|
|
- Headmasters have powers at their disposal
- with which Prime Ministers have never been invested.
-Winston Spencer Churchill
Winter
The forest of Erinor was silent, the normal sounds of the forest muffled by the falling snow, broken only by the occasional wet thud of snow falling from the boughs of the surrounding Ironwood Pines. Closer in to Alaric’s cabin, the air was scented by the smoke of the fireplace, the pungent gray cloud rising from the chimney and settling around the house in the cold, dense morning air.
Inside the snug cabin, Alaric woke to the snap of pine on the fire, and the sound of Kadin moving around in the great room. Alaric stretched and, with a great yawn, rolled to his feet to greet the day. Stamping his feet into a pair of fur lined boots, he made his way into the great room to find his foster son and apprentice hard at his studies.
“Good morning, son, already hard at it, I see,” Alaric ventured.
“Yes sir, I wanted to get through this book on trapping before you started teaching me how to do it. I thought it might help me pick up the skills faster if I knew something about it before we got started,” Kadin replied.
Seeing Alaric approach the kitchen, Kadin said, “I went ahead and made breakfast, Dad. I thought you might like to have something warm this morning, so I made porridge and sweetened it with honey.”
“Not a bad choice, son, I think that sounds like a great idea. Do we have any cream this morning?”
“I already milked the cows this morning and put the milk in the cold box, Dad, it has been in there long enough for the cream to separate.”
Reaching into the cabinet for a bowl, Alaric served himself a bowl of the porridge, placed a dollop of butter in the middle and, reaching for the milk in the cold box, carefully poured the lighter cream from the pewter milk pitcher onto his porridge, before returning the pitcher to the cold box built into the wall of the kitchen.
As Alaric ate, he observed the youth who had become the center of his life over the last seven months or so. Alaric took note of Kadin’s look of focused concentration as he worked his way through the book in his hands, gradually absorbing the material, his eyes growing unfocused from time to time as he considered the import of some new fact or concept he had learned.
When Alaric had mentioned that he was going to begin teaching Kadin about winter survival and trapping, the youth had reacted with enthusiasm, not only wanting to learn a new set of skills, but also wanting to make a bigger contribution to helping their small family thrive. Another consideration was the fact Alaric had impressed on Kadin that should anything happen to him, the youth would be on his own in an increasingly unfriendly world, and that he needed to learn the skills necessary to survive and thrive on his own.
Finishing his breakfast, Alaric quickly cleaned his bowl and the cook pot. He and Kadin had come to an agreement early on: if Kadin cooked, Alaric would clean up. If Alaric cooked, Kadin did the cleanup; and since each cooked about half the meals, the workload balanced itself out.
Alaric was quickly dressed for the day, and returned to the great room, ready to begin the day’s lessons. Prying Kadin away from his book was always a challenge, but he eventually had the book put away and the youth’s attention focused on him.
“Kadin, the first thing I want to go over with you is how to dress in cold weather. It is critical in winter weather that the clothing you wear be able to keep you warm and dry, without allowing you to overheat. You want to wear a base layer of clothing made from wool, as wool will insulate even when it is wet. Most other fabrics will not, and wool will wick sweat from your skin and allow it to evaporate, helping to keep you warm. Do you have all that?”
Seeing the boy’s head nod in the affirmative, Alaric continued, “The next point to remember, son, is that you want to wear many layers of clothing. Many thin layers work better than a couple of heavy layers because you can easily shed the thin layers as you heat up when working, maintaining a constant temperature, and then replace them as you cool off. It is extremely important not to allow yourself to overheat in cold weather, son, because if you soak your clothes with sweat, it will saturate the fabric and freeze, and clothing with ice in it can’t keep you warm.”
Matching actions to words, Alaric had gradually been adding additional layers to his indoor clothing until he was garbed as he would for an extended trip into the winter woods. He then demonstrated how to add the white winter over-cloak on top of his winter gear, explaining, “The white cloak will enable us to move nearly unseen in snowy conditions, especially if it is foggy or snowing. This is especially important when hunting, something we will need to do shortly. When we go out today, we will take our bows in addition to the trap lines, just in case we happen across a deer or elk.”
