17 Ashan 722
Dan's fishtrap, when he checked it about midday, was empty. He shrugged to himself, and slid it back in the stream. It happened sometimes. That's why he looked for food in a variety of ways from a variety of sources. He kept his eyes out for plant food as he headed on to check his rabbit snares, but most of what he saw were things that he had picked over on previous trials. It wasn't growing back as fast as he had hoped it would, so there wasn't much left - a sign that it was time to move on tomorrow, find somewhere else to gather from and leave this patch to recover.
His snares were empty too, although some of them showed signs that they had had something in, and that that something had been raided and removed by another animal. Dan pulled a face. It was rare now that he failed to come back from a gathering trip without something to eat, but clearly not impossible, and he knew all too well how to tighten his belt and endure through it. However nice it might have been to have fresh food instead of dried, he did have dried food left. He wouldn't go hungry as he would have if this had happened a few arcs ago. He did keep his eyes open and his bow ready as he headed back to his camp, but he didn't spot anything at close enough range to risk a shot, despite the sulky hollowed ache of his empty stomach.
To add insult to injured hunger, the sleeve of his coat had caught on a bramble thorn and the top layer of the quilting had torn, leaving the stuffing inside to poke through.
Back in his camp, he added fuel to the fire in the brazier's metal bowl, coaxing it back into life. He poured some of his water into a cookpot, hacked a strip of dried meat into shreds with his knife, and dropped the meat into the water to simmer slowly into a plain broth. It would be better than nothing, and the liquid would help to fill and fool his stomach into thinking it was a larger meal than it actually was.
Then he collected his sewing kit, peeled out of the coat, and bent to get a good look at the damage and how best to mend it. It was only a surface tear, but the stuffing had been disturbed too. He poked at the horsehair stuffing until it stopped being clumped in lumps that would dig in at the slightest chance and pressure, and went back to being a smooth, even, layer that would keep him warm without problems. Then he stitched a patch over the top of the tear, because the edges of the tear itself were too ragged and frayed to make a decent mend without puckering the whole area into a lumpy mess that would be far more uncomfortable to wear. It was hard to drive the needle through so many layers of cloth and stuffing, but the thimble in his sewing kit allowed him to provide the necessary extra pressure without hurting his fingers in the process.
With the tear in the sleeve dealt with, Dan turned his attention to a couple of other minor issues that could do with being fixed while he had the coat in his hands and the sewing kit out. One of the button holes had stretched enough that it now only held the button loosely, and tended to come undone at the slightest provocation. Dan stitched across the end of the button hole, shrinking the length and size of it back to where it should be and tightening it as a whole hole. Another of the button holes had worn through the stitching that prevented it from fraying too much, so Dan went round it again with buttonhole stitch. Buttonhole stitch was similar to blanket stitch, both being designed to protect edges of cloth, but buttonhole stitch was generally smaller and tighter, with the stitches themselves closer together because it covered a smaller area.
He slipped the coat on again for a moment, just long enough to make quite sure that he hadn't done something foolish like sew both halves of the sleeve together, then took it off and put it aside. Brushing the ponies down - and, as always, they needed to be tended to - would be hard enough work to keep him warm. (You looked after your animals, always. They were as essential to being able to travel on land as fire was essential to living out in the wild. You could manage without for a while, if you had to, but only a fool thought it was a good idea.)
Right now, the ponies were grazing together, heads down, enjoying the new growth that came with the warming weather. He started with Cloud, calling her over to him, and running a hand gently but firmly down each leg in turn from shoulder to fetlock, first the forelegs, then the hind legs. His probing fingers didn't encounter any warm spots that hinted at inflamation but Cloud decided to lean against him anyway and he had to brace himself against her weight. He hissed back through his teeth, and tapped the lower leg in the usual signal for a horse to lift its foot. She grudgingly complied. He took a firm grip on the hoof and began to clean out the dirt, and check for stones caught in the hollow around the frog. Once each hoof was cleaned, he lowered it back to the ground and moved on to the next leg. Cloud turned her head to watch him, but didn't resist or try to avoid his move, for which he was grateful.
