northclifflogs | Blue Blue Caravan

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Blue Blue Caravan

WHO: Wilde, Emery, Johanna and two open starters
WHAT: Stuck in NCP until the snow clears enough for him to gtfo
WHEN: Early - Mid February
WHERE: Various
NOTES: Screaming goats - may update as needed

Open

Market - Wilde had found a nice spot to unload the two-wheeled cart, unfolding its various panels to put his wares out for display. Various goat cheeses took up most of the display. Most were simple, but there were a few fancy ones with nuts and herbs and such mixed in. There was also a quantity of yarn skeins, soft as anything. Some were dyed in shades of green, red, or yellow, but most were plain.

Wilde had taken to relaxing on the wagon seat while Pehj had found a spot relatively dry and free of snow to stretch out, occasionally bleating at any passersby who looked like they might give him some dried fruits.
The Hammer and Spoke - It was getting easier to avoid the soldiers in town now that they had taken shelter in the mines, but Wilde was still on guard. He'd heard they acted like they had the run of the place, and frankly he wanted to avoid getting conscripted if they were on the prowl for hale young folk to fatten their ranks.

Fortunately, the inn was too crowded for him to stand out much. There wasn't much else for the townsfolk to do on these cold winter nights aside from the usual drinking, dice, and occasional brawl. Wilde kept out of the thick of it, but observed the goings-on with what might have been a wistful smile before whatever reverie he was in the middle of was interrupted by a few soldiers barging in.

The goatherd ordered another drink, and then abandoned his place at the bar as he slipped into a chair across from a stranger, setting the drink down as though he'd been asked to do so.

"Sorry," he murmured, never quite taking his eyes off the soldiers, "I won't stay long. I just didn't want to deal with- well."

He inclined his head to the soldiers who were already hassling the others sitting at the bar to go drink elsewhere.
For Emery -

Traveling in the mountains was always a gamble - but it was especially bad during the winter. Wilde had finally made it home, lighting the lanterns along the narrow, dangerous path that split off from the Pilgrim's Path and led to his homestead. In case there was anyone mad enough to be traveling in this snow (himself excluded). It wasn't uncommon for the faithful to make a bit of a detour to spend the night somewhere warm and dry or trade for supplies, but that was the extent of Wilde's company.

He wasn't particularly surprised to see someone coming up the path while he was out seeing to the Ladies of the House (four fat hens) who clucked disapprovingly at Wilde when he scattered the rest of their feed. He stepped around two young bucks who were playfighting, their horns locked and heads pressed together as they grunted and pawed at the snow, and opened the gate.

"Sorry," he said, "haven't had much time to clear the path. There's stew and a bit of bread if you're hun-"

He blinked, realizing his impromptu guest wasn't some random pilgrim, but someone from the town proper. The bloody magistrate to boot! Wilde promptly straightened, feeling a growing tension in his gut. Something must be amiss to risk coming up here.

"Er. Magistrate. Sir."
For Johanna -

One does not generally apply the term majestic to goats. That's because, in general, it doesn't really fit.

But no one would argue that there was a certain dignity to Wilde's flock. There had been several generations where his ancestors had bred them with the wild ibexes around the mountains, and then further selective breeding until you got the fine specimen that was currently standing on top of some poor soul's roof.

Pehj was a proud looking creature. From the curve of his horns to his sleek chestnut coat, he cut a striking sight, silhouetted against the gray light of early dawn.

And then he opened his mouth.

"AAAaaaaAAAAA!" screamed Pehj from the roof, echoing across the village. "AAaaaaAAAA aaaAAA AAAaaAAAAAAA!!!"

It hadn't taken Wilde long to find the creature. The snows were deep and there weren't exactly many goats of Pehj's size down from the mountains, so the trail from where he'd untied his reigns to his current perch had been pretty easy to follow.

"Get down from there!" Wilde hissed, gesticulating wildly. Pehj ignored him, and bleated somehow louder.

