northclifflogs | OPEN | this winter brings all the cold to the yard

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OPEN | this winter brings all the cold to the yard

𝕒 𝕨𝕚𝕟𝕥𝕣𝕪 𝕒𝕣𝕣𝕚𝕧𝕒𝕝

surprise!

I. Snow!

A mere week after the grisly discovery in the Deep Forest and the subsequent dispersal of the eerie spectral visitors, all Northcliff Pass residents wake one exceptionally frigid morning to find themselves buried under several feet of snow. It is of the light and fluffy variety--at least for now--which provides no shortage of entertainment for the village children, and means one is less likely to throw one's back out while trying to shovel it clear of doorways and the streets.

That is your first order of business, as it happens: free yourselves from your wintry entrapment. Or don't, if you've got enough food and drink squirrelled away in your tiny peasant house that you don't need to venture out into the elements. The world is your cold, shitty, socially stratified oyster; ditch your responsibilities, sleep in.

II. Fete! at ye olde tavern

All Souls' Day came and went, and nobody can really be blamed for forgetting about it what with the ghosts and the gloomy business of seeing to the bodies. All that aside the Hammer and Spoke seems especially welcoming that first wintry night, once all the snow shovelling is finished and the streets are clear enough for foot traffic again; lit lanterns glow warmly outside the door, and from within come the sounds of joyful music. Fiddles, whistles, a drum, and plenty of laughter; it seems the snow has stranded a troupe of minstrels in the village, which means at least two or three nights of great fun for village residents.

In truth it will take more than a few nights of drunk mischief to lift the pall cast across the village after the previous month's discoveries, but maybe that's why so many people gravitate to the light and levity and warmth of a party. After such a close call with so much death, it's good to remind oneself that there's joy in the world, too.

III. Cramped Quarters

The nights might be filled with good company, food, and drink, but during the day the village has to contend with another frustration: the roads in and out of Northcliff Pass are closed until the snow melts.

This is a common experience--in late December, January, and February. Not so much in November, when farmers are preparing to take their surplus harvest and livestock down the mountain to Cliffside, or when caravans with schedules to keep to are preparing to head east towards Woodsedge. (The only road clear in that direction is guaranteed to take them past Turn--something no one wants to risk.) Even a few late-season pilgrims have found themselves stuck between Gods' Reach at the summit of the mountain, and the creature comforts of Cliffside below.

There's nothing to be done for it, of course, except to endure the unusually crowded streets, the lack of vacancies at the tavern, and the occasional herd of sheep or goats picketed in very odd places.

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The night before Northcliff Pass wakes to several feet of snow, Dain arrives in the village. He arrives, as is his usual manner, without fanfare or announcement, with a heavy winter coat and headscarf hiding most of his plain cassock, like just another one of the few pilgrims taking a significant risk travelling to Gods' Reach so near to winter.

The heavy snow takes him entirely by surprise.

You wouldn't know it, though, to observe him. In the daylight, he's out in the village, helping to shovel snow and clear footpaths, with a smile and bright conversation for anyone asking for the extra help. Rejection or cold silence seems to do nothing to smother his spirits, either; he respects when others prefer to do the work themselves, and respects when people recognise the rank of his uniform and want him to stay as far away as possible. After all, he was warned what sort of welcome he might expect.

At night, he's always in the tavern, usually smiling, sometimes with a drink in his hand. He also dances -- the music is wonderful -- and generally appears like someone who has lived their entire lives in this community, rather than someone who just arrived mere days before for the first time.

The Shepherds who came to Northcliff Pass earlier in the year went to great lengths to distance themselves from everyone in the village. So far, Dain is their polar opposite.

II. O! The climate outside is coldly calamitous!

Fíadh did a decent amount of hunting before the snowfall hit, but she certainly hasn't been here long enough to stuff her stores to her satisfaction. Especially with the ghostly events that ended the autumn distracting her. Eventually she begrudgingly accepts the fact that for extra sustenance she'll probably have to, ugh, seek it from others. Every few days she wanders into the tavern and keeps to the farthest corner she can from the general carousing to eat in peace. Though ... she'd be lying if she said she wasn't mildly curious at everyone's song and cheer in the face of gloomy weather, occasionally catching herself staring before looking back to her meal.

Maybe someone wants to risk teaching her. Or maybe they want to be sure to keep their heads, that's also a good option.

III. Yet beholde! Burning flames bequeathe quite the captivating allure!

Once again Fíadh has left the smithy forge open and available for any passers-by who need the extra warmth. She's even spread cloth along the packed dirt floor this time in case people want to sit. It's not uncommon over the days to see a small huddle basking in the fiery glow, and of course Fíadh's all right with that. But anyone who comes up to her to thank her or give her some sort of return gift only gets a sour scowl that hopefully sends them scampering.

