Three hours later, after turning down a side road, we trundled into a woodcutter’s camp. Perhaps I should say it better resembled a western frontier fort, like something from a set out of an archaic movie.

As we unpacked, I managed to get a better appreciation of the woodcutter camp. The most obvious landmark surrounded the temporary camp in the form of a large palisade fence made from sharpened logs thrust vertically into the ground. It covered an area about the size of a football pitch, although square in shape. There were four basic guard towers, one at each inside corner of the camp which stood overlooking the walls. A parapet ran inside, along the top of the wall allowing people to patrol along it. One guard manned each of the towers. It reminded me of one the old western cowboy forts. I assumed the natives were naturally hostile and that the woodcutters did not go to all the effort of creating a fort like that for artistic reasons. Somehow, I doubted the fence was intended to repel people. Since I discovered the catkin people, the whole plethora of other monster denizens my father mentioned to me came flooding back to my mind. Generally, from his descriptions, most monsters punched way above human’s weight when it came to physical strength, numbers, and performance. Creatures like goblin hordes, their cousins the ogres and massive trolls, were just to name a few. Humans differentiated by their use of weapons and their intelligence. Monsters were not necessarily dumber than humans but at times could be even more cunning. Suddenly my axe seemed a lot more necessary than just for chopping wood.

After we unpacked the carts, we wolfed down the last of Alma’s food. It was threadbare at best, but I fully appreciated it because I understood what it cost their family. There was no time to make food before lunch so having that meal readymade meant I wouldn’t go hungry since I never had a breakfast that morning. Eating on the cart required a stomach made of iron so I was glad I skipped breakfast in favour of keeping my food down.

In addition to the defensive camp structures, there were canvas tented sleeping quarters, a covered kitchen with open sides, ablution facilities and stables. There was even what looked like a metal work smithy. Copious wood shavings and bark offcuts lay in paths on the ground to prevent the build-up of mud from all the activity in the camp. I could smell a mixture of wood resin, muddy earth, and horse manure along with smoke rising from various campfires.

One such fire belonged to the metal smith workshop standing in the fort corner near the stables. The clanging of a hammer on metal betrayed the blacksmith who seemed to be shaping a horseshoe for a horse that patiently waited patiently. I could understand these were everyday occurrences and I was lost in thought for a while when I realised the blacksmith had stopped his work and was now looking my way, probably aware of me staring in his direction. He waved at me, and I waved back embarrassed that I had unwittingly disturbed him, what else could I do?

Turning my attention to other things; visible amongst the camp activities were a smattering of women busy with various tasks. I’m not sure why I got the impression that some of them were family of the woodcutters. Even some children played inside the encampment, free to go wherever they wanted while it was within the confines of the compound, but they could not leave the camp unescorted. Not that they didn’t try to constantly sneak past the gate guard who not only had his hands full guarding the gate, but he also needed to keep an eye on slippery snotty-nosed critters. They no doubt viewed him as fair game in their imaginative breakout attempts. No matter what the situation with the children, the guard never shouted at them but would only point at the child he discovered trying to sneak through and the dejected child would turn around and go sit on the parapet in view of the gate until the guard indicated the child could leave again. Further limiting the child’s already limited freedom was more of a rebuttal than any form of corporal punishment. It was quite possible, judging by the row of thunder clouded faces sitting on the parapet, they would have preferred corporal punishment. The length of the timeout varied according to the whim of the guard and relative to how busy they were at the time. It was only a child with little common sense that tried to thwart a guard when they were fully occupied. The children didn’t have much time to play though, just like the women, the children also helped in the camp, there was zero tolerance for freeloaders.

Despite being woodcutters, most of the men seemed to have more than one job which wasn’t surprising given that only a limited amount of personnel could be supported in the camp. My second job quickly arrived when an urgent position suddenly opened.

The supervisor was facing another dilemma. The man they called Jomu, the one whose axe the newbie inherited, had been a well appreciated blacksmith and they were missing his expertise. Grenfell, the other blacksmith slash farrier, reduced the slack for a while but couldn’t keep up with the hoard of smaller items that needed his attention. Minor things like tool sharpening and forge fire management required time which he couldn’t get to while busy with larger tasks. The smaller tasks were nonetheless indirectly important to camp efficiency. Simply put they needed another hand, and there was only one person available who happened to be within his sight.

“Hey newbie.”

Hollered the supervisor from further down the camp.

“Go help out the blacksmith, we’ll work on your logging skills later.”

It seemed the blacksmith needed some help, so at once I left to help the man. He was a short, elderly gentleman with a neatly cut beard and grey hair. He looked to be over sixty, but there wasn’t a sign of fat on the man and he looked as sinewy as beef jerky. He looked a bit like a lean father Christmas, without the ho, ho, ho. He jumped straight to the point.

If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

“What can you do? Have you done metalwork before?”

I couldn’t tell him I used pneumatically driven gear and electrical tools then, could I? So I improvised.

“Yes, but with different tools to what you’re using. I’m not skilled with your tools but with a bit of practice I could quickly become proficient.”

“Well, that’s great and all but I need someone who can help me now. I’ve got two horses that just slipped their shoes and the carts they’re pulling are already leaving late. I’ll deal with that issue, but there’s a heap of tools waiting to be sharpened before the woodcutters go out in a short while, can you at least take care of that?”

