progressed. It wasn't until I decided to include it in The Archivist's Journal a few years later that I ever wrote it down or even told anyone about it. Of course, in that writing down it mutated a bit and more specific details got added until it became the story you see before you (beneath the "Keep Reading" line).

I hope you enjoy.

*******

This story starts in a village, not too unlike this Village, but rather than being surrounded by water it lay nestled in a space between mountains.  There were many other villages in this world, most of them similarly isolated.  The roads between, over, and through the mountains were long, winding, and dangerous; haunted by wild animals, malevolent spirits, and ruthless bandits.  But still, these roads were traveled despite the risks, mostly by merchants; people who brought goods and news from afar to trade for local crafts, foods, drinks, and gossip.

As I said, we begin our tale with one such merchant arriving in one such village in the springtime, when the trees bloomed with pink flowers and hid chirping newborn chicks among their branches.  A time when everyone, their pets, and their livestock are all taking any excuse they can to be out and about in the new-returned warmth and sun after months of cold and dark.  The time when everyone is happy to see a merchant after so long without word from beyond their village, for only fools travel in the winter, but when you are used to a thing it becomes strange to go without it and joyous to regain it.

As our merchant passed by the farms and rode into town on a rickety cart pulled by an aging steed, the locals smiled and called out to the young man they saw, and some even stopped their work to follow him to market.  The first merchant to visit the village this season, and a new one at that.  For this was the merchant’s first journey out on his own, and while these villagers had never seen this fresh-faced beardless young man before, neither had he seen the world beyond his home village until now, so he was excited as they.  And a bit afraid although he tried not to show it.

And so the merchant arrived in the village square and there was a sort of music to it all; the babble of the crowd clamouring for the latest news, the calling out of requests for foreign items, the rattling of the cart, the huffing of the merchant’s steed, the clucking of chickens happy to be forgotten for the moment as they pecked at the ground.  And behind it all, keeping the rhythm united, the steady beat of the blacksmith’s hammer.

It was toward the end of that first day when the merchant first caught sight of the blacksmith’s daughter, a beautiful young woman the merchant’s own age with snow-white hair despite her youth.  So distracted was the merchant by the sight of her that he did not notice the mischievous village children unhooking his cart from his steed, nor their unlocking its wheels, nor the steed wandering off.  So it was then that when he went to lean upon the cart to try to look casual when he realized she was leaving her father’s workshop to approach him that the cart began to roll off on its own.

A spectacle of a chase after the cart ensued, ultimately ending with the merchant making a fool of himself and landing in a pigsty.  Not the best first impression on the blacksmith’s daughter.  Perhaps even worse was the complication cleaning this soiled state presented.  For the merchant had a secret.  The merchant was in fact not a young man but a young woman, and in this world, among these villages, it was not considered proper for a woman to be a merchant.  There were many justifications and excuses for this idea, and regardless of the truth of any of them - or lack thereof - what mattered was that people believed them and if the young merchant’s true nature were to be discovered, her life and business would be that much harder.

And so the young merchant found herself gathering her goods, her cart, and her steed and fleeing before getting the chance to truly talk to the blacksmith’s daughter whom she was so smitten with.  And while beauty alone may not be the best reason for attraction, it’s a common enough one, and besides the merchant felt a certain kinship for the white-haired young woman.  By her apron and arms it appeared that she was training to take her father’s place and - while we know such an idea to be foolishness here - in that place blacksmith was not considered a “proper” occupation for a woman either.

As the spring passed into summer, and summer into autumn the merchant’s thoughts would often drift back to that white-haired maiden, and as she went from one village to the next she couldn’t stop comparing them to that first village she visited nor their inhabitants to the blacksmith’s daughter.  She resolved that come next spring she would talk to her for real, and prayed that she was not with another by that time.