Wilde searched around for a ladder. This was not, in fact, the most infuriating place Pehj had managed to park himself (he had once gotten about three quarters of the way up some ramparts - gravity for goats was not so much a law as a suggestion) but Wilde could already feel hot embarrassment creeping up the back of his neck. The last thing he wanted this morning was the scrutiny of grouchy villagers woken from their beds by Pehj's temper tantrum.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

There is plenty amiss in the village, but that is not the reason for the magistrate's visit to Wilde's homestead. Or maybe it is, in a circuitous, roundabout sort of way. The goats aren't his anymore--if they ever were, being his late wife's inheritance from her mother and father--but in the aftermath of her death it had only seemed right to ensure that they were well taken care of. The hermits up the mountain have cared for the herd for two decades now; it brings Emery some comfort to see the beasts thriving.

(It's therapy. Goat therapy.)

"Wilde," he greets with a grimace of a smile, leaning on the walking stick that has aided his trek this far. He looks beyond the young man's shoulder to glimpse the pair of bucks testing their strength against each other, and makes a sound somewhere between a snort and a chuckle. "Thought I'd come by to see the lads," he says, referring to the goats of course, "but if there's bread and stew on offer I'll sit down to eat with you, if it's no imposition."

The goats were, indeed, thriving. Clean, healthy, and they didn't have that lean look about them most animals got in the winter. Most were gamboling about in the paths their much larger brethren had cleared through the deep snows or climbing the craggy ridges that sheltered the home from the worst of the snows.

"Dangerous trek here," Wilde remarked, to affirm that Emery was welcome to rest here as long as he needed. Emery's grimace was a familiar expression - an attempt at the daily niceties when your mind was on anything but. And if he'd made the journey here, now, just to check on the descendants of his wife's flock, well. Wilde could sympathize with feeling nostalgia for something you could never get back.

"Head on in when you've had your fill of the goats. I've a few things to take care of out here, and then I'll get you sorted. And don't mind Gerda - just let her sniff you so she knows you're not some brigand."

Gerda, it turned out, was an old sow Wilde would take into the woods for truffling. She'd been black once but had gone quite grey in her bristles as well as her eyes. Her sense of smell was keen as ever though and she greeted any stranger by shoving her head in their stomach to get a good whiff of them, before returning to her spot by the cooking fire.

The home itself was an organized sort of chaos. It was warm, clean, well maintained, smelling of pinewood from the floorboards, and the constant aroma de chèvre that seemed to permeate any space Wilde lived in long enough. There were deer pelts and straw rugs on the floor, chests of mohair in varying states of being turned to wool or thread. Furniture was wood, cushioned with wild animal pelts, or cushions knitted from wool.

Dusty books - mostly almanacs, but also a few religious texts and the occasional anthology of fables or tales of brave knights that may spur a brash child to go join a band of mercenaries to seek out storybook glories - cluttered the various shelves along with tools and various statuettes of the saints, carved from wood or bone. Wilde's bow, quiver, sling, and sword were hung by the door, along with his horn and several snares for trapping rabbits and squirrels.

It was the right decision to sell the herd, much though it pained him at the time to do it, and much though guilt gnaws at him over it from time to time. But as he takes the time granted to him by Wilde to visit the herd, tolerating with good humour their curiosity and the occasional challenge from a young buck still learning his strength, their good health reaffirms the wisdom of his choice.

At length, the magistrate gives the door to Wilde's home a gentle knock before admitting himself, ducking a bit as he enters. Gerda and her snout greet him first, of course, and though he startles momentarily, he allows her to get a good whiff of his clothes without trying to shoo her off. He's no brigand; mostly he smells of inks and parchment, for those are the materials he interacts with most in his line of work. But there are the earthy smells of animal husbandry there, too, for he cares for his horse with his own hands.

Once Gerda has trundled back over to the fire, Emery makes his way over to one of the chairs and eases himself down into it. The walking stick he leans against the table, then gestures with his hand out towards the door. "They're looking well," he says, sounding pleased rather than surprised, and chuckles. "Sprightly, even, which is more than I could say for myself these days."

Wilde returned from mucking out the barn - it had needed it since he'd been stuck in Northcliff Pass for several days, but his priority when coming home had been milking the nannies. He was disheveled when he came in, bits of straw in his hair and after shrugging off his surcoat, he cleaned off his hands and face in a washbasin.

"Yet sprightly enough to make the journey here," he remarked, pointedly not mentioning it was the dead of winter. In the mountains. With a griffon who had a taste for human flesh flapping about.

"Something in the village must weigh on you. Is it the soldiers?"

