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[Paulus Fahlstrom]

Paulus nods as he listens to Fre explain how they try to lure the goblin Stasost to his untimely death.

"That certainly might work. We'll have to check out the building itself first of course, send a scout in to figure out where he is. Were it not for the fact that if and when he becomes aware of us I'd rather not be the topic of report to a goblin war leader, I'd be tempted to seal them in permanently and just ignore them. But, let's face it. Sooner or later the rest of the goblins that built this place will probably return. I'd prefer to have lots of nasty little surprises in store for them when that happens.

We'll have to discuss this more in depth later. No reason to open a new keg when we still have half a dozen we're working on. Good idea though."

The idea had occured to him as Fre was explaining that if they really wanted to they could simply seal him in the upper floors and just collapse the whole building on them. It would certainly accomplish their goal, but seemed like a waste of good obsidian. Stone he was already making plans for.

No, Fre's idea was much more practical than his. Less amusing than seeing a building collapse around an undoubtedly surprised goblin leader perhaps, but certainly much more practical.

[Paulus Fahlstrom]

9th of Felsite

Spring has certainly arrived, though a little late in coming. We've finally cleared out enough of the cumbersome stone and doorways the goblins have put in their structure. Enough to live in at least. I caught poor Steele sleeping out next to the cliff the other night. The ground still freezed solid at nights, so it's somewhat of a surprise that he didn't too. I've had him carving some obsidian blocks and doors though to use in the future. Near future hopefully.

Construction on the upper ramp to the river has begun, and scarcely had they started when Mafol came hurrying back to report they had struck a vein of Limonite. That certainly made my day. I had seen some chalk cliffs on our way in. That grin and bounce in my step could only mean one of two things. And we hadn't found gold. Better far for us, indeed. We now had what we needed to make Steel. Perhaps those miners were right in wanting to try and settle here to begin with. I shudder to think that the goblins knew about this. Their skill with metal thankfully only extended as far as iron, from what I hear learned from tribes far to the south who may have acquired the information from elves. Or so rumors say. I somehow doubt that even elves would stoop so far as to sell the secrets of iron to a race such as the goblins, but in any case that would have been centuries ago. Thankfully goblin skill hasn't improved that much with time. Time has passed quickly here. We're constantly busy and still sleeping on bare stone, but hopefully that will change soon.

I've finally gotten our central staircase completed. No more running around this infernally complicated building to get to the right floor. I've placed our workshops two floors down, our supplies and current lodgings just one down from the roof. The cold still seeps in, but it hasn't been as bad recently. Looking forward to the thawing of the river.

[Paulus Fahlstrom]

21st of Felsite

It's been unseasonably warm today. Just slightly above freezing, at least here in the valley. The pine are even starting to look green again. Aardvark climbed a cliff during his break to check on the river for me as we haven't finished the ramp up there yet. We're still cleaning up after the goblins, with all the stuff they've thrown about. At least should some traders arrive we'll have some goods to trade even if we haven't made any of it ourselves. In any case, the river hadn't thawed yet. In fact there was still a few inches of snow within a hundred feet of the bank. I've not taken the time to observe it but I suspect it lies in shadow much of the day, as some pools nearer us have thawed. Aardvark even spotted a turtle. Good eating if we can catch it. I hadn't designated the work for the water channel yet, which was just as well. At this rate the river may never thaw, except in really really warm weather. Perhaps in late summer or fall. In any case, we'll need a water supply just in case. I've ordered a pool dug in the back wall of the lowest floor of our building with a shaft going straight up nearly 100 feet next to a staircase. We'll drain the pools from below without compromising the structure.

With luck when the wall crumbles we'll get the turtle too. And then Fre will have her farms. She's been a little testy about that lately. What with Aardvark and Ragnar bawling drinking songs in the middle of the night and bragging about defeating two thirds of the entire goblin occupation force I suspect she's ready to swipe their axe and use it on them. I still haven't designated the lower wall to punch through, which is just as well. We're isolated on our little cliff here and kept well away from the goblins below and above for now.

