by Pirateaba
“It looks like it. It’s one week—no, maybe two weeks old? But it’s really big…I thought it was a fledgling at first, but like you said, it has no feathers.”
“A big bird…”
Sesame Street? No, focus, Laken. But now that I think of it, there might actually be land bound birds as tall as Big Bird in this world. Now there’s a terrifying thought.
“What else do you see?”
“Um. Well—it’s got a weird color. Sort of—well, dark grey. Almost greenish.”
“Green fuzz?”
Doesn’t mean much to me, although I don’t know any green birds. But chicks don’t look anything like their adult forms.
“Well, I found it on the ground. I think the nest it was in fell off the branch. Maybe the parent’s still around and we can return it.”
I get up and Durene and I leave the chick behind to go investigate the spot where I found it. I feel…amazingly happy to be able to walk that short distance without my cane. There’s no trepidation, no sense of unease as I walk. I know where everything is, and I don’t have to hesitate.
Thank you. I don’t know who or what brought me here, but just for a little while longer, can you let me feel like a—a normal person? Is this what it feels like? To walk and know that the ground is there and I am here?
Then I come up to that blank spot where the world ends, and Durene gasps as she sees the nest.
“Bones! Look at all the tiny bones, Laken! And over there—oh no.”
She sees something past the spot I can sense and walks over. I wait, trying to piece together my own sensory inputs. I can tell there are bones in the nest, but I didn’t focus on the size until now. There’s still a difference between what Durene sees and what I comprehend.
“What is it?”
“I…found the parent, Laken. It—she? She’s dead.”
Durene comes back, holding a dead bird in her hands. I blink as it comes into my zone and I register the size of the bird. It’s almost a third as tall as I am!
“That’s no sparrow.”
“No.”
Half-troll she might be, but Durene has a heart that weeps for everything. She sounds upset as she tells me how it died.
“It must have died of the cold. See here—oh, sorry Laken. It was fighting something, but it got hurt bad. It was bleeding, and it must have lost all its warmth when it got cold.”
“I get it.”
I sigh as Durene and I pause, unexpectedly sad over the death of this bird. I’m about to ask if we should bury it, when I sense Durene plucking feathers off the corpse.
“…What are you doing?”
“Oh—I thought we could eat it later. It’s still cold and nothing’s been chewing on it, so—”
Oh. Ah. Hm. Well, I’ve heard of people eating road kill, and at least the bird was well-preserved. Maybe I’ll let Durene have it, although I could use some meat myself…
“Okay, let’s put that aside for now. What about the nest? You say there are bones here, right? Little ones?”
“That’s right. They’re very small, but…I don’t know how any predator would have eaten the others and left the chick you found alive.”
“No, it wouldn’t do that.”
My mind jumps to an unfortunate conclusion. I bent down and touch at the bones with one gloveless hand. Yup. They’re picked clean.
“A predator didn’t kill the other babies. The chick did. It ate its brothers and sisters to survive.”
An unhappy sound. Durene didn’t want to come to that conclusion, but it’s the only one that makes sense. I straighten and sigh.
“Nature at its best. But I think I have a good idea who this mystery bird is. It’s an eagle, isn’t it?”
“I think so. It could be a hawk—I’m not a [Hunter] so I can’t tell the difference. But it looks like one of the birds that sometimes tries to swoop down and carry off a lamb, baby piglets, and so on.”
“Carry off lambs? Seriously?”
I’d heard stories of eagles trying to carry off kids, but I thought that was just a popular myth. But Durene sound serious.
“Oh yes. [Herders] and [Farmers] have to be careful. An eagle can swoop down and fly away with a lamb in seconds if they don’t keep an eye out. Normally we try to get people with bows to shoot the eagle first, but it’s hard unless someone’s got a high level.”
“Well, this baby eagle—I think they’re called eaglets, actually—isn’t going to be carrying off anything anytime soon. I think now’s the moment when we make a choice, Durene.”
“About what?”
