This is the journal of Sir Woge and his (kind of) lands, Snakesfreckles. Page 3I will make one main comment about the land:
It is wet.
Further information regarding the lands surrounding us: It is a nicely wooded, hilly terrain. The earth is soft in the valleys but rocks can be seen jutting out of the slopes of some hills. Ulum immediately declared that farming would be an easy task with such farm friendly terrain. When asked, Udda nodded and said hunting and trapping would likely be plentiful. She went on to point out a hoary marmot on a nearby hill. She has an excellent eye. Ina nearly lost a boot in the mud, prompting Sor to verbally berate me for bringing him to this 'miserable place' (his words). He seems to have been content working in a kitchen...
1st Granite, 204. Our first morning on site. We arrived late last night and camped by our wagon. Now that the sun has reared its glorious head, we shall move to my selected position for our mission. There is plenty of water scattered around, so I feel the river is not a necessary build point. Instead I have chosen a point which affords a great view of the lands. Unfortunately, our wagon seems to be stuck in the mud... we shall carry our goods by hand.
2 Granite, 204. We are moving all of our supplies into a giant sinkhole for protection. As a short term solution, I have told the workers to just dump everything in the designated space with no regard or worry for organization. Our first priority should be to get our goods in a protected place- then we can worry about organizing them later. I assured Sor he would not be responsible for cataloging our supplies until they were stored in a more proper manner.
17 Granite, 204. This work is hard!
At least when managing the kitchens I had plenty of enlisted grunts to execute all the legwork for me; here that is not the case. My two hands consist of a seventh of our possible workforce and as such my immediate help and physical involvement is proving to be necessary.We have moved all of our embarkation supplies into the sinkhole and disassembled the wagon we arrived in.
A few days ago I walked a perimeter with Ina and asked her to take charge of building a wall. Ad and Udda took up our two axes to supply the project with building materials.
Ulum got two small farm plots up and running. He is growing for food and cloth, or so he says. I admittedly do not recognize the identity of seeds by sight or even the crops, so I must take his word for it...
It has rained nearly everyday we have been here and without proper shelter we are all getting quite
wet. But, if my time in the army did anything for me, it taught me the importance of security... And how to order cooks around... but I digress. We are at war with the elves after all, and Snakesfreckles is directly on their war path... Despite some minor objections from the workers, we will have a wall before a proper shelter.
19 Granite, 204. I have been keeping the laborers busy while still maintaining a great workload myself ( a lot needs to get done), but every now and then Sor and I are able to sneak away to drink from the alcohol the King sent along. Mete almost always discovers what we are up to and invites herself to join us... I once tried to tell her to get back to work but she gave me a look that resembled something like 'I will drink if I want to... what will you do about it?' and I was forced to concede to her point. She is surely a better fighter than I.
22 Granite, 204. Our initial wall is complete. Sor is still working to secure the slopes around our storage sinkhole by turning them into cliffs so that no unwelcome visitors are able to easily sneak into our stores. Ad and Udda have been taking our axes to the nearby trees to supply us with lumber. Today I'll take the axe from Udda so she can start hunting. Some fresh meat may do our morale some good.
I no longer attempt to sneak off with Sor to get drink. Mete's company is actually proving to be quite pleasant. Sor has joked that I sometimes seem to be more pleased to have Mete with us while we relax and drink than when we drink alone.
27 Granite, 204. Work continues. I have ordered the construction of a hall. It will be our first and only permanent shelter for the time being. It has been nearly a month of sleeping on the wet ground under makeshift tents- it is time we sleep on a warm bed under a sturdy roof.
Udda is a very good hunter. She has taken our hunting dog with her during her trips into the wild and has always returned with a dead hoary marmot. Ulum, our resident farmer has taken to be our resident butcher as well. And tanner... He keeps busy dealing with our food.
29 Granite, 204. I was right to send Udda hunting. The fresh meat is proving to be a great addition to our meals and the bones from her kills are going to good use as arrows. I have also become quite the woodsman myself. Working the axes with Ad is keeping me in shape.
Sor discovered that we are pretty much out of alcohol. Ulum cheerfully suggested brewing some more with the crops he is growing. He is no brewer but says he could surely figure it out. I admittedly like to drink but I fear it may be turning into a vice amongst our crew. Our productivity cannot be hindered by alcohol at this time. I have ordered no more to be brewed. We have much too much work to get done.