Before proceeding further, Alaric removed the additional clothing layers to enable him to work in the warm cabin without overheating. He then broke out a trap line and demonstrated how to set a trap safely, and how to anchor it, explaining that he would demonstrate baiting and concealing a trap when they were in the woods. He then pulled a pair of pack frames from the wall and demonstrated how to load the pack frame, keeping the heavier items near the bottom to avoid having the pack overbalance its wearer, and showing how to pack the items that were needed on a regular basis, like a compass, matches, and snack foods, where they could be accessed easily.
With both packs loaded, Alaric guided Kadin through dressing in his new winter clothing before leading the youth outside to the barn, where he pulled down a pair of sleds with ski-like runners affixed to the bottom.
“Kadin, for short trips, a pack works fine, but for longer trips, where you plan to be out for several days, the best approach is to load your supplies onto a drag sled like these. They also give you a way of packing the furs we will be collecting and bringing them back to the cabin. I want you to watch how I load my sled, and then we’ll have you load yours while I watch, okay?”
Seeing the boy’s nod, Alaric showed Kadin how to load the pack onto the frame of the sled and how anchor the cargo with a criss-crossed lashing, and how to tie the lashing using loop knots that would be easy to untie even when crusted with snow or ice. Alaric then loaded the traps into a canvas bag which he then lashed to the frame along with the emergency shelter.
With his sled loaded, Alaric demonstrated how to shoulder the drag harness and how to move through the snow while wearing snowshoes, before allowing Kadin to begin loading his own sled. Alaric made a few adjustments to Kadin’s packing technique, explaining why he was changing things as he worked his way from one end of the sled to another. Judging things ready to go, he handed the youth his snowshoes, while heading into the cabin to bank the fire and lock the cabin by means mundane and magical.
With the cabin secured, Alaric joined Kadin at the sleds and aided him as he shrugged his way into the harness of the drag sleigh. Shouldering his own load, he set off to the east, setting an easy pace, allowing Kadin to adjust to the workload and settle into the rhythm of steadily setting one snowshoe in front of the other, a skill that developed slowly, as one must walk with a slightly wider stance to avoid one snowshoe being caught by the frame of the other.
The pair gradually worked their way deeper into the forest and eventually reached the banks of a small river that fed into the Silver River as it wound its way from the Great Silver Lake towards the Gulf of Naxos far to the southeast. Kadin allowed his attention to wander for a moment, taking in the virginal beauty of the scene, and when he returned his attention to where Alaric had been, found his mentor had disappeared. Kadin began to panic for a moment, before realizing that Alaric wouldn’t just take off without saying anything and looked at where his tracks had taken him. Seeing they disappeared under the drooping foliage of a massive Hinoke Cypress, Kadin began trudging his way towards the tree, following his foster father’s tracks.
Kadin entered under the canopy of the tree and found his father had already set a small fire pit and was in the process of building up a mattress of small fir boughs. Seeing he was behind, Kadin quickly set to work getting a mattress of his own set up. Once satisfied it would be comfortable enough, Kadin neatly placed his bedroll across the natural mattress before turning to his mentor to see what was next. Alaric reached for the canvas trap bag and handed a smaller bag with bait to Kadin.
Leaving the shelter, Kadin and Alaric headed back into the weather with their traps, heading for the river with their load of traps. Reaching the west bank of the small river, Alaric started by leading them upriver towards a beaver dam just visible a hundred meters or so further up the watercourse.
Alaric began, “Kadin, beavers are excellent engineers, and will immediately react to any damage to their dam or their lodge. Since we can’t safely get to their lodge, we will cause a small break in the surface of the dam, which will cause the beaver to come out to investigate. What we will do is place the trap in the break, just under the surface of the water, and anchor it in place. When the beaver comes up to repair the dam, it will trip the trap and we’ll be able to come back and bag the catch.”
