Exilian

ForgeFyre

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Foreword

For a while back in the mid 2010s, I wrote a story called ForgeFyre. Like many of my ideas, it had grander aims than ended up happening, or at least, it didn't end up with the sort of following that would have justified those aims. The idea was to do a fully-online format of tale that could allow for creative mixed media storytelling, focused on a heavily neurodivergent-coded character with a bit of a Sherlock Holmes aspect to her, and a portune, one of the strange magical little-folk of the Guns, Swords and Steam setting. They got two chapters in before my attention and that of Hannah, the excellent artist who'd provided sketches for me, began to fray rather: I tried things like getting ForgeFyre its own website but also to rather little avail.

The origins of GS&S were very much in pulp military storytelling - the very first versions of the setting which I made in my early teens (the oldest doc I have on the setting is a spreadsheet I made in 2006, when I was twelve) were for wargaming, and embarrassingly involved a sort of flipped American Civil War setting where the slave states were aesthetically and geographically the North. The setting moved pretty strongly to an earlier pseudo-time-frame through my teenage years as I developed it in its own terms and noticed that 'hey what if we did this thing but where the other guys were the racists' is a really bad concept. By 2010-11ish it had taken on a lot more gothic and pseudo-European rather than colonial-focused elements, the 'south' got scrapped altogether in favour of what became the rump state of Chaltary, and the Union faction became a sewing together of various old countries taken over by vampires rather than a 'union of states'.

Should I just have scrapped the setting rather than adapting and evolving it? I still wonder sometimes, and I abandoned it for a number of years partly because I wasn't sure I wanted to be writing a setting which aesthetically drew on periods with such huge impacts on the creation of oppressions that still sit with us today. My eventual conclusion, though, was that a lot of people are trying to write Steampunk and Clockpunk types of fiction, and I think GS&S has developed to a point where it has things to say that are worthwhile in that space, and that handling the tropes of early modern themed fantasy in ways that question and push back is worth doing, even (sometimes especially) where that means questioning and pushing back on one's own earlier work.

What emerged from all that was a setting that jumps quite wildly between various tropes and ideas, less coherent in its references but more coherent in what it's there to do. Where this is a setting about war, it's a setting about war from the view of conscripts: where it's a setting about violence and oppression, it's one that wants to see those things for their human, not geopolitical, cost. It can also be a setting about folktales and folk music and living what those meant to people, from love to greed to hope. This is all something that is too often missing from the sort of steampunk that mostly involves posing in pith hats for the aesthetic. The different places and factions in the setting have a lot of variance: Durginfeldt draws heavile on the English Civil War, Surany is a sort of early modern Rohan, Aloen allows for some pseudo-French courtly scenes and the Union has its own particular blend of vampiric Da Vinci gothic atmosphere. It's a jumble, but one that creates space for stories - and thus, stories were born.

In that light, ForgeFyre in 2014 (so written when I was twenty) was a further move away from the original geopolitical concerns of the setting towards something more rooted in folk tales and ghost stories, where I could tell the stories of ordinary people, misfits, communities, and adventures in this world. Some more courtly politics and suchlike was planned around the little French-themed mountain kingdom of Aloen, but the two chapters we finished were really based around the main character's home village.

The story now has been unavailable for about six or seven years, so this thread will contain a staggered re-release of the story, just interlinked within the forum and probably just limited to the two completed chapter-stories we finished, 'The Strangest Creature' and 'Ink-Cap and Nightshade'. It probably won't get read much but I feel like what we made should exist somewhere, and this is somewhere. I hope you enjoy it and find it interesting.

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Contents

Prologue - The Strangest Creature (https://exilian.co.uk/forum/index.php?msg=162388)

Chapter One
Words, text, setting, and editing by James Baillie: Art by Hannah Milburn.
Page One (https://exilian.co.uk/forum/index.php?msg=162635)
Page Two (https://exilian.co.uk/forum/index.php?msg=162754)
Page Three (https://exilian.co.uk/forum/index.php?msg=162888)
Page Four (https://exilian.co.uk/forum/index.php?msg=163038)
Page Five (https://exilian.co.uk/forum/index.php?msg=163124)
Page Six (https://exilian.co.uk/forum/index.php?msg=163229)
Page Seven (https://exilian.co.uk/forum/index.php?msg=163393)
Page Eight (https://exilian.co.uk/forum/index.php?msg=163916)
Page Nine (https://exilian.co.uk/forum/index.php?msg=164720)
Page Ten (https://exilian.co.uk/forum/index.php?msg=166164)
Page Eleven (https://exilian.co.uk/forum/index.php?msg=169712)
Page Twelve (https://exilian.co.uk/forum/index.php?msg=170158)
Page Thirteen (https://exilian.co.uk/forum/index.php?msg=170890)
Page Fourteen (https://exilian.co.uk/forum/index.php?msg=171276)
Page Fifteen (https://exilian.co.uk/forum/index.php?msg=171556)
Page Sixteen (https://exilian.co.uk/forum/index.php?msg=171659)
Page Seventeen (https://exilian.co.uk/forum/index.php?msg=171764)
Page Eighteen (https://exilian.co.uk/forum/index.php?msg=172038)
Page Nineteen (https://exilian.co.uk/forum/index.php?msg=172464)
Page Twenty (https://exilian.co.uk/forum/index.php?msg=172576)
Page Twenty-One (https://exilian.co.uk/forum/index.php?msg=172749)
Page Twenty-Two (https://exilian.co.uk/forum/index.php?msg=172852)

