Aerodouth Is Born

I. Despite the constant race to claim as much territory as possible and despite the exploration many times before of far off shores the Sea of Darkness has remained uncharted and the potential land beyond it unclaimed. Most sailors relied on the stars and the moons to guide their ships however something evil permeated the Sea of Darkness such that neither the light of the stars nor the moons could be seen, forcing sailors to either go on short expeditions during the day or become ensnared in the sea. Legends abound of the ocean with tales of the Lost Isles of Morokei and krakens prowling the depths however none have ever been verified, not until a sailor turned wizard, Michael Gorefiend had perfected a vessel that could traverse the Sea without stars. Using divination magic chunks of moon stone in the ships would glow in the direction where land lay ahead, with some effort, someone familiar with the arcane could set a stone to always show him where he had departed from. It was far from perfect but it was the best anyone had been able to come up with. It is on one of the first of these ships that our story begins. This story is either history or myth depending on where you herald from, however I assure you, somewhere in the cosmos the events I describe to you have happened Teron Aerodouth had never wanted to come on this expedition. He thought less of his parents for fleeing from their problems in Norphamus. His father had always told him a real man faces his problems head on, but now, after he had failed to pay off a debt, he and his family were on a ship sailing as far away from creditors as possible. Yuruk-Tar was to be their new home. Its name meant “The Land of the Wild '' in elvish, the language of those who discovered it. Teron’s parents told him of how this land was unclaimed and filled to the brim with opportunity but he still was anything but happy about leaving the home he had known for his entire life. Now he had been sailing across the Sea of Darkness for months, which even the astounding magical ship could not make up for. The nights were always pitch black, allowing for no way of leaving below deck to get a breath of fresh air without stumbling over something (or in the worst of cases falling overboard as Ryndel did). Their food was brick hard hard-tack and the occasional lemon. He and the other passengers served as the crew so there was little time or energy for talk and even when there was Teron found it boring. Most people were allegedly just simple farmers or tradesmen and women who hit hard times. After so many months the few stories of the honest people became stale and the people who genuinely had led interesting lives wouldn’t let out a peep of their real life. “Some adventure” Teron mumbled to himself at the bow of the ship, as he watched the waves break on the front of it. To him there was nothing better to do with his time after nearly three months of traveling across the Sea of Darkness with the same insufferable boys. “If this land is really so great then I’ll just leave my parents as soon as we arrive and set out for my own life, it’s not like they’ve done much good for me as of late any…” Teron’s thought was interrupted by the sight of a sliver of coastline off on the horizon. “Land! Finally land! I can get off this cursed ship and live my own life.” He began to turn away to go tell the captain and his parents but as he was turning he spotted something else out of the corner of his eye. The ocean was swelling, almost like a wave but instead of going from the back to the front of the ship it was coming directly towards the side of the ship. As Teron ran to the wooden railing to get a better look. The water finally broke and a jagged mountain peak of water poked out of the water, and then another, and then another. “Everyone! brace!” Teron yelled, barely getting the words out of his mouth and certainly not getting everyone's attention by the time the earthy spikes slashed through the underside of the ship. The ship nearly capsized and Teron flew over the railing just barely managing to catch it with his hand. As he pulled his head over the railing he saw from the other side of the ship the peaks rising from the water and then it was clear what was happening. The peaks were a jagged shell and out of the water rose a giant sea-green turtle with a maw of teeth the size of spears. Its head alone was the size of the entire bow of the ship, rough and covered with bumps all over his head with larger spikes forming a ridge along its neck. As Teron pulled himself over the edge of the boat he saw the boats wizard and captain, Menphil at the side of the ship facing the beast. As it began charging towards the boat he muttered an incantation as he slowly pulled a fist sized orb out of his robe. It was made of a green metal and required considerable effort from the wizard to raise up in front of him, arm extended, eyes wide. The ball bore runes inlaid with purple gemstones across its surface forming characters which Teron knew he had seen before but had never been able to read. The characters began to glow, one at a time, in quick succession. After a few seconds Menphil pulled the orb back towards his chest. As he opened his eyes Teron felt a sudden shake from the bottom of the ship, fearing the worst he looked back across the ship’s railing, however all he saw was the back of a shell resembling a small mountain range. Apparently it had just swam away, like a man with a grudge who thought he had seen the subject of his years of hate, and then after seeing his face, realized it was not the man after all. Menphil then turned around and said in his voice befitting a man of his age and weariness, “I have put a charm on the monster. It will last us a time however we must get to the shore before it comes to his senses, there is no hope for any ship when a sea monster such as that is pursuing it. Now get to work on making this boat go as a fast as it can. Oh, and also patch whatever damage it may have made with that swing of its with its tail.” Most of the men and boys on the ship and some of the women ran about the ship, some going down to the lower decks to open the oar panels and begin rowing towards the land. The other women spent their time to get those in shock or disbelief on their feet. Many of the children and some of the women and men on the boat were screaming and crying while their mothers tried to comfort them. Many men and women simply sat on the deck with a blank stare saying little more than “This is it” while the women tried to shake them out of it. Oddly enough Teron was not counted among either those with the blank stares and jaws agape nor the screaming men and children, nor was he one of the boys that helped to row, instead he was yelling at Menphil of all people. “What the hell do you mean we don’t have a chance against it! Surely there’s something on this ship that can at least scare that creature off to wherever it came from!” Teron yelled over the commotion of the ship. “You have no idea what you’re talking about boy!” Menphil said in a serious tone. “That beast is not something you simply drive off, you’d need a ship designed to hunt such creatures to even have a chance, we are on a voyager ship.”