2 Slate, 204. Despite the absence of alcohol Mete and I have still been spending a lot of time together while on break. I must confess that sometimes I intentionally neglect to invite Sor along. Ad has been complaining non-stop about the lack of booze, lack of shelter, lack of this and lack of that. I think tomorrow, when I got out to cut trees, I will be sure to work in a different are than Ad.
9 Slate, 204. I write this time not to discuss the progress we have made with our mission... no.. this time I write to profess my love for Mete... Our habit of drinking ourselves to sleep in an effort to forget about the woes of work, weather, and lack of progress planted a seed of love. Eventually that seed grew and prospered even when the initial context for our reason to rendezvous ceased to continue to be a factor. Snakesfreckles has molded a bond of love between Mete and me. I will now redouble my efforts for this mission to succeed.
11 Slate, 204. Construction of our main hall is progressing at a painfully slow pace. In the meantime I commissioned the construction of a trade depot outside our defensive walls. It was literally built overnight... Why can't these people replicate that behavior with our damned hall!?!? Perhaps they think the depot will draw in caravans laden with alcohol...
17 Slate, 204. Ulum came to me this morning for a meeting. He ranted for a solid ten minutes about his workload and the growing number of tasks assigned to him. He had the nerve to call that I show favoritism towards Sor and Mete! I was furious that he would make such accusations and promptly sent him away... But... I fear he may be correct. He has been burdened with
all of our farming, our butchery, our cooking, and our tanning... There
is a growing pile of corpses for him to butcher... I will have to reassign some tasks...
On a side note, I have ordered several more doors and beds to be made for use once our hall is complete.
22 Slate, 204. As the days go by I have come to know everyone much better. It is now starting to feel more like a community than a work camp. I think I can truthfully call everyone here a friend. Hopefully this feeling of camaraderie will not displace the command structure.
8 Felsite, 204. I've decided to have Sor start digging for stone. Right now access to building materials is a bottleneck in our construction efforts. Ad and I have been cutting trees as fast as we can but it is not fast enough. Eventually I wish to build some structures with stone. If I can get Sor to mine stone
now, then we can use that as a readily available building material when we want or need it. There is some Gabbro visible to the North West of our mission... I will have him begin digging there. Sor is no miner- he readily reminded me of that when I presented the plan to him- but he is the only person I can spare for the job. Udda is off hunting most of the time, Ad and I are busy deforesting the area, Ulum is overly busy tending to our food supply, and Ina and Mete are working construction. When Sor suggested I send Mete away to mine while he works construction, citing that she was stronger than he, I reminded him that she is our primary line of protection should the need to fight arise. Her being off in the hills mining would do us no good should the elves come.
10 Felsite, 204. The walls are finished in our hall. Now we just need to build the roof. Unfortunately, building is continuing to take forever... especially now that Sor is no longer helping. While I admittedly miss his presence as a builder
and as a friend, I believe it is better off that he is away mining for now. We do not have a good enough supply of wood for three builders anyways.
15 Felsite, 204. During a morning meeting to discuss the construction effort, Ina offhandedly mentioned hoping we are doing ok with our food supply after I instructed Udda to aid Ina with building. I took her comment in stride but did not respond in detail. I have no clue how much food we have available to us... I will need to get Sor counting our supplies soon...
9 Hematite, 204. Fantastic news. Udda installed the last section of roofing on the main hall today. It has been long under construction but is finally complete. It should have been done earlier, except for a misunderstanding/miscommunication about building materials. During a discussion about
future plans to incorporate stone in our buildings, the Ina mistakenly thought I meant I wanted stone to be used for the last few sections of the great hall's roof. She completed her wooden sections and left the remaining sections she thought I ordered to be made from stone untouched... That resulted in a cessation of work on the roof until I realized the workers were... confused...
Once cleared up, the roof was quickly finished.
Tomorrow I will have the hall populated with furniture.
10 Hematite, 204. Just as I was going to issue an edict to have the hall furnished, Mete kindly reminded me that the hall could use a finished floor... I fear love has interfered with my logical process and as such I have conceded to her request. The hall is
still not furnished. Work on installing a wooden floor is underway, furniture will come later.
