Draith
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Chapter 68 - Rope Swings
🕑 Added 2025-04-07 14:00:12 +0000 UTCBetween the rather blunt introduction, and the overly dolled up clothing, I wasn't too sure of what to make of the refugee representatives.
They'd provided a unified front, but the looks the elves gave Egerta hadn't escaped my notice. A certain amount of disgust mixed with wariness.
Still, I figured I’d follow what I’d learned of etiquette from the Elinder lessons.
"Welcome to the Frigid Peaks, Egerta," I said, giving her a slight bow, only giving her the barest of acknowledgment, which was technically more than I needed to, considering it was my domain. "I am Magus Dominus Perth of Althon."
"Right, hope ya don't mind if we skip over all that pageantry, Mr Magus," Egerta said, patting her belly. "Hoping to get a mite settled 'fore this one comes along."
I straightened, unable to keep a bit of a smile from creeping onto my face. If they didn’t want to do formal, I could work with that. "Of course. I'm afraid we're a little under-prepared. Only just heard you were coming a couple days ago."
"Thought it might be so. Saw ya slap together this thing yesterday," Egerta said, stomping on the deck with one foot, drawing my attention to where water was leaking between two of the hastily joined logs. "Mighty fine, for rush work."
The elf with the the tiny horns rolled her eyes, only to receive a subtle elbow from the elf beside her. When my gaze shifted to them, he took it as an opportunity to step forward. "Greetings Magus Dominus. I am Shaper Xoth, of the Sapphire Path, and this is my daughter Xelinda."
Both of them gave me a much deeper bow than I'd given Egerta, though I caught a second eyeroll from Xelinda.
"And I am Shaper Kallum, of the Emerald Path," the elf on the other side said as he copied their bow.
"Tarnibus," the raptor like person said, tilting their head to the side slightly.
"Right, now that we got all that out of the way, what say we get this started, lot of people waiting for us to get things sorted," Egerta said, stepping forward. "Little one's not gonna wait forever either."
I fought down a snort, turning to lead them towards a set of waiting basket seats. While we'd taken the ropes down, I'd convinced Myris that we'd need a way for the refugees to get up. The basket seats were what they used when the Tethered had injured or infirm who needed to be moved. "We haven't had a chance to build a proper lift yet. Or to carve out stairs. My folk prefer to climb the nets, but I realize climbing five-hundred-feet of cliff face is a bit much."
Egerta eyed the rope baskets for a second, before sliding her giant golden sword into a strap on her chest, which she then slid around until the sword was on her back. Only then did she reach out and grab the nearest net, hauling herself up wordlessly.
Tarnibus, the raptor-folk, approached one of the basket seats, holding it in a single clawed hand. They poked it once, before climbing into it, then curling around themselves much tighter than it looked like they should be able to. Kallum, the ram-horned elf shaper slowly lowered himself into the chair beside them.
"Dominus, if you do not mind, we have our own way to ascend," Xoth said, lowering his head slightly.
“Do as you please," I said, stepping back and gesturing at the cliff.
Xoth turned towards Xelinda, holding his hand out to her. She hesitated, before taking his hand with a sigh. Then he lifted his staff, waving towards one of the nearby trees. Several leaves came tumbling down, swirling towards him. A moment later, one slid to a stop in front of their feet. Then the leaves began to weave together, forming a small platform that they stepped onto. He placed the staff in the center of the platform and it lurched forward, thin tendrils like the ones from the ship's ramp propelling them forward. When the platform reached the nets hung from the cliff, it didn't slow, simply shifting its grip to grab them.
Then it carried them up and away.
As the last of the visiting dignitaries disappeared up the cliff, Calbern stepped up beside me. "That went rather well."
"For now," I said, glancing back towards their ship. There were easily another thirty people visible, all of them watching us, and who knew how many were out of sight. Then I stepped towards one of the baskets. I wasn't eager to ride it, but it would take me way too long to get to the top otherwise. I wasn’t quite at the point where I trusted myself with putting my foot in a single hoop to be yanked upwards.
Once I was secure, Calbern gave the signal and several Tethered leapt from above, riding the counterweights down while yanking us upward. There was a 'yip' from one of the other chairs. When I glanced over, I discovered that Shaper Kallum wasn't doing much better than I was, his grip on the rope basket sides of the chair white-knuckled.
It didn't take long for the chairs to pull us to the top. A pair of Tethered pulled each of our baskets in. We'd reached the top well ahead of the others, though it only took another minute before Xoth and his daughter rose over the edge atop their magical leaf. Soon as they were atop the cliff, Xoth twisted his staff, and the leaf-jellyfish transport withered away.
He let out a soft cough, then turned to regard the valley alongside the rest of us. A small frown made its way onto his face.
"Wow, you weren't wrong," Xelinda said as she followed her father's gaze. "Terra Vista never had anything so… untamed." Then she took a step forward, stopping when her father's hand reached up to snag her elbow. With yet another roll of her eyes, she stopped.
"There is much to be-" Xoth started, but cut off when Egerta hefted herself over the edge with a loud huff. Calbern was right behind her, though he'd made his ascent using one of the counterweight ropes.
He nodded to me, and I turned back to the gathered… representatives. "Right. As you can see, we don't have much ready. Yet. If you can contribute, let Calbern here know. That includes any of your people below. We'll put off proper discussion of your circumstances until after we've got shelter set up. Any questions?"
"We wish to stay," Xoth stated, nodding his head slightly. "My people will not be returning to Terra Vista for the next several decades. Not until those fools have settled their differences."
"That's great," I said, nodding to him. "But we'll still have to discuss laws and governance."
