Isobel

Forgotten Memories

• It was oppressively hot in the forge, and the stone walls did nothing to let out the heat. Sweat was pouring down the smith’s bare chest as he hammered the glowing white metal that would eventually form the beautiful pieces that the winged warriors wore. His light brown wings stirred behind him as he tried to at least circulate the air.
  
  The smith hid the smile that threatened to make an appearance as he heard the sound of light footsteps approaching. He didn’t look up from what he was doing, but in his peripheral vision, he saw a small spindly girl hug the wall. She crawled over to the window and peeked out, her jet black wings and hair contrasting against her fair skin.
  
  “Playing hooky again, are we?” The smith’s deep voice easily filled the room.
  
  “Shhhh!” The girl spun around and sat underneath the window, her light blue eyes wide and a slender finger at her lips.
  He obliged and stopped speaking, focusing back on his work. Cool water hissed as he submerged the scalding hot metal for the exact right amount of time and pulled it out again. He didn’t react when he heard another set of approaching footsteps. The sharp angular face of the girl’s tutor appeared in the window, right above her. The girl froze, not daring to move a muscle.
  
  “Is Isobel in there?” The man asked suspiciously.
  
  “Does it look like I have time to be playing with children? Come to think of it, I don’t have time to answer your asinine questions either.” The smith said, not bothering to hide his displeasure. He’d never liked the tutor. Without another word, he went back to forging the armor and the tutor, knowing he would wrest no relative information from the smith, left the window. His muttering died away.
  
  “Thanks Abelard!” The girl grinned and jumped to her feet. Now that she didn’t have to worry about being caught, she was free to explore the forge. She didn’t even seem fazed by the heat.
  
  Abelard laid the completed chestpiece on the table to cool and grabbed a towel to dry himself off. “Careful little Hummingbird. If you don’t watch what you’re doing, you’ll end up with scars like me.” He said without even needing to look. He knew she was over by the weapon rack.
  
  Like her moniker, the girl flitted over to his side. It seemed impossible that she could be this flighty without ever stirring her wings, but somehow she achieved it. “When are you going to forge my armor, Abelard?” She asked plaintively. “I’ve been waiting…” She counted in her head. “At least ten years. Which is basically forever.”
  
  The smith chuckled and she grinned. While the little angel was only 14 years of age, the rest of their kind was at least a century old. Abelard himself was looking forward to celebrating his 354th birthday next month. “You’re still growing. You’d need a new set of armor by the time I got the current one finished. Besides, a healer’s armor is special. While all of our armor must be light to enable flight, their armor must be the lightest of all and incredibly flexible. But it can’t be flimsy. We can’t have our healers getting hurt.”
  
  Isobel gave a dramatic sigh. “I’d never be in danger of getting hurt as long as the armor was made by the best Angel Smith who ever lived.” She grinned and he raised an eyebrow. Though she often tried, flattery got her no closer to her suit of armor. “Besides, I never asked to be a healer. I want to be at the front lines! Slashing down demons left and right, smiting them with my holy light!” She grabbed a thin rod of iron and jumped onto the table, swinging the rod like a sword and outstretching her other hand like it would send the very lightning of wrath to destroy all evil.
  
  Abelard nimbly took the rod from her loose grip. “You’d never kill any demons with a stance like that.” He leaned the iron rod next to the ground and gently lifted her down from the table. “And you shouldn’t take your healing for granted. You have incredible talent and vast potential.”
  
  Isobel made a face. “You’re starting to sound like Terrell.”
  
  The smith snorted at being compared to the tutor. “Speaking of, you should go find him before he has an aneurism and really needs you.”
  
  She nodded reluctantly, knowing there was no arguing with the smith. “Thanks for letting me hide out here for a while.” She hugged him tight and then flitted off.
  
  Abelard watched the girl and shook his head. She certainly lived up to her nickname.
  
  Once she was out of sight, Isobel changed directions. There was no way she was going to seek out the boring old tutor when today felt so full of promise. Now that the forge was off limits though, there was only one other place she wanted to go.
  
  Isobel snuck between houses to the middle of the great city. An ancient building sat in the very center and was guarded at all times, but she knew a secret way in. There was a crack in the wall hidden by the shadows that she could just squeeze through. She watched and waited until a patrol strolled past then sped towards the crack, shimmying through it to the room beyond. In the whole building, there was only one room and it was huge. Yet, for all it’s size, it was what lay in the center of the room that drew her attention.
  
  At first glance, it appeared to be a large round table, but when one grew closer, it became obvious that what was mistaken for a table top was really a set or round doors. The doors were raised from the ground slightly so that if they were opened, one could step over the lip of the doorframe and into...whatever was beyond the doors.
  
  She’d been forbidden to go near the doors, let alone enter the room, but the rules didn’t stop her. With one hand, she lightly touched one side of the door. What was on the other side? Perhaps today was the day she would find out.