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There is a girl here. She clutches something to her chest and stares at the fireplace, where a cascade of soot falls. Soot and ash are grime and dirt to the world, but to her they fall as black stardust, the billowing particles floating around a contrast to the white snow outside.

She is six years old, and the world is still a playground.

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The girl hears a voice from the fireplace. It comes as little shock; the world is still full of wonders, and her eyes light up at the sound. She is bold, and fearless, in a way that only a little girl can be.


"Child."
"Yes?"
"Child, o, child..."

Blinking little bright blue eyes, she stares into the darkening room. She is alone. The soot settles on the wooden boards.

---

The house is old, and creaks. Tucked into a half-forgotten valley somewhere in the hills of Aloen, with ivy growing up the walls, it is a moated manor that barely deserves the name. The seignior is away on business; he has been away often since his wife passed from the world, and the little ivy-covered house forgot the sound of song.


That was six years ago.

It is just a week and a day since the girl's sixth birthday. It slipped by without comment, the time passed with the old manor reeve who is teaching her to write. She can already read, and the scraps of books she can get through are beginning to become her truest playmates.

She dreams vivid dreams, and marvels at the world.

But she does not think she dreamed the voice.

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"Child."

"Who are you?"

Staring around, the little girl pouts. Voices are supposed to have people behind them. Or fairies. She found a book that had fairies in, not long ago. Her mother had not been idle in preparing for her child, and though five years of dust had gathered since, the gifts of an unknown parent were still voraciously set upon when discovered.

"I am a friend."

"Hm."

She has had friends, of course; but the children of the village never stay long when she makes her way out to the old stone wall, scared of a shouting at for talkin' to the better folks up at the house who aren't for their sort. And so she retreats; makes a shell. In the world inside her shell, there are people and fairies and dragons and all of them – all of them – read about other things so they can make those real, too.

---

"Why can't I see you?"

A haze appears in her eyes, and she squints, unsure of what she can see. Then her eyes widen...



As if some new thought seeped into the back of her eyes, almost painted onto and into the world, the little patch of haze thickens.

An image begins to form.

---

As if breathed out of thin air, a child appears. Or it might be a child; he, it, moves stiffly, an odd puppet in the thin air, and almost flickers out of being when her eyes flick away.

Both old and young it seems; the eyes at least are old, and dull where hers are bright.

Her eyes, for their part, widen, and she curls back towards her bed, for the first time unnerved.

The old eyes droop, saddened; the young-and-old shoulders slump.

The image fades.

---

"I am sorry."

"Was that you?"

"I am not good at being seen."

She shifts, uncomfortably. The voice speaks again; its pitch is low, its timbre careful and measured.

"But may we talk, child?"

She blinks at the soot-fall on the floor, and in the corner of her eye the last rays of the sun slip down behind the hills.

The girl exhales.

"Okay."

---

And they talk.

The voice is quiet but eager, patient and friendly. Words float into the dark air, the little girl and the half-imaginary friend.

"Do you know about fairies? I found a book about fairies."

A little bark, a laugh, sharp in the gloom. "Would you like to hear a story about fairies, child?"

"Yes, please."

The voice speaks, line by line, and a slow spoken music fills the air.

---

---

The girl has fallen asleep - perhaps some time ago.

The voice is silent.

She dreams of gemstones and faerie.

---

The girl has an imaginary friend, then. How imaginary? It is hard to tell. She grows, pale and slim and sharp-eyed, brown hair a little curly. She grows, feeding off stories in books and talking at night to an invisible darkness.

She has no idea that this is unusual. The seignior stays away when he can, a quiet man who always seems to be choking back old hurts when he talks to the little girl. The old nurse leaves when the girl is eight and dies, quietly and at home; another human and another life becoming another footnote in another temple's register of the dead. The girl mourns without tears, and moves on.

Still she grows, still she listens, still she thinks.

The small nose of an eleven year old child wrinkles and sniffs the air in a winter dawn.