She sounds apprehensive. I make a rueful expression, or what I’ve been told is rueful.
“About whether we keep it or not.”
“Do you mean—we’d throw it out in the cold?”
She sounds horrified. I guess I’ve got my answer. We walk back to her cottage. Durene pauses to bury the dead bird in the snow rather than bring it inside and show the chick.
“I’m just thinking about the problems. A baby eagle needs attention, food—the attention bit’s not so hard, but I’m pretty sure it only eats meat.”
“Oh.”
“Oh indeed.”
Here’s why this is a problem in this world. In mine, the biggest obstacle would be getting a permit to raise a baby eagle—they’re considered illegal to own in the United States, and I suspect other countries wouldn’t be too hot on them as a pet either. Housing would be another problem I guess, and training—
But here, meat is the issue. There’s not exactly a supermarket around here, and Durene’s not rich. I am, but Riverfarm isn’t, so I don’t know how far the gold coins I dug up would go down there anyways.
“I think we should take care of him.”
Durene’s voice interrupts me. I can tell she’s practically wringing her hands, and her voice is anxious.
“If we need to, I can get meat. I could try setting a trap or hunting. And I—I have pigs!”
It’s funny how she cares more for a chick I found than the pigs she’s raised for years. Then again, she must have to force herself to look at the pigs as food. I nod as I pick up the upset little bird and it pecks at my hands.
“Okay then. Hopefully it won’t come to that.”
“Do you really think we’ll be able to raise him?”
There’s a glimmer of hope in her tone. As it so often happens, I realize that this is something Durene might have dreamed about but could never realize. A pet. It sounds so simple, but for her, it might just have been a dream.
“We can try. But I have to warn you, Durene. The chick might die no matter what we do.”
“Oh no.”
Durene already sounds heartbroken as she hovers around the bird in my hands. I find her arm with a hand and pat it gently. But I don’t give her false hope. I’m under no illusions; I don’t know how to raise birds, and this young one was born too late. Or maybe birds in this world can’t tell when winter is about to arrive thanks to those…Winter Sprites, and so they can only hope.
With those thoughts in mind, I find myself constructing a more permanent nest for the chick. And that’s with the understanding that this nest isn’t going to be reused; the chick has already pooped quite extensively in Durene’s bowl.
“It should probably be pretty big. Yes—that’s about right.”
I smile to myself as Durene fusses over the chick, holding it gently and exclaiming as it pecks at her hands.
“Does it…have a name?”
“Not yet. Would you like to name it, Durene?”
“Oh—I couldn’t. Why don’t you, Laken? You found it, anyways.”
I nod and take the chick from Durene, it struggles a bit in my grip, but I have a good hold over its growing wings. I stare down at it and think for a second. And perhaps it’s a another bit of whimsy, but I decide that if I’m going to take care of this bird, I might as well do it properly.
Straightening my back, I place the chick on the new nest, and put my hand solemnly on its h
ead. It doesn’t move about much; I make my voice deeper as I speak to Durene and the world at large.
“It’s not often that I find a baby bird lying on the ground. But since you’re here and your mother—or father—is gone, it falls to me to take care of you. You—chick.”
The little bird pecks at the bottom of my hand.
“Stop that.”
Durene giggles. I smile, and think for a moment.
“Well then, I think I’ll name you Frostwing, because that sounds quite appropriate for a bird in a fantasy world. It sounds a bit silly, but maybe you’ll grow into it. And I accept you into my small empire as one of my loyal, if noisy, subjects.”
The bird goes still for a second, and then I sense it rustling under my hand. Durene makes cooing sounds of delight.
“Aw! It’s grooming itself, Laken!”
“I’ll take that as a ‘yes’. Okay, let’s finish this nest and figure out where it’s going to sleep. I don’t want it wandering off during the night.”
“Okay!”
