Hard Winters RPG

[Firefoot]

Léof set off for the kitchen, knowing that several if not all the supplies he would need for soap could be found there. He may have to go to the storeroom for some, but even then he wanted to check with the women before taking off with the supplies, in case they were low in stock or needed elsewhere. He’d made the soap so many times he had the recipe memorized, and as he walked he mentally reviewed the ingredient list: six parts tallow, one part neatsfoot oil, two parts beeswax, three parts water, and one part lye.

He found Kara in the kitchen and recited this list to her. She told him to help himself to what he needed, and to let her know if he needed help finding anything. He headed for the shelves where the supplies were usually kept and scanned the labels of the items stored there. He quickly spotted the jar of lye flakes and pulled it down, followed by the beeswax and tallow. The neatsfoot oil he did not see, and suspected it would be found in the storeroom instead – they had little use for it in the kitchen.

As he took one last look, Eoghan found him and wrapped his arms around Léof’s waist, saying: “Papa says I might ride! You must be with me when I do."

Léof tousled the boy’s hair affectionately. “I’m glad to hear it. We will go as soon as the rain stops.” As he spoke, Rowenna came into the kitchen with a large slab of meat. She seemed pre-occupied as Léof and Eoghan ducked out of the way, and Léof said, “Come, Eoghan, we are in the women’s way. Will you help me carry a few things out?” He held out the box of tallow cakes, which was both safe and non-breakable.

[littlemanpoet]

Rowenna entered the kitchen, her thoughts all akilter. Why could she not be as she wished when near Nydfara?

She almost bumped into Léof, who said, “Come, Eoghan, we are in the women’s way. Will you help me carry a few things out?” He held out the box of tallow cakes, which was both safe and non-breakable. The boy took the box and followed the ostler out. That was good to see.

Now, where were the supplies she sought? Bucket, rags, broom. She gathered them and hurried out to Nydfara. He was standing where she had left him, watching her with that distant, measuring look in his eye that made her heart beat more rapidly. What did he think when he looked at her that way?

"Here," she held out the broom. "I'll wet and scrub while you push the mess back out the door."

[Firefoot]

Despite her obvious dismissal he did not immediately leave. “You will not pry, but you will eavesdrop?” he said. There was no accusation in his voice; he was himself far too accomplished of an eavesdropper to find the habit distasteful. “But no matter. It seems everything I told Eodwine shall soon become public knowledge anyhow.”

She continued scrubbing. Frustrated, he bent to pick up his pouch from where he had left it. She was angry with him, it was clear; what was less clear was why. He realized he did not like having her angry with him, something of a novel feeling. He liked aggravating people, figuring out what bothered them and then using it. Well, this time her irritation was not his intention, and he did not know how to make her speak to him.

An image of his brother and his wife popped in to his mind, of them making up after a fight. Apologize. It galled him. He didn’t even think that he had done anything wrong, but he somehow knew that it was what Bedric would have done, though, and his brother seemed to have women figured out far better than him.

“I am sorry if I have somehow offended you,” he said stiffly, and turned to take the broom back to the kitchen.

[littlemanpoet]

She stopped scrubbing. His apology had come out stiff and curt, but it had been an apology.

"Nydfara! Stop!" He slowed but kept walking. "Please!" He stopped and turned.

"Answer me this and I will leave you be. Why did you come only to leave again?"

[Firefoot]

When Scyld turned around, there were many things he thought Rowenna might say, but this was not one of them. Who told her that he was leaving? He certainly had never said so. He did not try to hide his confusion.

"I have no plans for leaving," he said slowly. "Lord Eodwine has agreed to take me on for a year and a day, as a trial, and save that he cast me out or I find myself wholly unwelcome, I mean to stay." Amused, now, he asked, "When and to where had you heard that I was to go?"

[littlemanpoet]

"I - I thought I overheard..."

She must have heard wrong, or, miscast in her thought what she had heard. He had no intention of leaving. Her shoulders were relaxing and her face, which had been taut with pained anger, softened. The knots in her stomach untied and she felt elated. Why does this man mean this much to me? She needed to have a care.

"Well. I misheard." She put a smile on her face. "It is my turn to apologize. I am sorry for misreading your ... your ... you." She wanted to ask him if he had come back because of her, but to ask such a question would put her heart in his hands, and that was more than she could dare. For now. Not until she knew more of his purpose. If even then.

She allowed a smirk. "That broom is not going to walk itself back into the kitchen."

[Galadriel55]

They walked a long time in silence. After a while, the lad spoke. "Might you be willing to tell a story? It would make the road go faster, I think, and the rain seem less dreary."

“Then I shall tell you a tale of a land as dry and hot as ours is filled with rain and chill of late,” Balan responded smoothly. He did not yet know how the story would end; he only had a seed, and he would let it grow.