There was, indeed, bread and stew. Rabbit, mushrooms, onions, carrots and parsnips. The rabbit meat was lean (to be expected in winter), but this was easily offset by the fact Wilde had cooked the whole thing with goatsmilk and cheese in the broth.

Surprisingly, there was also a bowl of chestnuts and dried fruit set out with the meal. He also poured a palmful of rock salt mixed with dried flowers into a metal offering bowl by the tallow candle. Old superstition, that if the Earth God deigned to dine with mortals they should feel welcomed. It also smelled pleasant, counteracting the ever present smell of of goat.

There's plenty in the village who would look sideways at the small offering bowl and question the piety of the one who set it out. Emery is a pious enough man, but he has lived in the world long enough to recognize that devotion to the gods comes in all different forms. If it was his place to question or cast judgment, he'd have walked a different path in life.

"Something in the village must weigh on you. Is it the soldiers?"

His reply is silence, for a moment or two, and in that time he serves himself some of the rabbit stew and gave himself a moment to think. There is no way to mince words about it unfortunately, and if Wilde hadn't heard the news yet, it was only a matter of time. "Lorne was flogged. For protecting someone, from one of the soldiers."

The rage in him still simmers below the surface, but despair tempers it. "I was elsewhere, visiting my middle son, when it happened. I should've been here."

Wilde looked astonished by this news, before his expression settled. There was still a tightness in his jaw, a crease in the brow.

So. That was it.

"Your middle son needs a father as much as Lorne," Wilde reasoned. "...And Lorne did what was right."

Lorne hadn't changed at all - as far as Wilde could remember, he'd always been a brave and compassionate person.

"Even if you were away, I suspect something of you was still with him through the ordeal."

Emery doesn't answer, at least not at first. He focuses on his stew, gazing down into it unseeingly after each bite. These are words that have been offered to him by his own children in the days since his son's flogging, words of compassion and understanding that he knows, were the tables turned, he would offer to anyone else. His son is a grown man, and he acted on his principles. He'd not been taught to behave any other way, nor to anticipate that the soldiers' commander might not respond in kind. That Brickenden might be unspeakably cruel in demanding his recompense.

Forcing Lance to hold the whip that has scarred Emery's son for the rest of his life--

"I should have been here," he repeats simply, softly, and rubs a hand across his beard. Then, "Apologies, Wilde, I shouldn't place any of this on your shoulders."

"You can't blame yourself for another man's cruelty," Wilde said. "Your son stood up to him as best he could. I doubt his options were many and the alternatives would have been ... much worse."

Wilde uncorked a jug of what must have been some kind of homebrewed cider. There was certainly a strong smell of apples wafting from it - accompanied by the much stronger smell of alcohol. He poured it into two wooden goblets.

"The world is full of people like Commander Brickenden. Men like you and Lorne are few and far between."

He raised the goblet, bowing his head briefly before downing the moonshine.

It's the strong scent of the apples that pulls him out of himself somewhat, and Emery reaches out to take the goblet as it's offered to him. Then Wilde speaks again and he chuckles some, a quiet and abashed sound that's accompanied by a downward glance at his drink.

"That's kind of you to say," he answers, humbled and a bit embarrassed, then lifts his mug to his lips to drink from it. At the taste--and its potency--he raises his eyebrows some and then nods at the jug.

"It has quite a kick, this stuff. You brew it yourself?"

There was a huff that might have been a laugh from Wilde.

"Yes - old family recipe, you could say. It's made from apples, honey and whatever wild fruits we forage in the summer. It keeps the winter from getting too deep in the bones."

They also used it for stripping old paint, but Wilde neglected to mention that.

"Fortunately the thaw isn't far. The mountain paths will be safer then."

"Aye, that they will," Emery agrees. "You'll have pilgrims trekking past your homestead again before you know it, and probably stopping in for a tipple, once they catch wind of this." He lifts the mug again and smiles.

He finishes the rest of his stew in companionable silence across from Wilde--near cleans the bowl completely in fact, and seems a little surprised by his own appetite once he's finished. A little self-conscious, he admits, "Suppose the hike up here takes more out of me than it used to. I don't advise getting old, Wilde."

Getting to his feet, he glances about the room before offering, "Where should I wash this?" It's the least he can do after imposing.

Wilde shrugged.

"It may be age. It may also have been the snow. You seem hale enough."

He extended a hand for the dirty dishes. There was a stone basin with snow melting in it for just such a thing.