He finished checking the second of Cloud's hind legs, patted her, and moved on to Smoke, who was eyeing him more warily. She came, when he whistled for her, but she came grudgingly, until she saw the brush. Then she was more eager. Cloud tolerated being brushed for the attention that came with it, but Smoke actually enjoyed being groomed, leaning happily into his brush strokes, and nudging him with her nose if he stopped before she was ready for him to do so.
"Vain," he teased her, "that's what you are. A vain little pony who always wants to look her best." She nudged him more more firmly, and he took a breath to brace himself against more of her enthusiasm and then went back to work. He used short, firm, strokes on their coats, and then with longer ones on their manes and their tails. He was careful to stand to one side when he brushed their tails out, so that they couldn't kick him easily, nor could they deliver a pile of horse apples directly onto his booted feet. They were showing the first signs of shedding their cold weather coats, so he took extra care to get all the loose hairs out. He scraped the resulting mess off the bristles of the brush and stored it in a small sack for the next time he needed horse hair for one of his projects, whether that was stuffing a quilted coat with the short hairs, or braiding a replacement fishing line from the longer tail hairs. He couldn't afford to waste anything out here, so he saved everything. It came in useful, after all. Finally, when even Smoke was satisfied, he packed the tools away in the grooming kit, draped an arm over each of his pony's backs, and looked around, taking in all of the details of his camp, and checking for anything he had accidentally left out.
By then, his broth was ready, so he scooped it into a bowl and worked his way slowly through it. The slowness made it last longer and might fool his stomach into thinking he had had more to eat than he actually had. Cloud stuck out her head and whiffled her lips curiously at his scant supper. Dan put up a hand and pushed her head gently but firmly away from it. "You're ok," he told her, pulling a face, "you can eat grass. I can't. This is all I have tonight. Go eat your own food and leave me to eat mine."
Cloud huffed at him, lipped his ear gently in counter response, and obediently wandered back to her grazing, her tail flicking from side to side occasionally to ward off flies. Dan watched her for a moment, and then sighed and returned to eating his own meal. Hopefully tomorrow would be better.
"Signed words" Spoken words
OOC note
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6. Have your PC fail at something they're very skilled at.
This thread covers the following challenges:
Thread challenges:
6. Have your PC fail at something they're very skilled at.
His snares were empty too, although some of them showed signs that they had had something in, and that that something had been raided and removed by another animal. Dan pulled a face. It was rare now that he failed to come back from a gathering trip without something to eat, but clearly not impossible, and he knew all too well how to tighten his belt and endure through it. However nice it might have been to have fresh food instead of dried, he did have dried food left. He wouldn't go hungry as he would have if this had happened a few arcs ago. He did keep his eyes open and his bow ready as he headed back to his camp, but he didn't spot anything at close enough range to risk a shot, despite the sulky hollowed ache of his empty stomach.
To add insult to injured hunger, the sleeve of his coat had caught on a bramble thorn and the top layer of the quilting had torn, leaving the stuffing inside to poke through.
Back in his camp, he added fuel to the fire in the brazier's metal bowl, coaxing it back into life. He poured some of his water into a cookpot, hacked a strip of dried meat into shreds with his knife, and dropped the meat into the water to simmer slowly into a plain broth. It would be better than nothing, and the liquid would help to fill and fool his stomach into thinking it was a larger meal than it actually was.
Then he collected his sewing kit, peeled out of the coat, and bent to get a good look at the damage and how best to mend it. It was only a surface tear, but the stuffing had been disturbed too. He poked at the horsehair stuffing until it stopped being clumped in lumps that would dig in at the slightest chance and pressure, and went back to being a smooth, even, layer that would keep him warm without problems. Then he stitched a patch over the top of the tear, because the edges of the tear itself were too ragged and frayed to make a decent mend without puckering the whole area into a lumpy mess that would be far more uncomfortable to wear. It was hard to drive the needle through so many layers of cloth and stuffing, but the thimble in his sewing kit allowed him to provide the necessary extra pressure without hurting his fingers in the process.