Setting to work, Alaric carefully walked out onto the dam and showed Kadin how to open a small breach in the dam with his staff, and how to carefully place and anchor the trap. Once he had shown the boy how it was done, he pulled the trap up and had Kadin set and place the trap back in position before leading them on to yet another location he had scouted.
“Kadin, we trap for beaver, mink, marten, and otters using similar techniques. Look up the slope of this small hill and tell me what you see?”
Carefully looking at the slope of the hill, Kadin replied, “I see that something has disturbed the snow, master, but do not know what caused it.”
Smiling at the boy, Alaric replied, “Those tracks are caused by otters engaged in one of their favorite winter activities. They love to ‘ski’ down the hills and then jump into the river to hunt for fish. Take a look at these tracks, son, and notice the webbing between the toes. The webbing helps the otters swim, and acts like a snowshoe when they are moving on the snow. Follow the tracks and see where they enter the water.”
Carefully following the tracks without treading on them himself, Kadin soon found that they all terminated into one slide-like drop into the river: one that would enable easy entrance to, and egress from, the water of the river.
“Master, would we place the trap just under the water where they have been going in and getting out?” the boy inquired.
“Absolutely right, my son,” Alaric replied. “Knowing how we set the beaver trap, how would you set this one?”
Kadin reached into the bag of traps and withdrew a slightly smaller trap and proceeded to demonstrate how he would place and anchor the trap, which he did after getting his mentor’s approval. Alaric then demonstrated how to minimize the signs of their presence before leading his apprentice away through several other locations setting traps for additional otters and beavers, and demonstrated the correct techniques for setting the smaller traps for mink and marten.
With the traps set for the smaller animals, Alaric led the boy back into the woods along a well traveled game trail and showed Kadin how to find the best locations where larger predators, like the red, blue, and silver fox, the wolf, and the coyote hunted for unwary elk, deer, and rabbits. Alaric showed how to recognize the animals by their tracks, and how to tell the type of fox by carefully examining the tracks for hair that had been shed.
“Kadin, you have to be careful in how you set these traps. They are bigger and more powerful, because we want to take the animal cleanly and not cause undue suffering. Having said that, even with the best equipment and intentions, sometimes it does not kill cleanly, and the animal must be killed from a distance with your bow. I want your promise you won’t try and do anything foolish like attempting to dispatch a wounded animal with a knife.”
“I understand, Dad, I promise to do what you’ve showed me and not to do anything foolish.”
With that promise in hand, Alaric showed Kadin how to place and bait the first trap, before moving on to the next location, where he had Kadin take over placing the traps. When, at last, the rest of the traps had been placed, the pair moved through the darkening landscape, heading back to their shelter for the night. As they moved through the woods like a pair of ghosts, Alaric suddenly raised his right hand, bringing the pair to a silent halt. Motioning Kadin forward, Alaric whispered, “Tell me what you hear?”
Pausing to listen for anything out of the ordinary, Kadin eventually responded in a whisper, “I hear something moving through the snow, along with a scraping sound, Dad.”
“What you’re hearing son, is the sound of a few deer moving the snow off the grass so that they can feed. I know you have to be tired son, but do you think you could help me pack a deer out if it meant a steak dinner tonight?” Alaric whispered back.
“Sure, Dad, you know I love a good steak,” the boy replied quietly with his normal ready grin.
“Okay, Kadin, get your bow ready and we’ll see if you can take your first deer.”
Kadin quickly pulled his bow from his shoulder and strung it as he had been taught. Nocking an arrow, the pair slowly moved toward the sounds in the snow. Checking for any breeze and finding none, they proceeded directly ahead, using the time-honored method of taking a few slow steps and then pausing to examine the area, before slowly moving ahead again as quietly as possible.
After about ten tense minutes, the pair edged around a large Hinoke, when they caught sight of their quarry. The deer froze in place, sensing that something in their area had changed, but not seeing what it was. When nothing moved for several moments, they cautiously resumed their grazing. Allowing the deer to fall back into a false sense of security before moving, Kadin began raising his bow so slowly it was nearly imperceptible.