Likewise, the blacksmith’s daughter would often surprise herself when her own thoughts drifted back toward the smiling handsome stranger who somehow managed to laugh and joke even while chasing down his runaway cart or lying in mud.  Such thoughts never lasted long as her father would tell her to get back to work and remind her that with no son nor wife he was counting on her to carry on his skills and legacy.

And as winter came the merchant hunkered down in the city and drew up two routes for the coming year, one for if talking to the blacksmith’s daughter went well, in which case she would loop around to visit the village multiple times, and one for if the conversation went poorly, in which case she would avoid that village in the future.  Such planning was perhaps a bit much, but those who are young and infatuated often do many foolish things when they should know better.

Meanwhile back in the village the blacksmith and his daughter enjoyed an evening together under the stars while the townsfolk carried on their festival that was the one bright spot in that dark and cold season.  Standing on a bridge leading to a pavilion in the center of a pond on the edge of the festival grounds, the father revealed that he was ill, and come this time next year - or if he was lucky the one after - he would be needing to pass all his work on to her.  Which made it all the more important that she find and accept a husband so that she might continue the family line.  True, she might not be able to smith while having a child, but a good husband could provide for her until she could again.  And if it happened sooner rather than later, her father could continue helping as well.

This news soured the blacksmith’s daughter’s night in more ways than one.

Such were the affairs weighing on the minds of the merchant and the blacksmith’s daughter as spring returned, and with it, the merchant to that  village.

This time, there were no mishaps with the cart and steed, and  the two of them were able to talk.  First about business and news of the wider world, but then about themselves.  As luck or fate would have it, the two of them did actually enjoy one another’s company.  The merchant’s tales of travel and easy-going demeanor allowed the blacksmith’s daughter to forget her troubles for a time.  The blacksmith’s daughter and stories of village life were a pleasant reminder of the things the merchant had started to miss and grow homesick for after giving them up for a life on the road.

All too soon the time came when the merchant had to move on.  As promises were being made to see one another next spring, if not sooner, the blacksmith’s daughter mentioned her father’s illness and its impact on her own responsibilities.  As she rode away, on to the next village, the merchant thought about the blacksmith’s plight and the symptoms that were mentioned, and she remembered a skilled doctor she had met on last year’s route.  Letting her steed lead the cart on its own she consulted her map and her planned routes and began to make adjustments.  How soon could she get to that doctor’s village and return to this one?  Could she make enough money to pay the doctor for a cure to bring back before getting there?  Could such a route work out before winter?  And wintering in that village was no good, for if a merchant is to do well the next year it was said they must winter in the city where trade never stops, only slows.

Days she spent, revising her route, calculating profits and expenses, time and food.  By the time she reached the second village on her route, she believed she could do it.  There would be little profit in it and far too much time on the road, but it could be done.  Even if it meant a poor bed and lean food that winter in the city.

And so it came to pass that it was only early autumn, when the flowers were gone and the farmers made their harvests among the falling orange leaves that the merchant and the blacksmith’s daughter met once again.  To save the blacksmith’s pride the merchant charged for the medicine of course, but left out that it was far less than it had cost her to acquire.  When asked why she had gone to such lengths, she said that a merchant’s job was not to make money, but to make sure people have the things they need but cannot get themselves, even the needs they didn’t ask for.  She may not have fully believed it herself at the time, but that explanation marked the birth of what would one day become the policy that made her reputation as a merchant.  At any rate, it sounded better than the city.

Alas, if the merchant were to keep herself and her steed fed and housed through the winter, they could not linger.  And so the merchant and the blacksmith’s daughter parted ways again, hoping that by the spring the medicine would have done its work.

That winter, the merchant in the city chose to go hungrier than was perhaps wise while she searched for a gift to bring the blacksmith’s daughter.  Not a practical one, but a flattering one.  Meanwhile the blacksmith’s daughter thought of the merchant only to curse him as the medicine seemed at first to do nothing, or even make her father worse.  And then when her father joined her outside on the night of the winter festival, surprising her after being bedridden for weeks they both praised the doctor who’d made the medicine and the merchant who delivered it.

