Finn and Adi continued talking quietly into the early morning hours, though the topics were significantly lighter than what they had started with. Finn learned that Adi had spent most of her time cooking and cleaning for the miners in her clan when they lived in the mines. As the daughter of the chief, she didn’t have to, but she liked cooking and she loved her fellow clans people. She showed the faint lines on her ribs that were actually her gills, allowing her to breathe underwater. She explained that she couldn’t handle the pressure of great depths, but being able to breathe underwater helped her to traverse flooded caverns. Finn had nodded and pretended to understand what she meant by pressure.
Adi also told her about her favorite food (meat buns), her best friend (a snarky know-it-all named Teresa) and how her father would sit late into the night and recount every meeting he had with neighboring chiefs to his children. She was meant to be the next chief, since one brother had aspirations to join the court and advocate for kobolds and other lower fae from there and the other seemed to be constantly away on who knew what. Adi knew a lot of the goings-on in court, even though she had never been and had no aspirations of ever going. Finn was impressed that the kobolds were so worldly despite their low status.
Finn tried to reciprocate as much as she could without giving too much away.
Hesitantly, Finn told Adi that she didn’t really have a favorite food. She liked to eat everything. Which was mostly true. She had to learn to eat whatever was in front of her if she wanted to make it in the barracks. She liked to try new food anyway and would often hang around the backs of the kitchens and try to charm leftovers out of the kitchen staff whenever a big, important dinner or banquet happened. Finn also told Adi that was friends with most of the other guards, but never got super close with any of them. She didn't say that much of that was because Finn was the youngest person in the guard barracks until just a few years ago. Because of that, she ended up left behind eventually as all the guards she grew up with either got married and moved away or got promoted into other positions while she stayed stuck in the same place. She told Adi about how she and her brother would hide in the corners of the court and make up stories about visiting dignitaries, recounting some of the most entertaining ones, especially the rare times they turned out to be right.
They didn’t have a lot in common, but their personalities seemed to mesh well.
After hours of talking, Finn’s throat began to get dry, and she felt the urge to broach the subject of her past fumbling with other girls at court. She could bring it up naturally, since they were talking about their lives before the whole mess of being captured by humans. She could say, "No pressure, but hey, I like girls, you know?" and put the ball back in Adi’s court.
Of course, that was when Finn spotted them. A small group of about four humans left the lodge below them in the faint glow of blue sunlight just peeking beyond the eastern horizon. They carried big heavy packs on their backs, bows slung over their shoulders and short hunting knives strapped onto their belts. They walked in an orderly line toward the path that Finn and Adi had used to find the lodge, and then split into two groups heading in opposite directions. Smoke still rose from the chimney, but it wasn’t as thick as it had been earlier in the night.
“Hey,” Finn said sharply, pausing Adi mid-story. Finn hadn’t been listening while she watched the hunters anyway.
Adi quickly cottoned on to what Finn was seeing, her body going tense and alert against Finn’s right side. “Shit,” she whispered. “Do you think that is all of them?”
Finn shrugged and continued to carefully watch the quickly disappearing backs of the human hunting party. “We should wait a while to see if anyone else comes out,” she whispered back, not taking her eyes from the clearing in front of the hunting lodge.
They waited maybe fifteen minutes before Finn figured that if anyone else was going to come out, they would have already done so.
“I’ll go down and check it out,” Finn whispered. “I’ll whistle if the coast is clear.”
“Finn, no,” Adi hissed. “I should come along,” she added with an indignant look.
Finn frowned. She had incredible respect for Adi, but she sounded like a battering ram pushing through the forest, and this was the home base of humans who fancied themselves hunters. If she gave them away, there would be another chase, and this one may end up more drawn out and difficult than their first flight.
“I won’t ditch you,” Finn said, trying to guess at the origins of Adi’s concern.
“I didn’t think you would!” Adi spat back, quickly angry.
Finn twisted her mouth, not sure what the issue was. She didn't want to offend Adi, but she was also not willing to budge on this issue. “Listen, it will be safer if I go first,” she decided on going with. “I’m just going to sneak around the outside, see if I can find a good way in, and maybe try to figure out if anyone is inside.”
