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The Gig, Friday

Rosie had put the last finishing touches on the carving she'd been working on, oiled it, and set it on the bench in the smithy to cure.

Despite the weather outside, she was stripped to as little as was possible and remain decent. The forge was blazing and the ring of metal on metal filled the air as she worked.

The Gig was open, but it might take a bit of work to get her attention.

[ooc: up so late because it was 39 degrees here yesterday (that's 102 for you non-celsius people) and all I wanted to do when I got home from work was fall in a melty heap.]

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Without any classes to immediately plan for and actually having finished going through all the kids' exams already, Minsc was bored.

And when Minsc got bored, things got broken.

Or, in this case, bent. Another sword gone the way of so many others around Minsc and his eagerness to forget entirely how strong he was. He could have fixed it himself, of course, but that wasn't as much fun as going to see if Rosie was around to fix it.

"Rosie!" he bellowed out her name as he approached, over the clanking of her current work, and waved the zig-zagged blade in the air to demonstrate his purpose for being here without having to shout over the forge too much.

She looked up, hammer poised mid-swing, and her eyes went wide and startled. She glanced back at what she was working on, gave a half shrug, then smiled at him. "You finally brought me one," she said, sounding distinctly happy about it. "Give me a minute to get this to where I can leave it?"

Minsc grinned back a little. "I thought maybe you might be bored like me," he said. "No rush at all; take your time, Rosie, I quite have all day."

His grin was contagious, and she couldn't help returning it. Turning back to her project, she continued to hammer it, shaping the metal, heating it, and hammering it again.

After a time, she was satisfied it was at a place it could be cooled and left, and she plunged it into the barrel of water, sending up billowing clouds of steam.

"There," she said, wiping her forehead as she walked to the door of the smithy, enjoying the sharpness of the winter air. "Now, show me your sword."

Minsc dutifully obliged, holding out the broadsword bent this way and that, like an upwards shooting lightning bolt of steel. "You sure you do not mind me interrupting your other work?"

"Not at all," Rosie assured him, studying the sword and wishing, as she had so often, that Narl were here. "I'll be able to finish it in time." In time for what, she wasn't saying. "And I think I can repair this." She looked up at him. "Right now, in fact."

"Oh, good," Minsc chuckled a little. "I'd hate to think that the furniture sit unpunished for too long."

"We wouldn't want that," she said, amused, as she reached out to take the sword. "Have you ever thought of practising on trees?"

"But trees are living creatures," Minsc pointed out, letting Rosie take the sword, and giving another faint smile. "Ones that have done no bad-doing, and, in fact, give us only good-doings, giving us the fresh air to breath and shade in the summer and they are so pretty to look at, too. I could never just practise on a tree, unless it was malevolent, in which case, I assure you," he chuckled, "I will not be just practising then, either!"

"I never thought of it that way. Rocks aren't living, but they'd damage the swords even more." The sword she placed on the bench, turning it over and crouching down to stare down its line. She didn't wince, but only because she had good control. "You need practice dummies." She had a vague memory of seeing such a thing when she'd gone up to treat the Manor's horses. "Are attacking trees a common problem?"

Hey, she'd been a small red bear thing; anything was possible.

"I usually just drag random things from the junkyard," Minsc explained. "They work quite nicely, and always give me different shapes to work with! And malignant trees aren't all that common where I'm from, no, and I've yet to see one here, but there's been a few cases, to be sure. As well as many plant like creatures that must be battled against at time, always causing trouble!"

"Then I'd best get this into shape as quickly as I can." She turned up the flame on the forge, marvelling as always that so much heat could be achieved with only the turn of a dial. "Unless--" She turned to contemplate him, hands on her hips. "Would you like to try?"

The grin on Minsc's face and the fact that he did a poor job of hiding excitement no matter what the circumstances were a pretty good indication that he most certainly would, but, still, denying his expression, he said, "Only if you absolutely do not mind, Rosie."

"I absolutely do not mind," she told him, "but you have to be careful. And move slowly." She walked over to the storage bins and drew out a very large leather apron and leather gloves. "And you have to wear these. Agreed?"

Be careful. Move slowly. Wear large things in leather.

Well, at least he knew he was good at one of those.

Oof, doing this under Rosie's watchful eye would require a lot of thinking, but he nodded. "Of course!"

"Then the forge is yours." She handed him the apron and gloves and moved to set out her tools. "The first thing to do is to heat the blade. You'll be holding it by the hilt, which is why the gloves are important. Once it's cherry red, then you'll start hammering it back into shape, and you'll heat and hammer a lot of times before it's done."

Minsc tied the apron on and fit the gloves on over his hands, taking a moment to open and close his fingers and get a good feel for them. Then, he took up the blade and, making sure to be careful and move slowly, he nodded and did as instructed with the first step.

Of course, he did know how to do all of this,but it was more fun to have Rosie teach him.

Rosie nodded her approval, watching him closely. By the way he handled himself, she guessed he'd done this before. "You know, you can use the forge even if I'm not here."

[ooc: I must away, but I shall return in a few hours.]

"I have thought about it," Minsc admitted, handling the sword carefully. "Like that one time, when I came in expecting you to be here, but that's when you got Lady Juno to start working."

"You handle that well." Rosie rarely took long to make up her mind. Dithering was not part of her make up.

With a nod to herself, she moved to one of the drawers, pulling out a key. "For you. Use it whenever you need to."

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The Gig, Friday

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