Outside, a bitter wind howled, rattling the windows. Wilde had stuffed old rags into the cracks, and drew the wool curtains to keep the draft out.

"Rest a while - when you feel up to making the trek, I saddle up Pehj. He'll get you back to the village safely."

Emery passes the bowl over to Wilde with a grateful nod, then glances in some surprise when a particularly fearsome gust of wind rattles the windows in their panes. "Hadn't looked like foul weather when I set out," he says and paces a few steps over to the window, stealing a brief glimpse beyond the curtains to assess the situation. Dark clouds heavy with snow blanket the sky a forbidding slate grey; it would not be safe for him to begin the journey back, only to be caught unawares in the midst of a blizzard.

A mistake fit for someone unaccustomed to life in the mountain pass, not the village magistrate. Recent events have left him rattled.

He grimaces and turns to look back at the young man whose hospitality he must trespass upon. "I don't wish to impose," he begins uncomfortably... but looks very much like he's got no choice in the matter.

Wilde scowls, though it seems directed at the approaching storm, not Emery.

"This high up, it's not unusual," he sets the dirty dishes in the basin, before gathering up his coat. "Make yourself comfortable - I need to make sure the yearlings got inside safely."

The older animals knew to take shelter - but there was always the stubborn goat or two, still getting a feel for their limits, who think they can brave a blizzard. Wilde steps out just as the snow begins to fall.

---

He returns nearly two hours later, his coat thick with snow and carrying a shivering young goat under his arm. He doesn't look much better off, his tan complexion a worrying grey and trying to hide the chatter in his teeth. He clearly didn't expect to be out so long.

"Lonnie managed to wedge herself between two rocks, little fool," he said by way of explanation. He set Lonnie down by Gerta who gave the poor, shivering creature a sniff before snuggling her warm, bristly bulk up to her.

"Saints," comes Emery's quiet oath, one he undoubtedly does not speak aloud often, "are you all right?"

The little goat, cold and frightened though she is, looks as though she will be well cared for in Gerta's company. In contrast her keeper looks ghostly pale beneath the layers of snow now melting into his hair and coat. Emery walks towards him with worry setting a deep furrow into his brow, for it is difficult for him not to believe that, had he not arrived at Wilde's homestead when he did, the young man might have finished up his work before the weather turned.

He says, "You look like you near caught your death out in that mess," and looks for all the world like someone who does not know how to function in a crisis unless he is empowered to help in some way. please Wilde let him help, it's either that or more hovering.

"I'm f-fine," Wilde chattered, trying to rub some feeling back into his hands.

It was such an obvious lie, and as much as he didn't mind Emery hovering, he didn't much care to be fussed over. He shucked off the the green leather surcoat, the fleece trim damp with melting snow. The red coat underneath was also soaked, and he shed it, draping it over the back of a chair he set near the fire to dry.

For someone who gave the impression of a hermit farmer, Wilde sported quite a lot of tattoos. Most seemed almost like idle scribbles - looping lines and knots that bared no known significance. But one was much more detailed than the rest. Positioned just over his heart, depicted a skull and flute.

"There's blankets, upstairs. Clean. Just grab the whole lot. You'll need one as much as I will. The cold tends to creep in weather like this."

For now he needed a warm change of clothes and to boil some water.

The "upstairs" was more of a glorified loft. The wood floor was dry, old and creaked, though like the rest of the little cottage, everything was clean and well-kept. There was a bed, piled high with blankets and quilts just as Wilde said - all made from the heavenly soft wool his goats produced. There was also a loom, baskets of yarn, and scattered materials for making dyes set aside likely for spring and summer.

(There is quite a lot about this particular moment that informs Emery, with the sudden force of a battering ram*, that Wilde is no longer the precocious boy who trotted along at Lorne's heels when they were lads growing up in the village. Those marks speak to a grown man's experiences.)

"Right," he says, watches after Wilde as he goes to boil the water. Then he comes back to himself, rubs absently at his beard, and heads for the stairs. He rests his walking stick against the wall near the foot of them, then heads up into the loft.

The blankets are found without difficulty, and Emery is too much a habitually orderly person not to fold each one into a neat stack before he carries then back downstairs. He pauses when he catches sight of the dyeing materials and lingers over them with a practitioner's interest, then returns to the stairs and heads back down.