When the bow was finally pointed at a large buck with a massive rack of antlers, Kadin slowly brought his hunting arrow to full draw. With the bowstring gently touching his right cheek, Kadin slowly adjusted his aim point. When the boy was satisfied, the actual release was almost anticlimactic, as the arrow flew across the clearing and impacted the deer right in the kill zone behind the animal’s front shoulder. The buck looked up in shock, let out a surprised breath, and collapsed into the snow, as the balance of the herd bounded out of the clearing.
“Well done, son!” Alaric told his son, slapping him on the shoulder. “Let’s go get your deer.”
An hour later, the quarters of the deer, less two large steaks, had been hoisted high into the trees to cool, and protect them from predators, as the hunters prepared to dine on the rewards of the hunt. Alaric had started a small fire, heated a skillet with a bit of bacon grease, and then added the steaks. Once one side had been seared to perfection and flipped, he added the onion that Kadin had sliced and allowed the steaks to continue cooking for several more moments while the onions cooked.
Once dinner was ready, Alaric and Kadin dug into their respective steaks and onions with the gusto only understood by those who had worked up a strong appetite in the out of doors. After dealing with the dishes, Kadin settled into his bedroll and removed his shoes and outer layer, draping the cloaks across his bedroll to provide an additional measure of warmth as he settled in for the night. Alaric, seeing his boy nod off to sleep, banked the fire, removed his shoes, and slid into his own bedroll, turning off the magical light with a muttered incantation and wave of his hand.
Over the next several weeks, the father and son duo ranged farther and farther from the cabin, gradually adding trap lines and collecting the pelts of the animals their traps had snared. While each was responsible for his own trap lines, they always operated from a common camp, enabling Alaric to continue working with Kadin on his increasingly powerful shaman skills.
The small family found itself in their warm and comfortable home for the celebration for the mid-winter festival. At the celebration of the winter solstice, the peak of the holiday season, Kadin was thrilled when Alaric, standing in for Papa Noël, presented him with two things: the first being a fine cloak of forest green, lined with ermine in tacit recognition of his status as a member of the Alvar royal house, the sigils of his status as a secondary echelon shaman picked out with metallic silver thread across its hood. The second of the two gifts turned out to be the elvin silver steel reinforced leather armor he had ordered months earlier. The cloak had been magically augmented to enable it to shed water and stains. The armor had been magically enhanced to improve its resistance to weapon strikes, and both were spell-enhanced to enable them to grow as Kadin himself did, meaning they would always fit exactly right, something Alaric had spent considerable effort in getting exactly right.
Kadin had placed considerable thought into the gift for his foster father. Lacking the funds to simply buy a fine gift, he had considered and discarded idea after idea, before finally stumbling across the one gift he could give his dad, in an old spell book, that would truly show how he felt: the ancient blood bonding ceremony.
This ancient spell went far beyond the human blood brother ceremony, where hands were cut and blood mingled. This spell conveyed the blood of the giver to the intended receiver, along with all the benefits. In this case, it would gift Alaric with the language, lifespan, enhanced senses, and rapid healing abilities of the Alvar. The simple truth was that Kadin loved his dad and could not bear to see him die of advanced old age while Kadin himself remained a young man to all intents and purposes.
Kadin had practiced the spell until it was committed to memory before the solstice and, after putting his gifts away in his room, approached Alaric in the great room while they were home.
“Dad, I’d like to give you my gift now,” as he handed Alaric his silver steel dagger.
Seeing the dagger being presented to him hilt first, Alaric was puzzled why Kadin would offer the dagger to him. “Son, I already have a dagger, and if I were to take this one, you would be without one.”
“No, Dad, you don’t understand. I’m not offering you my dagger as a gift. I’m offering you the gift of an Alvar blood bonding,” Kadin replied. “I would be honored if you would accept this gift.”
