A Smith Found || Belle + Ellis || FB
Belle was in need of a blade. The knives and daggers already in her possession were no good against the enemy she wished to arm herself against. Steel, no matter how well-forged or edge-sharpened, would do little but further enrage him she wished to kill and, given her present state, would sooner see her in the ground than he.
She needed a silver-smithed weapon, a knife with a good grip and a smooth blade. A knife to slide between ribs and pierce precious bone-bound organs. A knife to blind and burn when pressed to flesh. A knife to kill a werewolf.
Where to procur such a thing was a thought that oft occupied her mind as she stayed bed-bound, nursing slow-healing, deeply-gouged wounds. She knew of one smith, Emery, by reputation alone and though she kept coming back to him, she always dismissed him, too. No doubt he was talented in his work, for as long-lived as he was he should be, but he was a friend of Shiloh's, perhaps more, and Belle did not want second-hand tales of her attack to find their way to the wolf's ears. She would tell him, she would have to; the scars across her back, once healed, would not be easily concealed. But, she wanted to tell him on her own terms, in her own time.
Once mended, or as close to it as could be managed, she struck out from her sickbed in the Slums to Athoria's more populous and prosperous parts, cursing the cold of the season and the stiffening it caused in her still-mending back. Leeds was where she eventually found herself directed towards and, so, it was there she pointed her feet. More word of mouth, idle gossip, easy-going questions, pointed her towards one man's anvil and forge.
Arriving at his shop's front, Belle stood silently by for a moment or two, watching him work and taking in the tools of his trade. The entire picture was weighed and judged in her mind and found favorable. She stepped forward another step, lowering the hood of her fur cloak to reveal a pretty if wind-kissed face, nose and lips pink from the cold.
"Good morning, Smithy," she said in greeting, her words accompanied by pale puffs of breath. "I have need of an unusual knife and was told you were the only man for the job. Was I told true?"
If he deigned to look up at this newly arrived customer, the smith would see a slightly built young woman, branch-brown hair messed from hood and weather. Leather bodice and pants, both well-worn, said she was no daughter of wealth looking for a pretty toy; the blade at her hip and its worn hilt and sheath said she knew something of what she asked.