The innkeeper was about to bite the lump of silver when he saw Mujin’s face and lowered his hand.
“May I check it?”
“Go ahead.”
His front teeth left shallow marks. The innkeeper’s eyes widened. This time, he looked back and forth between the silver and his own fingernail.
“This will cover your room and meals with plenty of change left over.”
“Then please give me plenty to eat.”
At that, the innkeeper’s expression eased.
Two loaves of bread and a meat stew with onions were set on the long dining table. Thin slices of turnip were sprinkled with salt and herbs. Mujin gazed for a moment at the steaming bowl, then picked up his spoon.
The meat fell apart under his tongue. When he dipped the bread in the sauce, even its hard crust softened.
He picked up a second piece.
As the innkeeper counted out his change, he quietly brought over another loaf of bread.
While Mujin concentrated on his meal, an old man across from him tended a small sickle. He wet a whetstone, rubbed the blade across it a few times, then tested it with his thumb. Before the edge, it was the hand gripping the sickle’s handle that caught Mujin’s eye.
The index and middle fingers would not straighten completely.
Every time the handle turned, the old man had to adjust his grip. A fresh blister had formed over an old callus on his palm.
“That handle is thick.”
The old man looked up.
“Eh?”
Mujin swallowed his bread.
“For your hand.”
“It fit me fine when this fellow and I were young. Seems I’ve shrunk.”
The old man laughed and put down the sickle.
There were three small chips in the blade. Inside the iron was a crack left from a repair long ago. To Mujin, it stood out as clearly as a finger whose bone had healed crooked.
“May I have a look?”
“So you’re a blacksmith, are you? Can you see work even in the middle of a meal?”
Mujin put the last piece of meat in his mouth and held out his hand.
“I’ve eaten.”
The sickle passed into his hand.
The rust vanished from the curved blade. Iron quietly filled the chipped places. Even the crack hidden deep in the joint closed.
The old man stopped laughing.
Mujin loosened the iron band at the end of the handle and replaced the handle with a small metal one. He made shallow hollows where the bent fingers rested and widened the surface the thumb pushed against. Hollow inside, the handle was lighter than wood. A gentle warmth lingered on its surface.
He also shifted the angle between blade and handle slightly.
“Try holding it.”
For a while, the old man could not bring himself to take the sickle.
“What did you just…”
“Fixed it.”
The hand holding the sickle stopped in midair. The old man could wrap his fingers around the handle without opening his palm. When he turned his wrist, the blade’s tip came to rest exactly where he intended.
He took a handful of dry grass from beneath the table.
He had been taking it home to feed his rabbits.
He gave the sickle a short pull.
Swish.
Severed blades of grass scattered across his knees. His wrist had not twisted. The old man looked at his hand, then gathered the grass again.
This time, he pulled more slowly.
It cut just as cleanly.
“I barely used any strength.”
Mujin left a small mark beneath the handle.
“You don’t need to.”
The innkeeper spilled the coins he had been counting onto the table.
***
The next morning, people carrying farm tools had gathered outside the inn.
Mujin stopped as he opened the door.
There were plow blades, hoes, sickles, shovels, and even sheep shears. Two people had dragged over a large plow too big to carry. The old man at the front hid last night’s sickle behind his back.
“It wasn’t me spreading tales.”
Someone behind him spoke up.
“You cut grass by the well more than ten times.”
“I had to test it, didn’t I?”
The woman who had been carrying firewood was there too. A boy beside her held out a small pair of cracked scissors in both hands.
The woman bowed first.
“I didn’t even introduce myself properly yesterday. I’m Marta. This is Tobin.”
As if he had been waiting for his cue, Tobin held out the scissors.
“These aren’t for cutting bread. Mama uses them to cut thread.”
“I haven’t asked him to take them yet, dear.”
Marta tried to lower the boy’s hands.
Mujin looked at the people’s hands before he looked at the scissors.
The man who had brought the plow had one shoulder noticeably lower than the other. The woman with a shovel had wrapped a cloth around her palm. The young man with the sheep shears kept rubbing the base of his thumb.
The iron had worn down in much the same way for all of them.
The people had not.
Mujin turned to the innkeeper.
“Is there an open space?”
The innkeeper pointed to an empty yard beyond the well.
“There’s a place we use at threshing time. If you need to borrow a forge, you’ll have to ask the gatekeeper…”
“The yard will do.”
He put the last piece of bread he had brought from the dining table into his mouth.