Alaric was stunned momentarily with the magnitude of what his son was offering. The bonding ceremony would, for all intents and purposes, make him an Alvar, with a lifespan easily ten times what he could normally have expected, a higher quality of life, to make no mention of the magical benefits of gaining access to the learning of the Alvar. While thrilled with what his son was offering, Alaric wanted to be sure this wasn’t something being done out of a sense of obligation.
“Kadin, my son, I am honored beyond words at what you are offering, but need to be sure of something first. Why are you offering me this gift?”
Kadin quickly sheathed his dagger and looked into his father’s eyes before he quietly replied, “You stepped in and saved my life, when you could have walked away. You have become my teacher, mentor, and guide, spending your time and energy on my behalf, far beyond what is strictly necessary. But the most important reason is that you’ve gone far beyond being my mentor, and have become something I never had, a true father. While I honor he who was my father, I never knew him, as he passed to the Blessed Isles while I was still in the womb of she who was my mother. Dad, you opened your heart and soul to me, making me your son in every way that matters. I want to give this to you because I love you.”
Alaric couldn’t help but be moved to tears by Kadin’s simple declaration as he reached out and pulled the boy into a firm hug. “I love you too, my son, and accept this gift you have freely offered.”
Smiling up at Alaric, Kadin pulled free from the hug before reaching down and pulling his bag of ward cubes from his belt, and began moving a few items out of the way to clear an open space for the ward circle. Setting the cubes, Kadin quietly worked his way through the activation sequence before testing the strength of the crimson-tinged hemisphere that enclosed them. Satisfied that the ward would prevent the entry of any evil or foul thing, he returned his attention to Alaric.
Kadin moved to stand before his foster father, before smiling as he knelt and pulled Alaric down into the same position. Once both were comfortably situated, facing each other, Kadin then drew the dagger from the scabbard at his side. Placing the edge of the blade in the palm of his left hand, the boy tensed before decisively pulling the blade across his palm. Seeing the blood welling in his cupped hand, Kadin extended the blade hilt-first to Alaric, who quickly repeated the boy’s actions before returning the dagger to his son.
Kadin quickly clasped his left hand with that of his father before invoking the protection of higher powers with a bowed head, “Vindayin, Goddess of the Alvar and Elvin peoples, protector of the green places, please lend us your protection this night, and your blessing for that which I am about to attempt.”
Before Kadin could proceed with the balance of the ceremony, both Kadin and Alaric felt the presence of a transcendent being and, glancing about, both saw the misty form of the Goddess Vindayin patiently standing outside the ward circle, her gaze plainly requesting admittance into the circle. Kadin quickly concentrated and whispered the control sequence allowing him to open a portal for Vindayin to enter. Once inside, he quickly closed the portal behind her.
Vindayin quickly stepped forward and, leaning forward, placed a hand on Kadin and Alaric’s shoulders, and said, “Kadin, I had hoped you would come to this conclusion, when I placed you in Alaric’s care. I am pleased beyond words that the two of you have found each other and are binding yourselves, one to the other, in this fashion. Kadin, may I recommend you proceed?”
Kadin bowed his head at her suggestion, saying, “Of course, my Goddess, I know you may not remain in this realm long.”
Kadin focused his attention for a moment, and suddenly his signet ring was visible on his right hand. Carefully removing it from his ring finger, Kadin wormed the ring; its narrow bottom side first, between their clasped left hands. Staring deeply into the six ray reflection from the cabochon cut ruby in the center of his signet, Kadin quickly centered himself before beginning the most important spell he had ever attempted. Entering a calm, meditative state, he automatically slowed and steadied his breathing, allowing his awareness of the room to slide away as he focused on the flows of magical energy in the surrounding forest. Gathering that energy unto himself, he uttered the spell, phrased in ancient Alvar, as he himself began to glow with a nimbus of crimson colored energy:
“Let the high magic of the Alvar join these two beings: sharing and passing the high magic from one who is Alvar, and allowing it to infuse every fiber of the other’s being. Join this man to the Alvar people, as he has bound himself as a father to his son. As it was done in ages past, let it be done now, fiat, fiat, fiat, voluntuas mea!”