He looked exasperated, I couldn’t but help feel sorry for him.

“My father taught me how to properly sharpen a blade.”

“Well good for you then. There are the tools that need sharpening.”

He pointed to a pile of tools on the floor under the open sided marquee tent which consisted mostly of axes and saw blades.

“If you do a good job, the woodcutters will thank you. Do a poor job and no one will want to know you in future.”

The point was clearly made to me, step up or go home. I could well understand his standing and it wouldn’t be the first time I heard that in my life. After my father disappeared it was left up to my mother and I to look after ourselves. My paternal uncle graciously stepped in and resumed our scrap metal operations. Had it not been for his selfless act, our worlds would have looked vastly different, and not for the better. My uncle had little to say to me afterwards, simply saying,

“I’m not doing this just for you boy so I’ll only say this once, either become useful or don’t bother me for a job in the future. I’m not going to entertain anyone’s laziness.”

It wasn’t in my nature to be lazy and my uncle eventually became a close friend of mine. However, the blacksmith’s words rang true and I didn’t want to mess up on a better opportunity even if it was under some weird otherworldly circumstances. I was certain that death there was as real as death on earth and starving was starving no matter where you came from.

I sat down for what turned out to be a tiresome job honing blades. How on earth I ended up there who knew?

Through casual conversations with others, I discovered that woodcutters tended to stay in the woods in shifts for about forty days, so I would probably spend a little while longer there. It was no wonder Orilay’s wife and children were so pleased to see him, even I would be happy to see that house of theirs after that shift. Since I didn’t have anywhere to go, I supposed that I could just keep tagging along anyhow since I wouldn’t likely survive for long without a job there. Although I preferred metal work to woodcutting any day, it suited my mechanical career choice. Woodwork just wasn’t my forte, otherwise I would have studied woodwork or carpentry.

Later that afternoon I was asked to help with kitchen duties supporting some of the women who were preparing dinner. The meal seemed centred around meat with the indomitable windroot popping up again. It was with no thanks to Orilay, who had already waxed lyrical about my prowess with windroot, that they conscripted me into the kitchen. It did however come with one benefit, other than having access to copious amounts of food, I could also talk with some of the women from the camp.

A young lady, with reddish hair plaited into a ponytail, chopped vegetables near me. In the early evening sun her lightly red tinged hair looked as if it was on fire. Suddenly and without looking at me, she asked me straight up,

“Is there something on my face or am I in the way of your view?”

I started smiling, it was unlike me to stare at someone like that, but I couldn’t help it. I wasn’t going to tell her that though. I must have started blushing because she also began smiling. I explained my embarrassing situation to her.

“I’m sorry, sometimes there are brief moments in life where beautiful things coincide, and I can’t help but admire the moment.”

Perhaps I was a bit too forward because she started blushing that time.

“Are you talking about me?”

“Ah…no. I was admiring the guard’s glistening armour in the sun.”

I said seriously while pointing at the guard on the watch tower who obviously only had plain leather armour. For a few seconds I could see her look dumbfounded at the guard until I couldn’t hold my poker face anymore and I started laughing. At first, she fumed for a few seconds and then started laughing and continued cutting her vegetables,

“Well…do you have a name?”

“Shane.”

“Shane hey? You’re not from around here are you?”

“Is it that obvious?”

“Strikingly.”

I knew that I wasn’t woodcutter material, but I never thought I would stand out that much. It piqued my interest as to what she noticed about me.

“What is it about me that stands out so much?”

Between the chopping noises, she paused for a moment before answering.

“Well for starters, your hands and nails are smoother than a palace scribe’s. Someone who knows their trade cut your hair and the sun hasn’t seen your face for longer than a day and whatever work you were doing before, it wasn’t outdoor manual labour because your skin looks very soft.”

The young woman, whose name I still didn’t know, was wrong about me on a number of counts. To be fair to her, she was using a measuring stick relative to her life’s experience but was right about one thing, my skin was smooth. We talked about various issues and I was enlightened on a lot of things I didn’t know. She may have suspected something was not totally right with me, but she was quite tolerant of my questions. At one point I noticed that the knives we used seemed to be of a basic design. Kitchen knives were generally made from poorer quality metal, while higher quality knives were expensive and difficult to come by. As a result, most people couldn’t afford them. Poorer quality knives tended to blunt easier, requiring sharpening more often. Ironically, that came at a cost too which when added up, equalled the cost of a decent quality knife. It was the lack of decent metals that caused the issue. I could sense the frustration from the women in the kitchen having to work with inferior quality tools. I later discovered that the blacksmiths didn’t usually bother with the kitchen tools as it was strangely beneath them to do so, that just seemed weird to me.

“Do you have a break during the day between breakfast and lunch?”

“Yes, why?”

Her face slowly turned red.

“Bring me your knives when you’re done tomorrow morning, and I’ll make a plan to sharpen them for you.”

She looked flustered for a moment.

“Oh, that’s why. I’m sorry.”

“What did you think?”

“Nothing…don’t worry.”

Goodness she was easy to read, but I liked that in her. She recovered quickly enough and retorted.

“By the way, my name is Haruhime since you were never going to ask.”

“Yeah, sorry about that, I totally forgot to ask. I was enjoying our conversation that much.”

I said rubbing my head in embarrassment.