2 Spring, 515 AV
Morning
Morning
Today marks the second day of spring in Endrykas in which the people embark on a grand elk hunt with teams and individuals all stalking across country in search of the king buck. Dravite waved goodbye to a handful of the Windborne warriors, both male and female who seeked to try their luck at hunting while sharpening their weapon skills with some of the elders attending.
His pavilion had arrived late last night to the city of tents. Belkaia, Dravites wife, was still rubbing the sleep from her eyes when he had slipped away at first light with their three year old son, Kyanite to see off the hunting party. His thin little legs hung over Dravite's shoulders, heels pressed into the sunned flesh of the man's chest while his fingers remained glued to the warrior's temple, sticking like frog digits to the bark of a tall tree.
The pavilions business in Endrykas on this occasion was to stock up and celebrate the Feast of Life before navigating the Sea of Grass again to return to the life members of the Emerald Clan knew best, that of the hunt. Now that Dravite was grown and had started his own family, he must provide for them just as his saw fit that he made it this far. Dravite couldn’t follow the Windborne pavilion forever, believing that leadership would be passed to his friend Bel-ha Tir, and though no one had said anything yet, he felt it in his bones, that ache for adventure; the kind that had seen him in trouble more often than not growing up.
With bare feet and weathered black pants he strolled through the maze of busy market stalls, smiling at faces he recognised and averting his gaze for those he did not. Kyanite would pipe up with the occasional, “Look, look!” whenever he spotted a caged animal or roaming stray. Just like his father had been as a child, he was fascinated by the world and all things living. Dravite got down on one knee to let him squeeze his chubby little fingers through the bars of a wooden crate to pet a long, lanky grey hare who stomped his foot in an attempt to intimidate the strange limb coming towards him.
Fearlessness in a child so young isn’t abnormal in Drykas culture, but what kind of father would Dravite be, he asked himself, if he did not preach caution? “He might bite,” the tall Drykas man warn his son, to which Kyanite merely smiled. ’Let him go with his fate’, Dravite's father used to tell his mother, ’he will learn’ .
Dravite always got a few strange looks in the marketplace. Drykas are not known to sport facial hair, but being as defiant as his father, Dravite hadn't been able to wait to sprout his own tidy beard and the longer he kept it, the more accustomed his kin had grown to the light smattering of sand-toned stubble. It seemed to roll in and out of fashion from one generation to the next as all things do, hair, clothing, pets; at the end of the day as long as people were true to themselves and don’t step on too many toes, he couldn't see the problem with it.
When the pair happened across the stall Dravite had been seeking, his his mother he smiled to the keeper before walking past to the next stall. Bartering is a way of life here, but his ability to haggle was little to none having spent most of his life out in the Sea of Grass. The pavilion only tended to visit Endrykas twice in a good year, more so if times were hard or the weather was unrelenting. Dravite, however, had a theory. If he were to act interested in another man’s gear, but say that it wasn’t quite what he was looking for, perhaps the salesman next door would spot a chance at a sale and try to convince him to buy his goods at a more favourable price. It was a longshot, but stranger things had happened.
He touched with folded finger his hand to his brow and greeted the young woman behind the stall, most of her wares were short bladed weapons, more decorative than deadly. “I’m looking for a hatchet,” he told her and watched the woman’s gaze drift over the table of her stall slowly before she returned her attention to him.
“My brother sells small blades and axes; he is on the other side of the market place near the Emerald Clan encampment.”
“You don’t have anything here?” Dravite asked, raising his voice a little this time to make sure the man at the next stall heard. “It’s such a long way to walk.”
“Maybe I can help you?” The elderly Drykas man finally spoke up, perhaps he was just hard of hearing.
Dravite looked to the girl he had been dealing with who shrugged him off to get back to her threading. Kyanite watched from on top of his father's shoulders, seemingly mesmerised by the woman’s quick moving fingers. Dravite moved round to chat with the old man; his stall decorated with fine weapons and stuffed animals with glass eyes, frozen in their death poses. “A hatchet,” he said to the elderly man who looked to have seen about fifty summers, “Do you have any?”
“Of course, of course, are you looking for anything in particular?”
“Just something that will do the job, sharp,” Dravite smiled; it must be sharp.
The old man scratched around under a sheet of leather below the table and presented a fine hatchet to Dravite who took the hatchet from him and tested its point on the tip of his own finger before brushing the edge over his forearm carefully. “Two gold mizas,” he chirps as a few bronze hairs fell away from Dravite's arm.
He noticed the woman from the first stall smile and knew without the subtle manipulation of her features that he was the one being had. Dravite laughed out loud and Kyanite jumped a little, not expecting the sudden bout of laughter. “Two gold mizas? I think I’ll take that walk after all.”
Dravite put the hatchet down on the table and turned away from the stall with not so much as a glance over his shoulder, even as the man called after him “One gold miza!”
“Father be reasonable,” the young woman he had spoken with earlier said, “or you will never make a sale.”
Slowly Dravite turned to smile at her before going back to the man with his offer. “Half a gold miza and you have a deal.”
He puffed his chest, folded his arms and shook his head stubbornly. “No, no, too little.”
“Six silver miza or I walk,” the price was fair and about as good as anyone would get anywhere. Dravite had tried his luck, but this time it hadn’t done him much good.
The old man thought about it for a few long seconds and then held his hand out to shake that of Dravite's, “Six silver, you have a deal.”
The morning had been eventful and after an hour in the marketplace Dravite was sporting a new hatchet and steel dagger on a fine leather belt. An expensive Hunter / Trapper toolkit was folded under his left arm, while under the right he held a new water-skin and additive. Belkaia gave him 'the look' when he got back, the type all women seemed to master at some stage in life, one that says without words ‘husband, you have been spending all our hard-earned money again, you best make it back’.
The wild, willowy brunette took the load from his arms to store with the rest of their things before raising her hands to take Kyanite from Dravite's shoulders. “We should go pray,” he whispered to his wife, thankful that they had made it to Endrykas in one piece and that their boy had seen his third birthday yesterday without too much grief.
“You, my love, should go hunting with the rest, the Gods are demand sacrifice, not whispered words.”
“The hunting party has an hours head-start on me,” Dravite said as if surprised she would suggest he go after them alone.
“But you have a nose as sharp as a dog’s, and feet as swift as the north wind.”
“There is nothing swift about these old leathery things,” he laughed, brushing his hardened feet against the dry grass.
“I meant your Strider, take Cree. Perhaps you will find someone else to go with you.”
Instantly he thought of his friend and clan mate Bel, if there was an adventure to be had, he was always happy to tag along, that or Dravite was getting very good at twisting his arm. The couple didn’t share any more words after that as Belkaia had a fondness for saying with her eyes what she would not with her tongue; they told Dravite to go.
He put on his leather boots and made sure Cree’s yvas was not too tight before setting off. Dravite had decided to take his new hatchet, steel dagger and the old bone-spear that had belonged to his father along for the hunt. He probably wouldn’t be taking down any giant elk today, but even a rabbit for supper was better than none. Before leaving he would pray, both for the good fortune his pavilion had experienced in the last season and the hunt ahead of him, but first he had to find out where.