But if anyone has business with her or needs her help with something she'll wordlessly oblige.

Edited 2019-11-16 21:56 (UTC)

I. I HAVE BEEN READY AT YOUR HAND TO GRANT WHATEVER THOU WOULD'ST CRAVE

Lately Elena's life has been pretty all right. Not great, but all right. In fact, she actually finds herself a little ... bored at the lack of excitement. The ghosts, as terrifying as they were, had injected a little life into this small town. In fact, she's hardly played obscenely in public for a week!

But that all changes when the first fluffy flake flutters down to land on the tip of her nose. She crosses her eyes in surprise to get a good look, assuming it to be some sort of late-season bug. However, more and more snowflakes begin to fall around her and she breaks into a giant grin.

She practically gallops to the town center, all the while proclaiming from the top of her lungs, "SNOW! THERE'S SNOW! SHITE, EVERYONE, LOOK AT THE SNOOOOOOW!"

Children giggle, parents look horrified, and Elena's mood is exactly back to where it should be. She falls on her back in the middle of the road, by now covered in a healthy layer of snow, and begins waving her arms and legs back and forth to make a snow saint.

If you see Elena outside, expect to continue seeing her enjoying the snowy conditions for the entire time they remain. Every. Long. Month.

II. ALAS MY LOVE YOU DO ME WRONG TO CAST ME OFF DISCOURTEOUSLY

As nice as it is outside, the true spirit of yule is to come together as a community and get fecking blasted. And of course the tavern was always going to be the prime location for such festivities where Elena is more than happy to contribute. But she's wasn't expecting any competition.

Really? A minstrel troupe? Here? It doesn't help that she knows a few of the performers. And, well, has known a couple of them. But hey, she's a big woman, she can share the space. However she can't help if a couple of sour notes accidentally get plucked from her guitar or she has a lewd coughing fit while they're performing. But she could really use some company to keep her distracted ... or to urge her on to do worse.

It is the headscarf--the particular manner in which the fabric is wound and folded about the wearer's head and hair--that catches his eye at first. The Glennich tend not to do such things with their clothes, least of all the men.

Tuomas af Fiapori sits perched atop a fence near the entrance to the Hammer and Spoke one evening, absently feeding bits of his own dinner to the magpie perched on his shoulder. When Dain makes an appearance, whether coming or going, Tuo greets him as familiarly as any Saaristomeren might another. "Hyvää iltaa."

If he's wrong, this is surely the quickest way to figure it out.

It's funny, how you can lose a language for two decades, and yet in a single moment react as though no time has passed at all. "Hyvää iltaa."

Good evening.

It's several seconds before Dain's conscious mind catches up with his habitual greeting, and he stops, and he stares. If he'd had time to think, he might have pretended not to understand -- but no, he can tell his emotions wouldn't have let him. He's quite paralysed with them.

"Who are you?" he manages to ask, his tongue easily switched back to Glennich, unwrapping his headscarf so he can get a better look. The stranger -- no, not a stranger, he wouldn't be a stranger even if Dain had somehow missed the pang of familiarity in his chest. "... Tuo?"

Kit is more or less immune to sour scowls, given the company he chooses to keep. And at any rate, he owes Fíadh... something.

He turns up like a bad penny, cigarette tucked into the corner of his mouth, and finds a bit of available space by the forge to warm his hands before the fires. Fíadh is easy enough to pick out from the bunch, based on Ben's description of her, and he waits a moment until he's (reasonably) sure he's caught her eye.

"Evening," he says, carefully walking that line between 'friendly enough' and 'mind your own business' like a pro.

Well, he was more correct than he realized.

The wry, whimsical twist at the corners of Tuo's lips grows lax from surprise, and he grows still before he can offer up the last piece of flat bread quick enough for Alvi... who ruffles his feathers and gives his ear a reproachful nip. Tuo flinches, and, "--ah! You little beast," he scolds, but he gives the last of the bread to the greedy magpie anyway. Then he carefully slips from his perch on the fence and approaches Dain, cautious curiosity brightening his eyes.

A weighted pause, before at last he smiles. "Anja." And, heedless of what it must look like to any bystanders, he steps forward and puts his arms around his oldest friend in a warm embrace. (Alvi, peeved, squawks and flutters back to the fence to preen his feathers indignantly.)