"Blankets," he announces, and carries them over to whatever surface looks cleanest to set them down.

--
(* it's the battering ram of repressed bisexuality)

Eleven years make quite the difference. Wilde changed out the rest of his wet things, and pulled on a fresh, clean pair of long braies and a plain tunic. But he also hadn't missed Emery's lingering look, and so the tunic was left mostly unlaced while Wilde dried off the damp, chilly goat nestled close to Gerta.

Wilde sidled up to Emery, "accidentally" bumping shoulders as he picked a blanket off the pile with an uttered thanks.

He watched him out the corner of his eye, trying to gauge his reaction, just to make sure it wasn't just his imagination or some sort of weird wishful thinking.

"Grab one for yourself," Wilde urged, before disappearing into the larder for some supplies. Nothing like warmed goatsmilk mixed with honey, ginger and cloves on a night like this.

He misses Wilde's (carefully calculated) approach, eyes having been drawn towards the windows as the wind rattles them in their frames again, but he turns when he feels the warmth of another human body touching his, however briefly.

"--oh," he starts, and then, "of course," at Wilde's words of thanks, and it takes him a fraction of a second longer than it should have to recognize that another man probably would have politely stepped aside to make more room. It's precisely what he would have done himself, and yet he hadn't, and the reason for why is not so mysterious to him as he'd like.

(It had not been that mysterious to him even three decades ago, when he and Bertram had huddled together for warmth in their lean-tos on the eve of that last skirmish between Cliffside and Black Rock, before they deserted the army.)

Wilde says, "Grab one for yourself," and Emery says, "Right," again, repeating himself both in word and in deed; because his eyes follow Wilde as he walks away until he disappears from sight. He exhales and reaches up to rub a hand across his eyes and the bridge of his nose, then picks up a blanket for himself and goes to one of the chairs near the fire. Once there he has to ease himself down into it, for the cold always causes the old injury in his left knee to act up. He stretches it out with a small sound of discomfort, but already the proximity to the fire is loosening the tight tendons and ligaments. (Would that a bit of fire could provide relief from other ailments--or desires he'd thought he'd left behind as juvenile fantasies.)

The cottage was pleasantly warm despite the raging blizzard, but even with its sturdy stone walls and bits of oil cloth stuffed into every crack Wilde could find, a draft would occasionally slip through - under the door or from some hidden cranny Wilde hadn't discovered yet.

While Emery brooded, Wilde mixed the milk, honey, and spices in a saucepan, warming it over the fire until it was just shy of bubbling.

He was sure he wasn't mistaken at this point, though he doubted that's what Emery had in mind when he trudged up here. But chasing ghosts left you seeing them in the strangest places - Wilde certainly had no place to judge. Emery's cheekbones and mannerisms had left his own mind wandering to better days with Captain Arvid. Maybe they both weren't thinking clearly.

When he'd finished and poured, Wilde stood unnecessarily close at Emery's side, proffering the cup.

"You do seem tense," he noted. "Is this a problem?"

Whatever 'this' was, or was going to be.

Whatever 'this' was now, it would undoubtedly become something he could never share with his family, or bring to confession at the vicarage when he attended matins and vespers. Even if he does the sensible thing, even if he feigns ignorance of or obliviousness to the intent behind Wilde's close proximity, the skin that he has left carefully exposed, that quiet question, "Is this a problem?" Very little would change, for it's his awareness of the thing that matters.

It's always been isolating, and terribly lonely, and so would it be the most unforgivable thing in the world if he sought to alleviate that for a little while?

He pushes himself carefully up from the chair and reaches out to take the mug from Wilde. Their fingers, and his mouth twists into a bittersweet sort of smile. "I ought to be the one asking that question, I should think," he answers, quietly abashed, and breathes in the comforting aroma of the milk and spices. "Seeing as I'm the one taking advantage of your hospitality." (The hospitality of a very young man, his son's childhood friend; that goes without saying.)

He looks up from the mug to meet Wilde's eyes, searching his expression for--something, and takes the most cautious of steps forward into his orbit.

Wilde's inquisitive expression gentled into a soft, wistful smile as their fingers brushed, his own lingering against Emery's until the cup is finally taken from him.

"Well," Wilde shrugged, "there's nothing for it on a night like this."

