Flashback Nowhere like home

[Sorla]

2nd of Autumn, 516

The feel of hard land under her feet after two weeks at sea was not as much as a relief as she had been hoping for. Even though she was now definitely on solid ground, she could feel herself swaying sickeningly from side to side as if she was still on the boat. She reached out a hand to steady herself on a tree. Whatever was going on, she was determined to pretend she was fine. She didn't want to show these traders any weakness, but it seemed Virok had noticed. 'It'll pass, girl. It's just your body's got used to the sea, that's all.' She nodded, gratefully. She had spent most of the journey huddled in a corner, unable to do anything to help onboard and so immersed in her own gloom that she barely bothered to converse with the men who would her guides and guardians for the next six months, but even still she had noticed Virok's efforts to make sure she got enough to eat. Perhaps she could come to like this strange outsider.

Rikar didn't seem to be feeling any after-effects from the long sea voyage. He was positively elated in fact, swooping and diving over the undergrowth. Sorla was pleased. She had been worried about the effect of a diet of dried, salt-sprayed food on her beloved crow. Now they were back on land he would be able to scavenge himself some bugs and worms, and maybe even the odd mouse. She checked the pocket of her thick katinu overcoat to make sure his hood and jesse were still there, fingering the worn leather leash like a string of prayer beads.

They headed inland. They had landed in one of the few harbours on the north coast of Kalea. From now on, it was wilderness all the way to Alvadas. Sorla shivered. She had never been this far away from Wind Reach before, and it was the closest she would be to it for a very long time. She glanced over her shoulder, as if hoping she might somehow catch a glimpse of Mt. Skyinarta looming over the sea. Get a grip, Sorla she told herself. You'll need all your energy for what's ahead. No point wasting time with memories. Easier said than done, but she was determined to try.

The first night they camped by a stream, in the shadow of a large rock. 'The bear,' Virok said. 'All traders know it.' The rock was tall, with several lumpy protrusions at the top that did in fact make it resemble a standing bear, when seen from the right angle. Sorla didn't know whether to feel protected or threatened by its hulking figure and outstretched paws. 'We leave some food in there,' he said, pointing to a hollow at the base of the rock, 'every time we pass. If the food is gone next morning, it's a good sign. It means Oriana has accepted our offering and will be watching out for us on the rest of the journey. If it's still there... may as well turn back to Wind Reach right away.' 'Oriana?' Sorla asked. She had never heard this name before. 'She's the goddess of bears,' Virok replied, 'but she watches over all natural things in the wild places. Respect her and she will respect you.' Sorla nodded, pleased to have another potential source of help, however distant or unlikely. Virok added, almost as an afterthought, 'and by the way. Don't disturb her children when they are sleeping if you want to avoid her anger, and theirs. That means be very careful of caves, especially in winter.'

Great, that meant she would be sharing a tent with Virok and the other traders for the foreseeable future. Luckily they seemed kinder than she might have expected, at least for now. Her parents had each given their best creation to help pay for Sorla's keep - a tiny but almost miraculously detailed glass bird from her mother, and from her father a large silk scarf the colour of Mt. Skyinarta's fires, beaded with green glass and fringed in the finest pale orange silk thread. Light enough not to burden the traders but valuable enough to fetch a fine price once they got to Alvadas. If they got to Alvadas.

First, they had over 1000 miles of wild land to cover, and half of it in winter. They needed to make as much progress as possible before the first snows. They were up early the next day, and the next, and the next...

[Sorla]

Autumn - Winter 516

Gradually Sorla settled into the rhythm of travel. They were up every day before dawn so they could start with the first light, and they stopped to make camp about an hour before sunset. The mornings were getting later and the evenings were getting longer, and every minute of daylight was precious.

