Role

Chapter 18

Learning the ways of the Noldarian Smiths has been a goal for Vargal
for some time. Though he is a storm giant, a race bound to the Seas, no
race upon Thera exists without Smiths. Amongst his people, Battarin
Nathorn was one such smith. Though metals to be found within the sea
were brittle at best, imported mithril and iron to be made steel Battarin
made an art of forging. It was an axe that Vargal's father forged which
made him choose to learn the weapon. Its power suited his sometimes
bull headed manner, and its rather simple also suited his slow wit.
Later, after Vargal left home to find his place in Thera, it would become
perhaps his greatest ally.

It was during one of the early days at home when he learned of the
Noldarian Smiths, and of the Hammersong. Outside of his Father, Battarin's, forge
where Vargal was practicing as a young lad would with his balanced axe.
His Father called to him, a burly man with an easy manner, and told him to
listen to the strikes of his hammer, and follow them like the beats of a
song. Vargal nodded, and it was not long after beginning that he was
drenched in his own sweat. His Father kept a grueling pace on the anvil for
the young storm giant. Panting, Vargal turned to his Father and looked at
him askance. He knew that battle flowed with a rhythm, that much was
written in every book on the subject Vargal had ever read, yet something
at the edge of thought prodded him. The elder man nodded as he continued his
work methodically. 'I do tell you two things my son, this day. The first, keep
in your heart and do no forget it. Courage do be your ally, and if your heart
do know it, you will no fall too far, no matter how dire things do be.' With a
a short sigh, the storm giant continued. 'The next, my son, do be this. A
great dwarven warrior lived, long ago, in the Village of BattleRagers. He do
still live, as no mortal can imagine. The Lord Thror. When you do become a
man, my son, seek out his name and learn what you can of him.' With that,
the storm giant quenched the steel he had been working, steam rising to obscure
his great blue skinned form. Those words Vargal kept in his heart as his Father
told him, though it would be many long years before he could heed the latter.

Long years passed, and the world beat its Hammersong. The rhythm pulsing
and spurring Vargal to continue no matter how hard he fell. Yet, it was not
the forge turning him which haunted him. In his time in the Village,
Vargal had come to find men who thought they did the Lights work with magic.
The idea was foreign to Vargal- any man or beast who stole of the Gods could
do the work of the Light, but these men and women believed so, and thus came
the offers Vargal had first given. The first to a half-drow named Amayara, a
magic-user who summoned beings of other planes. He told her of the Village,
and that magic was stolen from the Light of the heavens. Though he believed
his words only fell on deaf ears, word came to him that the woman had
returned what she stole of the Gods, and sought the purification of the Light.
Vargal could only feel joy for this, he had saved one from death and returned
the Power to the Gods. But it was nearly two years later that Vargal was
faced with outright refusal. A bard, this tim