"Long as I get a place for me and mine soon, I don't much care 'bout none o' that," Egerta said, scratching at her back with the guard of her sword, having already freed it from its sheath.
There was a long-suffering sigh from Xoth, but he inclined his head in my direction anyway.
Guessed I'd be sharing in that feeling soon.
The next few hours were a flurry of activity as the Tethered continued bringing wood from the forest through to the refugee valley and hoisting up those still on the ships the representatives thought would be useful.
Which turned out to be a rather small number of people. Most of the ships remained anchored farther out.
To my surprise, Xoth wasn't very useful with construction. He didn't have any spells like Bloom. All of his work was with his vine constructs. Which meant he could provide amazingly beautiful doors, or even ramps, long as I didn't want them to last longer than half an hour. He'd brought several saplings to grow a new garden, but even with Bloom, those would take years before they'd provide him with the materials he needed to make permanent stuff like his ship's walkway.
Still, those ramps were helpful to move materials around, so he wasn't left without something to do.
Egerta proved to be strong enough to hoist a thirty foot long, foot thick log onto her shoulder all on her own, though she wasn't nearly as good at not hitting people with it. Thankfully, the Tethered remained on their ropes, which meant they only came away with bruises which Minor Heal was able to treat.
By the time I was made aware of it, Calbern had already separated her from everyone else, getting her to build her lean-to near the head of the valley.
Hers was the only lean-to being built. Most of the buildings we were putting together were closer in design to the hall where we'd met Sarpit and his Frost Rivens, with central pits for heat and cooking. They still weren’t glorious, but they were only intended to serve as temporary structures while proper homes were built. Personally, I was thinking of tiered apartments, with private gardens and larger communal green spaces. I'd read about a design like that in one of the magazines I brought in for the customers, and always thought it seemed like a better way to do city living.
Would be a lot of work, but considerably less than building houses for everyone.
The current halls were little more than stacked wood harvested from the shattered trees of Mistvale. Thanks to Bloom, they were firmly rooted and had far fewer gaps to let in water from outside. Still, the haste with which everything was thrown up meant the floors were either rough dirt, hard stone or even grass. And since this was the Frigid Peaks, keeping the weather out meant there were no windows and only a few chimneys.
Wasn't much in the way for furniture either, though the Tethered had managed to produce a couple hundred hammocks. Turned out that Balthum's order on being able to replace all rope in the village had extended to the woven furniture. The Tethered even had hammock-chairs.
Hadn't even known that was a thing.
All in all, I was feeling pretty impressed at how well things had come together. In less than forty-eight hours, we’d gone from having no infrastructure to having enough to provide a few hundred refugees with shelter that’d stand up to a storm like the one that’d just swept through.
Not everyone was as impressed.
"Are we really going to be sleeping in rope swings?" Xelinda asked her father, who was standing beside her as they inspected the first of the finished halls.
"No," Xoth answered, his gaze shifting to meet mine. "We will allow those we've sheltered to come ashore first. The Great Vineway shall remain our home for the time being."
"The boat? That's even worse," Xelinda said, throwing her hands up. "Still not sure why we left Spellford in the first place."
"Because Spellford wasn't safe," Xoth said, raising a hand to cut her off. "We will continue this later, when we're alone."
At his not-so-subtle rebuke, Xelinda finally noticed me standing just inside the hall. To her credit, she immediately blushed, offering me a shallow bow.
"Shaper Xoth," I said, stepping forward. "Do you have time?"
He nodded his head.
"Good," I said, gesturing for him to follow me. I took him to where Calbern and Selvi were waiting. "Selvi here will take you through Tetherfall's existing laws. If any of your people want to visit, I don't want ignorance to be an excuse."
"As you wish," Xoth replied, giving me a shallow bow.
"Good. This is all temporary. The laws, the buildings, the furniture. We really weren't ready for… any of this."
"We are quite grateful for the accommodations. I had feared we would be left foraging for the barest of scraps," Xoth admitted, his gaze shifting to the building around us. “Already, you have shown more kindness than many in your position would’ve offered.”
“Uh, right,” I said, shaking my head. “I’ll leave you to it then.”
With a nod, I left him behind with Selvi. I went back to the cliff, Calbern trailing along behind me. Below, the other ships had docked at the pier, their occupants spilling forth. These weren't nearly so well put together as the representatives we'd met earlier.
"So, what's Tresla found?" I asked, watching as a mother and her two children flinched back from one of the sailors on the ship they'd just departed.
They hurried up the dock as Calbern stepped up beside me. "It is as your sister said. Terra Vista is at war with itself. Though the Bladesingers are merely one faction. Most of the refugees do not understand what was happening, though its clear several of the Terra Vistan Columns have shattered."
"Those are like the Pillars along the Front, right? They keep monsters from passing through?"
"Just so, master Perth. Though I do not believe they are capable of stopping anything on the level of a Hydra."
"Neither do the Pillars," I grumbled. I still remembered my first day on Ro'an, and the hydra that nearly pushed through the Front. "And their trip here?"
"It is too soon to be certain, but most do not seem to have been mistreated," Calbern replied. "Though they have brought little provisions of their own. They've been living on what they could catch, and it seems the waves haven't been kind."
"Well, at least that's not too hard to address," I said, rubbing my chin.
"Indeed. Tresla was already organizing several Tethered to arrange a feast. However, there was some resistance to giving up meat that was so recently added to the village's stores," Calbern replied.
"Always something," I grumbled. "Let me know if I'm needed. I don't think there's much more for me to do here."
"Of course, master Perth. Where will you be?"
I gave him the first genuine smile I'd had all day. "I'll be in the workshop with Neta."