. “You’re just a coward, just like everyone else on this boat.” Teron said right as he felt a stinging smack on his cheek as Menphil spun around. “Learn to respect your elders boy! You have some nerve talking like that to me, a wizard who could light you aflame where you stand if I wished!” Said Menphil now still in the same serious tone but in a volume that could make any boy quake in his boots. “You think you can fight that creature off! Fine! There’s some spears down in storage by the rope. But if you actually want us to survive this rather than trying to kill yourself then I’d suggest that you go down there and get rowing instead.” Teron stormed off to help repair the hull of the ship which had apparently been damaged when the creature had turned around, although it was only a manageable relatively small gash in the side considering how big the monster was, made only by a whipping of its short tail as it turned around. He knew the odds were against them but he didn’t understand why they couldn’t at least try, Menphil was a wizard! After all, he said he could light him on fire where he stood. Couldn’t he do something! In Teron’s mind there wasn’t a chance they would reach the shore before the monstrosity came back. The chances of beating it were slim but they had to try, and besides, he couldn’t stand running away anymore. He went down into the depths of the ships with 8 other people, mostly boys like him, who had been told to fix the leaks in the ship. Luckily (if any part of this situation could be called lucky) the beast had only made a few fist sized holes in the bottom of the ship and there was nothing beyond fixing. There was one grown man among them leading them in repairing the ship, handing out boards, hammers, and nails. “Nail down a plank right there!” “You missed one!”. Although the other boys were a bit shaken, the man among them was actually the most distressed among them. Teron put his frustrations into each strike of his hammer into the head of the nail. He wished he could take a hammer to the massive skull of that damn turtle. Teron usually had far too much confidence in himself than was actually merited, his parents knew this the best. After all the holes had been repaired the man was significantly calmer and led all of the boys up to the deck, although Teron decided he would stay down for a bit longer, “I just want to double check to make sure we got all of the holes.” he said to the man, who gave his lantern to Teron as he climbed the last few steps. Teron looked around for a while in the cargo hold of the ship. Most of what he found was nothing more than hardtack and other, equally disinteresting, supplies. However in one tucked away corner he found a few crates of weapons. Although nothing among these could possibly kill such a beast as one that lurked the oceans around them his stubbornness was too weighty for him to realize this. He grabbed three iron spears and ran up to the deck. Teron had not been in too many scraps nor had he gone hunting much but his father had made sure he knew how to use a few weapons, namely knives, spears, and crossbows. Even while Teron was bitter and resentful towards him because of what he believed to be cowardice he still found himself thankful that he had a father that was at least concerned about the safety of his son. Teron walked to the side of the ship the monster had come from before and stood there with spears in hand, waiting. Luckily no one noticed his waiting about in the current chaos, until nearly 30 minutes after he had first started standing there his mother noticed him. “Why aren’t you helping us row the boat towards shore?” she said attempting to suppress the panic in her voice.Teron said “I’m only one boy and the shore is at least 30 leagues away, there's no chance we will flee in time to escape that thing, the least we can do is try to drive it off.” Teron said in a surprisingly calm voice. “Teron, I’m sorry for taking you on this journey, I know we should have stayed home. But unlike you your father and I are still trying to cling to hope, hope that life can get better. I know this is likely our last day on this strife filled world we call Karnum, but can’t you at least try?” she said as tears began to well up in her eyes. “ I am trying mom, I don’t know what I can do but maybe if I land one of these spears in just the right place at just the right time it will drive that titan away.” Teron said, the confidence dying in his voice as he said it. “We’ve always tried to run away from our problems and I know right now might be the worst time to be brave but for once in my life I want to stand up for myself, stand up for us.”. “ Well at the very least can you talk to Menphil about this, he may be able to help you.” she said. “I will” said Teron. He walked up to the deck, trying to shrug off the stress of the situation he still refused to believe they were in. Teron walked into the captains quarters, a strangely calm place in contrast to the rest of the ship, up until heavy footsteps could be heard from above. Over a table with a large leather bound tome Menphil stood, reading its pages slowly and carefully in the light of the lantern hanging above. Teron walked forward to see illustrations of the beast they just encountered on the pages with text running margin to margin in handwriting so sloppy he knew it could only be a wizards. Teron spoke up after a moment “Menphil, I wanted to-” “I know what you’re here for I can see the spears. I’m old but not blind” Menphil cut him off. “I’m sorry Teron but you cannot fight this creature, simply go below deck and help row.” “There’s not a chance we’re going to make it to shore in time and you know that!” Teron suddenly burst out. Menphil let out a sigh that contained the weight that came with leading men and women through trial and tribulation for most of a weary life. “I know Teron. I’ve spent more time in here accepting my death than studying giant turtles. But I also know I can’t let the people on this ship know that.” “Isn’t there any chance of driving this thing off?” Teron said, frustrated by the wizards lack of both the courage he possessed and the hope his mother had. “Not that I can muster, that spell I cast was powerful and I am old and weary, I could scarcely cast another spell even half as powerful.” the wizard said, his face seemingly becoming more wrinkled as he said it. “Then I’m just going to fight this thing myself, since apparently the captain of the ship can’t.” Teron said. “List Teron, there is one thing I may be able to do to help you.” Menphil said. “Lay your spears on the table.” Teron promptly did so although with a bit more force than was necessary. Menphil chanted for a few minutes while running his finger along the flats of the spearheads, after he had finished the metal of the spears glimmered as though stars from the sky had been ensnared within. “With this enchantment upon these spears, whether it’s by chance of fate or by an act of the gods themselves, you should be able to at least harm the creature, although not as well as we likely need. Now go, we likely have no hope, but perhaps there is some hope in the courage of youth.” Teron thanked Menphil and left the captain's quarters with a sliver of respect for the wizard he had hated since he had gotten on that boat. Teron went over to the starboard side of the boat and watched out towards the direction the monster had retreated to. The sun was just beginning to touch the