On to better news: Ad indicated he saw a caravan procession to the north. I stood atop our hall's roof and have determined the caravan carries the standards of Uthalgil. We are preparing the mission for their arrival as I write.
13 Hematite, 204. The caravan arrived this morning. I was glad to verify the caravan was indeed from Uthalgil upon their arrival. My experiences as a Paige in my younger years have paid off, heraldry is not a lost art to me. Mete and I met with the caravan first. I was not entirely sure of their intentions and did not want to fall for some bandit trap. Everyone else watched the encounter from the gate, ready to lock it tight in case anything went horribly wrong. After a quick close up inspection it became obvious the caravan was legitimate. I learned that Casot Lumgaval is the diplomat assigned to the caravan. He will get an audience as soon as I have time.
22 Hematite, 204. The Uthalgilian caravan has been here nearly ten days. We have hosted them outside our walls exclusively. Until we have a better established defensive plan, I will not host them within our wall's perimeter. We placed some of our limited goods in the depot for the caravan to evaluate a couple of days ago. Later today I shall begin negotiations personally with Casot. Sor is far better at this than me, but currently he is off at the stone mine. I do not know when he will return.
Late night 22 Hematite, 204. We are taking a break from trade negotiations for the night. So far I have made requests for goods in future caravans. I requested anvils, Iron, picks, axes, and swords. Tomorrow morning Casot will negotiate his requests. These are the first extended interactions I have had with anyone outside of Snakesfreckles in nearly four months.
23 Hematite, 204. Casot is taking advantage of our hospitality. This morning, upon resumption of our negotiations he simply
rediscussed our previous agreements (my trade requests) and made some sorry excuses for why his requests are not quite yet ready- something about needing to reexamine his records of guild stocks... I see through his guise and know he is just trying to extort more food and drink out of us from our hosted dining events... This makes me glad I have them sleeping outside.
24 Hematite, 204. That fool Casot has managed to hold out until today before finalizing our
future trade agreements. And to make things worse, he just requests foolish goods like spears, war hammers, gems... all things we are in
no position to supply... And to think, we have not even started the official negotiations for goods in the depot yet... next time I will be sure to let Sor handle these matters...
27 Hematite, 204. I think Casot has been avoiding me. Every time I am ready to negotiate trade he seems to be off surveying the land or some other pathetic excuse. And then of course he barges in eager to trade while I am busy with important mission tasks. This is becoming a volatile situation.
9 Malachite, 204. I stood Casot up. We had finally arranged to meet yesterday to trade our goods at the depot. I never showed up. He crossed too many lines with his previous antics, delaying and diverting attention so that he and his crew could feast on our limited foodstuffs. As such, I shall not benefit him trade with me...
I carried a large grin as I watched that fool Casot march away empty handed of our goods.
Despite this, I hope Uthalgil sends a caravan with my requested goods next year... we sure could use an anvil.
13 Malachite, 204. Sor is not happy with me. He actually had the nerve to berate me in front of Ulum and Mete this morning. He came back to the mission last night on break from his mining. When he heard I sent Casot off without negotiating any immediate trade, Sor became quite agitated. He was unhappy we did not secure supplies this season from the caravan, but I think he was also disappointed that I did not leave the trading business to him.
I cannot let him and his feelings disrupt our operations, though. The caravan was not going to wait for him to return from the mine regardless, so perhaps it is better I did not execute the trading contracts and risk getting cheated with the numbers.
4 Galena, 204. We have been at Snakesfreckles for many moons now. Five months, I believe. Except for the Uthalgilian caravan we have seen no one. No visitors to our mission, no refugees, no one. This is a surprise- the King indicated that this charter would draw refugees seeking sanctuary. I overheard Ulum and Ad speaking about the situation last night in hushed whispers.
On a more positive note, our hall is nearly complete. We have populated it with beds, and are constructing tables and chairs. This structure will prove to be an all purpose hall. Perhaps we will have a party to celebrate the completion of the hall- it may also help keep every one's mind off being so very alone out here.
6 Galena, 204. With the hall essentially complete, I am ordering construction of an office space. I feel like my friendship with Sor has suffered during these last weeks. I am afraid the fallout from that bastard Casot's visit may be drawing Sor and I apart. As such, I will have an office built which he can claim as his own to be used for administrative affairs, including trade negotiations.