Emotions tangle into a single overwhelming mess. There's a bird -- new, and curious, but Dain will file that thought away for later. There's his own name -- right now, not very important, except where it rings with nostalgia and buried memories. And there's the time, the sheer weight of years passed and old, healed-over acceptance that Tuo might very well be dead -- and that even if he wasn't, the odds of seeing him again were so astronomical as to exist only in the realm of the gods.

But he's here. Here, in this tiny village cut off by snowstorms for half of the year, looking both completely different and utterly identical to the much younger version in Dain's memory, and he can't help but hug back, hard, as though he can squeeze some lost time back into the present.

"It has been," he says quietly into Tuo's shoulder, "such a long time. Have you been here, since Griston?"

Half of a breathless laugh gets squeezed out of him by Dain's tight embrace, but Tuo can endure a lost breath or two for Dain's sake. He smiles into the fabric of his friend's clothes, fisting his fingers in the fabric, then forces himself to draw back just enough so that they might be able to see each other when they speak.

"...Have you been here, since Griston?"

"Oh, no, that would have been dreadfully tedious," he replies, all lightness and whimsy but for the bit of wetness at the corners of his eyes (treacherous tear ducts). He makes an expansive gesture with one hand. "Throw a dart at the map and I daresay I've been wherever it makes its mark, most recently Fairport. I come here during the festival seasons but, as you see," another gesture, "there is precious little of that at the moment."

His words taper off some as he gazes back at his friend; doubtless he could talk circles around him if he so chose, but after so long--

He takes one of Dain's hands and clasps it between both of his. "Come back to my camp," he says softly in their language. "Let's have tea and speak properly, not here where we'll be overheard by all these dim lights." A dig at the dutiful followers of the Path of Light.

Dain laughs, and finds it very difficult to stop. Tedious, Tuo says. Not dangerous. Not hard. Tedious. Like lessons without consequence or carrying more home from the markets than you intended. Part of him feels amazed they never crossed each other's paths in Fairport, despite logic and the size of the city dictating that of course they didn't, it would really have been rather remarkable if they had. Much better to meet here, where there's no one around apart from someone a little way down the street walking as though they've had too much to drink. Fewer witnesses to make Dain's life a little harder, fewer loose ends and difficult questions to answer.

At this, Dain remembers what he's wearing beneath his coat and scarf, and he resists the temptation to make sure it's perfectly hidden. Much harder to resist is the thread of guilt snaking its way through his thoughts.

He understands Tuo, perfectly well. It's just... oddly hard to reply, like Dain's tongue doesn't quite remember the shape of the language. He simply nods, tears overflowing, utterly unable to stop smiling even if he wanted to. Surely he can allow himself this. Surely he can set aside his caution just long enough for a simple, joyful conversation in a language others can't understand.

Despite saying nothing and making no move, Fíadh notices Kit the second he walks in. And what really catches her eye is the fact that she's never seen him before. At this point she's fairly used to the regular faces around town, and having someone new walk about so casually is ... not necessarily concerning, but notable.

But of course he comes up to her; she just had to flick her gaze to him right when he noticed. Whether it's to talk or start something, both prospects are equally loathsome. So Fíadh continues at her work meticulously polishing a strip of metal, giving nothing more than a grunt of acknowledgement.

I. Snow! Closed to Detlef

The morning brings snow for the town and a choice with DIRE CONSEQUENCES for Detlef.

On the one side is Farogil. Technically he's on his stomach, having dragged Detlef over him in the night, less like a 'big spoon' and more like a 'fourth blanket'. Faro is a heavy sleeper and can be obstinate and sour when he wakes up before he's ready. He is definitely not ready to be awake.

On the other side is Moose. The fire dwindled down to embers overnight so her basket beside the hearth is colder than she would prefer. A snowdrift blocks the window shutter-turned-catflap so she can't slip out to beg for or steal some breakfast either. Moose knows her favorite humans are upstairs but she's shut out by the bedroom door. So she cries at the door and scratches at the wood with increasing desperation. And volume.

What will it be, Detlef? Rescue a lonely kitten from being mildly hungry and uncomfortable but risk a grumpy boyfriend, or stay warm and comfortable and listen to a few minutes of shitten yowling before she realizes she can go curl up with Lord Sneak?

III. Cramped Quarters, OPEN AS HELL

Once the doorway's cleared and the snow trampled down in the road, Faro's actually secretly grateful for the sudden snowfall. Business isn't booming like it was during the peak of pilgrim season, but it's better than it was last week, what with all the ghosts. Now there was a bunch of people stuck in town with nothing to do and a craving for somewhere warm. The snow gives him a captive audience of prospective customers!

If only he was a good salesman. He tries, though, and spends most of his time in his shop like usual.