And so he told his companion of the Wraith of the Desert, cursed to live in endless thirst. Once the guardian of a bounteous land, he was charged to stand watch over its people and treasures, and for that he was honoured. He was the warden of the land’s tall towers, and of its lush shady trees, and its round silver pearls, and of its colourful blossoms. Yet, as the time went by, he forgot his duty, and disobeyed his task. With little thought for his people, he cared mostly for his own affairs. He tried to gain new treasures and new power, and sought them where one ought not go. He was hopelessly lost in broken promises and trickery, until finally, when hoodwinked by a black wizard, he traded him all of the land’s treasures for the greatest knowledge that there was. But the wizard deceived him, and escaped with the riches, and hid them in the four corners of the world.

Gone were the pools filled with glittering pearls. Without the shade of the trees, the sun scorched the land. Its towers crumbled to dust, and its blossoming fields were replaced by colourless mounds. And a great wrath rose from the people of the land, and they cursed the wayward guardian with a curse of great power, for so great was their grief and rage; never shall he part from this land, and suffer always the loss that he brought on it. Any towers that he builds shall scatter like sand on the wind; any colour that he paints shall starve and fade beneath the blazing sun; no roof shall shield him from the burning rays; no wealth shall he have to trade for the meanest harvest. The spirit of the land, he shall be what the earth is, and feel what the earth feels, until a child of this land entrusts him once again with the treasures that he so irreverently relinquished. Cursing him thus, the people left, homeless, hopeless, and bitter, to seek a place where they could live. Some went east, to the far mountains; others went west, to the restless sea; yet others went south, where the wetlands rule; and some went north, to the hard hills and gnarled pines; and none of them came back to their land, and it became truly desolate. Men shunned the place, for only thing that awaited them there was death.

For many years the desert grew, ever drinking up any moisture, ever thirsting for more. No amount of water that rare travelers brought with them could quench its thirst. The desert swallowed them all – the travelers with the water. Thus this land became known as the Thirsty Desert.

And Balan told the boy of the fate of the exiles, how their numbers dwindled, and their rage abated, and their hate was replaced by sorrow. He spoke how the last of the descendants of these people came together, men and women, old and young, to find the lost treasures that the black wizard hid on the edges of the world. Long was their search, and many died along the way. Balan gave each a name and a fate, and spoke long of their toils and adventures. By the end, only five of them remained, sailing eastward on a ship with the lost treasures. But the wind was treacherous and the shore was hostile; a storm seized the ship, carrying it away from safe havens, and broke it against the rocky cliffs, and drowned the gathered treasures. Only a young lad survived the storm, carried onto the shore by a wooden splinter. For a day he searched up and down the coast, calling the names of his companions, but all he heard was the dull roar of the diminishing waves and the mocking cackles of the gulls. Yet, when he was about to lose hope, he heard the sound of a human voice. He ran towards it and found the eldest of their crew, washed up ashore. The boy was glad, but the old man stopped him: he did not drown, but he was the last to live, and his bones were smashed against the rocks on the coast, and he would not live until sunset. He bid the boy to remember their quest, and find the wasteland that was once their home without delay, and give it all that he has yet to give, for the treasures were lost and this boy was the last of their people. But the boy stayed until the old man passed beyond this life, and wept for him, and built a cairn over him as best as he could. And with a mad despair in his heart, he set out to the Thirsty Desert. Onwards he went, though his food pouch emptied and his water flask dried. He did not stop at the edge of the desert, but toiled onwards to the heart of the desert, sinking in its colourless sand and choking on its hot dust.

Balan watched his companion during the telling. Now, the lad was looking straight ahead, but his eyes were clearly seeing sand dunes instead of puddles.

“And when the boy could walk no more..." Suddenly, a new path for the story occurred to Balan. "...he took off the hat that shielded him from sun and rain alike, and long locks spilled onto her shoulders, for this was not a boy but a young maiden.”

Balan looked at his companion with a hint of a smile and a mischievous spark in his eyes, waiting to confirm his suspicions or put them to rest and continue on with the story.

[Firefoot]

"Indeed it will not," Scyld agreed, and turned from Rowenna for the second time to take the broom to the kitchen. He felt exasperated and amused, and still not wholly sure he understood her.

All of that anger, over something she’d only thought he’d said? Maybe he ought to be more annoyed than he was, but he was much more amused at the memory of her flustered. Even when he tried, it was difficult to catch her at a loss for words. He liked seeing her so, with her defenses stripped away, if even for a few moments. Even more, it pleased him what he saw in those moments: that she would have been upset at his leaving and was now glad of his staying.

His good mood was tempered though, by the knowledge that she did not yet know everything. Wait until she heard the rest.