1 Limestone, 204. I awoke this morning to discover three new calves in the mission's yard. I was not even aware our cow was with baby- or calf... or whatever you say. Mete seems to have found beauty in the birth of new calves and went on talking about love. I responded talking about fresh beef. My ribs still hurt from the jab she gave me.
Construction on Sor's office is progressing quickly. I have decided to build a second floor for his office, to act as his lodging. I may initiate construction of a second floor to the main hall as well. Dormitories above, dining below. We are all becoming much more proficient carpenters, and I have become rather handy with axe on tree, too.
8 Limestone, 204. Sor approached me today. He professed guilt that I initiated construction of an office
and apartment for him while the other laborers and I slept in a dorm that doubled as a dining hall. I assured him it was no matter- his skills required office space and I was surely going to offer it to him. I owed it. I saw him smile for the first time in weeks.
2 Sandstone, 204. Sor's apartment is complete. He 'moved in' today. That affair entitled the lot of us standing around cheering as he entered his room, as we all lack personal belongings to move. I noticed a level of jealousy amongst the other crew so I have promised that eventually each of us would maintain a personal suite.
15 Sandstone, 204. We have started moving our the goods in storage in the sinkhole up into the main mission area. I have an exotic plan for that sink hole...
1 Moonstone, 204. Winter. It is upon us... I thank the gods we have proper shelter now. We have started work on a second story dormitory, but for now we have the main hall to sleep in... with the cows and mules, but it shelter at least. I've had Sor working to the north, diverting the river some in an effort to bring better fresh water to our mission. Winter may pause that- we'll see... I do not know how cold the Snakesfreckles winters get. Everyone is jealous of Sor's personal suite.
At least I have Mete to keep share warmth with at night.
13 Moonstone, 204. Ina saw a Kobold this morning. She took a long hike in the hills to the north and happened across the kobold. She rushed into the mission out of breath to let us all know. We assured her that one kobold was not a major threat, but she is still frightened. I may need to assign Mete to active guard duty...
16 Moontstone, 204. A kobold was spotted
in the mission today! Udda was bringing wood into the walls and stumbled directly into the beast while it was sneaking through our gate. Udda's hunting dog sprung into action and chased the creature far north before it managed to escape. I have decided to order train the other dogs into fighting beasts. They shall watch after the mission for us.
24 Moonstone, 204. That kobold was back today... Some people are getting worried. I fear setting Mete to armed guard duty will cut our productivity back too much, so I will attempt to promote and maintain a better level of vigilance amongst the crew rather than assigning a guard... hopefully no one will not wake with a cut throat...
Our war dogs are not properly stationed but rather spend their time following Mete. While I am both glad she has extra protection with her at all times, I am cursed that she has trained them so well. When I cross her she needs only issue a quick command and the beasts are growling at me.. Mete has been getting her way a lot recently.
Needless to say I have ordered a cloth supply chain to get up and running within our walls so that we can tie those dogs up by the entrances to serve as proper guards.
10 Opal, 204. Sor approached me this afternoon to indicate food stores were getting low. We have only 15 meals left. I was shocked to hear that low number. Upon further investigation I learned we are practically out of seed, how, I do not know. Ulum said something about planting, harvesting, but not cooking, to which I responded 'then cook!' to which he countered a string of paced obscenities and something about there being only 24 hours in the day. So all the foodstuffs we have are being eaten and not replaced. I've ordered our three cow calves to be slaughtered. They will provide us with meat and leather and bones. Eventually I may need to send Udda out hunting again.
2 Obsidian, 204. The dormitory is complete. Practically as soon as work was finished people began plopping down into the beds. Now we may start expanding the mission beyond our most basic needs. During the next few days I will meet with Sor, Mete, and Ina to discuss our possibilities for expansion.
6 Obsidian, 204. If there is one thing that everyone seems to be able to agree with, it is that space is becoming a precious commodity. It seems that people have been seeking meetings with Sor to discuss their problems with him, so that he may then bring them up with me. Just yesterday Sor was telling me how Udda was complaining about personal space, Ulum was complaining about food storage, and even Mete confided with him - and not me!- about a lack of a proper barracks!
With so many issues arising, I decided to host a meeting between Sor, Ina and me this morning to make a decision on what project to tackle next. I trust Sor's administrative skills to keep us on track resource-wise while I feel Ina's carpentry and building skills will be important in planning feasible constructions.