As excuses went, it was a pretty paltry one, but if Emery was going to grapple to rationalize this, Wilde might as well toss him a rope. He leaned up against the arm of the chair, not quite sitting, not quite standing and his gaze drifting over Emery's face, down to linger on the the laces of his jerkin.

"It's not like I offer this to every pilgrim off the path," he added.

As far as jerkins go, it's a nice one, made of durable, good quality fabric that someone of Emery's station would be expected to have access to. The colour of it has faded, though, from the vibrant red that it probably was once upon a time, to something more like mauve. The threads that keep it closed are frayed some at their edges.

"It's not like I offer this to every pilgrim off the path."

At that he chuckles once, the corners of his eyes crinkling fondly. "I'd never have presumed," he replies, lifts up the mug for a drink, then lowers it again and sets it aside. For a moment his hand hovers, as though he's uncertain of where to put it, before allowing his fingers to gently rest against Wilde's on the arm of the chair. The tips of his fingers are callused from hours spent with a quill in hand, stained slightly from ink, but long accustomed to delicate work. And there is a delicacy to how his touch lingers against Wilde's skin, as though prepared to withdraw quickly.

He purses his lips, and then, "Wilde, if I've got it wrong..." He trails off into unguarded silence, waiting.

Wilde curled his palm upwards, and drew Emery's hand to his chest.

"You haven't," he reassured. It was easier to talk about it like this - without putting it into exact words. No sense scaring Emery off.

He guided his hand down the open tunic, along the bare skin of his chest before finally settling it on a sturdy thigh. Wilde was built lean and nimble, but there was an undeniable sturdiness to him, and Emery's hand was lovely and warm.

"When you're ready, we can head upstairs," he said gently, barely audible over the wind buffeting the cottage which stood resolute against the storm.

Well, there was no misunderstanding that, was there? Emery's dark eyes follow the path his fingers take as Wilde guides them across his bare chest, looking up only his hand comes to rest on Wilde's thigh. He carefully slides his hand upwards towards Wilde's hip, and in the back of his mind he's heartened to note that beneath the fabric of his braies, Wilde feels warm again.

"Lead the way."

Life, as ever, goes on in Northcliff Pass, even when blanketed so heavily with snow that one can barely get out of the house. They're accustomed to this by now. All the same, it's nice to see activity in the marketplace, both permanent shops and the more temporary stalls.

Particularly nice today to see an old familiar face. Lorne isn't intending on doing any shopping, but when he sees a handsome goat sprawled out beside a wagon he can't help but stop.

"Wilde?" Lorne smiles, small and surprised. He gives a laugh and trudges over, gesturing to the piles of snow. "What on earth possessed you to come down the mountain in all this?"

"Shallower drifts, and level ground," Wilde delivered - uncharacteristically deadpan from the loud and brash youth Lorne would remember trailing after him. He hopped down from his perch on the cart, extending a hand to greet an old friend. He had fond memories of Lorne who'd tolerated both his impetuousness and ceaseless questions.

"It's good to see you again. Did you wind up joining the guard?"

Wilde definitely seems calmer than Lorne remembers, but that often happened with age and experience. He himself is no exception, though he's always been a bit reserved. Lorne takes Wilde's hand and shakes it gladly.

"You as well. And yes, I did," he confirms, releasing his friend. "I was serving elsewhere for the past few years, though. Near a decade now, actually. I only moved home about two and a half months ago." Lorne has visited when he could, but it has been quite a while since the two have seen each other by his accounting. "How are you? The goats must be doing well." If the array of cheeses and wool is any indication, they're healthy and productive even in the depths of winter.

"I was gone for a time as well," Wilde admitted, "came back about three winters ago, but I haven't been down to the village until after father passed."

It seemed they'd both thought the grass was greener on the other side of the fence until they actually got there. Or maybe something else had driven Lorne home - the middle of the market didn't seem the place to pry.

"The goats are certainly doing well though. The summer was good to us this year. I imagine guard work here is quiet?"

Oh, if only he knew.

"I'm sorry for your loss," Lorne says honestly, and leaves it at that. Whether about his father or his travels, Wilde can choose to speak of them or not, and Lorne won't press either. He knows what it's like to lose a parent.

His expression pinches a little at the last. "It usually is, yes. Duke Galein's soldiers being camped here has caused significant tensions. Most are barely more than boys, but some... I'd stay away from them if you can."