horizon. Teron looked out upon the hauntingly calm sea, not one tall wave, not one strong gust of wind, not even a dark cloud in sight. He looked to his left and saw the shores of the land they were heading towards. He could now make out the green plains of the land they were coming towards. He no longer looked at this new land as just an escape route like how he thought his parents looked at it. He was determined. They were going to make it to that land and they were going to claim it as their own. He was going to make it, he was going to make it his home. And no beast on land or water was going to get in his way, or at least that’s how Teron saw it. Although initially people had been running to and fro across the deck of the ship there was now nearly no one on the deck except for the two men managing the sails, although they needed little adjusting or even monitoring as the wind was nearly still, and Menphil stood on the upper deck with ship wheel in hands, although he was less so sailing the ship and more so simply holding onto the wheel since there was little reason to adjust course. Besides this the only people on the deck were those who occasionally came up from the ship's hold to check with Menphil, this however, like all other action on the ship during that tense and quiet hour it was brief and rare. Seeing the people come up from the hold and back down in combination with the constant sounds of oars rowing like they were powered by some mechanical engine made Teron feel guilty for not doing anything to help, but then he reminded himself that those below were rowing to achieve an impossible goal, even Menphil, their captain, knew this. Even if they would need to at least 3 hours going full speed to reach shore and they were barely going a third of that and they did not have even half the time. So instead of that Teron decided he ought to practice his aim, for all the good that 30 or so minutes of practice could do him. He set a barrel against the wall of the upper deck, below where menphil piloted the ship. He made it his goal to hit the cork in the side of the barrel from the other side of the deck, something he knew was nearly impossible from the start but what he intended to do was also just as difficult and there was no sense in pretending it was any easier. Throwing one, two, then three. Picking up the spears lying upon the deck. Then throwing one, two, three, thunk! Picking up two missed spears and pulling out one which had hit the top of the barrel. He continued in this pattern for a while. Most of his throws had missed by quite a bit at first, then he got used to the sway of the ship and the strength required to land a hit, then in one round all three spears had hit the barrel, all on the side the cork was on. By now the barrel was useful for nothing but target practice as even a grapefruit probably would not stay inside for long. He guessed he only really had time for one more round before he should stand at the ready for the turtle, even if Menphil and everyone else would just think he was a naive and hopeless kid. He threw one spear, thunk! Half a foot left of the cork. He threw another, thunk! A few inches above the cork. He threw one last throw, the only one he had thrown the whole time with more than a smidge of confidence behind it, thunk! The cork broke through the barrel as the spear hit and now the entire side of the barrel facing Teron had caved in. He had done it. The boy now felt he had a chance rather than a hope to drive the creature away, a torch not a candle, a well guided arrow and not a flimsy and unpredictable spear. The beast's return was hard to miss. The entire ship began to rock to and fro as waves from its starboard side tossed it about. Teron ran to the side of the ship from which he heard the churning of the water. The creature's head breached the ocean waves, jaws open and eyes focused upon the vessel before it. It immediately bolted towards the ship and although there was nary a cloud in the sky the churning and spraying of the water before the monsters bulk made the ocean just as wild as though the ship were in the center of a violent storm. Teron had already thrown a spear that flew at least twenty feet ahead of where it actually was, even with a long run up, he grabbed another spear tucked beneath his shoulder and waited a moment more before throwing it again. By now it was close enough for a small child to hit with a stone. This time the spear flew true directly towards the creature's throat. Teron’s heart skipped a beat as he thought he had done something when within another quick moment he had realized his magical spear had done nothing but glance off of the creature's iron-hard scales. He heard the rest of the ship, screams of terror from men and women alike. He looked around and saw several other men shooting at and throwing weapons at the monster. This almost disheartened him more than the plinking sound of his spear had, he realized he was no hero nor was he even a brave fool; he was no more than a desperate fool, just like every other person on this ship. But even with such a realization the mind has no intent of being any less desperate in such a situation. He clutched the final spear in his hand and raised it above his head and as he turned back towards the menace that had stolen away his courage his breath went out of him. The creatures head was now level with his, in it’s gaping maw he saw what seemed all of the sea’s water waiting for him to fall in and drown. He met the creatures empty eyes and then looked back down to its mouth and another revelation of terror hit him. There was fire coming from the belly of this creature, the water in its mouth was boiling and even from where he was he felt the stinging in his face as boiling hot steam precipitated on his face. Fear gripped his mind and urgent self-preservation his body. He looked back up into its eyes and as he felt a gale of inhaling breath nearly take him off balance he flung his arm forward and allowed the spear to fly out of his hand. Of course though, Teron never had a chance, no one on that ship had a chance. This behemoth was a dragon turtle, related to dragons in a distant way, but rarely being nearly as intelligent as their true dragon cousins. Instead they prowl the waters, hunting ships unfortunate to cross their path. This is the fate that Teron and the ship he was on encountered. As much determination (or more accurately stubbornness) Teron had, no amount of determination alone can pierce a dragon turtle's shell nor its scales, much less harm it enough to overcome it’s lust for treasure with a true fear of death. Nor was there any chance to subdue it or resist it as, despite wearing the resemblance of a turtle it’s flippers and jaws better resemble those of a bear or a crocodile and can of course can shred through nearly any ship. And thus the voyager ship was shredded apart. However, Teron did accomplish one thing. The spear he had let looseflew into the creature’s eye caused it to flinch, making the cloud of boiling steam it was about to unleash go into the air instead. Now, Teron was indeed immediately knocked unconscious by the dragon turtles tantruming head slamming into him and throwing him in the water and many were killed in the dragon turtles rage as it thrashed the ship to pieces. But some small number of people had made it off of that ship, many drowned but some found pieces of driftwood and managed to float to the shore, such that some twenty odd people managed to survive the attack and reach the shore, and although he had a broken arm and a few cracked ribs Teron was lucky enough to be counted among them. Although he was far from being a hero at the very least he was right that what he had done was better than what Menphil or anyone else had done, nothing.   