Zebanamana

Grayfall Guild: Now Hiring!

With a thud, the box of tools Emmerling carried was dropped on the ground and he rummaged through it in search of a charcoal pencil. He moved surprisingly quickly for such a large man, tapping on support beams and listening for rot and then marking if the beam was good or not. When he came upon a beam that he could not be decisive with, Emmerling would extract a small metal crank and would bore deep into the wood with a hollow drill. After looking at a core sample he would strike a beam with charcoal and move on.

“Mmm,” He grumbled as he worked, “There is some bad rot in some of these beams. Goin’ta be tricky.” He said looking over to Cliver and Sarrai’a.

“Pine, spruce, chestnut, hickory.” Emmerling listed, “Which ever ya can find quickly. Pine will do though, got plenty growin’ ‘round here.” He clicked his tongue sharply and dashed charcoal against a beam so hard that the pencil shattered.

“If we get some wood, I can make a sled, that’d get the wood here quicker, but I don’t know how ya will be gettin’ it across that river.” He said. “I ain’t makin’ the order for ya though, tha’s on ya guild master.” Emmerling gestures at Lilith, “But the way I’m seein’ it, ya’ll gonna need at least ten to fifteen adult trees to fix up these supports. The scraps . . .” He thought a moment and looked up at the ceiling above him. The weight of the building was dark in his mind and a shiver went down his spine before dissipating. “. . . well the scraps can be used to fix some of this other damage. I ain’t worried ‘bout wood trim though. I ain’t lookin’ to have this place collapse with me anywhere near here.”

Grayfall Guild: Now Hiring!

Oh, I am sorry to hear about that. I hope everything is alright.

Grayfall Guild: Now Hiring!

“Yesterday hrm?” Emmerling said with a grunt. They had come together quickly and already completed a task together. It sounded suicidal to go into combat so shortly after they had met each other, “You’ve all been bit busy eh? Ya’ll know me almost as well as ya’ll know each other.”

As they journeyed, Emmerling lagged to the middle. He would not be first into danger, nor would he allow himself to be picked off at the tail end of any group. The tools on his back were too expensive to lose, but the most precious thing he has was his life, and it was best to let others negotiate around danger before he had to. It was a long route they took. The sun was reaching its zenith just after they passed the log bridge, and his water skin was almost empty by the time they came in sight of the guild house.

A sharp exhale burst from Emmerling and almost caused a coughing fit in him, “This is a travesty!” He had half a mind to yell at Sarrai’a from entering the building in its current state. “I’ll have to survey the property. I can’t be seein’ this as safe.” His head shook vigorously and he stared through the holes in the walls, and to any of the visible support beams.

He stepped with a weight of responsibility cast over him. The dull tired look in his eyes were now wide and fierce. Emmerling immediately stepped through the doorway and began rapping on any of the exposed wood and all the beams he could find. “Rot.” He whispered under his breath as he listened for the soft thud of rotting wood.

“Six months?” Emmerling said, “This all happened in six months?” His face reddened at the mention of magic, and he pursed his lips such that it looked like they would disappear into his mouth, “Magic ain’t no way to keep a building standin’. Age is catchin’ up to the structure. It’ll be needin’ swift repair.”

He turned about to Lilith, “Send an order for wood quickly. We will be needin’ to cut some of our own lumber as well.”

Grayfall Guild: Now Hiring!

Why is that?

Grayfall Guild: Now Hiring!

Yeah, I am tired too. I have to be up early tomorrow to film a music video so this weekend is going to be swamped for me.

Grayfall Guild: Now Hiring!

Good good. It has been years since I have really participated in a forum RP. It feels good to be able to do it again.

Grayfall Guild: Now Hiring!

So how is everyone?

Grayfall Guild: Now Hiring!

Emmerling rocked on his heels and cracked his knuckles as Cliver spoke with the gate guard. The guild was a curious grouping of individuals. Cliver had seemed strange to him when they had first met, but the others were a weird collection. The tall elf woman struck the older man as a strange character. She had an aura of defensiveness around her and seemed ever alert. The guild master herself was an enigma as well. She was short to the point she seemed almost a child, and she did not carry herself in the way that he would figure a guild master would.

