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Excerpt
“Careful,
guys. We want to finish the
bolts for Zeus without any mishaps. He
wants to celebrate the return of his sons’, Castor and Pollux, in a big
way and that can’t be done if someone gets hurt.”
Hephaestus’s voice boomed throughout the forge.
He was a good boss and they liked their work, but Brontes knew his
brothers, like him, weren’t focusing on completing the task at hand.
The job they chose to do was dangerous and required their undivided
attention, except right then, their minds were closed to everything except
their woman.
The
day was hot and even hotter in their workshop, which was one of the
reasons why they only wore thick leather aprons, gloves and boots for
protection. It didn’t help
matters that the forge wasn’t particularly large. The
crude space was filled with fiery pits, massive boiling cauldrons, and the
four large men intent on their duties made it feel even smaller and
hotter. None of their tasks
were quiet either. Banging,
clanging, sizzling, and pounding all were necessary in them building
quality bolts of lightning with sufficient noise for the God of Sky and
Thunder to be proud to throw. It
was an intense job, full of risks, and they were the only Cyclopes who
could and would do it. A
mixture of what was in their soul and their emotions played a big part in
what they added to the raw steel rods Hephaestus produced and the
potential for disaster became even higher when they were in a mentally
unstable position.
Even
though he didn’t need to vocalize thunder to add it to each strip of
metal, his throat still burned from the effort he put into each one he
constructed. Pulling the
latest bolt from his personal cauldron filled with boiling oil and the
essence of his personification, thunder, he walked over to the drying
rack, and took a moment to see how his brother around the corner from him
was doing. Steropes who added
flashes of light to each bolt, occasionally flickered, but still looked to
be in control. With heavily
gloved hands, he picked up a raw bolt from where they waited to be
enhanced, and walked a different way back to his vat to check out his
other brother. One look at
Arges and he knew he’d found the reason for their boss’s concern.
He was the sibling who made the bolts brighter and, as he stood
working at his fiery iron tub, he was glowing like a lit lantern.
Brontes
knew his brother wasn’t in a good place mentally and they had to do
something to pull him from the path he was currently on as it led to a
potentially tragic end.
They
prided themselves on holding their special qualities in control.
Thunder, lightning, and brightening were traits humans and many
immortals couldn’t deal with in a raw state, but they could.
When they’d first started working with Heph, the four of them had
settled on a routine, and it helped them establish a controlled
environment to enable productivity. There
had never been any problems, but then again, they’d never been in love,
nor were they prepared for the upheaval it caused in their lives.
The noise of the workshop was so loud, Brontes knew if he managed
to shout a warning, it wouldn’t be heard by the others.
Quickly, but with care, he made his was to their boss’s side, and
let him know there was a big problem brewing.
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