"Thank you. And no need - I've seen how Commander Brickenden talks to his men."

When the Commander deigned to speak with them at all and didn't just. Yell. Or delegate.

"The people certainly seem brow-beaten. I take it his men are overstepping?"

"You could call it that. Most keep to themselves, but when there's been trouble the soldiers are essentially able to do as they please," Lorne relates ruefully. All things considered, it could have been much worse than the few incidents that have happened. Or it could still be.

His gaze slants towards the magnificently sprawled goat, and the corner of his mouth twitches up. "If they come see your wares, they might think twice about bothering you as long as he's around."

"They're the Duke's men, aren't they?"

It would explain why those who weren't scared out their britches were strutting around the place like peacocks.

"Pehj is a rather good deterrent," Wilde agreed. And if potentially getting gored by a giant, angry goat didn't do the trick, the sword and bow usually persuaded others to leave Wilde alone.

Pehj, with almost uncanny intelligence in his eyes, perked up at the sound of his name, and stood, padding over to Lorne to see if he could sniff out snacks or the adulation he thought he was due.

"Not everyone is so lucky though," he said, tugging back on Pehj's reins. "Is there any way I can help?"

"They are," Lorne confirms, nodding grimly.

Then Pehj comes in search of food or affection, and that would lighten almost any sour mood. "Hello, Pehj," he greets, keeping a hand at the level of the goat's horns while offering the other to be sniffed. Lorne is familiar with goats, though not nearly of Pehj's size. Unfortunately he has no treats to give.

"Stay out of trouble," he tells Wilde dryly. "And keep others that way, too, if you can manage it safely. The last thing we need is a scuffle turning into an all-out brawl." A beat, and he adds, "You've certainly grown more levelheaded."

"We all have to grow up sometime," Wilde said.

Pehj found Lorne's attention perfectly agreeable, though the goat still gave testing nibbles at pockets or pouches or loose folds of clothing. You know. Just in case.

"I don't intend to start anything," he assured, with the unspoken implication that if, indeed, something was started, he may not be the instigator but he would absolutely finish it. "Have they picked out specific people or families to target, or are they more opportunistic?"

Lorne gently dissuaded Pehj from nibbling too enthusiastically, keeping the goat's mouth where he could see it. In the future, he'll try to remember to bring some treats. As far as growing up, Lorne only wonders what Wilde has seen in his time away from home. Or perhaps he was always bound to mellow.

He is grateful for the implication that Wilde will step in to halt fights, if he sees them. The Watch can only cover so much ground between the three of them.

"Opportunistic mostly. Some focus on the oddballs in town; anyone who sticks out tends to get more attention," Lorne explained. Such as Tuo. "I think it's boredom, and the rabble aren't satisfied with cards or music. Hopefully the snow will keep them all too busy and too tired to bother anyone."

It's wishful thinking, and it won't get in the way of his vigilance.

Another tug on Pehj's reins finally gets the goat away from trying to suss out hidden snacks, and he made a huff of disappointment before throwing himself down dramatically in his corner.

Won't no one think of his needs?

"I'll make a few rounds then, as long as I'm in the village. If I spot anything, I'll notify the guards, of course."

Unless he'd need to make a hasty getaway. But you know. Good law-abiding citizen and all that. Maybe some of his impertinence still lingered yet.

The corner of Lorne's mouth turned up. Impertinence tempered by experience can be valuable; he trusted Wilde would apply it judiciously.

"Thank you." Wilde doesn't have to do this, but the offer is welcome. The Watch is terribly outnumbered by the soldiers, and their authority limited by comparison. "While I'm here, I ought to take some of that cheese off your hands," he said, more relaxed on this topic. Fresh cheese in winter was a treat. "How often do you think you'll come down?"

Just so he can make sure Wilde is doing well; it can be difficult to keep an eye on those who lived well outside the town walls, but they were still a part of the community.

Wilde gestured to the mountain of cheese wheels. Some were herbed and carried the additional scent of garlic, others mixed with chopped nuts, some aged, some quite fresh. Help yourself Lorne, there's a lot.

"I can come down for a day or two every week, snows willing. With the thaw coming, it should be easier - but I suspect by then the soldiers will have moved on."

Gods willing, anyway.

