Kind of like he was doing right now as he dug this trench. Orin pressed the blade of his shovel into the dirt one more time, tossed it over his shoulder, then gave it up as his muscles declared continuing to dig a lost cause. Shading his eyes, Orin glanced down the ditch. It covered the entire length of the field at this point and while it wasn’t entirely straight and even and the depth tended to vary greatly, it hopefully would would do the job. Resting his arms at his side, Orin turned to look at Jeremy across the trench. ”Think we could take a break? Or move on to something else? My muscles are a bit worn out. Didn’t realize that a season without doing any work on a farm would make that much of a difference. Of course, most times I shirked my duties out in the fields which in retrospect didn’t help too much with the being disliked by the farmers now that I come to think of it.” Orin had to chuckle at that. At the time Orin had felt that it was unreasonable for the men and women of Mithryn to force him to do a job that Orin was so obviously unsuited for. And now here he was, willing toiling away for the promise of practically nothing except helping out those he’d come to know and maybe even care for.
When the conversation came back to Jeremy’s abilities as a Kelvic, Orin frowned. He felt the other man was selling himself far too short and Orin took it upon himself to try and rectify that situation. ”I wouldn’t say that. I am the one that’s not that interesting. You, on the other hand, have experienced the joys of the open sky and the thrill of the hunt in a way that no human possibly could. I’ll never be able to look down from above and see the people in this fields, in this settlement, or anywhere from above, with a literal bird’s eye view. I’ll never be able to feel the wind through feathers or anything that you get from being able to fly and shift. So, don’t ever forget that. Whatever else comes from being a Kelvic at least there’s some good.” Orin averted his eyes. He’d made a speech and he was understandably embarrassed. After all, Orin didn’t know anything about being a Kevlic. Therefore, Orin didn’t really have anything to base his words off of other than a vague sense that they needed to be said and Jeremy needed to hear them. Orin had run into quite a few incredible individuals in his short time in Syliras and it was amazing the number of times Orin had to point out what was exceptional about them. Too often, Orin had found that people took the abilities that they were born with for granted and it wasn’t until Orin pointed out to them how unusual it really was that they even started thinking about it. Hopefully that was the case with Jeremy as well.
However, when Jeremy explained the concept of a bondmate to Orin, Orin felt that he might have just made a huge mistake. The price of being a Kelvic seemed steep indeed. Or at least, it would be for Orin. Orin had a quite understandable fear of attachments. While Orin was perfectly happy to help others and even tentatively had a few people that he would consider friends that didn’t actually extend to letting them into Orin’s own mind and hearing his darkest secrets. In fact, the only person who knew Orin’s whole history had been someone who needed to hear it before Orin felt they could begin to cope with their own demons. Orin was hardly expecting to see her again. Orin would try and put a positive spin on it for Jeremy. ”I don’t see what’s so bad about that though. I mean, bonding sounds like it would be beneficial to both partners. Am I missing something?” Orin’s voice lacked the conviction with which Orin had been speaking earlier. However, Orin did his best to keep it light as he could. Just because Orin had some formidable mental barriers didn’t mean that Jeremy had the same problems that Orin did. In fact Orin didn’t think it was typical for people to have the types of boundaries Orin had when it came to forming relationships of any kind.
Orin waved off the compliments, blushing. Of course, Orin had just been expounding on Jeremy’s virtues so it was only fair to let the other man have his turn. Still, the man seemed to want to change the subject away from himself and Orin figured that they could probably do that for Orin as well. However, Orin’s hopes were soon dashed when Jeremy asked Orin about what he did in his spare time. ”Well, I don’t have a lot of spare time so that’s the first thing you should know. Mostly I work. Sometimes in the morning I work out and train my weapons skills, but that’s just a silly activity. I’m about as far from a fighter as it’s possible to be.” It was true. Orin’s martial abilities had actually gotten laughed at multiple times by the true warriors in the Fighter’s Pits. Still, Orin ignored them. He was training for himself and not for them so their opinions didn’t matter unless they had something constructive to add. Realizing something important Orin glanced over at Jeremy. ”So, what do you do with you time, free or otherwise? I can’t remember if you told me what you did for a living. I got a bit distracted there didn’t I?”