It was Adi’s turn to twist her mouth in displeasure. “That sounds like you’re basically going to do all of it,” she replied sourly.
Finn felt the corner of her mouth pull into a smirk. She tried to smother it, but Adi wasn’t wrong. “I probably won’t be able to carry up all the supplies we’ll need. I’ll need your help for that, so long as the cabin is empty.”
Adi looked away angrily, vaguely in the direction of the lodge. She crossed her arms under her ample chest, and Finn had to avert her eyes so she didn’t get too much of an eyeful.
“You know what to get?” Adi asked after a long moment.
Finn nodded eagerly in response.
Adi gave her a measured look, her expression saying she still wasn’t psyched about the idea of Finn going alone. But, she ultimately folded, so maybe she was aware of her own lack of sneaking skills.
“Please be careful,” Adi said in a furtive whisper, good as permission for Finn and surely a phrase that would haunt her fantasies for many months to come.
Finn nodded brusquely, since she didn’t trust herself to reply verbally. She then dodged quickly and silently down the steep incline toward the cabin.
Finn wasn’t exactly a stealth expert, but she was very good at being fast and being quiet. Those were practically her specialties. So, she wasn’t especially worried about being discovered or attacked while breaking into the cabin. She was aware that her skin and hair were blindingly pale, which was not exactly the greatest camouflage when moving through the riot of forest greenery, even with all the dirt smudged and rubbed into every inch of her after days of hiking through the woods naked. She would just need to move fast and be quiet, and hope that her luck held out.
Finn reached the back of the lodge in almost no time. The back wall of the log cabin butted almost directly against the steep hill Finn had just slid down. There were no windows on this wall, and it was probably just as well that there weren’t. There wasn’t anything to out at but the hillside less than an inch from the building. Finn peered curiously under the eaves of the roof. There was a narrow crack between the wall and the underside of the roof that leaked the smell of smoke and a little bit of orange light into the early morning darkness. The crack was probably for ventilation. It wasn’t even close to big enough to squeeze through, though. Finn pushed curiously at the long flat boards making up the underside of the roof and found they had some give. She might be able to heave them loose if she used her full strength, but that would surely alert anyone that was inside. She made note of the possibility, but left it alone and moved on to the side of the cabin closest to Adi. From afar, Adi could likely just make out Finn’s pale back moving among the trees from the safety of her hiding place.
This side of the cabin was shorter than the back and also had no windows. The hill sloped sharply away from the back, and the front of the cabin was held up with straight logs framed up underneath. Curious, Finn ducked underneath the cabin once the gap was wide enough to admit her. The dirt beneath her feet changed in quality. It was wetter and softer, pure loam with fewer sticks and leaves to crunch, protected as it was by the cabin above. The smell of damp rotting earth and the sharp metal tang of animal blood was strong underneath the cabin. There was some split firewood stored there in the smallest highest part under the cabin, but it must have been long forgotten there, the wood having soaked up the dampness and rotted almost completely to mulch.
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Looking up, Finn saw that someone had insulated the bottom of the log cabin, which was a shame. Finn was hoping she might get a hint to whether the cabin was empty based on the light coming through the floorboards. But, the dirty straw sticking out from between the rotting canvas strapped along the bottom of the building, just inches from Finn's head, made that an impossibility.
Finn carefully inched forward, taking stock of her surroundings. She tried to keep the wooden staircase that led to the front door between her and the clearing, peeking around it every few steps to make sure the clearing was still empty. Soon, she was crouching directly below the stairs themselves, the stinking deer carcasses hanging ominously to her left and faintly twisting in every breath of the wind.
Deciding that, so far as she could tell, entering through the front door was her only option, Finn quickly jumped up onto the stairs from the side. Her vertical jump was nothing to sneeze at, so she was able to jump up and grab the lip of the uppermost step with her fingertips and haul herself up under the handrail to crouch on the cabin’s front stoop.