---

It is a few days before midwinter. Snow lies deep in the little valley, and fires crackle, smoke curling through smoke-holes and chimneys in the little cottages. A bout of disease passed last winter; eight villagers died, some well before their time. Rumours of war flit up the valley, and storms fell the tall old tree that had stood in the middle of the village's central ring of houses.

The house still sits, old and ageing, somehow knowing in its presence, continuing with its old stone as houses and people flicker by around it. It sits, as if waiting. Perhaps it is waiting.

---

Day dawns.

The child pulls on a pair of warm boots, fur-lined, boots made a generation ago and still firm and cosy.
 
She pulls a heavy woollen shawl over her shoulders and sets out into the cold. Nobody notices; she is wild, and her ragged hair is only combed when the old squire begs her to, to keep up appearances. The snow is deep and up to her knees, but she trudges through it anyway, small and lithe and young, almost so light she could run on it – though , as she has found out, only almost.

---

Trees creak and shiver; a small stream sits motionless, rocky and icebound. An explosion of crows bursts out of a dead pine, and from above the house, sitting astride the little valley, she sees downriver almost as far as the town. The glow of fires will soon be visible below, and the sun is soon to dip beyond the near hills. The valley is a world of cold shadows in these months, all through the long wait until spring.

The village is known simply as Na Dilenne – the riverbank. The "river" – barely more than a stream – curls around the little circle of the village in a wide loop, beginning its course to meander down to the great lakes of Aloen and the bigger rivers that surge down to the fine city of Ralace.

These are the things that our eyes would see – the big things, the broad sweeps, the everyday...

---

The world as the child sees it is different. She sees clearly. Her eyes are young and crisp and see... everything.

How is a birch different from an oak? From a pine? She looks, she feels the bark, sniffs the resin. She counts the twigs on the branches, and remembers. When she goes into the village or wanders around the house it is always the same, always remembering, always looking.

She knows the difference between hands that have worked with a plough and with a needle and with a pen; she can tell from feel what brass and bronze and steel are, the difference of their colour. She knows from memory the inscriptions on every column in the temple, and can draw any of the villagers' faces near-perfectly, as she saw them yesterday, as she saw them last week, as she saw them when she was a year younger and even wider of eye and fresher of face.

Occasionally she is surprised to find that not everyone can do this.

---

She sits back and remembers a surprise.

---

It had been the spring before, and she'd clambered over a tree and wandered into the village. A travelling salesman, beady-eyed and wearing clothes more than smart enough to show his own success, was buying valuables from the villagers.

"Ah yes, a cup. Hmm, let me see, metal, yes..."

"It's been in the family a while. But it's been a hard winter." The old lady who had just handed the cup over smiled grimly. "And we need the food."
"Hm, yes. Pewter, of course, so not much value in it, but I suppose I can give you a little for it."

"Excuse me." (The old squire had always taught politeness in conversation, and this, at least, had rubbed off)

"Ex- oh, it's you, little ma'am." The old lady moved aside and the little girl pushed in to stare at the cup more closely.

"Excuse me, but that cup's not pewter. It's silver; pewter doesn't tarnish. You can see it if you look at the silver cup in the temple and the pewter spoons we have at the house."

She had, of course, no idea that the tradesman may have known well the difference between the two. He paused, as if mentally assessing the options available, and gritted his teeth a little. He made a move as if to shoo her away, then noticed the finer cut of her clothing and paused momentarily.

"Who is this girl?"

The old lady looked up at him. "She's the little ma'am from the big house on the hill."

The trader closed his eyes. The last thing he needed was trouble with some local seignior or his squire at this moment in time.

"Ah... of course. My mistake, my eyes must be going. It is indeed silver! I'm sure I shall have to pay you a pretty penny for this one..."

---

She did not see him scowling at her as she walked away.

---

She runs down the hill and back to the house, pulling her boots off.

Searching, searching – and then she finds a scrap of paper, finds pens, and begins to draw out a map. What is like what? Where are the patterns?

Her mind flickers, synapses flicking on and off, switches and pathways humming as she works. Soon she reaches the extent of her scrap of paper, frowns, and scribbles out her work. The bewildered squire (and when is he not bewildered by the little girl he is supposed to be looking after?) is quickly relieved of yet more paper as she draws out thoughts, spiralling onwards.

Trees - trees are a group. But what do they split into? What the wood is used for? Their types of leaves? Their heights?

She ponders for a moment, then rolls up the paper, sits down and laughs at a small songbird frantically trying to peck away at the snow. She is still a child for now, after all.

---

She walks into her room with the rolled-up paper under her arm, and looks at the fireplace. And, as it so often does, the voice speaks.

The voice speaks, in its strange wordless way. It only happens when she is near the fireplace, quiet and soft and low.

"Child, what is that?"

"Why do you still call me a child?" she looks accusingly at the stonework around the fire. "I'm all of eleven now."

