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FLTL Ch 190. Turbulence
🕑 Added 2025-03-17 14:30:02 +0000 UTCA/N: I wanted to give a better idea of how the stream looks in winter, so you can use the below two images as a reference (the copyright of the images are owned by their respective owners, I don't own them).
The size of the stream Kivamus is visiting is somewhere between that in these two streams in the images.
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Kivamus explained, "There are many reasons, but a major one is that this is not stagnant water. The continuous movement of water, especially in a fast moving stream like this, creates turbulence, which is uh... a lot of movement, and that prevents ice crystals from forming."
"But everything around us is already covered in snow by now..." Hudan said with a frown.
"That's true," Kivamus said while pointing at the shores of the river. "As you can see there, some ice has already started to form on the edges, but the volume of water in this stream is still enough to prevent it from freezing completely even at this temperature. Of course, if the temperature gets even lower for a sustained time, then even this stream would freeze over."
"I have seen that happen in the past when I was still young," Tesyb commented from nearby. "It was easily the coldest winter I remember in my life, and my father had brought me here to show the frozen river, since it was so rare. But I know for sure that it has only happened once in this place, at least since we moved here a few years after the founding of the village."
Kivamus nodded. "That's good to know. A particularly harsh winter can certainly freeze this stream, but I am glad to know that it's not common."
He thought about the feasibility of connecting the stream to the farming areas in the South. He had kept a keen eye on the surroundings when moving here, and as expected, the ground had a small upward incline as they had moved deeper into the hills. That meant the elevation of this hilly area was a little higher than the flat ground in the village, which should have made it very easy for water to flow from here to the farmlands, but the stream was flowing in a deep channel between these hills, and while he couldn't be sure about it, he still believed that the elevation of water level was equal to the ground in the village, or probably even a little lower.
That meant the water of the stream would have to be lifted around a meter at least to make it flow easily through the canal they were planning to dig from here to the village. This would also require a small water wheel, but there was no hurry to build it since any digging for a canal could only be done after spring when the ground had thawed. But it was still good to know that it was possible to irrigate the farms with this stream.
"Alright, let's return now," he announced.
Tesyb looked wistfully at the river. "Can't we at least catch a few fish? It's still early afternoon, and we will easily reach back to the village before it gets dark."
"Of course not!" Hudan immediately reprimanded the guard. "We don't have the time for that!"
Kivamus intervened, "It's alright, Hudan. I think we can afford to take a break here and have something to eat. I am getting a little hungry as well."
They had already brought some of their precious meat jerky and hardtack biscuits with them for lunch, and this seemed like a good time and place for that. If the guards could catch a few fish here, it would make it all the better.
Hudan looked reluctant to agree, but eventually nodded in acceptance.
"Thank you, milord! I'll catch a big one for you!" Tesyb claimed with a grin, and immediately untied a long fishing stick from his horse, with another guard doing the same.
Kivamus just snorted. Had the guards already planned to do fishing here before even leaving the village?
Then he noticed that what he had thought to be a fishing stick was actually just the spears which Tesyb had tied with some string at the end. He sighed. What was he even thinking earlier? How would these poor villagers have a fishing stick with them in the first place? They weren't out on a luxury fishing vacation in a lake in England!
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The fishing had taken much longer than they had expected, and the rare glimpses of the sun behind the clouds was showing them that it had already dipped behind the hills to their west.
A while ago, Kivamus had also tried his hand at fishing as well, but not having any experience of fishing at all, he didn't get any success. However, the guards seemed to be well versed in it and they hadn't taken long to catch nearly half a dozen of them. The fish had looked kind of like trout to him, or perhaps like salmon, but the guards had told him that it was named sorjun and was the most common fish in this stream.
He was still surprised that if it was so easy to catch fish here, why didn't they keep fishing every day, but tesyb had told him that it had been more than a month since they had last come for fishing here, and that was why the fish seemed abundant today, otherwise they wouldn't catch nearly this many fish in such a small stream. That showed why the village didn't use this stream as a regular source of fish. However, in the future, once they had dug a big enough pond in the South of the village, these fish should survive there easily enough, and that should increase the availability of fish for Tiranat.