[Frelock]

((Just wanted to remind you: goblin towers don't collapse.  They're made of solid stone, not constructed, so they stay intact in the case of a cave-in, just move a few z-levels down.))

[Paulus Fahlstrom]

((Hmm... I didn't know that. It's good to know though. That would have been very dissapointing. A four story drop... and nothing. It's ok, it would have been very impractical to do, and I'd prefer the original stone to remain rather than having to reconstruct the walls and floors. I've actually never had a cave-in or anything like that happen before so it's simply never come up.))

[Paulus Fahlstrom]

1st of Hematite

Well, it's early summer. Despite the fact that it's much nicer indoors it has been good to get some fresh air that wasn't freezing my breath in my beard. Our plateau and the lower one are now awash with green. I've had Fre try gathering local plants to supplement our food supply as we haven't gotten any farms up and running. But the lake draining project is coming along well enough. We'll have to be quick about it or things may start to freeze before we're ready. There is a lot we can do in the winter, but irrigate isn't one of them.

Aardvark has been busy deforesting around our building. We now have a reasonable supply of logs. Enough to begin making some much needed beds. I grow tired of sleeping on stone. There is so much that we really need to do, and so little time we have to do it in. I fear I'm pushing a little too hard, but at least our alcohol supply remains strong, and so morale hasn't been too bad. We've finally managed to get our area cleaned up from after the goblins and only in the lower floors now is there that tell-tale odor. That too should dissapear once we start renovating there as well. But first things first. Most of us have been relegated to tasks outside of our area of expertise. We all kind of expected it and so it hasn't been too bad.

Usually we spend the evening in the common room, surrounded by our barrels of food and drink and sit chatting as the light fades. It's been nice to reminisce a little about Kilrudmorul. I recall it being much better as a child. The place seemed to diminish in my eyes somewhat as I grew older. The population had grown drastically too, and then came the wars. I had only been a child of a few seasons when that had taken place. We were all put to work though. Since I was a child they let me do pretty much whatever I felt inclined to do. Mostly that had involved playing in the ill-used mechanics shop amidst all the gears and mechanisms. Occasionally the master mechanic, Morul, or one of his assisstants would dash in to grab some equipment they were installing. But generally I had the run of the place if I wanted it. Both my parents had been in the military. My father was a Marksdwarf. My mother in the infantry. I was apparently born shortly after they immigrated. They never mentioned where they came from before that. I never thought to ask. Kilrudmorul had been my home, I assumed, naively that it would remain that way.

[Paulus Fahlstrom]

21st of Hematite

The shout of alarm was raised for the first time since our initial arrival. My first gut reaction was that the goblins had returned and were attacking. Reason took over after that. They still had no easy way to get down here. In fact, we didn't even have a way to get off this cliff yet. Not since the avalance had blocked the northern road. I was only two floors down working on an obsidian mechanism when I heard the shout. It sounded like Fre.

Making a dash for the stairs I arrived at the roof just in time to see Fre sprinting around the corner of the other building shouting at the top of her lungs.

"Where ya gonna go little kobold? Gonna grow wings and fly away?"

Kobolds? Here? How had they gotten down. Or up. I followed after Fre and as I was turning the corner I saw Ragnar and Aardvark arrive armed as well, it looked like they were calling down to the others. By the time I caught up with Fre it looked like she had things well in hand. Apparently she caught up to the little thief near the second corner of the other building and had tackled it. Now, I'm not usually one to stereotype, but I hadn't expected a Marksdwarf to lay into a kobold quite so thoroughly, but apparently Fre was in the process of venting. By the time I got there the poor creature had, by the looks of it, already had both it's legs broken as well as a hand, and there were some rather severe bruises forming on it's torso. Mercifully it had blacked out. It was lucky. Fre obviously hadn't quite finished with it. Moving on towards where it had been running I noticed a rope dangling from one of the trees near the edge of the cliff leading down. The thief had actually scaled the side of the mountain to get in. A second rope was tied near it, bouncing up and down rapidly. Looking over the side I saw another of the thieves making his getaway at the bottom of the 20 dwarf-high cliff. Quite a distance to climb. Hopefully he hadn't gotten away with anything useful.