II. Teron slowly drifted back to consciousness laying on his stomach on a sandy shore under the dim light of the waning dusk. Despite having not moved for hours he felt out of breath and aching. He tried to catch his breath but as soon as he tried to take a deep breath of the humid and salty air he was stopped short by a sharp pain within his chest, for the stretching required to breath deeply proved too straining a task for his broken ribs. It was then that he also noticed something cold and wet was wrapped around his wrist and he opened his eyes with considerable effort to see what it was, and he wept bitterly. Holding onto him from the opposite side of a large piece of wood which shattered off of the ship was the cold and stiff hand of his undeniably dead mother, clutching onto the wood with her other hand. Several stakes of splintered wood were embedded in her body and blood coated her from the shoulders upwards where the salty water could not wash it off. Her eyes were closed but she was so pale it was clear that she could be nothing but dead. Teron wept not only for the death of his mother but also for the last action she had taken. He loathed himself in that terrible moment because for a month or more he had thought of his parents as cowards, running away from problems, not understanding why they had to leave their home and blaming his parents for it. And yet, in his mothers last moments she ensured that her son would be safe to float to shore. She did not panic and she did not try to run from the inevitable, but instead saved him. However, no matter how mournful Teron was he was still more weary, and as the last rays of sunlight disappeared from the shore his grief mingled with tiredness and not long after he had awoken he fell asleep once more.   “Oh! Lemons! Thank the gods we have lemons!”. Teron was awoken by a voice dripping with sarcasm and soaked with stress. He opened his eyes and saw a large man talking with his arms raised to a smaller but still well built man carrying a small, open, wooden crate. “Well it's not like I’m shopping around at the market around here!” the smaller mans voice was quite low, although unusually smooth. “If you don’t want a little food just cause it’s not bread, be my guest but we need whatever we can find, oh just a second”. He set down the box and walked over to Teron, leaning over him, “I think the boys stirrin”. Teron mustered up a painful “hello” as he tried to sit up before collapsing to the sand again. The two men noticed his dire state and both rushed to grab him before they realized they had nowhere to take him. “Maybe it’s best if he just lays down where he is”. The larger man's voice wasn’t as deep as his companion but he did have a unique accent which struggled against the syllables of the common tongue despite his apparent mastery of it. “We both saw you, you were that kid who took a hit from that giant turtle! You look terrible, all bruised up and I assume you’re pretty badly injured, honestly I thought you had to be dead before I found you here.” Teron didn’t know what to say. The memories of yesterday came back to him and he wished that it had all been a dream, despite the vividness of it all. But he knew it was not a dream, and he thought he was a fool for thinking he could do anything against the monster, and he felt weaker than he ever had. He laid there, contemplating on how little he was able to do, and eventually decided to not say anything at all. “It probably hurts him to talk” said the larger man, half right. “Well let's get him on his back. Can’t imagine he wants sand in his face”. The larger man turned Teron over while the smaller ensured he gently turned onto his back rather than flopping onto it. Despite this it still hurt and Terons groan was swiftly answered by a “sorry” from the larger man. “Well you don’t have to tell us yours yet but my name is Derry” said the larger man, “and this is Melvin”. “You’ve been out for a good part of the day, the suns a quarter the way to the top of the sky now” said Melvin. “We’ve been looking for who and what we can but as you may have heard all we’ve been able to find a box of lemons, each other, and you”. Both Melvin and Derry looked like they had just gotten out of a bar fight. They were covered in cuts and bruises. Melvin was the oldest of the two with a short beard with wiry gray and black hairs mingled with dry blood. The swollenness of his red and purple face made the wrinkles in his face taught but one could tell he carried both the burden of injuries and age. His face was strangely calming. Despite his currently disfigured appearance he still seemed calm and assured, as though “this too shall pass” came out of his eyes and into the minds of Teron. Derry was younger and likely only 8 or 9 years older than Teron, and seemed even younger in comparison to Melvin and his battered face. His hair was a bronze brown as was his skin and he seemed to be far more worried than his friend despite (or perhaps because of) Melvin clearly being more battered than he was with his cuts and red bruises. After a moment of silence that dragged on too long Teron decided to say something, the grief on his heart hurt but there was nothing he could do to undo the tragedy but at least he could ignore it if he did something else. “My names… Teron”. He found that although he could only take shallow breaths, being on his back helped the pain immensely and he was able to power through the stabbing in his chest. “Lovely to meet ya” Derry said. “If lemons happen to be the cure for what's ailin’ you you can have as many as you like but besides that we have nothing else and both us are nothing more than farm hands so any injuries you have we’d probably just make worse.” He was clearly trying to be positive but his voice dampened with every few words until his cheerfulness was fully overcome by an awareness of their situation. Melvin stood up slowly and looked around. He squinted his eyes inland and after a moment said “You were right Derry, were not the only ones who survived. There’s smoke not too far from here!” “You stay here with Teron, I’ll go and see if I can find whoever started that fire. If I take long, don't take a noonday nap or something, this isn’t like back home and I have a feeling that something worse than an overseer will chew you out.” He walked off into a plain of tall, golden grass with a few trees here and there, small enough to not even look as thick as the pillar of smoke rising on the horizon despite their closeness. Teron was either unable or unwilling (or perhaps both) to get up and was content to think that this new acquaintance was simply disappearing from the small world he was stuck in, a large man sitting on the sand peeling a lemon to his left, a beach to his right, and a beautiful ocean in front of him. However, despite its beauty, he hated it. He hated every wave that lapped onto the shore for not carrying