The traders had no intention of giving Sorla an easy ride. The glass bird and scarf would only become valuable once they reached civilization again, and until then she would be expected to earn her keep. Her first lesson was in building a fire. As an apprentice tailor she had not spent much time outside Wind Reach and had never had to build her own fire, so her first attempt was an abject failure. She tried to find firewood by pulling twigs off trees, until Virok stopped her and told her the wood needed to be dry, which meant it had died a while ago. She discarded her bundle of fresh branches and started again, collecting up the dry, crackling twigs that lay scattered on the ground. Under Virok's guidance, she took her flint and steel from her pack and struck the flint repeatedly with the steel. Nothing. 'Other way round,' Virok said. Sheepishly she swapped the two so that she was striking the steel with the flint. A few weak sparks appeared, but vanished before they even got to the little heap of dry leaves and bark she had created. Eventually one of the sparks was strong enough to singe the edge of a leaf, and a few tries later she actually made a flame! She smiled proudly - and realized it had been the first time in weeks that she had actually smiled. She was so distracted by the thought that the flame went out before she could build on it. But after that things went more smoothly. 10 minutes later she had piled her dry twigs on top of the burning tinder nest, and added some larger branches. Soon it was giving off heat and ready to cook on. Virok nodded appreciatively. 'You'll do,' he said.

She was also relishing the opportunity to practice with Rikar out in the wild, something her falconry teacher had not considered her experienced enough to do back home. The bond between her and the crow was intensifying at a far faster rate than when she had only been able to spend a few hours a day with him. She thanked Eywaat and Priskil that she had been able to find Rikar before she left and take him with her. Her hope-bringing crow; her one link with home. Every evening she placed the hood over his head and stroked his soft black feathers. She told herself it was to lull him to sleep, but as he'd never needed lulling before she had to admit it was probably more to soothe her than him. Still, he seemed to like it. She concentrated on remembering as much as possible of her bird care classes, and inspected his feathers every day to make sure there were no mites, and his throat to check he had no canker. She regretted not having paid more attention but he seemed healthy enough for now. She didn't know what she would do if anything happened to him.

Once they had left the pine forests of the northern part of the Unforgiving and moved into the more open foothills of the eastern edge of Kalea as it sloped down towards Taldera, Rikar was able to fly high overhead and dive down to catch small mice and once even a snake. At first he devoured anything he caught, but gradually Sorla trained him to bring his finds back to her. She would throw small scraps of meat from her own food for him, and immediately call him and hold out her gloved wrist. When he didn't bring the scrap back, that was the end of the game. No more scraps. When he did, she gave it back to him right away, followed by another as a reward. He very quickly learnt that bringing her what he had caught was more profitable, although he probably struggled to understand why she wanted to touch his food before he ate it.

Besides general camp duties, such as collecting firewood and helping pitch the tents every night, Sorla wanted to be able to contribute to the group in some more important way. She cursed herself for not having brought a bow and arrows with her, but one of the traders had one. She asked to borrow it one day and he dismissed her impatiently, unable to believe that a mere girl would be able to wield his weapon. But she perservered, convincing him that she had used a bow before. 'All Inarta know how to shoot, we learn before we can walk!' Eventually he gave in, although he clearly wasn't expecting much. Her first shot confirmed his doubts. Out of practice, she had forgotten to take the wind into account, and her arrow missed the tree she was aiming for by several inches. He moved to take the bow back, satisfied that he had been proven right, but she quickly notched another arrow, sighted and loosed in one quick motion. This time the arrow did hit - not quite in the centre of the tree, but near enough that it embedded where it struck, quivering. Begrudgingly, the man let her practice another few shots. Virok nudged her: 'do you see that rabbit? Under that bush.' She didn't need any more encouragement. Taking a deep breath, she sighted along the shaft, feeling the light wind on her left cheek and moving the arrowhead ever so slightly to the right to compensate. Her shot hit its mark. From then on she was regularly allowed to borrow the bow, and brought back a useful, if not entirely regular, supply of rabbits and hares.

Her sewing skills also enabled her to help the traders. Despite having bought new, sturdy outfits for themselves in Wind Reach, the constant hard wear was starting to take its toll after just a couple of months. She didn't have much to work with, but one of the men had a needle and some thread, and she was able to patch up the worst of the rips they suffered as they pushed through thickly overgrown terrain. For rips that were so bad they couldn't be sewed back together without changing the shape of the garment, she used rabbit skins to create patches. She noticed how the traders skinned them, used flint to scrape off the fat and meat and then stretched the skins out over their packs to dry as they walked. Her handiwork was far from elegant, what with the crude tool and materials and her own lack of finesse, but she hadn't spent two years as an apprentice for nothing, and while her stiches were coarse and raised where they should have been fine and flat, they did the job and the traders were grateful.