The door was plain wood with a simple rope pull to open it. Looking at the hinges, it looked like it opened inward. Finn held very still and quiet and listened for any sounds coming from the other side of the door. All she could hear was the very faint crackling of a low fire. There were no sounds of movement, human or otherwise, that she could detect. That didn’t mean that no one was inside, just that if there were, they weren’t moving around enough for her to hear them.
As slowly and quietly as she could manage, Finn pressed on the door, and it popped loose from its jam with a small sound that seemed incredibly loud to her straining ears. She waited, expecting to hear some movement from the other side, but there was nothing. Still maintaining her caution, Finn pressed the door slowly open, until it hung wide on its hinges.
The inside of the cabin was dark, even compared to the relative darkness outside. The only light being thrown was from the low embers in the fireplace on the far right side of the cabin, and what little light from the rising sun struggled in through the open front door. Finn stared into the gloom and willed her eyes to adjust as quickly as possible. Luckily, the light levels weren’t so different, so it didn’t take long. She scoured every corner of the cabin with her eyes for a huddled figure, a human hidden under blankets or sleeping in a corner.
Sure enough, sitting by the fire in an old wooden rocking chair was an elderly human man sleeping heavily. He was bundled under several heavy knitted blankets, his frizzy white hair and beard almost completely obscuring his sleeping face. His skin was deep brown and weathered like old leather from countless days in the sun. He breathed shallowly as he slept in front of the low fire, the embers casting his long dark shadow across the length of the lodge to where Finn was crouched in the doorway.
Okay. So, there was one human inside, but it was a frail old man. Hopefully, if Finn was quiet enough, he would sleep through the whole burglary. But, even if he didn't, it wasn't like he was going to be able to give chase.
Finn could do this.
Moving cautiously, Finn dodged into the cabin and pulled the door almost shut behind her. She needed clothes, food and weapons, she thought fiercely. She visually scoured the room again, but for these items.
The first thing that caught her eye was a large empty bag made of rough fabric sitting near the door. Judging by the faint sheen on the fabric, it had once been waxed on the outside to make it waterproof. It had some holes in the corners and the wax had worn off in some places, likely the reason it was passed over and left in the lodge, but that didn’t give Finn pause. She grabbed the bag and flipped the top open, and then began casting around for what to put in it.
Clothes were probably the most important thing they needed, so she focused on that. The bag was sitting beside a small wardrobe that barely reached Finn’s shoulders once she stood up from her crouch. She began ruffling through the clothing that was hanging and folded in the small closet. She only found two shirts, one long sleeved and thick, but badly stained by what looked like animal blood and the other threadbare and short-sleeved, the hems coming undone, and the collar stretched out. Regardless, she shoved both of them into the bag. There were a few thin undershirts beneath these two outer shirts, and she shoved those in the bag as well. She looked around for pants and only found one pair made of soft deerskin, with the bottom hems all stained and dark with something she couldn't identify and wasn't sure she wanted to. The pants looked narrow and long, unlikely to fit Adi’s wide hips, and would probably be a squeeze for Finn as well. She shoved them in the bag anyway. The only other pants were one beige pair of men's underwear, as old and well-worn as everything else in the wardrobe. Finn frowned at it, resisting the idea of bringing only a pair of men’s underwear for Adi to wear. But, she liked the idea of her being completely nude on the bottom less. At least the underpants were clean, if old. She shoved them in the bag.
There were a fair number of socks. Someone obviously knew how to knit, and apparently only knew how to knit socks. Finn sorted through lumpy heavy wool socks and came out with four pairs that looked okay and threw them in the bag. There was only one pair of boots. They were definitely too big for either of them, but it was a good idea to take them. There were ways to adjust boots if you needed to do so. Finn used the laces to tie the boots onto the strap of the bag, rather than letting them take up valuable real estate inside the bag.
Finally, there were two old cloaks hanging in the wardrobe. These were also worn and probably the worst set of all their other cloaks, as the other hooks in the wardrobe were empty. They were made of tarpaulin with no lining, the outside waxed to keep out the rain, but the wax was faded on the shoulders. Finn grabbed them anyway, rolling them into a tight ball and shoving them as deep into the bag as she could manage.