And so that next spring, happy to see one another again, their friendship began to bloom in full.

At first, when the merchant returned to the village, she was nervous.  What if the medicine had not worked and the blacksmith’s daughter now resented her?  What if the gift she now brought was rejected?  Was she being too forward?

As it happened, these fears were unwarranted.  The blacksmith was more hale and hearty than he had been in years.  And his daughter, already grateful, was delighted with the simple hair ornament the merchant presented to her; ostensibly as thanks for sending her on such a journey that led her to contacts that would be profitable in future seasons.  It was a small, plain thing, for the merchant could not yet afford more, but its color shone brilliantly against a head of white hair and it was most effective at keeping that hair out of the way when working a forge.

As in the last spring, and in springs to follow, the merchant lingered for longer than was profitable in that little village so that she anddaughter might spend as much time in one another’s presence as the sirmitwork.  There came the when she surpassed her father’s skill and took on most of the blacksmith’s work.  But, leave once again the merchant always did, although always with a promise to return.  And return she always did, with news and tales and goods, traded for coin and horseshoes and a nostalgic taste of a slower life.

And so the seasons turned, and with them the years.  The claim the merchant once made to impress the blacksmith’s daughter about her purpose not being money but to fulfill the needs of those who cannot for themselves became a guiding principle in truth.  And in this way she gained a reputation for being fair and compassionate in balance with being cunning and capable.  And in this way she wove a web of connections and esteem greater in value than the coin of any one great trade.  Of course, there was an ever-increasing amount of coin too.

Meanwhile, the blacksmith’s daughter came into her own as well.  There came the day when she matched her father’s skill and took on an equal share of the smithy’s work.  There came the when she surpassed her father’s skill and took on most of the smithy’s work.  There came the day when - to both their surprise - her father received a commission from outside their village.  She smirked as she cursed the merchant for spreading overwrought tales of the talent of a humble village blacksmith and pushed herself to ever further mastery so that she might live up to those tales.  And then surpass them.

And then give the merchant much playful grief over the whole ordeal when she next returned.

Yet, for all the sweetness of those years, there were still the subtle bitternesses.  The merchant still had to pretend to be a man for her own safety and status.  The blacksmith still got the credit for his daughter’s work while asking her more urgently every year when she would find a husband to continue the family line.  And for all the time the merchant and the blacksmith’s daughter spent with one another, growing ever more mutually smitten, neither had the confidence to admit to the other of being more than close friends.

And when at last the merchant shared her secret with the blacksmith’s daughter, her faint hope that one day the merchant would settle down as her husband and fulfill her father’s wish for grandchildren was dashed.  And yet, the revelation left her more smitten still.

So, turned the seasons and years with their bright joys and quiet sorrows, until one hot summer’s day brought a change.

The merchant had stopped at a pool beneath a waterfall, far off enough from the road that she might water her steed and bathe in private.  It was a pool she had stopped at often enough before and had never encountered another, so - for a short time - she allowed herself to relax the guard she kept up on those dangerous roads.  And so she found herself half-disrobed at the water’s edge when the bandits of that place’s wilds set upon her with the hunger of wild animals and the cunning of men.

Now, the merchant was not unskilled at defending herself - one must be capable of such to travel those roads - and indeed she had done so handily in the past more than once, but on this occasion she was caught unawares and with the bandits between her and her bow and her spear.  And so, after trying and failing to reach her armaments, for all it hurt her pride she shouted for help she did not believe would come.

The bandits laughed at her despair.

The merchant steeled herself for her fate.

The wind picked up, carrying with it a scattering of petals and the scent of flowers.

A glint from the forest.

A blur that seemed to ride the wind.

A whistle of sharp metal.

The first of the bandits fell.

The laughter ceased.

The merchant beheld the beautiful swordsman.

His mocking grin drew the enraged bandits unto him.

His dancing feet spiraled amongst them untouched.

His gleaming sword flowed in and out and across.