A low, gentle laugh.

People become adults when they get to a certain number. But many adults still are children – mewling babes with no idea who they are. Do you know who you are yet?"

"Of course I know who I am." The girl crosses her legs and sits crossly on the floor.

"Do you?"

She stands up, to her full height – still a good way short of five feet, but growing – and her sharp green eyes narrow.

"My name is Ninette Eleta Delphine. I know who I am."

---

The laugh – quiet and low – comes again.

"You know your name, child. What you do not yet know is what that name will come to mean. What will people think when they hear those words? What will they become?"

"I... " the girl falters.

"We all make choices. Every step, every breath, is a choice. We shape who we are. We start answering the only question that matters."

Ninette pauses.

"Which question?"

"The question every child must start answering. Who are you?"

The voice falls silent. A moment of calm descends around the fireplace, a breath hangs in the air.

Suddenly, the girl's eyes sharpen a little.

"Is that the question?"

She turns and leaves the room.

---

The voice rings and rattles in her head. The voice she has heard since she was a little girl – the one she stopped talking to people about when she was still small, when she saw how they shook their heads as if it were child's play. Her storyteller, her friend...

"Who are you?"

"Who are you?"

"Who are you?"

But the voice changes – it is not so much the voice asking the question, as her own.

"Voice." This time she speaks it aloud, though barely more than a whisper. "...who are you?"

She heads to the library, and the study. Thin little fingers brush the spines of ancient volumes; she selects one, then another, then another.

The library is not so very large, but it is old. Gnarled wooden shelves groan under the weight of books made many years ago, some even copied by hand by old men in different worlds and days gone by. A long table lies along the middle of the room, boxes of papers stacked upon it; a little writing desk sits in the corner; an old chest, oak-made and bound with iron, sits by the doorway. Old libraries can keep many secrets tucked away.

---

The child knows something about knowledge: she knows that it is to be found in books. She has never needed to read one more than once, but she knows that there are some she has yet to read, even in her father's little library, or where she was rudely interrupted in her reading by such trivialities as mealtimes, bathtimes, or nightfall.

There are few novels in the library, and this suits her tastes quite well. She prefers to read about things that the authors assure her most certainly took place, about about armies that marched off to Chaltary and Durginfeldt in times gone by, about the customs in Mirawanda and the horses ridden in the Bouan lands of the west. Even better still, she likes reading about things that she can see in the world around her, where a connection can click into her mind between a description of a type of stone or a prayer-day in the temple and the things she can proudly declare knowing.

She will get no such immediate joys today, but the question seems poorly framed.

"Who are you?"

It is hardly the precision of wording she would have chosen.

She sits and slips into the river-ways of her mind, contemplating.

---

It is an hour later. A battered old book lies in front of her. Its leather bindings are hardened with age; its pages thick and old and strong. Time has not wearied the book; it looks designed to stand the test of a thousand years.

"Yhe Bestiarie of Aloise"

She turns the first page.

---

The girl is eighteen years old.

Years have continued to whisper by, and she has grown. Quiet,long-limbed, frequently tripping over, she lives in a world of her own. Her father is still often absent: she has in her life only the stubborn conservatism and formal, stilted affection of the squire in his short, pained visits, and the quiet, confused deference of villagers unsure what to make of this girl. Her hair is kept back out of her face, for she reads voraciously. She gives advice, sometimes welcome and sometimes not; she is Ninette, the Maid of the Valley, and she is "a strange creature" by most accounts.

She neither embraces or rejects the label, in part because few would say it to her face, but mostly because she has no particular sense or desire that would draw her towards normality. With no mother, and a father both absent and without a sense of the prerequisites for a lady's upbringing, nobody pushes her towards dances or enunciation. She learns a little music, but self-taught from books, with her own discordances and dreams mixing through the notes of an old viol in ways that would have horrified a conventional teacher. She plays, in any case, for herself, reads for herself, and though she observes much of the people around her, the observations are still formless, a catalogue without an index or a purpose.

She stares out of the window across the valley, book in hand. It is early autumn, and the browning leaves toss and dance on the wind in the yard below.

---

She sits at her desk, leafing through the Bestiary of Aloise. It is one of the books she turns to when bored, an old friend on battered and ancient paper.

"Great Elks"

"Yhe Gryphonne"

"The Merlinne"

"Polecats"

And then... there is a missing page. Between "Porpoise" and "Pronghorn", someone has removed a page. She blinks; a surprise, in a book she thought she knew well. But sure enough, the jagged line of a cut-out page stub can just about be seen.

She closes the book, slowly, and walks down to the library. She checks the shelf where she originally found the book, every book on it, page by page.

"Missing." She mutters, eyes sharp and narrow. "Why would it be missing?"

Why, indeed?

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