Acknowledgement is still acknowledgement! Kit can work with that.

He reaches up to pluck his cigarette from his mouth, blows a whorl of smoke away from the other loiterers around the forge, then takes a few steps nearer to Fíadh. There's no point in waiting for a less awkward moment to start a conversation with the taciturn types; he'd be better off waiting for the saints to rise from their graves.

"Thanks for helping Ben," he tells her, forthright. "He's my--" uhhhhh "--friend, runs the carpentry shop with me. He mentioned you, and the, uh, you know." The ghosts. Spooks. Whatever they are.

Dain's tears are like a vice around Tuo's heart, squeezing tight enough to force the wetness from his own eyes. He smiles, pained, and lifts up a sleeve to blot the wetness first from his friend's cheek, and then his own. "Now, now," he chides breathily, trying to compose himself. "I'll have none of that. Come," he adds, then tucks his arm into Dain's and leads him along the road back towards his wagon. (Begrudgingly, Alvi flutters to Tuo's free arm when it is held out expectantly. What an odd trio they must make.)

The wagon itself has been secured just beyond the village walls and within Northcliff Wood, but not beyond the (questionable) barrier of Sands Creek that separates this bit of wood from the Deep Forest. Even in the dim light of the gloaming, the bright red paint that ornaments its wood paneling is eye catching, and the lanterns that dangle from the arch roof would surely cast a warm and inviting glow, if they were lit. A piece of Saaristomeri art, to be sure, though carpentry was never Tuo's strong suite. Someone else must have built it for him.

Alvi flits from Tuo's free arm and up to a perch designed especially for him near the back door and fold-out steps. Tuo smiles blithely. "I should count myself fortunate I have not been burgled yet," he tells Dain, "though I must be courting fate, saying it at all. Here, I shall get the door." He steps away from his friend, key in hand, to unfasten the lock.

The paltry patch of muddy earth and snow that separates the Hammer & Spoke from the (mostly empty) marketplace stalls is no place for anyone to picket a bunch of skittish horses, but will these loudmouth, know-it-all Fairport traders listen to Pippa? Of course not. 'We've been doing this far longer than you've had curls to braid, girl,' a bearded man with an unkind sneer tells her while latching the gate. 'You don't know the half of how this work ought to be done.'

Maybe, maybe not. But when a huge drift of snow sloughs off the tavern's roof and collapses the picket, thus sending approximately twenty spooked horses stampeding through the village streets, the son of a bitch isn't around for Pippa to sneer, 'told you so,' in his ugly face.

Besides, one of the younger, dappled fillies has managed to thrash her halter free of the young miner who had attempted to catch her, and has rushed out the open gates and into the woods. The miner takes two steps after the horse before shaking his head; after all the ghosts, there's no way he's heading into the forest. Pippa scowls, passes the lead of the last horse she'd been able to catch off to one of the traders, and sets off after the filly at a jog.

The cacophony of frenetic energy from the village is muted once she's beyond the walls and across Sands Creek, heightening the sounds caused by... well, just about everything else. Five minutes into her journey and she's already regretting her bravado, pausing every few paces to whip her head back over her shoulder as though to catch a stalker who is never there. Her footfalls in the snow sound heavier than they ought to, as she forges her way after the horse's tracks, the wind whispering in her ears like someone's breath on her neck.

Stupid. This was such a stupid idea.

Snow sucks. Ice sucks. Faro's doing his best to get Detlef or Colin to run all his errands for him, but there's one delivery he's got to make himself. It's not that far from his place to the smithy, yet by the time he gets there he looks like an exhausted mess, somehow sweaty and cold at the same time. Probably because more layers = more cold protection, therefore he's bundled the fuck up and his fancy shoes are for warmth and not traction.

Farogil doesn't go to the fire. He leans himself against a wall and takes deep breaths. He waves Fíadh over with one double-gloved hand, "Brought- brought you somethin-"
GET HIM

A SLED

Edited (put the spaces back but with a purpose) 2019-11-20 01:30 (UTC)

Fíadh runs back her past conversations with Ben in her mind. It's really easy, actually, considering the two of them have exchanged a handful of words each. But she recalls that Ben was missing someone and had her go through his empty shop. Looks like it's not so empty anymore.

"Mm. Is he all right?"

It takes a minute for Fíadh to recognize the bundled mass as Faro and she quickly comes over, concern etched into her face. He must be sick, why else would he be so out of breath and shivering in sweat? She grabs her workstool and shoves him to it.

"Sit. Are you ill? You shouldn't be out."

"Mm. Is he all right?"

