The knife simply refused to cooperate.
The first attempt looked promising while he moved the etching tool along the flat of the blade.
He held the strange, merged rune in his mind like a holographic picture of what he wanted the enchantment to look like in the end.
Magic flowed, and the metal warmed as he imprinted that picture into the mana field. For a moment, he felt the pattern lock into place.
Then the warmth vanished, and the metal went cold as if nothing had ever happened.
Attempts two and three went the same way. The fourth did not even get that far because the enchantment fell apart before he could finish the marks.
The blade never shuddered or fought him. The power simply would not stay. It drained away like water poured onto dry sand.
After the seventh failure, his shoulders ached, and his head felt thick with his muddled thoughts, which seemed to get him nowhere.
The knife on the table remained a cheap farm blade. It lacked any glow or the specific hum that usually came from a successful enchantment.
It was just the typical mix of metal and wood that anyone could find in a kitchen.
Jacob set the tool down and pressed his thumbs into his temples while he reviewed every step mentally.
Whenever he worked with normal runes, the pattern lived flat in his mind and then sat neatly on the surface.
This time, the merged rune refused to flatten. It wanted to stay twisted and layered. He kept trying to force it onto a single side, and every time he did that, the magic slid apart.
The realization came slowly. The pattern was not meant to live as a drawing on a flat surface. It wanted the whole object rather than just one face.
He had been trying to press a three-sided shape into a single piece of paper and expecting it to behave.
What am I doing if I am not using the entire blade? He wondered.
He picked up the knife again and turned it in his hands as a new idea took shape.
Perhaps the rune did not belong only on one part of the tool. It might need to be anchored in stages across different faces. Each pass of the etching tool would hold one aspect until the whole strange shape finally locked around the blade.
He shifted his grip so the blade lay across his fingers. If the rune refused to lie flat, he would stop trying to force it.
He would break the work into pieces and trust that the magic remembered the whole even when he drew only parts.
He touched the tip of the tool to the flat of the blade near the base. He called up the merged rune.
Only the portion for this specific face answered him from his envisioned enchantment. He traced the lines for a clean cut, letting the magic soak in until the metal felt alive under his skin.
Before the feeling could slip, he turned the knife and set the tool against the spine.
The pattern in his mind moved with the motion. It revealed the next section that braced the metal to help it hold its shape.
He guided that fragment into the spine and felt it hook into the first part like a knot.
His breath grew shallow. He felt his nerves tense as he rolled the knife again. He pressed the tool to the other flat side, letting the self-mending portion of the rune flow into the steel.
This part pushed the metal to fix its own cracks and restore the edge. The magic sank in with a strong flow and settled into the previous layers.
On the final turn, he set the tool against the wooden handle. He traced the last segment that bound the whole pattern to his hand. Everything lined up.
The impossible shape in his mind snapped shut around the knife like a finished puzzle.
His heart began to race. He held the knife perfectly still, afraid that any movement might shake the pattern loose, even though he knew it would take a lot of physical force to mess up the final stage of the enchanting process.
The magic did not drain away. It sat there, settled around the blade and the handle. The sensation produced a weird feeling of stillness.
It did not feel like the light vibration of a broom charm or the gentle pull of a healing rune. It felt deeper, as if the mana in the metal had learned of a new way to exist.
Carefully, Jacob shifted his grip and set the point of the knife against the edge of the table.
He applied a small amount of pressure and dragged it across the grain. The blade slipped through the wood without any resistance.
It left a clean, visible line that made the old surface look like it had been scraped by a much finer tool than a farm knife.
He pulled the knife back and brushed his thumb along the edge. It felt keen and sturdy. The tiny drag that usually followed a rough cut was gone.
When he pressed harder on a stone for the next test, he felt the metal resist, then he felt that resistance ease as the self-mending portion of the rune did its work.
When the knife started to lose its edge, the enchantment nudged it back to its sharpest version.
For the first time since he had started using an etching tool, he felt an enchantment that belonged entirely to him. It carried lessons from Arthur and elements from his field work.
The way they fit together was his own discovery.
Jacob stared at the knife, breathing hard and grinning despite the ache in his shoulders.
"This is how it works," he whispered. The knife felt warm in his hand, and the strange shape remained clear in his mind. "This is how I do it."