Food next. They would starve if they had to rely on forest berries, roots and herbs. Luckily, this was something the lodge had in spades. There were jars and jars of dried venison, and Finn happily dumped at least three jars into the bag whole. They also had a smaller store of dried herbs and vegetables, some colorful dried fruit catching Finn’s attention in specific. Finn dumped two jars of dried fruit in, followed by what looked like a paper bag of dried sweet potatoes. It was hard to say for sure in the low light.
Finally, tucked near a dry sink in the back corner, Finn found a round slab of greasy soap. It was probably fanciful to grab it, but Finn could feel the grime on her skin, so thick that it cracked in some places when she moved. She hoped she could convince Adi to brave the river for a quick bath after they finished robbing the hunters.
Lastly were weapons. Despite being a hunting lodge, there wasn’t any real selection to speak of. It wasn’t that surprising, considering that weapons were usually the most expensive thing a hunter might own. Even if they made their own bows and arrows, these were still the most time intensive and required the most skill to make.
Finn almost had to pull the whole lodge apart to find what she was looking for. More than once she found herself freezing in fear as this sound or that scrape made the old man in the chair grunt before settling back into sleep. She finally found a small foot locker at the end of a flat, lumpy cot. It held an old dried out bow that was unstrung with a quiver of equally sad looking arrows. Luckily, a small jar of wax and a soft cloth were beside the bow, as if someone had been waiting for an opportune moment to rehab the old weapon. Finn grabbed all of this and was gratified to find an old hunting knife hidden underneath. The knife was probably the nicest thing she had found in the whole cabin. It was over half the length of her forearm, a graceful curve of deadly sharp steel with a carefully carved soft wooden handle. It even had a soft leather sheath with a clip to attach it to a belt. Finn hesitated to take the nice knife for a moment. It was obviously a high-end tool, probably a family heirloom or a gift from a lord or princeling or something like that. Still, Finn needed a knife, and she hadn’t found anything but little pen knives so far.
Guiltily, Finn tucked the knife into the bag along with the jar of wax, the soft cleaning cloth and, as an afterthought, a few ratty falling apart belts that were shoved into the corner of the foot locker.
Finn stood and hefted the bag onto her shoulder. She felt like she had been in the lodge for hours going through the unsuspecting hunters’ belongings, but it had probably been barely thirty minutes. She glanced quickly at the old man, but he was still breathing softly in his chair. The door she had left open had cooled the interior of the cabin pretty significantly, and Finn watched as the old man tried to snuggle deeper into his pile of blankets. Sighing, Finn carefully picked a big log off the stack of wood beside the fireplace and carefully placed it atop the pile of coals in the hearth. At least she could keep the old man warm in return for all the stuff she had stolen.
Finn glanced around the cabin one last time before she began shutting cabinet doors and shoving empty jars out of sight. It was probably useless. It was likely the hunters who used the lodge regularly would quickly realize someone had been through their things, but any time she could buy herself and Adi to get away before they noticed would be best.
Once everything was as close to put back to rights as Finn could manage, she crouched down by the front door and glanced cautiously around the edge to check the clearing. It was still empty, as she expected. Taking a deep breath, she felt it was probably not worth it to bother trying to be stealthy on her way back under the house and up the hill. She would just go full speed out and up. She was fast enough that even if a human was looking at the lodge from a distance, it was unlikely they would get a good look at her before she was gone.
Finn focused her little bit of magic into her legs, the thoroughly abused muscles protesting loudly. She ignored the pain, scrunching her face into a grimace the only allowance she gave herself, and darted off the top step of the lodge and down into the soft ground of the clearing. The ball of her foot had barely alighted on the ground before she was pushing off and darting up the steep incline back to the flowering tree that marked Adi’s hiding spot.
“Gods!” Adi gasped, jumping as Finn suddenly appeared beside her.
“Jackpot,” Finn whispered back, grinning at Adi as she gestured over her shoulder at the bag.
Adi leaned around Finn to glance at the straining seams of the bag, her eyebrows steadily advancing toward her hairline.
“Let’s move away, though,” Finn suggested. “I’d rather not be found with all their stolen shit when the humans get back.”