(“Let the high magic of the Alvar join these two beings: sharing and passing the high magic from one who is Alvar, and allowing it to infuse every fiber of the other’s being. Join this man to the Alvar people, as he has bound himself as a father to his son. As it was done in ages past, let it be done now, fiat, fiat, fiat, voluntuas mea!”)
As the incantation concluded, the nimbus of energy suddenly engulfed Alaric, who went rigid, his eyes wide, as the energy washed over his form, changing him to the core of his being. As quickly as the energy had washed over Alaric, it was suddenly gone, and Alaric collapsed onto the thick bearskin rug they were kneeling upon. Kadin was hovering on the edge of consciousness when Vindayin steadied him, pouring energy back into the exhausted boy, who began to recover as the energy transfer began to take hold.
Vindayin reached out to brush Kadin’s blond hair out of his eyes before she smiled at him, “Kadin, you have done well, my son. I am extremely proud of you and how hard you work to learn and grow. I am even prouder of how you have come to love the father I found for you and the wild green places I love so. This was a noble gift: one your father will never forget. Your slight alteration of the spell has also done what you intended: as far as the courts of the elder races are concerned, Alaric is now of the Alvar; more, by your actions, he is now a member of the house of Aradan.”
“What do you mean, my Goddess? I only meant to bind myself to him: son to father.”
“Kadin, by including your signet in the ceremony, you have done a great deal more. Open your hand and you will see what I mean.”
Kadin turned his attention to his left hand, which was still clasped in his father’s. Opening his hand, he was startled to see that there were now two signet rings, where there had originally been only one. His ring was unchanged, but the second, while styled much the same, had a smooth round opal in its center, pulsing with a soft white light, surrounded by Alvar script which read:
Alaric, Prince of Aradan, Father of Kadin
In the common tongue, this would read: Alaric, Prince of Aradan, Father of Kadin. Stunned, Kadin looked up at Vindayin, the unspoken questions plainly written on his young face.
“Kadin, by placing your signet into the bond, you not only made Alaric your father in the eyes of the elder races; you made him an adopted member of the house of Aradan: a prince in his own right. Because he is adopted, he is not in the direct line of succession; you will still be the next heir to the throne of The Greenwood.”
Smiling at the tired youth, Vindayin continued, “I also bear greetings from your grandfather and your brother Aric, and yes, they know you are alive and well. They wished for me to tell you that they love you and look forward to the day you can all be reunited as a family.”
As her smile broadened to a huge grin, she continued, “I can’t wait to tell them about the events of this night! They will be amazed!” Vindayin gushed in an almost girlish fashion before continuing, “Kadin, can you lower the ward for me? I must be away before my presence draws untoward attention to your home.”
“Of course, my Goddess, one moment, please.”
The golden haired youth quickly concentrated, murmured the deactivation cantrip, and collapsed the ward.
Before departing, Vindayin stepped forward and gave Kadin a hug before advising him, “Kadin, before you place that ring on your father’s hand, attune yourself to its unique energy pattern. It will enable you to find him at anytime, regardless of where he might be located. Talk with him once he is awake and alert and advise him about some of the features the ring imparts to you, features I know you have figured out on your own. Be good to each other, my son, remember I love you both, and that I shall see you anon.”
“I will, my Goddess, will you convey my best wishes to grandfather and Aric? Tell them I love them and look forward to seeing them again,” Kadin requested.
Getting a nod in acknowledgement, the Elvin Goddess of the Woods quickly disappeared.
Nearly a month after the events of the winter solstice found Alaric and Kadin out tending their trap lines in the backcountry of the forest of Erinor. Alaric was trudging along, his pack heavily laden, as he considered the changes of the last month. Kadin had taken him aside the morning he woke from the floor of the cabin, and advised him the bonding had happened correctly, and then explained the unexpected consequences to him. Alaric smiled as he thought about it, ‘Who would have thought it could happen? Me, becoming a prince of the Alvar!’