And there we have it. Another little addition to the cottage. I’m not sure if I regret it; little Frostwing pecks at my fingers and it eats and defecates a bit too much for my comfort. It has a very sharp, curved beak. Plus, it has a rather shrill cry that can get on the nerves—
And yet, I can’t see any other way this encounter could have gone. Would I have left it there to die? No. There’s no way I would have. And I have to wonder as I go to sleep, Frostwing resting in its new nest in the kitchen. I have to wonder if it was like that for Durene with me. Perhaps I was a little bird she found in the forest. The thought makes me smile as I close my eyes and sleep.
[Emperor Level 5!]
[Beast Tamer Obtained!]
[Beast Tamer Level 1!]
[Skill – Lesser Bond: Frostwing obtained!]
“…Oh you have got to be kidding me.”
Day 32
Why is leveling up so easy? No, before that, why is gaining a new class so easy?
This is the thought that circles around in my head, nudging my brain every once in a while. I don’t really have the brain cells to allocate to the issue though; I’m so sleep deprived that I can barely think straight.
It’s been a long night, and a longer morning. Durene is asleep, and I’m on bird-feeding duty. Again. As it turns out, Frostwing, the noisy little eaglet, apparently needs to be fed on an hourly basis. Or at least that’s how it felt last night. And since Durene isn’t as nimble as I am, it fell to me to get out of the warm, comfortable bed and feed the squalling creature while avoiding its sharp beak.
Do I regret all of this? Yes and no. The class helps. It really does. Because now I can wonder—what does ‘lesser bond’ mean? What’s the benefit of this class? Will it just aid me in raising Frostwing? Or are there applicable benefits?
Right now the only benefit I can feel is knowing how much to feed Frostwing. It’s like intuition—I can tell if the bird needs another morsel, or if feeding it—her too much would result in her puking up her meal. That’s valuable info, as is her gender.
I can’t tell with my [Emperor] senses, and I’m not about to go probing with my fingers. But Durene checked, and this bird is indeed a female one. Good for her.
But back to my class. I get the [Beastmaster] class. It only makes sense that I’d get it. But why did I level up as an [Emperor]? Let’s think about that.
I poke Frostwing as she tears at a bit of meat. She pecks my finger. I rub at an eye and frown.
Intent. Intent and purpose. I was fully committed to keeping the eaglet—Frostwing alive. Not only that; I fulfilled some criteria for the [Emperor] class. It makes sense that gaining exp for an [Emperor] would involve growing my kingdom and recruiting new subjects somehow.
But seriously? One baby eagle is worth a level in [Emperor]? No—no, wait a second. Maybe it’s not just numbers, but something else. Durene was my first vassal, but she came with the class. This is the first time I’ve declared my sovereignty over another being, and after I’d rescued them from death within my sovereign territory, no less.
That’s the only explanation I can come up with. How confusing. If only there were an instruction manual, or a wiki page or something I could use. But assuming this is a game, or something similar, the fun would be in finding how the rules work. And exploiting any secrets you can find.
Poke. Peck. Poke. Peck.
I keep baiting Frostwing, letting her strike at my finger and pulling it away before she can tag me. It’s, well, pretty fun, although getting pecked isn’t. But it must be fun, because before I know it, Durene’s awake.
“Laken! Is your finger bleeding?”
“So it is. I guess I must have got lost in playing.”
“For how long?”
“I’m not sure. Hours? I fed her twice.”
“Twice?”
I’m not good with sleep deprivation. Not that I think anyone’s exactly proficient in that area. Once I’m more awake and I’ve had a cup of tea—and what I wouldn’t give for an espresso—Durene and I get about the business of business. We don’t always stay in the cottage, although it’s a tempting option in this cold weather.
Our goal for today is actually quite simple: in lieu of the practically gone sausage, Durene and I have to find something for Frostwing to eat. She doesn’t want to butcher one of her pigs and I can’t blame her. They’re not fully grown yet, and it would be a terrible waste, even if she and I eat some of it.
Plus, I don’t quite have the heart for it. What I do have the heart for, and what came to me as I was feeding Frostwing a bit more sausage was that my [Emperor] senses can be used for more than just navigation.