the ship a little faster, every glistening gem of light on the water for not burning the behemoth that they laid above, every drop of water for being content to allow such monsters to live amongst them. He was so consumed in his irrational hate that he barely noticed Derry’s attempt to make small talk and suddenly he felt extremely rude. He hardly cared about Derry and he had always been self absorbed whenever he encountered sadness or grief but at the same time he had been raised to never ignore someone even if your only response is going to be “ok” or “I don’t care”. They talked for a while (or more accurately Derry talked while Teron listened only to occasionally respond with a “mhmm”) and Teron found it strange that he had never talked to Derry before, as a matter of fact it baffled him. During those months on the ship he had avoided talking to anyone who was too much younger or too much older than him, and now he wondered why. Derry, despite his simple life, was still a more pleasant conversationalist than any of the younger people on the ship. Teron found it comforting to listen to the man's stories as he lay there motionless. It distracted him from his mother and their present danger and also reminded him of his old home which he was so fond of. Apparently Derry had spent most of his life just south of Rilin in a wine vineyard owned by some noble a ways off who thought the land was a good investment. Here he had met Melvin who was the unofficial overseer of the whole place. Of course, there was an official overseer, but he was nothing more than a lazy oaf leeching off of pay he didn't deserve. Although this is place was where Derry worked for 10 or so years he was originally from much further down south in Arethol, hence his accent. Although slavery had been outlawed for hundreds of years his parents still sold him off to an organization that claimed to simply “find” people employment. They would buy people who had been forced to sign an “employment contract” and then sell them off to various aristocrats who would be guaranteed a years work from a good worker, although due to details in the contract it was always unlikely that the worker could ever find better employment, or even easily leave. Although he never considered himself a slave and the conditions were not bad Derry was still heartbroken that his family had sold him off to a foreign land and for no reason as far as he knew. His real name was actually Dìrnalàmur but constant butchering of his name led everyone to simply call him Derry, which after a while he didn’t mind, especially since his homeland seemed to have betrayed him anyways. Melvin eventually became a father figure to Derry since unlike his real father he would help him in his work and give advice on difficult circumstances (what those circumstances were he did not say and Teron did not ask). Eventually Melvin found out about the expedition into the Sea of Darkness. Melvin was content to stay where he was; He was paid well, could do everything he wanted in the slower months, and had few complaints. But he knew Derry was in a worse straight. He was barely paid, trapped, and would do anything to leave the place of his confinement, and so, Melvin decided he would sign up for the expedition, and he signed Derry up with him. Although technically not legal the overseers laziness was easy to take advantage of and without even noticing Melvin took Derry out with him on one of his town excursions, and they never came back. After being asked Teron gave Derry an account of his life as Melvin still had not returned and it was looking like it was going to be a while until he did. Now, Teron lied about most if not all of his life to Derry. In his story his father was a highly proficient hunter and his family decided to go to the new world in the hopes of profiting off of hunting exotic beasts. Teron was not a compulsive liar, and he didn’t lie simply because he wanted to sound like a skilled hunter himself, and he didn’t even have to hide anything. He simply held some amount of shame when it came to his background in the old world and why he and his parents left, but regardless of how much shame he still holds about it I’ll tell it to you and I’ll give it to you honestly. Teron was born in Rilin, a small town in Timély, and he never knew any other home. His father, Kaldin, had been a tanner his entire life exactly as his father before him had been, and for the first 20 years of Teron's life he worked as a tanner under his father. Teron never thought his life was particularly exciting but he was content. He had a family and a stable home, and he was quite skilled in a trade that he didn’t mind, despite the foul smell of flesh rotting off of the hide. Soon enough, after he had saved up enough money, he would have moved out and made his own way in the world. Perhaps he’d even be able to go and travel the world, have some adventure in his life, maybe find a beautiful wife and settle down after it was all said and done. When he was younger he had dreamed of moving to the city and becoming a master artisan of a guild, or perhaps he would pivot entirely and become a world renowned arena duelist, but growing up in Norphamus has a way of tempering ambitions, and to many of his friends even his notions of travelling the world for any amount of time was overly ambitious. These were the goals of Teron until a month after his 20th birthday. On a chill fall night a knock came from the door. When his father answered it he opened the door to a gray-skinned man significantly taller than the doorway with a large ax on his back. He was not only intimidating in his stature but his face as well. Teron was terrified and thought he was some kind of robber who would kill them all and sack the house. He was slightly relieved when his father hesitantly walked out with the man (whom he later found out was a goliath, a race of people known for being as rigid as stone and as serious as death). His father closed the door behind him. He couldn’t make out their voices through the wall of his home but his mother was breathing heavily and was clearly stressed for some reason, which made him stressed as well. His father eventually came back in, with the goliath nowhere to be seen. All of them were calmer except for Kaldin, who seemed to have turned as gray in the face as the goliath. That night Teron found out that his friends were probably right about his over-ambitousness. His family was not as stable as he thought. When Teron could go out on his own was not a matter of when he was financially stable, but of when his family was. His father had never paid off the tannery in which both of them worked, and on top of that he had apparently taken out many loans to be able to afford the hides that were essential for his business. This was not unusual, but unfortunately for the Aerodouths the person they were borrowing the money for the tannery and the hides from was not a banker but instead the richest man in their town. There was no normal bank in Rilin, so when Kaldin needed money to practice his trade he got it from a man named Farcháun Dinéshaer, the man who owned most of the land in Rilin. Originally he worked his fields like the rest but due to the exorbitant amount of land he had inherited he was able to hire some laborers, which is really how Rilin started as a