The last bandit remaining slipped behind the beautiful swordsman.

The merchant cried out a warning.

The blow that would have torn spine from back tore only skin from shoulder.

A final flash and it was over.

A final flourish and the sword was sheathed.

A final flower on the breeze and the air was still.

The merchant and the beautiful swordsman stared at one another for a long moment with no sound but the nearby waterfall.

And then the moment ended as the swordsman winced and gripped his injured shoulder, making a self-deprecating joke about being too reckless and then thanking the merchant for saving his life.  The merchant thanked him for saving hers and began to bandage him up.

While they recovered they talked, and as they talked they found they had much in common.  Both were wanderers of the roads; her to bring people together and him to keep them safe.  Both thought they were the only ones who knew of this pool.  Both knew of the other by reputation, although the merchant’s secret, now revealed, was news to him.  Both had a similar sense of humor and played off one another well.  Both were beautiful, although on this one point the merchant disagreed for none had ever told her such before.

How could she compare to this man who was more beautiful than any she had ever seen?  Who moved with a dancer’s grace?  Who smelled of iron and flowers in bloom?  Who had saved her life?

He smiled and reminded her that she had saved his as well.  And then he offered to show her how she might compare.

She did not object when he moved to kiss her.

Over the days it took to travel to the next village, the beautiful swordsman convinced the merchant to try - just this once - to present herself as a woman while conducting her business.  It was an out-of-the-way place where her wider reputation would not suffer if things went poorly.  To her surprise, it did not.  It was frightening at first, yes, and there was some initial skepticism, true, but she was known here and her skills had not changed with her appearance.

It felt better than she’d expected.  She had not realized how much hiding herself had worn her down.  She knew it was reckless, but she tried it again in the next village.  And the next.  And before she knew it, the rest of her stops on the year’s circuit.

It did not always go so well of course.  Some fell back on old prejudices despite their past relationship and dealings.  Some felt they had been lied to all these years and resented the fact.  But the greater number accepted her as the same merchant who had always served them so well or even befriended them in the past and continued business as usual.  Some even lauded her cleverness in keeping up the ruse for so long or called her brave or skillful at having succeeded so well at a disadvantage.

Although, of course, the merchant knew that having already built up wealth and reputation made things far easier than if she had risked being herself from the start.  And having a famous swordsman at her side as a personal guard didn’t hurt matters either.

If there was one blemish on that unexpectedly exhilarating year, it was the guilt.  The merchant could not help but feeling that she had betrayed the blacksmith’s daughter.  She told herself that since the two of them had never claimed to ever be anything more than close friends, there was nothing to betray.  But the feeling persisted, and so the merchant revised her route so that she would not pass back to her favorite village until she was on her way to the city for the winter.  Of course, that only made the gnawing feeling worse.

When the blacksmith’s daughter next saw the merchant, riding openly as she had only shown herself to her in private and with a beautiful man at her side, she felt a stabbing pain in her chest that she refused to identify.  A moment looked forward to for months, suddenly turned to a fear she dared not name.

Over the following days the time that had once belonged to just the two of them was now shared by the three of them.  Their favorite private place now had a beautiful intruder.  An intruder who was never anything but gracious, and funny, and kind, and infuriatingly hard to resent.

It hurt how happy her best friend was, and she hated that it hurt.  She knew that she should be happy for the merchant’s happiness.  And so that was the face she showed.  A facade that all was right in the world, when every hour she wished that she had spoken her feelings sooner while chiding herself that to voice those words now would be nothing but hurtful selfishness.

And so the blacksmith’s daughter spent those last days of autumn smiling and those last nights silently weeping.

As the merchant returned to the city for the winter with the beautiful swordsman still at her side, she was happy that the two people in the world she cared for most had gotten along so well.

