Chapter 4
The smithy and the house beside it stood on the edge of town. George’s father had built both with his own hands. Thomas, who had spent nearly half his childhood in and around their house, remembered it very well. It was a pleasant home, well lit and sunny, even in the loft that George used as his room. It was also the single worst place in Elmvale to try to sleep off a hangover.
The morning was achingly bright, even through Thomas’s closed eyelids. His mouth was dry and fuzzy all at once, and his head felt like Lionel’s hammer was pounding away inside it instead of on the anvil outside. George’s father had always said, “A smith’s work is never done, from break of day to setting sun,” and true to his word, the man was putting hammer to anvil with what Thomas considered far too m