The farm tools were laid out in the morning sunlight. When the people tried to arrange them in rows so no one’s tools got mixed up, Mujin raised a hand.
“Just remember which ones are yours.”
Then he sent his will through all the metal in the yard.
The rust vanished.
Split blades joined. Holes around loose nails drew tight, and crooked iron bands tightened just enough to hold without harming the wood. The broken neck of a hoe flowed into a smoother curve than before.
From the little scissors to the great plow blade, he missed nothing.
There was barely even a sound of iron striking iron.
A woman hurriedly looked down at the sickle she still held. Morning sunlight stretched along its edge.
“Mine’s done too.”
Her words carried across the yard.
“This one too.”
“Father, look. The broken part’s gone.”
People picked up their tools. Someone reached toward a blade and got his hand slapped by the person beside him. The man who had brought the plow ducked his head under its iron blade.
He sprang upright.
“No, how did you get all the way in there…”
Mujin looked at the plow handles in the man’s hands.
“The repairs are done.”
All eyes turned to him.
“May I see you use them?”
***
The field lay just beyond the village fence.
The plow belonged to a man named Bern. He led his ox to a furrow. When the repaired plow cut into the wet soil, it sank deeper than usual. Bern quickly lifted the handles.
Mujin walked alongside him, watching.
After only a few steps, soil clumped in front of the blade.
Bern stopped. He kicked the soil away, then took the handles again. As he bent over, one shoulder dipped even lower.
“This field’s always like this. After rain, I have to clear it every two furrows.”
Mujin crouched beside the plow.
The blade cut the soil, but the soil had nowhere to go. It stuck to the broad, flat iron plate and caught the earth pushing in from behind. Bern was making his ox drag that lump along too.
Mujin remembered the metal shavings that used to pile up on the floor of his old workshop.
Even a sharp tool worked roughly if the shavings it cut had nowhere to escape. Sharpening the edge alone would not be enough.
With one finger, he traced a curve along the side of the plow.
The flat plate twisted upward. The nose that cut into the earth narrowed. He gave the surface that turned the cut soil aside a broad, shallow curve. He changed the surface, too, so wet earth would not cling to it.
He made the section behind the blade yield slightly to a blow, then return to its shape.
Every time the plow struck a stone, the force did not have to travel straight into Bern’s wrist.
“Take hold of the handles.”
When Bern set his hands on them, Mujin changed their height first.
Bern’s bent back straightened.
The ends of the handles broadened into surfaces that supported his palms. He could steer without clenching them with all his fingers.
“Can they be this high?”
“Try walking.”
Bern clicked his tongue at the ox.
The plow moved forward.
The split earth curled up along the curve of the iron plate. Thick clods rolled over to one side. Whenever wet soil began to stick, the next bit of earth pushed it free.
Bern passed the place where he would normally have stopped.
It was where he would have kicked the soil away.
He walked to the end of the furrow. On his way back, he kept looking behind him.
“Why is there nothing to clear?”
The old man watching from the field bank clapped his hands.
“Must have had a hearty breakfast!”
Bern turned the plow without even smiling.
On the second furrow, the hand holding the ox’s reins relaxed. The blade cut a steady path through the soil without Bern hanging his weight on the handles. Even when it glanced off a buried stone, the plow’s neck only bent briefly and straightened again.
He stopped in the middle of the field.
“I’ll finish this side today with time to spare.”
His voice caught strangely at the end.
His wife, standing on the field bank, asked,
“Then will you do the east field too?”
Bern turned his head.
“No. The roof.”
His wife closed her mouth.
“I said I’d fix it before the rain.”
Mujin left a mark beneath the plow’s neck. Sunlight spread across the back of the man walking upright.
***
When Mujin returned to the yard, Tobin was measuring his own height with both hands.
He laid a palm on the top of his head, held it there in the air, and ran to Mujin.
“I’m this tall.”
“What do you want to make?”
“A shovel.”
Marta sighed.
“You can’t ask him to take your shovel too.”
“When I use yours, the dirt won’t lift.”
Mujin looked at the shovel the boy had brought. Its handle had been cut down from a broken adult shovel handle. One side of the blade was chipped.
He asked Tobin to hold it and show him how he scooped up dirt.
The boy stretched out his arms. The blade was heavy, and its tip kept dropping.
Mujin called iron and a light, silvery metal from beneath the ground. Without a speck of dirt flying up, the gathered metal wrapped around the shovel blade. He narrowed it and gave its inner face a shallow hollow. He rounded the edges, leaving only the front, which dug into the earth, hard.