As he trudged along, he suddenly became aware that he was being trailed, as he neared one of his trap locations. Seeing the trap had a fine silver fox, he began to scan his surroundings, looking for the presence he sensed. Seeing tracks leading towards the river bank, Alaric cautiously approached, stringing his bow and nocking an arrow to be on the safe side.
As he reached the edge of the riverbank, he knelt as he paused to examine the tracks, when suddenly an orc charged him from an undercut area of the riverbank, its fangs extended, clearly intending that Alaric should join the orc for dinner, as the main course. The hapless orc, however, had not counted on the reaction time of Alaric, who stood, turned, and loosed an arrow into the orc, so quickly that the orc had no chance to avoid the arrow that thudded home into its chest, causing it to pause in its charge.
Enraged, the orc ripped the arrow free of its chest and continued towards Alaric, who readied three spinning ice blades and threw them as he backed away from the onrushing orc. The blades cut through the orc, turning it into five large steaming hunks of bloody meat as Alaric fell backwards, his left boot catching in between two branches of the deadfall he had tripped over.
As Alaric fell, the sudden silence was shattered by Alaric’s scream of pain as the bones of his lower leg snapped. Unable to bend enough to wrap around the bole of the deadfall, as his weight continued to pull them backwards, the bones snapped before his knee was able to remove the stress from his lower leg. Alaric’s upper body landed in the water of the river’s shallows, quickly soaking his upper body.
Biting back the pain of his lower leg and taking stock of his situation, Alaric knew he was in serious trouble. He was soaked, badly injured, and out of doors in freezing weather. Quickly working through his options, he remembered Kadin’s signet, and quickly turned his attention to finding his son. Searching for the ring’s unique energy pattern, Kadin was quickly located about three miles from where Alaric lay injured. Gathering his energy, Alaric put the pain and cold aside and centered his mind on the task of projecting a message into Kadin’s mind.
Several miles further north, Kadin had just completed cleaning the pelt of a mink and adding it to his pack, when he suddenly felt his father in his mind.
“Kadin, I have been injured badly and am in dire need of your help. I know you can focus on my ring and find me. Please, son, come quickly. Hurry!”
Sensing the urgency and pain, Kadin immediately shouldered the harness of his drag sled and locked his father’s location into his mind before setting off at as fast a pace as he could manage. Trudging through the forest, Kadin found his mind racing with thoughts of what he would find. Was he attacked, was it an accident, what happened? Kadin found he was unable to find a likely scenario where his father would not come out on top, and this only added to his anxiety. Still, he remembered the lessons that Alaric had drilled into him about not getting overheated in the backcountry, and avoided attempting to race to his father, maintaining a steady mile-eating pace.
Nearly an hour passed while Kadin struggled to reach Alaric, but eventually, Kadin reached the riverbank and saw his dad. Shrugging out of the drag harness, he shouted “Dad!” as he ran to his father’s side. Alaric was semi-conscious, but managed a pain-filled smile at his son.
“Dad, oh my Goddess. What do I do, Dad?” Kadin gasped out as he saw the broken leg.
Through the haze of his pain, Alaric knew he needed to steady the boy down, so he bit back the pain and told Kadin, “Son, remember what I told you about how every big job, no matter how overwhelming it may appear, is solved by breaking it down into smaller ones that are easily managed? This is one of those situations. Calm down and think this through, you’ll do fine.”
Hearing the pain in his father’s words, Kadin knew he needed to get himself under control. Brushing the tears from his eyes, he took a deep breath to calm himself before beginning to catalog what needed to be done. He knew he had to get his dad out of the water and warmed up, but saw that to do that, he would need to free his trapped leg first. Getting up, Kadin returned to his sled and returned with his hatchet and his healer’s kit. Opening the kit, he carefully considered his options before selecting two herbs, fire-root and bruisewort. The fire-root would act to raise Alaric’s internal temperature, while the bruisewort would act to deaden the pain that freeing the leg would cause.
