Celebrations and Omens

[Benreeder]

Jack found the once abandoned shed in almost the same condition he’d left it in the fall. The bigger repairs he’d made to the roof and walls had held over the winter, and only a couple of leaks had developed since. With clear skies over the nortern outpost that night, he felt he could put those off for the next few days or so. For tonight…he needed rest, a fire, and a meal. The fire came first, set in the small stove he’d found the summer before and set in the back corner. A haphazard looking collection of bricks and crudely shaped stones had been laid against the wall, partly to protect the wood, but mostly to hold the heat from the stove during the winter. A few strikes of flint to steel had a spark glowing against the ball of unwrapped twine and wood shavings Jack had set at the bottom of the kindling. He leaned in clsoe and blew on the orange spark, and in seconds, a tiny flame blossomed. It needed little encouragement to grow and begin licking at the twigs and bark set next to it. Before, long a small fire was blazing in the stove, and Jack could look to his dinner.

Pulling dried meat, some potatoes and vegatables from the bag he’d stored them in, Jack started a pot of water to boil, and took a moment to reflect on the day. His return to his newfound home had seen the official recognition o fthe northern outpost as a community, and word that Bruzog had been appointed as a representative for the town. It was a role the stalwart orc had seemed ill-at-ease with; all the more reason that he was the best person for the job, to Jack’s thinking. There had been new faces among the friends he knew, as well. Some he felt as if he knew ere he saw them, faces from troubled dreams before Morpheus had been freed from Tully-Eye. There were also unfamiliar faces (to him) who were simply passing through. One such, Malachai, had given him the distinct pleasure of seeing Tanas looking nervous. As if seeing the leader of the Conortium without steel and armor to hand hadn’t been odd enough, seeing his discomfort while talking over past frictions betwixt them was enough to earn a good laugh from Jack.

His own conversation with Malachai had been productive as well, bringing him into contact with other Honest Tradesfolk. Plus, he’d spoken with Zeravica about getting the new shop built, and hoped to have it ready to open in a month. With the influx of new people, including a new corporal of the guard and an Order researcher, the little outpost he’d stumbled onto was quickly growing to become an actual town.

As he added the meat and vegetables to the pot, Jack pondered the other side of that coin. Bruzog, Simon and Kaylen were headed out on some mission of their own, even as refugees had begun to trickle in from a nearby Jurnigen town. Those kinds of troubles knew no borders, and had a bad habit of spreading. Now that Aiken had joined the Halcyon Association of Merchants, supplies for the soon-to-be-opened Infinite Hourglass Emporium would be more likely to flow regularly, but nearby unrest meant trouble for everyone. JAck frowned at the thought that followed: in times fo conflict, only ironmongers and healers did well. The former didn’t appeal, and he had no desire to see the kinds of increases in trade an all out war might create for healers like Kelora. The folk he’d found himself among were hardy, and he had no doubt they’d weather the worst of times, if anyone could… but he wished that none of them HAD to, himself included.

“If wishes were horses, we’d be knee deep in manure,” he muttered. He pulled the bubbling pot of stew off the fire, the list of things tha tneeded doing growing longer and longer the more he thought on it. His eyes sought out the pack and staff laying next to the door. How easy it woudl be to take them up again, to wander as he had all winter…

The thought passed just as quickly. No longer clanless, Jack had firmly pledged himself to the outpost some months ago, and again this day when he’d returned. There would be plenty of roads to travel, even if the clan called the same plot home all the time.

“Time to get to work,” he said to himself around the first bite of stew.

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