|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 Posted: Mon Aug 06, 2012 1:58 pm
 The celebration for captain Ruzanski's band returning from a very successful viking had come to an end after many days of hard core feasting. Halvdan did his best to sober up and get back to regular pride life. He was currently skulking around, trying to avoid bumping into someone he knew, and would be honour bound to talk to. There would be questions and there had already been some uncomfortable ones during the feasting. Those that knew him well were bound to notice that he tried to hide something.
The reaver sighed and made a face. Hopefully the interest would die down soon. Rumours spread quickly in the pride, but soon there would be some other piece of juicy gossip to pass around. That day couldn't come soon enough... He had just returned from a viking, and he was already itching to go out again. It would have been different if he had battled a mighty foe or brought home a pretty thrall. He wouldn't have had any trouble bragging about that!
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Mon Aug 06, 2012 2:55 pm
 As the youngest lawspeaker, Tuomas was presumed to have the most available space in his head for learning new things. At least that was what the older lawspeakers told him and he had never quite figured out whether they were joking when they said so. At any rate, it had been given to him to learn from Halvdan the story of what had befallen him during his prolonged absence from the pride.
Tomi didn't usually mind hunting down stories. In fact, most of the time if a lawspeaker announced they wanted to hear a story people clamored to tell theirs. That was the kind of pride he lived in. Everyone wanted their story to be committed to memory and made into a part of the pride's history and heritage. Everyone except the reaver Halvdan, it seemed, because Tomi had been doing his best to find him for the better part of three days and meeting with no success.
At last he had been forced to resort to staking out the spot where thralls brought the morning's kill for any freeborn lions who didn't choose to hunt for their own meals. The thralls Tomi had spoken to over the course of his hunt had told him that Halvdan tended to break his fast in this way. Now it was just up to Tomi to wait. It was very boring, and to amuse himself Tomi practiced tongue twisters in Old Stormborn.
"Tuulan ja Tuulin tuulinen tuuli tuulee talvella täällä ja tuolla."
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Wed Aug 08, 2012 2:13 pm
His stomach rumbled, and true to his habit he started to make his way to grab something fresh to eat. Halvdan rarely hunted unless he was out on a raid. He didn't need to, and he told himself it wasn't challenging to hunt regular prey beasts just to get some food. Now, taking down a rare beast or capturing a thrall on a raid, that was sport!
He nearly missed the lurking Lawspeaker, but the soft sound of the old language caught his attention. His ear swiveled in the direction of the noise, and moments later he turned his head too. s**t. He’d been told that the lawspeakers wanted to talk to him, and dutifully avoided all places they might be. But of course, they got hungry like any other lion. Halvdan made an attempt to dive behind a low bush before anyone spotted him. Unfortunately it was too late."There you are," one of the thrall's exclaimed, "We wondered when you'd turn up today Halvdan." Halvdan had to think on his feet, because he was not going to admit that he had tried to hide. He very much wanted to give the thrall a good beating, but perhaps not in front of one of the lawspeakers. There was no way Toumas hadn't heard that, so he did his best to save face and pretend his little leap had a perfectly logical explanation.
"There was a rat here," he shouted to the thrall and rattled the bush, "Can't you even make sure this place isn't overrun with vermin? It shouldn't be that hard..."
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Wed Aug 08, 2012 3:17 pm
Annchen You like my tongue twister? I found a whole website full of the things.
The youngest lawspeaker tried and failed to stifle a snort of laughter. Was he serious?
He stood up and strolled toward the bush Halvdan had attempted to hide behind. Not that he needed to explain himself, but there were any number of reasons for him to do so. The most obvious of them would be to see what was going on. Curiosity was no crime, and anyone would be curious after seeing Halvdan's behavior.
"Oh dear," Tomi deadpanned upon hearing the explanation Halvdan offered. "Rats. That is incredibly disappointing. I'm embarrassed to admit I hadn't noticed."
He smiled and gestured toward the space he'd occupied before, which was more than capable of comfortably seating two lions who wanted to have a nice, long chat. Or, in this case, a nice long interview. "There are no vermin over there. Why don't we have the thralls bring us a fresh, vermin-free kill?"