By the time I got back the others had gathered. Ragnar and Aardvark were slapping Fre on the back and congratulating her on the fine bit of wrestling. Mafol and Medtom were still standing near the entrance, pick in hand looking for any more problems. It seemed strange to me that kobolds would come to us to steal, but made sense when I thought about it more. The goblins had left plenty of stuff just lying around. It would have been easy for them to swipe some. We'd have to be more careful, just because we were isolated didn't mean things couldn't get to us. It just made it harder.

That evening we all sat around drinking and discussed the situation. A quick inventory had shown that the other thief had gotten away with all 35 *Iron Arrows* we had obtained from the goblin guard. Those alone would have purchased food and drink for all of us for another three months, maybe more. Such theft couldn't be tolerated and the kobolds success would only inspire others. Worse, it had gotten away. Word would get out that we were here. And not to the right kind of creatures. We'd need some time to get things in place but I felt it was time to act. It was time to claim the rest of this place as our own.

[Paulus Fahlstrom]

8th of Malachite

Our preparations for the ongoing occupation are now complete. There was a minor delay nearly a week ago. Only one week after the first two thieves came a third showed up. How it managed to get ahold of our exceptionally well crafter Nickel-silver earrings is beyond me. I can't believe no one saw it until Ragnar spotted it climbing out of the stairs on the roof. He dropped the rock he had been carrying and drew his axe, grinning.

The kobold of course took one look at him and ran back down the stairs. I'm still not quite sure where it was intending to go, but on the bottom floor it ran into Fre and Aardvark who were helping clear the area our water supply and farms will go. They immeadiately jumped on the thing and beat it to a bloody pulp. Dwaves 2 Kobolds 1. It was that one that still bothered me though. And the fact that a third had shown up so near the first two indicated that there must be a bolt hole of theirs nearby.

On to bigger problems though. Last night Mafol and Medtom broke through the lower wall of our building as quietly as possible. The location was well chosen and should have been amply covered by the trees growing nearby. Aardvark and Ragnar snuck out and made their approach on the goblin sentry. It was the perfect textbook ambush. The goblin was leaning against a tree, facing the other way. I was quietly watching from the roof, through the fortifications the goblins had so conveniently provided us.



It was a short battle. And a brutal one. Ragnar charged around the trees to the south, Aardvark to the north hoping to catch the goblin by surprise. Thankfully they did and it's first bolt only grazed Ragnar as he cut into the goblins right leg cleaving through the leather and cutting into flesh. But the goblin was quick to reload. Quicker than expected. A second bolt followed the first but buried itself into Ragnars gut as Aardvark yanked the goblin backwards and Ragnar chopped into it's other leg, severing it entirely. The goblin was much tougher than expected. It stood on it's remaining leg and tried weakly to continue the fight but Aardvark shield bashed it from behind stunning it while Ragnar leveled a fierce blow and in his fury struck so hard that the goblin flew nearly ten paces and struck a tree, disintegrating in the process.

We weren't sure if there were more goblins about and since I didn't want to press the issue with Ragnar wounded I called the pair back. I certainly didn't want to lose either of them. Ragnar had already been invaluable against the goblins and recently, after deciding to give the trees a reprieve, had cobbled together some very fuctional pine beds. Aardvark I'm sure would prove more than useful once we got our metalworks up and running properly. I'd given plans to Aardvark that I'd had and we now had a wood furnace and smelter. There still remained the forge proper, but time enough for that come winter. We still needed to secure a water source and the river had finally thawed just yesterday. Still, we'll drain the pools first. The work for them is almost complete and I doubt we'd have time to did a proper channel to the river before it refreezes.

Calling Steele up as the two soldiers made their way back indoors I indicated the two remaining buildings.