The handle changed to a thickness that fit a small fist.
“This one is yours.”
Tobin lifted the shovel.
This time, the tip did not drop.
The boy scooped up dirt at the edge of the yard and carried it over. He took too much with his first scoop and spilled half. The next time, he took just enough.
After that, he said nothing.
For a long time, he stared at the little hole he had dug with his own hands.
Marta turned away, holding back a laugh.
Mujin pointed to the cloth wrapped around her hand.
“Let’s see the scissors too.”
The scissors could cut thread only when she squeezed hard enough to force the two gaping blades together. No matter how sharp the edges were, if they did not meet, the thread would merely fold between them.
Mujin remembered the large shears used for cutting leather in his old workshop. Shears for thick leather and scissors for paper differed even in the length of their handles.
He gave the insides of the two blades a slight curve.
Instead of the entire blades meeting at once, their point of contact would move toward the tips as they closed. He set a small, hard, smooth ring around the pivot. The force used to close the handles would no longer be lost to friction.
One finger loop lengthened enough to hold three fingers comfortably. Between the loops, he placed a thin coiled spring.
Marta opened and closed her fingers.
The scissors sprang lightly apart.
“They open when I let go.”
“You don’t have to keep pulling them open.”
The innkeeper brought over an old sack. Marta set the blades against a section where the seams overlapped.
Snip.
She stopped.
The owner of the sheep shears craned his neck beside her.
“Did it cut?”
Marta held up the cut sack.
“My hand hurts less.”
She spoke softly. She did not put the scissors down.
Mujin took the sheep shears as well. He asked the young man to show him how he held a sheep and which way he brought the shears in. He rounded the side that came near his fingers and the sheep’s skin. He broadened the surface supporting the base of the thumb so it would not dig in during long use.
The young man worked the finished shears a few times in the air.
“Even if a sheep moves, I won’t have to adjust my grip.”
He ran off, saying he would fetch a sheep at once.
Meanwhile, Mujin handed the hoes and shovels lined up in the yard back to their owners. The tall woman received a hoe with a long neck; the old man with a bad knee received a shovel angled to let him put his weight downward more easily.
Each handle curved differently.
Even the two sickles brought from the same house felt awkward when their owners swapped them.
The old man grumbled as he held his wife’s sickle.
“This keeps pulling my hand sideways.”
His wife snatched her sickle back.
“That’s why I told you to leave mine alone.”
Laughter spread through the yard.
Mujin’s lips rose a little too.
***
They ate lunch in front of Marta’s house.
Food arrived without anyone having to ask. Bern’s wife brought bread toasted with butter. The old man offered dried fruit soaked in honey. The owner of the sheep shears put down a lump of cheese and said,
“The sheep liked it before I did. I was finished holding it much sooner.”
Mujin cut a thick slice of cheese.
He put it between pieces of bread and added meat. When Marta’s eyes widened, he asked,
“Shouldn’t I eat them together?”
“No. I was thinking it looked delicious.”
“It is.”
Tobin promptly copied him.
Marta was bringing tea when she hurriedly set the kettle on the table. The cloth wrapped around her hand was wet. Hot water seemed to have soaked through it, carrying the heat to her fingers.
She shook her hand and folded the cloth again.
The kettle’s handle had blackened where the fire touched it directly. Beneath its short spout, spilled tea had left a brown streak.
Mujin drew it toward him.
“This hurts your hand too.”
“Only because it just came off the fire. It’ll be fine if we wait a bit.”
He looked at the kettle, then at the cooled cup of tea in front of him.
If they waited, her hand would be comfortable.
The tea would cool too.
Mujin remembered the insulated flask he used every winter in his old workshop. With a space between the outside and the inside, the heat within could not escape easily. With the metal here, he could even give the space between them a structure that held warmth.
“Would you boil a little more tea?”
Marta nodded.
While she did, the old kettle’s dented belly straightened. Its black handle sank into the body. In its place, broad, shallow hollows formed on either side, where palms could rest naturally.
Inside, he raised a new, rounded wall to hold the water. He left the space between the walls empty. In the narrow sections connecting the opening and the base, he formed a structure that made it hard for heat to cross outward.
The inner wall held its warmth for a long time.
The outer wall kept a comfortable warmth for bare hands.