“Right here.”
I whisper to Durene as we stand next to a tree trunk. She’s silent for a second.
“Found it. It’s a small hole.”
“Want me to—?”
“No. I’ve got it.”
Durene takes a deep breath, and then I hear her reach into the hole in the tree trunk. There’s alarmed chattering and frantic movement as her hand enter the squirrel’s nest, then—
“Got one.”
I heard the crunch. I feel a bit sick, but I know it’s not over. There are—were—three squirrels nesting in the tree that I sensed. Durene grimly catches the other two and swiftly snaps their necks.
“It’s done, Laken. I’ll pull them out if you can hold them—”
“Got it.”
She might not like killing creatures, but she’s efficient when she does. I hold the surprisingly heavy creatures, wincing as I feel their dangling necks.
“I feel bad.”
“…Yeah.”
It was an idea. If I can sense Frostwing, what about other creatures? Turns out I can at least find squirrel dens, if I concentrate. Is this fair? No. But we’re out of meat and Frostwing needs a meal. So this has to be done.
Once we’re finished, Durene and I walk back to the cottage. She actually took the acorns the squirrels had been hoarding as well; they can be ground up. Durene doesn’t waste any food. Then we’re in the kitchen, Frostwing cheeping with excitement. Three squirrels are ready to be skinned in moments, and I have to help with that grisly business. It wouldn’t be right otherwise.
“Um—I—I think we’ve got to—with the head—”
“I’ll do it.”
It’s gristly, and it involves sawing and hacking, neither of us being proficient in preparing animals. Durene is no hunter, and if she does find animals, she generally has someone in the village help her prepare it for a share of the food. She didn’t even manage to bring herself to eat Frostwing’s mother—after some debate we buried her half-plucked corpse just outside the garden.
At least I can’t see what I’m doing. Durene assures me that in this case, this is a good thing. Mind you, I don’t like the squishing and the—rest. But I’m not the one who has to stumble out of the cottage for a breath of fresh air.
“Durene? I think I’m done.”
Quietly, Durene takes the fur and other inedible bits outside. I can tell she’s burying the pieces. She’s a bit snuffly when she comes back in, but determined to put a brave face on it.
“At least Frostwing gets to eat. That’s—it’s for her.”
I nod. The chick is already demanding a bloody piece of meat, and we can freeze the rest although we’ll have to watch out for scavengers. Hell, we could probably kill them.
Durene shudders a bit as I put the meat into a bowl. I clean my hands with water after I feed Frostwing and then go over to her.
“Did they bite your hand?”
“A bit. But—it’s fine. My skin’s tough and I did far worse to them.”
She sounds unhappy. And guilty. Carefully, I hold her hands, making sure they’re unharmed for myself. Thick skin. But such a terribly soft heart.
“You’re a gentle soul.”
I kiss Durene gently on the cheek. She blushes—I can feel it. And then of course one thing leads to another. At least Frostwing doesn’t interrupt us more than once.
What? It’s not like it’s hard to figure out what people in this world do in the winter. And Durene and I are new at this. But kissing her I could do forever. I could sit and talk with her long into the night. And I do. Other things happen of course, but sometimes it’s just worth sitting by someone you…
Love.
[Beast Tamer Level 2!]
Day 34
It’s funny. I’ve had pets, and it’s always flurry and new experiences those first few days. But after a while, even feeding an eaglet bloody pieces of meat you’ve butchered yourself gets normal.
That’s how I find myself sitting in the kitchen, playing poke-peck with Frostwing. I think she could use the exercise, and I myself have already gone for a brisk walk with Durene. But at this time of day I usually stay indoors while she works.
Yes, works. Durene’s job doesn’t end in the winter of course. In fact, there might even be more to do. She planted a number of crops that could be harvested in the winter, and aside from tending to them, she has to clear out snow every day as well. She also normally takes this time to fix up her cottage, repair any tools, and of course, chop firewood.