"Hoy Steele. You remember those ten obsidian blocks I hade you make a while back? I want you to go seal off those two buildings. Good and tight. Make it look as much as possible like the natural stone. I'd rather nothing else try and make those their place of residence until we're ready to expand into them ourselves. We'll just seal the goblins in that one until we decide what to do with them."

[Paulus Fahlstrom]

12th of Malachite

It's only been four days since we jumped the lower guard. Ragnar appears to be recovering fine. It seems like his deer skin armor helped absorb much of the damage and though he had bled considerably when he yanked the arrow out he insisted that he'd be fine. Of course before our evening blow I noticed he'd broken into one of the rum barrels and cleaned the wound before dousing it liberally with rum. Then he doused himself liberally, or rather his insides with it too. Funny, he didn't seem to drink less that evening with the rest of us either. There's a dwarf what likes his liquor.

Today however was good. We finally broke through the crust of the upper plateau with our ramp. Medtob and Mafol did good work with it. I've my doubts that a wagon'll be able to get down it but we'll see when the time comes. Unfortunately our labors there were apparently noticed by the goblin sentries up above and as soon as we broke through the thing was there, flapping it's gums and charging the miners. What a sight that made. Two dwarves with picks and covered in dirt being charged by a lone, unarmed goblin. They just looked at each other and pretended the goblin was a rock wall. Medtob was limping a little after the struggle but shrugged it off when I asked about it. The goblin had both it's legs and back perforated profusely with picks. We tossed it in the garbage pile and pressed on. Our activites seemed to draw sufficient attention from the other sentry up there and we noticed him tossing rocks at us below.

Pulling Fre aside we stared up the nearly hundred foot cliff at the little figure trying to hit us with fist sized rocks.

"Fre, I've got a job for ye. Now, that little bugger has been a pest. More so recently I'd say. Now that we have a way up there why don't you go try out that new crossbow of yours."

Fre just smiled and nodded. And took off running towards the temporary armory. I figured I'd head up to see how things went and to get the lay of the land from the vantage the top there provided. Fre passed me again on my way up the ramp. I wasn't hurrying. The Bismuth bronze crossbow seemed to fit well in her hands, the nearly full quiver at her hip. From the look on her face it looked like it was her birthday and rite of passage combined.

I made the top just as she was angling around the cliff, the oblivious goblin still looking for targets to throw stuff at far below. Her first bolt went wide, as did her second. By then the goblin had noticed her and started howling towards her. The thing must have been half mad. It'd been trapped on this half-frozen cliffside for months now. It probably caught fish from the lakes behind it to eat.
It seemed though that with the first two shots she was just getting the feel for the weapon since her third pierced it's left arm through and stuck. The forth bolt caught it in the chest as it stood there looking at it's arm and then it fell over. It lay there immobile while Fre carefully took aim and put a second bolt next to the first in it's chest. She stopped after that. No reason to waste good iron bolts on target practice.

I gave a look see around this upper plateau and was pleased with what I saw. There was still snow on the ground near the river, despite it being high summer. But this was the first time I'd been out of the valley since we arrived. It was a glorious view. The landscape around was visible to the east all the way to the horizon. To the west there towered more of the high mountain range, nigh impassable. The main trade roads lay north-south along our position here, which made it a very useful stronghold. I even saw some deer as I looked around in a smallish meadow north of us, near where the avalanche had struck and destroyed the path. It looked like the old path we had taken was accessible from here. Our ramp would be very useful, provided it could be used by wagons, and wasn't covered with ice.

Glancing at the stones to be found here I grinned in spite of the chill wind that had begun to pick up. I had noticed several exposed gemstone clusters, exposed by the elements. And a vein of Magnetite, with streaks of silvery metal, possibly platinum. The miners had been correct indeed that this place harbored useful resources. Perhaps that's why the goblins came too. Perhaps not. They had made little effort to utilize them. This place seemed almost more of a hideout, or regrouping ground of sorts. Lots of supplies, enough goblins to hold it if they had been watchful. There was the key. Goblins, watchful with a mountain of supplies. Yeah. That just didn't happen. It's no wonder half of them had been drunk. Still, we needed to be careful. We'd already had several thieves come, and two of our own were injured still. It wouldn't take much to become disaster. If they were careful though and planned properly it could be avoided.