Since there still weren't enough fish caught by them to take back, they had decided to roast them all over a fire and have them as a late lunch, so that they could save the dried provisions they had brought for future use. That was a couple of hours ago.
Kivamus took a gulp of cool water from his water skin, and looked towards the west. With the sun already having dipped behind the hills, sunset wouldn't be far away now, and with every passing minute it seemed like the worry lines on Hudan's forehead kept increasing because of the delay.
Deciding not to make him anymore distressed, Kivamus ordered, "Let's pack up now. We need to leave or it might get dark before we reach the village."
"We are probably already late though," Hudan muttered, and he didn't take long to organise the guards, and soon they were all riding back towards the village in the same formation as earlier. Two guards riding in front of Kivamus, two guards behind him, with Hudan on his side.
"We really shouldn't have left this late..." Hudan complained with a frown. "Even if just an aggressive bear comes in our way, it would be very difficult for us to fight it while protecting you at the same time on this narrow path."
"I know, I know," Kivamus tried to reassure him. While the coal mines were around half an hour's journey from the village, this stream must have been closer to an hour-long journey from Tiranat, but he felt confident that with five guards surrounding him, there shouldn't be any problem. Then he quipped, trying to make the mood lighter, "Once we had decided to roast the fish here, we couldn't have just left in the middle of it, could we? And come on, even you enjoyed eating the freshly roasted fish!"
Hudan didn't give any reply, and just grumbled as their small group kept moving west.
After a while, Kivamus estimated that they had been traveling for nearly an hour, so the village of Tiranat shouldn't be far away now. They still hadn't left the hilly region though, likely because their pace had started to slow down as it began to get dark, but thankfully they hadn't encountered anything dangerous on the way, and there was still enough light to see the path they were riding on, albeit barely.
"See?" He teased the guard captain. "Everything went fine, didn't it? You worry too much."
Hudan was going to retort something with his persistent frown, but suddenly the air was filled with a series of bone-chilling howls, the kind of which Kivamus had never heard in his life. It felt similar to the howls of a wolf, but for some reason this particular howl felt a lot more dangerous to his ears.
Immediately, he saw the guards riding in front of him stiffen in fear in their saddles, before they pulled the reins to stop their horses, while putting their hands on the shafts of their spears.
''That's the howl of Goddess' damned adzees!" One of the guards in the front hissed loudly. "What are they doing so close to the village!"
"Quiet!" Hudan scolded the guard immediately in a whispered voice. "Not one more word or we are all dead!"
Kivamus looked at the guard captain with wide eyes, his heart racing fast, but didn't know what to say. There were adzee out here in these hills?
He pulled the reins too with shaking hands, while he noticed Hudan stopping his horse as well on his right, while pulling his sword out.
From the howls it sounded like there was a whole pack of them here! He had heard that even a single fully grown adzee usually took an armed knight to take it down, and with some help from others to keep it at bay. But if there was a whole pack of them out here? He didn't fancy their chances of survival at all.
They kept waiting for a while, everybody trying not to make any sound. Even the horses seemed jittery now, making him worry even more.
Before long, there were many more howls echoing in the air. With the sound reflecting from the surrounding hills, it was hard to tell where the howls were even coming from. He looked at Hudan again with worry, thinking why they had even stopped. Shouldn't they be riding fast now to run away? But the guard captain, who already had his sword ready in his hands - unlike the other guards who were holding spears - was just looking at the surrounding hills carefully, perhaps searching for any kind of movement.
By now Kivamus' heart was beating so loudly that he thought everyone could hear its sound, and he kept blaming himself for the decision to catch fish and roast them like they were on a damned picnic!
This was a dangerous medieval world with all kinds of savage beasts everywhere, especially in the middle of winter. He really should have thought of everyone's safety first, instead of trying to impose his will over the guard captain earlier. Hudan had the most experience of how to survive in this region - especially when he worked at Helga's inn, which was located in the middle of forests. He really should have listened to the guard captain's advice to leave early.
As he heard another howling sound from somewhere, he blamed himself once again for getting everyone caught in this situation. Would they even return alive to the village now?
What had he done...
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Next chapter: FLTL Ch 191. Vigilance
Comments
Zeddicus Zu'l Zorander
Thank you for the chapter! 🙏