Mujin lengthened the spout, then shortened it again. He made the tip thin and added a small lip underneath. When the kettle was righted after pouring, the last drop would turn back inside instead of running down its belly.
A broad plate shaped like a leaf appeared on the lid for a thumb to press.
A small mark appeared on one side of the base.
When Marta brought the freshly boiled tea, a silver-gray vessel sat on the table, like leaves laid one over another. The vertical curves around its belly took on a faint gold tint in the light.
“Where’s the handle?”
“It doesn’t need one.”
Hot tea poured into it.
Marta reached for the cloth. Mujin first cupped both sides of the kettle in his hands. Steam rose from the opening, but his fingers rested easily against it.
“Try holding it.”
She touched it with a single fingertip.
Then she pressed both palms against it.
“It’s less hot than fresh bread.”
“That sounds about right for holding it.”
Marta lifted the kettle and poured tea into a cup. Its weight rested evenly in both hands, unlike when she hooked her fingers around a single handle. When she righted it, the drop at the spout curled back inside.
Not a drop fell on the table.
Tobin peered underneath.
“Is there a hole?”
“No.”
“Then why doesn’t it drip?”
Mujin pointed to the tip of the spout.
“This part catches it.”
Tobin slowly tipped the cup he was drinking from and straightened it again. Tea ran over the back of his hand.
Marta quickly wiped it away.
Mujin took the boy’s cup too. He softened the rim that touched his lips and made a rounded hollow underneath for small hands to support it.
“Tilt a cup when you drink from it.”
Tobin nodded.
A little later, he asked,
“Then can I hug the kettle when I sleep if it’s cold?”
Mujin looked at the kettle’s rounded belly.
There was no reason to stop at something that poured tea.
***
That afternoon, a thin, oval metal pouch took shape.
It was large enough for Marta to rest against her back when she carried firewood down from the mountain. Filled with hot water, it slowly spread warmth across its broad outer surface. Its sturdy rim distributed the weight of the firewood across a wider area. It had a loop for attaching it to a shoulder strap too.
Marta held it to her back and stood there for a long time.
“My clothes will dry.”
Mujin recalled her wet shoulders the day before.
“That would be good too.”
“In winter, coming down the mountain sweaty is the coldest part. Even when I get home and sit by the fire, my back stays chilled for ages.”
She ran a hand along the edge of the metal pouch.
“I’d want to carry this before the firewood.”
The innkeeper beside them cleared his throat.
His eyes kept returning to the kettle.
Mujin asked,
“How many cups do you serve?”
“Pardon?”
“When you make a pot of tea.”
The innkeeper’s face lit up.
“On an evening, as many as twenty.”
A large kettle that took two hands to carry appeared at the inn. Mujin added a catch so the lid would stay in place while it poured. Its base was broad and steady. He raised the barley ear from the inn’s sign on its outer surface.
When the innkeeper cradled it, it reached right up beneath his chin.
“I’ll be showing it off in every room.”
“Fill it with tea.”
Even as the sun sank, hot tea still poured from Marta’s kettle.
Bern came down after replacing the old boards on his roof and accepted a cup. Sawdust clung to his once-hunched shoulders. After drinking his tea, he looked toward the field.
“Will it plow just as much tomorrow?”
“I made it to last.”
“I like the sound of that.”
Mujin leaned back in the chair he had occupied since their late lunch. Marta split the last piece of bread in half and gave it to him. A thick layer of butter filled the middle.
He did not refuse.
When he bit into the bread, honey and butter melted together.
Across the yard, the old couple tied cloth to their sickle handles so they could tell them apart. The young man with the sheep shears stuffed the shorn wool into a sack. Tobin was digging a place for his mother’s herbs with his own shovel.
The boy set down the shovel handle and opened his palm.
He seemed to be checking for blisters.
Finding none, he picked up the shovel again.
Mujin watched him, then looked down at his own hands. Calluses lay thick upon calluses. The marks left by a lifetime of working iron remained.
Things those hands had made were now held in other hands.
He ate the rest of his bread slowly.
The evening bell rang.
Its cracked sound spread over the village. Mujin looked toward the small bell in front of the inn. The crack he had sensed when he first came here was still open.
He lifted a finger lightly.
The gatekeeper ringing the bell gave the rope its next pull.
Dong.
A clear, deep note flowed between the rooftops.
The gatekeeper looked up, still holding the rope. One by one, the people in the yard raised their heads too. Tobin hugged his shovel to his chest.
Mujin lifted his cup of tea.
It was still warm.
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