Dorenemal indeed. Diamond sense this place had been christened, and just now it felt that was a very, very fitting name. Agna hadn't bargained with this perhaps. He had underestimated the goblin force here, as well as us, or so I hoped.

We are the Fahlstrom clan, we are the Wall of Zeal!

Enough of reveries, I've got to go get to work. There's a lot of clean up to do and this place still isn't operating properly. We're low on food for one. I must make the farming priority. Or find another way to obtain food. And soon.

[Paulus Fahlstrom]

27th of Malachite

The river has frozen again. This lends significant weight to needing to finish the water supply. I've also tallied our food stores. I dare not say how dangerously low we are. Should it come to that I hope we would be able to hunt and gather sufficient plants to survive. At this point I'm relying more on any reinforcements and supplies we might be able to trade for. Hopefully we get supplies soon though. We've gone through all our dried meat and are down to a few plump helmets and the seeds and berries Fre foraged earlier this year.

It's strange. Earlier today we had a racoon brazenly walk in past three sleeping dwarves and try to make off with the same nickel-silver earrings the kobold had. Ragnar spotted it trying to get away and soon parted it from the earrings, and this life in a shower of gore. I wonder if we can eat what's left of it? I'll see if Fre is willing to look into that since we're still working on her farms. I daresay the episode she's had with the kobold and then the goblin have put her in a better mood. She's almost been giddy.

PS

We had another racoon today show up and try to steal something. I just barely managed to grab it before it broke out into the open. Apparently it had taken a fancy to a nice mole-bone crown the goblins left behind. We took a fancy to it. Fre will have another racoon to dress out and cook up.

[Paulus Fahlstrom]

23rd of Galena

Summer's been getting on and I've been anxious to have our water supply finished. I've heard of outposts that've started fine and in less perilous situations than ours spend time carving out rooms and making trade goods. By the time they realized they were running low on drink all the rivers had frozen. Dying of dehydration isn't pretty.

Not our problem now thankfully. Our lower pool is finally finished and I had Mafol do the honors of tunnelling up to the bottom of the lake. He did it in style, and the whooping shouts coming from the shaft as he sped down it amid a torrent of water helped brighten our day. One of the few bright spots recently. Even with the two raccoons we've caught we still only just barely have enough. We're down to essentially a month worths of food. Racoon meat and Plump helmet anyone? After that we start eating seeds and nuts that Fre foraged. Not great but beats starving. I'm beginning to think we've been abandoned out here, but at least with fresh water available we have drink. Of course, we haven't checked the water yet to ensure that it's safe, but if a goblin can camp out up there for a whole season it can't be that deadly.

[Paulus Fahlstrom]

28th of Limestone

Well, the indoor lake project didn't quite turn out as we had intended. Not necessarily in a bad way, thankfully. We must have finished it just in time too. The lake hadn't even drained fully when it froze solid. It was uncanny walking back up our shaft to where the lake was to find a wall of solid ice. I swore there as still a turtle in there. We might have to chip it out if it comes to that. I requested Steele that he seal off the hole with a door, so we could control the water flow come next year. The bottom of the lakebed was nice black sand though. Good quality stuff. We might be able to use it in the future, but for now we had enough work as it was. We'd barely gotten settled indoors and already it was getting cold again. With a little supplemental help from Fre our food supplies were extended till now.

Thankfully today marked the first time we had visitors. A trade caravan from Etagzasit arrived along with the outpost liason assigned to us by the crown. The liason could make himself comfortable and wait. The caravan apparently couldn't. They were somewhat impatient to get back on the trail and catch up with their wagons that hadn't stopped. Not my fault they came from the east. Had they used the westerly path there was a nice ramp to get to us with. Still, they brought much needed supplies. I was amazed at how valuable goblin equipment was considered. One of the merchants explained it to me like this:

"Well now, some interesting leatherworking by all accounts. And not even in dwarven sizes. Now what dwarf in their right mind would make something that doesn't fit?"