And so again the seasons turned and the years turned with them.  The merchant grew yet wealthier and more connected, while the blacksmith’s daughter became ever more skilled.  Ministers in the city asked the merchant to handle their affairs.  Warriors from afar journeyed to a once little-known village for blades and armor like no other.  Young traders sought out the merchant and asked to work for her.  She gave advice to all but hired none.  Would-be smiths sought out the elderly blacksmith and his white-haired daughter for apprenticeship.  He would take no apprentice but a non-existent grandchild and she sent all away without a word.

Masks cannot hold forever, and lies to oneself can only be believed for so long.  The merchant’s guilt began to gnaw again.  She began to question her relationship with the beautiful swordsman.  Had she made a mistake?  Had she simply done what was easy, useful, and expected?  He was dear to her, and she enjoyed his presence and his touch, and had done so much for her.  He seemed as near to perfect as a mortal man could be.  He had never been anything but loyal to her.  But if he had deeper depths, he never revealed them to her.  So how could she ever truly open up to him in return? 

And why did every visit to the blacksmith's daughter feel so painful these days when all three of them looked and sounded so happy?

Meanwhile, the blacksmith’s daughter closed herself ever further off.  She spoke to no one except her father.  And the merchant and the beautiful swordsman when they visited.  All commissions would go through her father and she would make creations that each put the last to shame without a question of payment or word to the patron.  Suitors stopped calling after a thrown hammer grazed the last one’s ear.

The beautiful swordsman, while a carefree man, was not an oblivious one.  And he knew what he was well enough, perhaps even better than most know themselves.  He knew his bonds were not as strong as most, no matter how easily he formed them, and he had long since made his peace with that.  He saw himself as a simple man of simple pleasures, and saw no shame in that.

He was not unaware of the merchant's growing melancholy, nor was he blind to the masked pain of the blacksmith’s daughter.  Nor the other buried feelings between the two.  He’d hoped all that would either blow up or fade with time, but he hadn’t anticipated it festering this long.

He liked to think he knew when to end a good thing before it goes bad, but admitted to himself that this time he may have been complacent.

And so, one spring day, he sighed to himself and declared he needed a new sword.

Of course, there was only one smith who would do.

It was raining when they arrived in the merchant’s once-favorite village.  She found it fit her melancholy these days.  A place she’d first seen full of light and color, now dim and drab.  She hated that she now felt dread instead of joy in coming here.  She was surprised when the beautiful swordsman said he wished to speak to the blacksmith’s daughter in private about the commission, but secretly relieved.  It was strange though that they talked all day, and through the night.  

She never did learn exactly what they spoke of.

The blacksmith’s daughter did not know what to make of the long conversation herself at first.  Nor of the commission.  Her voice was sore the next day, she had not spoken at such length for… well, she didn’t know how long it had last been.  The next day she did not pick up a hammer.  She only sat, and thought, and paced, and planned.  And then the next day, she worked.  And the next and next until she quenched the metal in her own blood and tears.  Only once her frenzied work was finished did she pause to rest for a moment on the floor of her workshop.  A pause that became a deep sleep.

She never did learn what the merchant and the beautiful swordsman spoke of during those days.

When the merchant woke the next morning, the rain had stopped and the beautiful swordsman was gone.

When the blacksmith’s daughter woke the next morning, the rain had stopped and the sword she made was gone.

The other item from the commission remained.

When the merchant reached the door of the workshop, she hesitated, unsure if she was doing the right thing.

When the blacksmith’s daughter reached the door of the workshop, she hesitated, unsure if she was doing the right thing.

The knock came at the same time the handle turned.

The two of them stared at one another as if for the first time.  

The blacksmith’s daughter invited the merchant inside to see the second half of the beautiful swordsman’s commission.  As they walked through the maze her workshop had become, she nervously explained that the first part of the commission had been the easy one.  Only a blade finer than any seen before, worthy of its own name and stories.  The second half had been the most difficult piece she’d ever attempted to forge.

“Her own heart’s desire.”

The simple hair ornament was a small, plain thing, but it shone brilliantly against a head of graying hair.