He's in the process of taking another puff off his cigarette when she asks that question, and chuckles a little. "Yeah, he's fine. Same pain in my ass he's always been." It's the softness in his eyes and lopsided little smile on his face that makes the words a testament to how much he truly cares for the cantankerous diva who lives with him.

Kit glances absently around the forge, gaze out of habit looking towards the places where the walls meet; you can take the carpenter out of the carpentry shop, etc. "You need any work done around here?" he asks Fíadh a moment later, then adds, "On the house." Evidently it's his way of giving his gratitude more meaning.

Normally Fíadh would bristle at the suggestion that her shop is not completely up to par ... but wouldn't you know it, she has been in need of a certain carpentry project for quite some time now ...

She gives a curt nod before motioning Kit to follow her. Somehow there is still a dark abandoned corner of the smithy and it in lies a pile of wood, stone, and broken dreams covered in dust and cobwebs. Fíadh stares wearily at it.

"... A few months ago my grindstone cradle broke. I need a new one."

The village welcome wagon is fortunately in the station when Dain arrives, a standing lantern by the guardhouse casting its golden light partway onto the figure below it, who stands slightly bent with the cold.

"Who goes there," comes the raspy voice, and he stirs to life, the snow that's had the chance to collect on his shoulders in the last ten or so minutes now shifting about as the Watch Captain approaches the newcomer with his lantern.

The snow seems to come earlier every year, but perhaps that's only because Lance has gotten older and every year feels shorter.

It's not unusual for him to be quiet, but he's seemed almost as though he's been avoiding Fiadh and Detlef since their expedition into the forest, less because he's upset by what they found there (which, to be fair, he was) and more because he's afraid he'll be asked to explain something he can't-- and doesn't want to-- comprehend.

But the night has been long and exhausting with the snow ever-deepening, so when Fiadh lights her fire in the morning, Lance finds himself drawn to it on his way back to the guardhouse.
Nose and cheeks a bright red against the whiteness of his skin, he holds his hands out to warm them with a sheepish, grateful little smile to the blacksmith. He wouldn't presume to use her fire this way if it weren't relatively clear, by this point, that it's open to everyone.

A dark form leans over into Elena's line of sight, smoke trailing from the stick in his mouth and from his nostrils as he exhales. Ben is perplexed, and annoyed, but mostly just making sure this grown-ass woman hasn't died in the middle of the street while people go about their business around her.
But when he sees that her eyes are open and her face is bright with seasonal mirth, he just rolls his eyes, straightens, and lightly ashes his cigarette onto her before putting it back in his mouth and turning to go again.

"Of course you haven't," Dain replies without thinking, pressing one hand against the painted wood of the wagon like he's halfway worried he might be imagining it and his hand will pass right through. "You have quite a capable guard bird."

Which reminds him of all of the questions he wants to ask, all of which seem important enough to tie for the first spot, none of which will have quick or easy answers. If Tuo hasn't changed, then asking questions will be something of a game, trying to find more and more specific words to ensure that he has no choice but to give a direct response. 'Where does your bird come from' leaves plenty of room for a meandering tale.

But the wagon -- it's beautiful, and familiar. Even in Fairport, Dain hasn't come across much architecture made to be beautiful. Homes are simple and serviceable. Churches are large and intimidating. Other buildings fit somewhere into the vast chasm between, and richer families will pay for elaborate trappings, but almost nothing is built from scratch to be this colourful. It makes Dain abruptly, sharply homesick, in a way he has not been for many years.

"You didn't build this yourself," he remarks in an effort to distract himself. It's very deliberately not a question. "And I'm sure I would have remembered if it fit onto the ship. Where does it come from?"

It's been snowing for the past hour now, longer than Dain would like, and it's impossible to tell which way the weather's going to turn when there isn't enough light in the sky to make out the clouds. It's with a sense of relief that he arrives in the village, and a silent upward prayer of thanks that one of the first buildings he sees appears to be the tavern --

-- and, with a quiet yelp of surprise, someone waylays him.

"I would have thought you were a statue," Dain says apologetically, gloved hands out in a gesture of peace. "I've just arrived, but I promise you, I'm not a threat. Would you be the Watch?"

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OPEN | this winter brings all the cold to the yard

𝕒 𝕨𝕚𝕟𝕥𝕣𝕪 𝕒𝕣𝕣𝕚𝕧𝕒𝕝

I. Snow!

II. Fete! at ye olde tavern

III. Cramped Quarters

OTA; available day or night, pretty much anywhere, hit me

OPEN!!

OPEN!!

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iii

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closed to Roesia!

3, please help

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the night of his arrival

III

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