To which I of course responded:"Well, our ... uh... resident craftsman had this terrible illness this spring, he's down to a shadow of is former self. But he only makes things that fit him, so that's what were stuck with."

The merchant looked stunned for a second or two before belting out gales of laughter.

"Nah, mate. I know where those come from. Ye even missed a spot o' blood or two cleanin' em. Don't worry. It's remarkable what market we find for this rot. The humans use them for their we'uns. Apparently fits remarkably well, so that's the major market. But some dwarves in larger mountain homes have taken to wearing some items too. They call it 'fashionable' whatever that means. Probably started by some fop-wearin' noble what thought it made him look fierce. They're considered 'exotic' clothing items."

"Really? Well, we have more inside."

"Ah, well, save it for next year. Looks like another storm is blowin' in. We'd best be leavin' soon. Don't want to be caught before winter hits in this range. I certainly don't envy you gents. You'll be snowed in for months if you're not careful."

In the end they were in a rather big hurry so we didn't get to unload all of the stuff we found. But we managed to obtain some of their more useful items. A nice bar of pewter, some well-crafted pigtail trousers, just so we had an extra pair. An empty tower cap barrel. May need it eventually. A pig tail rope. Very useful, especially if we wanted to make a well of our newly made indoor lake. And food! They didn't have much, but we bought it all. Six full barrels of plump helmets and a barrel each of horse, jaguar, cougar and groundhog meat. Oh, and a bag of dwarven sugar. Might be edible. That should be sufficient to see us through, or so I hoped. And I even managed to get a surprise for Fre. I wasn't sure we needed them, but I didn't want an axe to be our only weapon should she run out of bolts. And Aardvark had that sword but apparently preferred using the shield as a weapon. So I got 25 well-crafted steel bolts for the lass. Maybe now she forgive me for saying we didn't have enough water to irrigate any farms for her yet. I tried to get a pair of steel greaves from the traders as well but he got a little huffy and said something about 'needin' to make a profit as well'. I let him keep them. We needed them to come back.

[Paulus Fahlstrom]

15th of Moonstone

Well, apparently it's early winter. I can't see through repeated blizzards to chech though so I'll just have to accept the word of whichever southern idiot thought to base the seasons on the calendar. While the Vabok the outpost liason was appraising the place and meeting with us we had another kobold try to make it in. We were in the southern plateau a few hundred feet out working on a wall to isolate our lower door from the rest of the world. The bugger had the nerve to try to sneak by me in the snow. I'm not sure it occured to the rat that he leaves a trail. Anyways, I was carrying some stone for the wall when we passed. The thought of the rat trying to steal some more of our rightfully obtained loot infuriated me so much I threw the rough stone block at it. I must give credit where credit is due. I fully intended to have to chase after the filthy kobold, but he froze when he saw that rock and it hit him square in the chest. I vented the rest of my frustration on the thing until it stopped twitching. I feel better now.

I also had the foresight to call an alarm when I spotted it and Ragnar went and stood guard near the other entrance. Sure enough, within minutes a second kobold popped it's head up the stairwell, the same Giant mole bown crown clutched in it's grubby paws that the raccoon had attempted to steal. Were they somehow in cahoots? Was it possible they simply thought alike or were koblods like little shapechangers? In any case, Ragnar dealt with the kobold much as he had dealt with the racoon. I'm beginning to wonder about Ragnar's state of mind lately too, now that I mention it.

In anycase the Liason wrapped things up quickly once I had a chair placed in an unused section of the goblin fort and called that my 'office'. I sat there as he talked, and then we traded places. It was all rather strange. I'm not sure he entirely grasped the circumstances of our situation.

"So Mr. uh..." Shuffles through some papers.

"Paulus. Just call me Paulus."