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Thu Aug 09, 2012 7:00 am
Princess_Feylin I meant the choice of character. smile I can't understand finnish, wrong language family for me.
"That sounds good; Lawspeaker," he said, and then called out to the nearest thrall, "You heard what Toumas said, get us a nice vermin-free meal!"
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Thu Aug 09, 2012 8:16 am
Annchen That's what I thought. That Finnish wasn't your language. But I wasn't positive.
He was asking about food because it seemed like a sort of sideways introduction to the subject he really wanted to discuss. He got the feeling that Halvdan was not particularly eager to tell his story, and ordinarily Tomi would have respected that and allowed him to have his secrets, but Tomi had received orders from on high that forced him to get the information out of the reaver somehow. It probably would be an interesting story, but judging by Halvdan's reluctance it might end up as more of a comedic tale with Halvdan playing the role of fool.
"Or are you relieved to be back to our diet of fish, goats, and the like?"
Tomi had initially been amazed upon coming to the pride that fish was considered nothing special since he had lived most of his life without ever eating it. Since then he had eaten most kinds of catchable fish and discovered that it really wasn't anything special.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Sat Aug 11, 2012 5:07 am
Halvdan was still somewhat suspicious, but he could do food questions. Easy, peasy. Lawspeakers were interested in the weirdest things apparently. He thought for a moment, trying to remember any culinary high points that Tomi might find interesting.
"It's good to be back," he said, "I tried some new foods, but it gets boring to hunt alone."
He tore into the meal delivered by a thrall before continuing. Halvdan realised that his words might have sounded as if he had to eat weird things because of a lack of hunting skills. He had turned to stealing at times, but it was to be expected by a reaver so he didn’t mention it. Hmmm... There was that one meal that might be of interest.
"I did taste something really odd," he said, "A large stranded sea monster. It was supposedly rare and delicious, but I found the taste strange and oily."
Whales rarely travelled up the fjord, and Halvdan was of the opinion that any larger creature from the sea could be sorted under 'sea monster'.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Sat Aug 11, 2012 6:16 pm
"That's true. I can't actually remember the last time I hunted for myself," Tomi mused. It had been when he was a thrall, actually. Probably it would be better not to remind anyone of that. Some people still thought there was something wrong about his advancement to the position he held even though he had earned it and been tested more rigorously than most other lawspeakers.
"A sea monster!" Tomi's eyes widened. "What did it look like?"
He had never seen a whale before, and probably would not easily understand the distinction between a whale and a large fish, but he would not mind being told about it. And then he could maybe segue from there into asking how Halvdan had come to encounter this beast.
"Did you have to kill it before you could taste it?"
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Sun Aug 12, 2012 4:57 am
"No, I did not kill it," Halvdan confessed, "There were several other carnivores eating from it, but the monster was large and there weren't really any fights over it. It had black slimy skin, and a mouth large enough to swallow even a Stormborn lion. No one bragged about hunting it down, so it might have stranded in a storm."
The other lions had acted as if the sea monster was worthy of a party, so perhaps it did feed on lions. Halvdan had found the taste odd and not very pleasant, so he figured it wasn't valued for its taste.
"I think it actually might have been a lion eater," he mused, "All the lions feeding on it seemed to be very happy about it being dead."
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Sun Aug 12, 2012 6:22 pm
Tomi was a little startled by Halvdan's admission that he had not been the one to bring down the sea monster. Many Stormborn would have claimed the kill even if the credit was not rightly theirs, just to improve their own status. Tomi thought no less of them for it. He'd done his share of stretching the truth before coming to the pride, and a certain amount of it afterward, too.
"Sounds enormous. I'll have to ask the other lawspeakers and the bards if they know anything about lion-eaters from the sea. I'm sure there must be some stories, but I don't know them."
Fortunately, lawspeakers were required to know the laws, history, and genealogy of the pride. They were not really required to know ballads and the like. That was more bardic territory. Sometimes there was overlap, but generally speaking this job which had fallen to Tomi shouldn't have been his anyway. It should have been a bard's.