“Dad, I need you to chew these two herbs before I work on freeing your leg.”
“What are they, son?”
“Bruisewort and fire-root, Dad. I need to deaden the pain as much as I can, and the fire-root will warm you up.”
Alaric took the herbs and immediately began chewing them, allowing Kadin to consider the best way to free Alaric’s leg. Seeing the two branches his leg was caught between, Kadin decided if he could cut one of them off, the leg would come free easily, allowing Kadin to cast a healing spell that would cause the bones to re-align and the damaged skin to heal. With the leg healed, he could get his dad out of the freezing water.
Stepping closer to the log, Kadin warned his dad about what he was going to do, and then advised Alaric to brace himself. Working carefully, Kadin slowly chopped into the three inch branch, cutting into it and gradually opening a ‘V’ shaped groove which he slowly proceeded to widen, cautiously cutting deeper and deeper into the branch. Eventually, only the bark on the back side of the branch was holding the branch in place, and Kadin carefully cut that away with his dagger. Pulling the branch away, he could see that Alaric’s leg was now free, and straightened as he prepared to cast his only healing spell on his dad’s leg.
“Dad, I’ve got your leg free and am about to cast a healing spell on it. You might want to spit out the herbs before I do, so you don’t choke on them by accident.”
Alaric complied with Kadin’s suggestion and braced himself for the pain he would feel, before telling him, “I’m ready, son.”
Kadin clasped his hands together as he centered himself and intoned the ancient healing spell. As the incantation was completed, Kadin’s hands began to glow with a crimson nimbus of power: the healing energy manifesting itself through Kadin’s hands.
Stepping forward, he gingerly applied his hands on either side of the break, ripping a gut-wrenching scream of agony from Alaric before he mercifully passed out. Kadin stood back and watched in amazement as the leg seemed to grow longer, the bones sliding back into the skin before the leg began to straighten and then return to its normal length, as the bones were knitted back together. By the time the crimson energy had faded, the only evidence of an injury was limited to two small pink spots that indicated where the bones had erupted through the skin.
Shaking off his bemusement, Kadin walked around, and after lifting Alaric’s leg free of the log, placed his arms under those of his father, and began walking backward towards the sled, getting Alaric out of the water. Leaning Alaric’s unconscious form against the back of the sled, Kadin quickly unloaded his sled, re-arranging the pelts and other cargo so that it would support Alaric. Kadin then dragged Alaric’s unresponsive form across the sled, using his arms and legs as levers to turn Alaric into the correct position on the sled.
Propping Alaric against the pack in the rear of the sled, Kadin began addressing the problem of Alaric’s wet clothing. Seeing that his pants were pretty dry, Kadin quickly removed the wet clothing from his upper body and then used a small wool towel to dry Alaric’s hair and upper body. Reaching for his bedroll, Kadin wrapped Alaric in the warm, dry blankets and then tied him to the sled, after drawing the cover across the sled, to keep snow and ice from undoing everything he had just accomplished.
Heading back to gather up his hatchet and knife, Kadin became aware of the hunks of orc that had cooled off to the side of where he had been working. ‘Well, I guess I know how Dad got backed into that tree,’ Kadin thought to himself. Spotting Alaric’s bow and quiver, Kadin gathered them up, and then returned to the log for his hatchet and knife. Stowing everything in its place on the sled, Kadin checked on Alaric, and finding him to be warming up, quickly covered him again.
Considering what to do next, Kadin noticed the silver fox frozen in the trap and proceeded to remove the creature from its trap. Securing the cargo to the sled, Kadin shouldered his tired body into the harness of the drag sled as he considered his destination. He could take Alaric back to the cabin, but they had several more trap lines that needed tending. Figuring that Alaric would be fine after a few days rest, Kadin decided to head for their current campsite, which was actually much closer. Leaning into the rigging, he took up the slack in the harness and began trudging slowly back to camp, his precious cargo gliding along behind him.