"Ok. Paulus, I must say I'm quite impressed what you've managed so far. It hasn't even been a full year and already you've made three very impressive structures. Very defensible by the looks of it. I can understand they're still being worked on, as that's normal. But still very impressive work. One of the others said you had the other two buildings sealed off until you felt like you could use them. Shows foresight. Planning for growth already."

I wondered who had told that little white lie.

"Anyways, I've assessed your overall value as an outpost. It's worth just over two hundred thousand ingots."

I choked. He looked at me somewhat crossly.

"I understand you may have been expecting more. The structures alone warrent nearly that much, but from what I've seen you've done little more than build here. The infra-structure is somewhat lacking. In any case, that's probably still ten times what many normal settlements are worth at the one year mark. You should be proud of what you've accomplished. Now on to trade matters..."

The meeting was purely numbers after that. Two-hundred thousand ingots. That estimate alone should ensure a great report for immigration. I groaned. We were nowhere close to ready for more people. Still, when it came down to it, the report would be favorable. I was concerned that Agna would have his hand in this as well and that we'd get an extremely biased liason. Such things had been known to break settlements. If I recall in the history of Kilrudmorul the early years had been particularly tough. No liason had shown up at all and so they had been at the mercy of what few meager merchants could make it through. It was almost five years after the founding when someone had found the liasons body up in the hill on a cliff, the goblin bolt still stuck in his ribcage.

Now that the first year was over and favorable it only meant we had more work to do. Much more work. I called a meeting that night. Spirits were high, Fre and Aardvark it appeared had been drinking a little too much. As the chatter died down I filled everyone in on the meeting.

Steele commented:" That's good then. We'll get more hands in here before too long. Things'll go quicker."

Mafol and Medtom nodded, grinned and helped themselves to another round.

Ragnar just shrugged.

Fre and Aardvark had long since not been paying attention.

I kind of understood the feeling. It was both good and bad. With success and prosperity came other complications. It would no longer be just us seven. And that would certainly complicate things.

[Paulus Fahlstrom]

19th of Opal

Well, well, well. Actually just one. While Steele was busy working on the construction I had Fre fish out anything useful from the water of the lake. We got lucky! Two turtles. It told her I'd split them with her. She just glared at me and said she already had a turtle dinner planned and I wasn't invited. I hadn't gotten her her farms yet. Well, the last part was true, undoubtedly. So I let her get away with it. I'm not big on raw turtle and she'd be the one preparing them. It might be safer to just eat horse again.

We finished the lower wall as well as a ramp leading from the lower plateau to the upper. Now there was only one entrance into our main hold and the other buildings should have been sealed off by now. I'd not bothered to ask Steele about it yet. We've been so busy it's possible he hasn't gotten around to it. In terms of defenses it makes it rather nice. All traffic will have to pass through the gap between the second building and the ledge. It's maybe wide enough for three wagons abreast. If they're lucky. I've been preparing some surprises of my own, and though Aardvark grumbled a little when I said he'd have to make his own charcoal and smelt his own ore he got to it. We've begun working on steel and should have enough to arm and equip ourselves soon. Ok, with only Aardvark doing all the work it was likely to take much longer than that.

One of the things Steele has been working on was getting us some decent stone furniture. Some tables and chairs to start with. Now our common area was beginning to feel more like living space, though still too close to the surface to be proper for dwarves. With hard work we'd be able to move into proper quarters below before too long.

At the meeting I called for any ideas regarding defenses we could propose, knowing that we had very limited space and massive cliffs helping, or hindering depending on how you looked at it.

We'll see what the others come up with.

Of course we'll have traps. Those are one of my specialties. I am a mechanic after all.

((Feel free to suggest any defensive structures you'd like to see enacted. I'll take all ideas under consideration. Keep in mind we have three plateaus, makes it hard for very large scale projects and such since there really isn't much space between the cliffs and the buildings. I'll be back after the holidays))

[Skanky]

((I generally favour spamming obsidian sword weapon traps, but I tend not to use an actual military force either))