town. However, as Dinéshaer acquired more money he began to step away from agriculture and instead began to make most of his money by renting his land and, of course as Teron found out, loaning some of his wealth. Dinéshaer charged an infamously high interest compared to the banks of the big cities, mostly due to being stung several times by vagrant borrowers before he finally hired collectors like the goliath which met with Kaldin that night. So naturally, when Kaldin realized he could make so much more money runnig his own tannery rather than working for someone else, as he and his father had done, he bought on loan a building from Dinéshaer that would serve as his tannery, and when he was unable to find or afford hides he would buy them from Dinéshaer. However, as you many guess, the interest on his borrowed money was too steep for his tannery to keep up with. He had avoided the debt for years and tried to bargain with Dinéshaer repeatedly with some success. However Dinéshaer has run out of patient, and the goliath at the Aerodouth’s door that night was hired by Dinéshaer as a debt collector. The goliath told Teron’s father that he had 3 months to pay off his debt, and if he could not Dinéshaer would take his home and everything they owned except for the clothes on their backs until the debt was paid. Teron and his mother were terrified at this news, and the accompanying figure. In all Teron’s family had accumulated 3,000 gold pieces in debt, and were expected to pay it off by the end Frost-Melt. After a few weeks of trying to figure out a way to pay off the debt Teron’s family realized there was no way to pay off the debt without acquiring yet more debt and so they started to try and think of a way out of it. At the beginning of Frost-Melt a messenger reached the town and announced that a new settling expedition to Yuruk-Tar had been funded. At first the Aerodouth’s thought nothing of this but soon they realized that perhaps they could dodge their debt by joining the expedition. Of course they’d have to be discreet though, otherwise their creditor’s new hire would track them down. They began to pack, but after they had finished packing they did not leave for a while. They had planned it out so that the ship would leave no longer than two days after they arrived in the port city it was departing from. This would allow them to already be on the sea by the time the debt collector (or debt collectors more likely) had caught up to them. One night, about 2 weeks before the ship would leave port, they left in a wagon in the middle of the night, with no more than they could fit. And so it was then that Teron left his old life to venture into a new one. One he didn’t ask for, didn’t want, and didn’t know. Teron was terrified, as was his family. And even while he was retelling this story to Derry he found himself frustrated with his family. to venture into the realm of business that all people with lots of money and lots of land venture into. He began to lease some of his land and loan some of his money to those around town that needed it. The main problem with this, however, was that since Dinéshaer lacked the stability, know how, and large customer base that most bankers had, he charged an interest rate far higher than would be normal for a traditional bank. This was better than not having any sort of “bank” at all for most people in the town, better to have land that is hard to pay off than no land at all, but as you may have guessed it did not work out so well for Teron’s family. Kaldin had started off his life in the town with a house he inherited from his father and very little else. In the past he and his father would work in the tannery owned by another family however due to a sudden drop in the demand of leather that other towns and cities had it went out of business. For a long while Kaldin survived off of odd jobs and only made just enough to feed himself and occasionally replace his tattered clothes. One day Kaldin heard that Dinéshaer was trying to lease off a building that one of his tenants had recently abandoned . Tired of poor paying work he decided to go to Dinéshaer and ask him if he might lease the building to him so that he could turn it into a tannery. Dinéshaer accepted and soon enough Kaldin was running his own business once again. However, whether it be poor planning or plain misfortune, Kaldin was not very successful in his business. Yes he was a good tanner and he used the bulk of his facilities but hides were hard to come by and expensive. Given his previous circumstances when a hunter did visit the town to pedal their harvest the prices of their hides were always too high for Kaldin to pay up front for. But a tanner cannot make leather without hide so Kaldin began to take on loans from Dinéshaer to pay for the hides, and this was his fatal mistake. Although Kaldin made enough money to pay off the loans for the hides, the interest left him with little money to pay off the lease of the land and the building he was renting. Kaldin fell behind month after month. Dinéshaer repeatedly asked him for the money but the money wasn’t there. Being terrible with true conflict and too busy anyhow Dinéshaer hired a goliath as a debt collector. That goliath came to Teron’s house that day and told his father that he had three months to pay off the rent on the tannery, or else Dinéshaer would take the tannery back as well as Kaldins home and everything else he had to pay off the debt. A debt of 5,000 gold pieces.   For a while Teron’s family tried to pay off the debt, but even when all of them were working they found that they could not get enough money to pay off the debt. As they were falling into a pit of hopelessness a town crier came to town. “Through the kind patronage of many anonymous benefactors a voyage to finally settle the unknown lands of Yuruk-Tar has been funded. Any who wish to come are welcome, they must simply prove that they have a valuable skill that will help build up the new settlements that are to be born in the foreign land. Go to Port Talinad and inquire at the Starless Expedition Company to join in on the chance of a lifetime!”. Most people disregarded this invitation as they had family, property, business, and other ties and had no good reason to leave. The Aerodouth’s, on the other hand, were about to lose everything. That night they discussed the idea, and although they knew it would be dishonest and may not even work and may simply get them into a worse situation they had few other options besides lose everything and slowly starve. Discreetly, they began to trade most of their possessions for things that they would need, even their own home. Nobody knew that they were in such terrible debt and saw no problem with it, and no one was suspicious of them selling everything because they would trade only a handful of things with any given person, and by the time they needed to leave the sales had not yet become public knowledge. Additionally they began to trade for supplies for the journey to Port Talinad. It took them one month to accomplish all of this. They planned it just right so that by the time they got to the port the ship would be leaving in just two days. They started off trading for small things like rations and some gold, and it was only on the last day before they left that they traded their home for a cart, two oxen, and a few other supplies. That very night they left under the cover of darkness. Just as people were beginning to get suspicious and just as the rumors began to spread they were already gone. Since they only got to the port 2 days before the ship left it did not matter that the debt collector followed them as you might have guessed. They took the spare time to sell off the cart and oxen and buy some things that they could take with them but would also remain valuable in the new world. Grain, a few chickens, some jewelry, and more odds and ends. By the end of it they seemed to be the richest on the ship, despite the fact that none of what they have legally belonged to them. By the time the goliath made it to Port Talinad the ship had already set sail, and he would not follow them to another continent. They were off to what was supposed to be a new life, but now, as Teron reflected on this and realized where this debt-dodging had gotten them, he couldn’t help but resent his father more than the dragon turtle that destroyed the ship.   