Strong Apprentice Gloves

Strong Apprentice Gloves are a weathered pair of leather gloves, the hide thick and pliant, dyed a dusty parchment color with ink-blue piping along the knuckles and a narrow brass rivet at each seam. On the back of the hand, a faded sigil—two crossed quills and a small forge—is stitched in stubborn thread, a mark of the apprentice's order that funded late-night scrivener studies and clumsy first-crafting experiments. The texture tells a story: the leather is brushed to a matte patina, the fingertips worn smooth from countless sprints across workshops, the interior lining frayed from years of use. They carry a faint scent of oil and wax, the kind you notice more in retrospect, when you pause by a cracked workbench and imagine the hands that wore them first. The stitching holds tight, and a tiny loop at the wrist hints at a time when tools were hung from lacing and belts, not pockets. In the world they are not merely armor for the hands but a bridge between risk and craft. The strong prefix speaks to a sturdier build, thicker stitching that yields a little more protection and a touch more resilience for delicate fingers that learn by building, repairing, and testing blades. When you slip them on, you feel the difference in grip—the way the leather returns a steady pressure and the knuckles avert a worse fate from a stray spark or a misjudged swing. They grant a solid barrier for the apprentice who must wield a hammer as often as a blade, and they carry a subtle boost to the wearer’s survivability in the early hours of any expedition. Lore threads weave through the use of these gloves as well. They’re said to have belonged to the first cohort of the city’s craft-bards, young artisans who walked between guild halls and street markets, turning raw metal and rough leather into something fit to barter and tell stories about. In this way, the gloves become more than equipment; they’re a portable memory of the craft’s humble beginnings, a reminder that great works start with steady hands and patient effort. Market life rounds out the tale. In the bustling Saddlebag Exchange, where caravans unload crates and stallholders trade stories as much as goods, a pair like Strong Apprentice Gloves can drift from hand to hand for a modest sum. Sometimes a seller will barter for a pocketful of copper or a few slivers of leather, especially if the buyer speaks with the confidence of someone who intends to use them well. I once watched a tinker haggle over a price, tapping the cuffs with gloved fingers and insisting that the gloves would pay for themselves in practice, not sentiment. And that is how the gloves persist: not as a trophy of a glorious moment, but as a reliable companion for the next small victory—the repaired lock, the re-wrapped grip, the quiet confidence of a hand that knows it belongs to the work. In this way, Strong Apprentice Gloves become a living thread in a larger story of hands, tools, and the craft of making something useful out of stubborn material. The glove, still worn, keeps telling its quiet apprenticeship tale.