"Hopefully, yes." Lorne wasn't about to place any bets on it. Between the weather and the war, the soldiers might be here for far longer than anyone anticipated. Assuming their move to the mines didn't result in an early demise.

He considered the various cheeses and selected three, one for Colin and two for the Ward house. With four of them in the house, it wouldn't take long to go through it all. "I'll look forward to seeing you when you're here, and not simply for an extra pair of eyes," Lorne said, reaching for the coin purse at his belt. "Don't make me come up there and find you having broken something by being incautious," he added, ribbing his old friend.

Johanna did not live in a place that was easily accessed by random wandering. It took really very pointed wandering to arrive at her doorstep and, frankly, somewhat more effort to get onto her roof. The waterwheel covered most small sounds (for instance: the sounds of hooves on the ceramic tiles) but nothing, neither the gods' nor any creation of man, could have covered the unbridled screaming of that goat. In the early morning air, why, it carried so well that Johanna would not have been shocked to hear an echo of it come back off the mountains.

As it was, Pehj managed to wake Johanna from a dead sleep and did so with such a startling abruptness that she actually started and tumbled from her bed. It screamed again, once she was awake, and she stared up at the roof in mixed alarm and groggy anger as she scrambled to her feet and charged out the front door.

This was where she found a young man gesturing and whispering loudly toward her rooftop. She glowered at him blearily, her dark hair askew at all sorts of strange angles and her whole face still mussed with sleep. Her chemise was an overtly lacy affair and, had she been from Maireglenne she might have been embarrassed to be seen in it. She was not from Maireglenne and, despite the flowy garment being both ridiculously inappropriate to be seen out in, as well as being far too thin for the weather, she stalked out, barefoot and bristling, to give this young man a piece of her mind.

She jabbed him square in the chest with her finger before even saying so much as hello.

"Do you know what time it is?" Johanna demanded, her tone rough from sleep. "Why in the world are you out here screaming at the ass-crack of dawn?"

And, in timing so delightful that it might as well have been a defense, Pehj screamed from the roof again.

Wilde startled and then hung his head in utter shame.

In any other circumstance, he might have asked if Johanna was cold in her bare feet and impractical nightdress. Perhaps offer his surcoat to keep her shielded from the winter air because he hadn't been raised in a barn*. As it was, all he could manage was to point at aforementioned goat who had now migrated to the chimney.

It is important to note at this time that this is why Wilde didn't really bother keeping more than one cockerel at the homestead. He already has plenty of large animals content to scream their heads off at the crack of dawn at the most minor inconvenience.

"I don't suppose you have a ladder," Wilde asked sheepishly to the fuming woman.

"AAAAAAAaaaaAAAA!" Pehj screamed to an uncaring universe at large.

*(Actually, he practically had been. Probably not the best figure of speech.)

He pointed and Johanna turned, gradually, and with an expression that was split, evenly, between fury and resignation. It was an odd look. She saw the assorted sets of hoofprints on her roof, she saw the places where large lines of snow had been disturbed and fallen to crush the plants sheltered by the awning. She then spied Pehj on her chimney.

He screamed.

Johanna stared for a long moment and then scrubbed her hand over her face.

"No, I don't," she responded, her tone carrying the threat of impending shouting without actually being shouting of any kind. She looked back at the boy and then sighed again.

"Come on," she ordered, the irritation in her voice less restricted, and marched back toward the house.

The only way for a normal creature to get onto her roof was to stop the waterwheel entirely and climb up it. If they wanted to retrieve the goat, that was what they would have to do. It was a cumbersome and difficult process that would result in both of them getting soaked in icy river water. She was going to make him do most of the work.

Wilde shot one more disgruntled look at Pehj and then followed after Johanna. He didn't even bother an attempt at the dread 'small talk' - neither of them seemed in the mood for it and frankly he just wanted to get his goat off her roof.

"...So how exactly am I getting up there?"

Only the important questions, of course. He hoped there was a trap door leading up to the roof or something of that ilk.

He really hoped so.

"It's fine," comes the amiable reply, and a gap-toothed ginger youth lifts his mug to Wilde. "Been a lot more crowded in here since they showed up." He doesn't say anything against the soldiers, per se, but something in his otherwise cheerful expression belies a tension and irritation.
This is the closest Finian gets to saying he hates someone.

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Blue Blue Caravan

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Market!

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Hammer & Spoke