He blinked and stared off across the muddy Fort Mundy.

Forty people dying fighting a dragon. That must have been an endeavor. For a moment Emmerling wondered if she had witnessed it. There was a glimmer of thought before his eyes focused again. It was none of his business. None of it was. The reason there was a girl with wings, or a Halfling, or a drunk man, or even the unconscious man carried by Sarrai’a. Adventurers were always strange.

Emmerling pulled his hat off of his head and turned a wipe of his brow into a salute of acknowledgement to the approaching Elras. His hair was a thick brown that was pulled so tautly into a pony tail that it seemed like his forehead would tear.

“Mhm, yes. We’ll be handlin’ fixing this guild house.” Emmerling said. “It doesn’t matter what shape this building is in, I’ll fix it up right an’ tighty.”

With a hiccup, Emmerling follows Lilith into the forest with the rest of them. Every step of his heavy and laborious, and as they wandered his thirst came with a sticky dryness that he quenched with a skin of water.

“Now, how long’ve ya’ll been together?” Emmerling asked over the din of casual conversation, “You all seem quite friendly with each other, like fast friends.”

Grayfall Guild: Now Hiring!

“Pack hmm?” There were two wolf pups that Lilith showed off. One with her, and another that a superiorly drunk young man carried. The sight of Drek gave Emmerling a light smile. He had his first beer at ten, and he had not been able to concentrate properly. Words slipped his mind and his reflexes had been dulled. Generally he had made a mess of things that night that the potter did not forget for several months. Drek reminded him of his youth.

“These ain’t a pack. They’re people.” He tore himself from a reign of nostalgia and turned to Sarrai’a, “We ain’t animals. Least we shouldn’ act the part.”

Emmerling picked up the pace slightly as the group trudged headlong into a muddy causeway in Fort Mundy and toward the gatehouse. His heavy brow reddened with the effort, and a sheen of sweat started across his face. The carpenter was used to the weight of the tools on his back, but the effort still sped his heart to a race, and it urged a continued wheeze from out of his throat. Through the camp they went, and they passed faces familiar to him, those that waved respectfully to the guild members and with quiet salutations to Cliver and Emmerling.

“Some of these men’ve been here for some months.” He said stepping beneath the gatehouse with a huff of breath. “Me? I’ve been here bout a year. It’s good work, very good work.” Emmerling nods to himself not caring if anyone was listening to him or not. “ ‘fore we go any further, do ya’ll have all you came with? Where’s the Halfling?”

His dark eyes dully glazed over the band and then over the fort before he abruptly said, “I am Emmerling if ya’ll didn’t hear and cared to find out. I’m a carpenter. Best damned one in this region.”

Grayfall Guild: Now Hiring!

“Eh?” Emmerling smacked his lips in response, “I see. Ya’ll killed a dragon.”

His head bobbed slowly in contemplation. He had never seen a dragon, and for that matter he had never seen a desert before. Emmerling’s entire existence was a microcosm of life. Waking up and working and sleeping. Never travelling far from home. His complexion was localized, his accent was familiar. Emmerling was not one who had ever been more than fifty miles from his home, and the slow creep of a resting face softened his expression. He was content with his lot in life.

“I ain’t callin’ your guild a failure. I am askin’ if it is some kind’ve failed guild.” Emmerling repeated. “Ye know, as in it hasn’ been successful currently. Ya’ll need to repair your guild hall, ya sound like ya’ve been havin’ financial troubles too.”

The fat man tugged sharply on the leather straps on his shoulders pulling them tight. “If it ain’t workin’ as intended then it is failed.” Emmerling grunted as he fished along his belt for a wine skin. A low wheezing cough rolled up from his throat and he quickly drowned it beneath a gulp of wine. “Now, I ain’ tryin’ to get in an argument ‘bout semantics.”

Emmerling’s brow furrowed and his gaze narrowed as Sarrai’a snarled at her. With a wipe of his chin he looked over the woman, “Why are ya growlin’ at me?” He turned down to Lilith, “Why is she growlin’ at me?”