"About when was this after you parted ways from the rest of your band?"
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Tue Aug 14, 2012 3:39 am
This question started to edge in on uncomfortable territory, but Halvdan tried not to show it. He frowned and tried to remember when it might have been. The time after being separated from his bad was very hard to remember. Sort of like hitting the mint with a bit too much enthusiasm and end up not knowing what day it is. Only several weeks of that. And what he did remember from the first few weeks, he worked hard to forget.
"I'm not sure," the reaver finally said, "But it should have been about one or two moons after I lost them in the storm. I managed to get to a shore som time after we got separated, but it wasn't like our shore. I don't think so at least... When I realised that the sea was wrong I tried to get back to the savannah again. So I saw the sea monster before going back to the Savannah."
How long had he stayed at the strange shore? He wasn't sure.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Tue Aug 14, 2012 5:02 pm
Tomi waited as patiently as he could. Part of being a lawspeaker was being able to be patient, but Tomi was also very young for a lawspeaker and he had not been a naturally patient lion to begin with. Patience was a thing he had been forced to learn when he was captured and made a thrall. To occupy himself he tore off a hunk of meat and began consuming it slowly.
"In what ways was it different?" Tomi asked. "As I'm sure you can guess, I have not spent much time with the sea, and I would not know how to tell if a sea was right or wrong."
This was a far more roundabout way of getting Halvdan's story out of him than he might have liked to employ, but it was pleasanter than issuing the reaver an ultimatum. Particularly since lawspeakers technically only interpreted laws. They didn't make or enforce them. There was no law stating that a lawspeaker's questions had to be answered, though there was one saying that in answering a lawspeaker's questions one must be truthful. Tomi had always thought that an unusual state of affairs.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Tue Aug 14, 2012 11:59 pm
"There were no cliffs," he started, "And I saw different kinds of fish than we have here. Some where the same, but some looked different. I guess the sea monster was a clue too."
He sighed and gave the Lawspeaker a pleading look. It was hard to describe a gut feeling, but he did his best. There were some things he didn't mention at all. The fact that he thought he had been on an island at one point. Because... He had no clue how he had ended up on the island, or how he had left it. Perhaps he had heard wrong, or mistunderstood.
"It just had the wrong smell." he finally settled on. "That's why I decided to try to return to the savannah. It doesn't smell like home either, but it's more familiar to me."
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Wed Aug 15, 2012 4:56 am
"Oh, yeah. That would probably do it," Tomi agreed with a chuckle.
Tomi was delighted that there were no sea monsters living near the pride, but he knew most reavers in the pride would prefer that there was some sort of threatening thing for them to go out and kill, or at least try to kill, when they were bored or wanting to prove something. Tomi had always found it a more effective proof of manliness to steal someone's woman.
"Halvdan," he said, looking the reaver in the eyes and pretending not to have noticed his pleading look. "I'm going to be honest with you. The other lawspeakers have told me that I have to get your story from you one way or another, so we have a couple of options. I can tail you through the pride and pester you until you give in. I can get you drunk and see if you talk more in that state. Or you can just get it over with."
Honesty was not always the best policy, as Tomi well knew, but with reavers it could serve better than trickery. At least as long as raiding wasn't involved. "As far as I know their interest is purely academic. They have no intention of making public anything they learn."
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Wed Aug 15, 2012 2:35 pm
So that was the way it was going to be, huh? 'Academic' his tail... It was apparent that he had to tell this lion what had happened out there, or at least enough to satisfy the nosy Lawspeakers. They were worse gossips than thralls and womenfolk! There was just one problem... Halvdan had trouble remembering exactly what had happened, and Tomi might believe that he was hiding something. He sighed, and decided to start from the beginning.
"Well, just so you know," he started, "There are parts where I don't remember much. There was some strong mint, or I assume it was mint anyway."
He was rambling, and that wouldn't make Tuomas leave him alone.
"You know about the storm when I lost track of my band?" he asked, assuming that the captain on the raid had already told about that part at least, "Well I took shelter with a female that night, and her mint really messed me up..." ((should we fade to black and assume that he told his story, or would you like to play some more?))
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