With the tear in the sleeve dealt with, Dan turned his attention to a couple of other minor issues that could do with being fixed while he had the coat in his hands and the sewing kit out. One of the button holes had stretched enough that it now only held the button loosely, and tended to come undone at the slightest provocation. Dan stitched across the end of the button hole, shrinking the length and size of it back to where it should be and tightening it as a whole hole. Another of the button holes had worn through the stitching that prevented it from fraying too much, so Dan went round it again with buttonhole stitch. Buttonhole stitch was similar to blanket stitch, both being designed to protect edges of cloth, but buttonhole stitch was generally smaller and tighter, with the stitches themselves closer together because it covered a smaller area.
He slipped the coat on again for a moment, just long enough to make quite sure that he hadn't done something foolish like sew both halves of the sleeve together, then took it off and put it aside. Brushing the ponies down - and, as always, they needed to be tended to - would be hard enough work to keep him warm. (You looked after your animals, always. They were as essential to being able to travel on land as fire was essential to living out in the wild. You could manage without for a while, if you had to, but only a fool thought it was a good idea.)
Right now, the ponies were grazing together, heads down, enjoying the new growth that came with the warming weather. He started with Cloud, calling her over to him, and running a hand gently but firmly down each leg in turn from shoulder to fetlock, first the forelegs, then the hind legs. His probing fingers didn't encounter any warm spots that hinted at inflamation but Cloud decided to lean against him anyway and he had to brace himself against her weight. He hissed back through his teeth, and tapped the lower leg in the usual signal for a horse to lift its foot. She grudgingly complied. He took a firm grip on the hoof and began to clean out the dirt, and check for stones caught in the hollow around the frog. Once each hoof was cleaned, he lowered it back to the ground and moved on to the next leg. Cloud turned her head to watch him, but didn't resist or try to avoid his move, for which he was grateful.
He finished checking the second of Cloud's hind legs, patted her, and moved on to Smoke, who was eyeing him more warily. She came, when he whistled for her, but she came grudgingly, until she saw the brush. Then she was more eager. Cloud tolerated being brushed for the attention that came with it, but Smoke actually enjoyed being groomed, leaning happily into his brush strokes, and nudging him with her nose if he stopped before she was ready for him to do so.
"Vain," he teased her, "that's what you are. A vain little pony who always wants to look her best." She nudged him more more firmly, and he took a breath to brace himself against more of her enthusiasm and then went back to work. He used short, firm, strokes on their coats, and then with longer ones on their manes and their tails. He was careful to stand to one side when he brushed their tails out, so that they couldn't kick him easily, nor could they deliver a pile of horse apples directly onto his booted feet. They were showing the first signs of shedding their cold weather coats, so he took extra care to get all the loose hairs out. He scraped the resulting mess off the bristles of the brush and stored it in a small sack for the next time he needed horse hair for one of his projects, whether that was stuffing a quilted coat with the short hairs, or braiding a replacement fishing line from the longer tail hairs. He couldn't afford to waste anything out here, so he saved everything. It came in useful, after all. Finally, when even Smoke was satisfied, he packed the tools away in the grooming kit, draped an arm over each of his pony's backs, and looked around, taking in all of the details of his camp, and checking for anything he had accidentally left out.
By then, his broth was ready, so he scooped it into a bowl and worked his way slowly through it. The slowness made it last longer and might fool his stomach into thinking he had had more to eat than he actually had. Cloud stuck out her head and whiffled her lips curiously at his scant supper. Dan put up a hand and pushed her head gently but firmly away from it. "You're ok," he told her, pulling a face, "you can eat grass. I can't. This is all I have tonight. Go eat your own food and leave me to eat mine."
Cloud huffed at him, lipped his ear gently in counter response, and obediently wandered back to her grazing, her tail flicking from side to side occasionally to ward off flies. Dan watched her for a moment, and then sighed and returned to eating his own meal. Hopefully tomorrow would be better.
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