[Sorla]

Late winter 516/7 - early spring 517

Virok had lived up to her early hope and shown himself to be a kind and fatherly man. He told her all about the wondrous sounding places he had visited during his travels all over Mizahar - 'I've seen the sands of Eyktol stretching as far as the eye can see, far to the south. I've seen the ice wall of Avanthal in the frozen north, and the great bazaar of Syliras, where anything in the world can be bought for a price. I've seen the beautiful cascade of Riverfall and golden glow of Yahnatep.' She could feel a restlessness stirring within her as she listened to his tales. She was sure half - or more - were wildly exaggerated, but she couldn't help feeling a tug of longing. The whole world... waiting. She had never even thought about leaving Wind Reach before, and now suddenly the possibilities seemed endless. Exile had seemed a fate worse than death when she had been told her punishment, but perhaps it wouldn't be so bad. As for that... Virok had tried a couple of times to find out what exactly she had done that had led to her turning up on the dock, drooping like some forlorn rag doll, and asking for passage. But she always batted his questions away. She wasn't ready to talk about it yet, if she ever would be.

They were getting closer and closer to their goal, weaving south through the eastern Kalean foothills and then heading south west for one last push through the mountains before Alvadas. The days all seemed to resemble each other, and Sorla felt a strange sense of contentment she had never imagined possible when she left home. Orinia had been kind to their little party indeed. She was almost sorry when one morning, Virok announced they would be approaching Alvadas by evening on the following day. The next morning, he called her over. 'Before we part ways, Sorla, I want to give you something. You have proved yourself more than worth the price your parents paid for you, and anyway I've...got used to your presence. It'll be different when you're gone. I mean...' he looked away. Gruff old Virok wasn't much given to expressing his feelings, but she knew what he meant. 'I'll miss you too, old man,' she said, giving him a hug. Unlike him, she found it hard to repress any but the deepest, most intimate emotions. He reached into his pack and pulled out the glass bird her mother had made and the silken scarf, her father's handiwork. 'I would like to give you one of these,' he said. 'I'd give you both but the others would kill me. They are valuable, after all. But I know that whatever value they have for us, for you they are infinitely more precious. Please, pick one. I hope it reminds you of me, as well as your home, for as long as you have it.'

She blinked at him, unable to speak. To have a piece of home with her, wherever she went... a piece of her parents. She had been expecting him to give her a little wooden carving he had whittled or something, but his was more than she could have hoped for. She hesitated between the bird and the scarf. She forced herself not to think of it as a choice between her mother and father, and eventually chose the scarf. Not only would it be more useful, but as an Inarta she felt naked without a scarf, and having such a fine one would help her hold her head up high in her new city. And it would serve as a reminder of her father's skill, the skill she hoped to attain, and an encouragement. Gratefully, she took it and wrapped it around her neck. She was ready.

[Chameleon]

GRADE

XP

• Birdkeeping: 1XP
• Falconry: 1XP
• Hunting: 1XP
• Land Navigation: 2XP
• Sewing: 1XP
• Weapon; Shortbow: 1XP
• Wilderness Survival: 1XP

LORES

• Birdkeeping: Checking for mites and canker
• Falconry: Training birds to give you finds
• Land Navigation: The bear rock
• Land Navigation: Following Kalean foothills
• Oriana: Goddess of bears
• Sewing: Using rabbit skin as patches
• Tanning: How to dry rabbit skins
• Wilderness Survival: Using dry, dead twings
• Wilderness Survival: Using flint and steel
• Wilderness Survival: How to start a fire

OTHERS

I loved reading this, I enjoy your writing and the way you showed her journey over these posts. Just keep in mind that travelling through Mizahar - especially Kalea - is dangerous, so don't plan on doing more without another group to go with you!

Otherwise, mark your thread as graded and enjoy your rewards. If you have any questions or problems, just send me a PM!