We are storing our goods in the open air within the mission. It is time we build a warehouse for our supplies. During the meeting I will push an agenda to start work on a warehouse.
8 Obsidian, 204. Nothing is going as planned.
Ina, Sor, and I agreed to plan the construction of a warehouse to store all our supplies. Ina was tasked with coming up with a build plan. That was all two days ago...
Just today I had Sor and Mete come to me while I was relaxing outside to tell me we needed to build a defensive watchtower. Apparently word of our next project got out before Ina even finished the logistical planning of it and miraculously everyone spontaneously decided that a watchtower was more important.
I have a feeling that Sor let the plan slip to Mete, who probably sweet-talked Ad and Ulum into siding with her that a watchtower was an immediate necessity, even before a proper warehouse. Sor, in an attempt to avoid intra-mission conflict, probably then went and convinced Udda and Ina to go along with the watchtower idea because he knew just how bullheaded both Mete and I were, but also knew that he had a better chance living if he crossed me than if he crossed Mete. I tried to weasel the truth out of Ulum, but he seemed firm in his belief that a watchtower was necessary and that he never would have supported a plan to build a warehouse... I don't know how Mete did it, but she really managed to change their minds.
I did try to approach Mete personally, to ask her what happened, but she just clicked her tongue at the dogs when I asked and that sent me scurrying away in a hurry. That fool woman really has me tied around her finger...
10 Obsidian, 204. Sor and I have been meeting frequently to discuss the logistics of building a watchtower... no member of The Holy League is anywhere near being a qualified mason, but we feel stone is an essential building material for the tower. Sor has unearthed quite a bit of gabbro, along with other stones, which can be used as building material. Ina is a capable builder but all her experience comes from working with wood. Both Sor and I agree that the last thing we want is to build a structure that topples over at the first big storm. So far we have made no reliable decisions.
13 Obsidian, 204. I have ordered the collection of stone outside the mission walls.
During an impromptu mission-wide meeting we all agreed that our watchtower should be built primarily from stone. Everyone was enthusiastic about the project but I made it known that we had one big problem: all the stone was far away in the quarry. Bringing stone to our mission would make construction easier- I could get everyone agree to that point. Only Sor knew that I was planting a seed to set forth a plan to keep everyone busy for a few more days while Sor and I tried to figure out what the heck we were going to do about building the damn tower.
20 Obsidian, 204. A couple days of stone hauling has turned into a week of stone hauling. Sor and I still have no clue what to do about building the tower. We are now starting to privately discuss alternative projects- and then how we can convince everyone that they are more important than a stone watchtower. I think Ad is just happy to be done chopping trees for a while, while Ina is certainly unhappy to be hauling stone all day, everyday. Sor has had her busy a couple of times in her workshop building some things for him, but otherwise everyone is busy hauling.
1 Granite, 205. Spring is here! And not a minute too late. We are having a small festival to celebrate the coming of spring! It will also distract everyone from the fact that we have made pretty much no real progress on the watchtower
at all during the last couple of weeks. Sor has also indicated he has a surprise to show me tomorrow.
2 Granite, 205. Sor's special mining work by the river is nearly done! He has been busy diverting a section of the brook to the North East down towards our old storage sink hole. Ina built some mechanisms and a couple of floodgates which she has hooked up to some levers to control the water flow from the river. We will be able to fill and/or empty the sinkhole at will. I may look into having that sinkhole stocked with fish too... Sor says he only needs to dig out a little more land before the final connection from the brook to the hole is complete. Then all we need to is pull a lever and watch the water flow.
Granite, 205. Today we opened the floodgates to allow the sinkhole to fill. It was very impressive to watch the water roar into the large open space like a horde of charging bulls. Some water even splashed up and got Ad wet. Everyone had a great laugh at that, even the stoic Udda!
19 Granite, 205. I stopped by the sinkhole's edge this morning to observe the water rising. This is an exciting time for Snakesfreckles. I think everyone has forgotten the woes of hauling stone and the lack of progress on a tower. Spirits are up, and everyone seems to be relatively content or even happy. Mete even indicated she was very proud of the work I have done. We are all ver- ...
[con't]
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Topic: The Journal of Sir Woge and his (kind of) lands: Snakesfreckles (Read 26395 times)