III.   “Over here, they’re just over here!”. Teron heard Melvin's voice coming from behind him. “You’re finally back!” said Derry, standing up with his arms in the air. “And I see you’ve brought Gerihn with you!”. Teron was still facing the ocean and couldn’t see Gerihn but recognized the name. Gerihn was well known among those on the ship because he was the only dwarf among the whole of the ship. It was quite unusual for a dwarf to leave his clan behind on another continent and so from the moment he stepped aboard he was a kind of enigma. He claims that Dwaghúm, the god of his kind, told him that there were wonderous gemstones and ores waiting to be discovered in Yuruk-Tar, but many on the ship believed he was exiled by his clan or perhaps an outlaw. Teron, for one, liked to believe that he was a debt dodger just like his family was, even if dwarves were supposed to be people of honor. Whatever his reason for being there he was one of the strongest people on the expedition and so Teron was glad to find out that not only had Melvin brought Gerihn but a makeshift sledge made from some bits of wood from the ship nailed together (with nails also from the ship). “Derry, help me lift him onto the sledge” Melvin said. “No no no, it’s fine, I can walk” Teron objected hastily. He stood up slowly, and quickly realized there was something wrong with left ankle and knee, letting a groan through gritted teeth. They pained him like hot glass has been inserted between the joints of his bones, but he continued to stand anyway. Being dragged behind a dwarf would be too large a wound for his already damaged pride. He knew he was foolish to attack the dragon turtle but he still wanted to believe he could be a self-reliant and able young man, especially since his mother was dead and his father likely with her. “Ya mean I nailed this piece of junk together for nuthin’?” Gerihn protested. “No, there are plenty of things we could use it for!” Melvin said, a little embarrassed (the sledge was his idea, but who would have thought Teron would be fine after only a few hours?). “Here we can use it to haul this crate of lemons!”. Gerihn looked over to the crate of overripe, brownish, lemons, “Oh thank the gods we can take these lemons with us!”. Gerihn was being sarcastic of course. Apparently once they are off the sea people appreciate the cure for scurvy much less, especially when they look more like wooden balls than fruit. Melvin loaded the lemons on the sledge, who had already promised he would pull it back if Gerihn pulled it to the beach, and they set off inland towards the pillar of smoke that continued to rise into the sky. While they walked Gerihn explained the current situation to Derry and Teron. Teron listened to him more than intently to try to distract himself from the pain in his leg. “More people than you would think washed ashore alive. That’s not sayin’ much since most us guessed that all of us were going to die on that ship. It took us ‘til a little past noon to gather and bury all the dead, and to mourn them too I suppose.” Teron tried to not think of his mom but still had to choke back tears. Gerihn was not cold hearted, but he intentionally kept himself distant from those on the ship during the voyage, lest he find himself distracted from his true goal, whatever that was. “There are roughly thirty of us that we know of. There could be more lost on the shoreline or perhaps deeper inland but I honestly doubt it. Anyone who hasn’t already headed towards that smoke is either dead or close enough that it makes little difference if they were found or not.” “Did much survive from the ship, aside from people that is” Teron asked. Gerihn took a moment to remember everything they had recovered, rubbing his beard. “Well we did recover some things; two boxes of hard tack (more like soft tack now heh!), some soaked changes of clothes, a wooden shield, a more or less usable bow, some arrows, and… well… Melvins staff.” Everyone walked in silence for a few moments. All of them had hoped that somehow the old wizard would survive, afterall he was the only reason they got close enough to land to stand a chance of getting to the shore. “Oh yes, and a shocking amount of live chickens” Gerihn said, interrupting the silence to change the topic. “Those may be my families” said Teron. “No one has the sole rights to anything until we’re no longer in immediate danger of starvation. I know they may be the last of what you have but unless you want to try and survive alone we are all in this together” said Gerihn. “Sorry, I forgot about the food problem”. “Unfortunately, the tack we recovered will only feed all of us for 4 days or so if we ration it. And everything we really need is at the bottom of the ocean. All of our axes, hunters spears, knives, hardware, my pickaxe!” “I thought no one had sole rights to anything at the moment?” Teron said playfully. “Oh shut it, it’s under the waves anyhow!”   When they reached the “camp” despair dragged down the the hearts of the three newcomers like a weighted net. Gerihn had already informed them of the situation but hearing and seeing are different altogether, especially since their imaginations neglected to think about how the other survivors would look. Sure they didn’t look great themselves, but Derry and Melvin were usually in ragged clothes and they all reasoned that Teron was just beat up since he was the closest to the dragon turtle with it sank the ship, but as they looked between the faces of the survivors they realized beaten boys and cut up men were the average if not the more fortunate. There were only 2 men and 3 women walking around, or at least sitting up by the fire trying to dry their clothes. Many of the survivors appeared unable to walk, or at least unwilling. Ten people, by Terons count, wore splints of driftwood, bloody bandages cut from clothing, and bruised faces. Another three seemed unable to walk but had no visible injuries aside from cuts and bruises, invisible broken bones and torn ligaments he imagined, similar to his own. Among the latter, he spotted a familiar figure curled in the grass. It wore the same coat that Teron’s father had been wearing when the dragon turtle attacked, and he seemed about his size, but of course this couldn’t be Teron’s father. “Dad is tougher than the average man, he was surely one of those going and gathering food and supplies” Teron thought. It seemed impossible to him that his father would have fared poorly, especially since the son he had raised was alive and well (at least relative to the others). He did not want to but could not resist walking over to the huddled form and placing his hand on his shoulder. There was no response. The man was breathing but not responding. Teron shook him and there was still no response. “Hey don’t mess with that one!” Gerihn yelled form across the field were the camp lay. Teron ignored the dwarf and turned the man over onto his stomach. He gasped, choking on his own breath, and recoiled backwards. It was undeniably his father, but something was terribly wrong. His eyes stared blankly into nothing as his mouth, agape, gasped for air with steady, slow inhalations and staggering, unsettlingly quick exhales.The opposite side of his hand from where Teron had been was sticky with blood, and a portion of his scalp appeared to have been torn off. Teron knelt besides his father, jaw dropped and eyes unblinking. Gerihn had stopped his measuring up of supplies and ran over to Teron. “Get away from him boy, his minds gone, there’s nothing you can do”.   IV.   Gerihn did not know that the braindead man he had hauled to shore himself was Teron’s father, and in that moment even Teron was not fully aware either. When Teron saw his mother, dead on that forsaken shoreline, he was filled with emotion, but when he gazed upon his father, he was instead filled with dread that was further buried by confusion inflicted upon him by his own denial. Teron refused to believe that the barely living person before him could ever be his father. He understood death. It was regretful, sometimes tragic, sometimes noble, but death never degraded the victim. Teron’s father taught him everything, was willing to give him anything, and had failed to protect him from nothing. Yet there lie his father, a shadow of his former self, not even conscious that he was looking at his own son.   Days passed and the survivors were able to find a field by a freshwater stream by which they could set up a more permanent settlement. The first night they slept alongside the gently murmuring water was the night that Teron’s father passed away. There was no scream in the night, there were no last moments of lucid clarity, there were no words. By the time the sun rose and the rest of the survivors were awake, Teron was already across the stream, sitting by a patch of freshly dug soil. Teron had been unable to sleep. He watched his father all night, trying to reconcile what was happening. He watched his fathers chest gently rise and fall with his breaths as he contemplated what he ought to do, then, to his surprise, his fathers chest fell but did not rise again. He waited a moment, nothing. He waited a minute or more, nothing. He knew something was wrong, but he did not rise to check on his father, he did not wake anyone up. There was a calmness about him. He knew there was nothing that he or anyone else could do, he didn’t even know what could possibly be wrong, and his father could not tell them. He inched over pressed his ear against his fathers chest. Silence. Teron slowly and exhaustingly drug his father over across the stream and, using his hands a sturdy stick, buried his father. You might think me cynical or perhaps cruel to describe him as such but truly Teron was happier with his father dead. He did not so much dislike his father by any means, he loved him more than anyone, perhaps more than his mother, but seeing him in the state he was was intolerable for Teron. It was better to know he was at peace than to see him as a prisoner in his own body, or perhaps his own mind. And besides all that it already felt to Teron that his father was dead, now the only difference was that he wasn’t a burden on everyone else too. Teron would rather remember his father as a strong and caring provider than have him as a pitiful mess. Teron was terribly upset by this, it's true, but he did not cry. He had never seen his father cry and figured it would not be what he would want him to do. He never went back to sleep that night he buried his father, instead he wandered along the stream. The previous day the survivors had talked of how water had been figured out but there was no way to build any shelter without a forest, and none of them had the knowledge or experience of how to make one without wood, so why not go and look for a small grove, or if he was lucky, a forest. The river meandered through the plains and he meandered alongside it. He admired the bright stars that glittered across the night sky, the giant moon, Selûne, and the waxing and bluish moon, Ostillian. He drowned out thoughts that might bring him to his knees by focusing on the murmuring waters of the stream. As he closed his eyes to try and command his thoughts for what seemed only a moment, he walked straight into something. As he held his now bleeding nose he looked up and saw a looming oak allowing only a few stray beams of Selûne’s light to pass through its bows. He stood up and realized he had found the forest he was searching for, and had somehow managed to narrowly dodge the saplings which edged the further parts of the forest. It occurred to him he had no way of harvesting the wood surrounding him so he started trying to fashion an ax for himself. Now of course Teron had no idea how to do this but it did not really matter, he preferred to combine fallen branches and a particular rock he found a million times with no success over sitting still long enough for him to actually contemplate the last two days. I could go into great detail of that night, but you can likely guess the details and be correct. Teron made many prototypes, all of them broke on the first or second swing, each time they broke he stood silent for a moment before crying, tore himself away from the thoughts, and began his task anew. Eventually he noticed the orange glow of dawn permeating through the forest and he decided it was best for him to return. Gerihn was the first to rise at the camp, even a little before dawn. He had been concerned when he saw Teron and his father missing, but his concern turned to pity when he saw Teron walking back across the still, dark grass of the early morning. Gerihn did not move from where he had been sitting when he saw Teron, and watched as Teron, seemingly in a trance, fell to his knees before laying himself out on the grass and surrendering to sleep. Teron woke to the noonday sun glaring into his eyes. He shielded his face as he stood up and as his eyes adjusted he once again saw the desperate state of the motley group of refugees he was now a part of. Many were still unable to stand up and move about but funnily enough many of them were sitting up and working on something.   Now, this is not a story of how the survivors of the ship wreck struggled to survive. Indeed it was hard and indeed they were nigh always on the brink of death from starvation or exposure or illness or a myriad other things that come with having no infrastructure or resources to fall back on, but you could have guessed all that. No, this is a story about Teron, and how his rebelious nature that had at first been directed towards his parents began to be directed towards the natural world around him.