Aproaching the docks, Lexie saw a the most fortunate fishing ships had returned. They left early, and they came back when their hold was full, or on a bad day, when they finally gave up. A few more were coasting along through the harbour, setting a liesurely pass for the docks.

Lexie wandered down to where a grizzled man and a young girl were cleaning fish. She watched for a few minutes. The man wielded the knife like an expert, and the girl, though young, clearly had practice as well.

When he finished the fish he was working on, he looked up at Lexie. "Aye, can I help ya?"

"Um, maybe. Mrs. Sprübeck at the village store said I should come down and seeabout getting some leftover fish parts for my cat."

"She did, did she."

"I'm happy to buy them, I don't need much." Lexie felt in her pocket for a couple coins.

"HAW HAW HAW" laughed the man, a great honking laugh that caught Lexie by surprise.

"Granddad," said the girl with an exasperated sigh. She didn't look up from the fish she was cleaning.

"Oh Aggie, I'm just having a bit o' fun." The old man rolled his eyes. "Kids. All work, no play."

"I'm right here," said Aggie.

"So you are," said the old man. To Lexie he said, "I'm Captain Norbert Dick, but my friends call me Norby, and this here serious person is my granddaughter Agniesca."

"Nice to meet you," said Lexie. "I'm Lexie--"

"Oh we know who you are," interrupted Captain Norby Dick. "Whole town knows. You're Martha's relation. We're awful sorry about her passing. I even took her out on my boat a few times. Great lady."

/* :tocut: */

"Thank you," said Lexie. She was becoming used to accepting condolences. Martha had a whole life here, and it seemed that she was the first member of Martha's family anyone from Albatross Bay had met. What was Albatross Bay to Martha? wondered Lexie. Was it just a place to write, and out of town, out of mind, or was it special to her, a secret she kept to preserve that specialness.

Lexie thought, from the letter, it was the latter. She wished Martha had told her about it, though. Shown her pictures. She wondered if Martha had wanted to. It was true, they hadn't seen as much of each other in recent years. Martha was busy writing, but she'd always been busy writing, and she'd still had time for Lexie. No, it was a normal part of growing up, thought Lexie. Where, when she'd been a child, even a teen, she saw a great deal of Martha. But slowly, as she began to live her own life, that fell off to the occasional weekend, and then just holidays.

/* :endcut: */

"Thank you," said Lexie, who had become used to accepting condolences. "So Mrs. Sprübeck said I should come down to the docks for some of the leavings after cleaning fish. For my cat. I can pay?"

Captain Norby's eyes twinkled and the girl Aggie elbowed him. "Grandpa," she said in an exasperated voice, "Stop teasing."

The old man sighed. "Never lets me have any fun, this one. Work work work. Sure, take as much as you like. We'll just use it as bait, most of it will sink to the bottom and feed the scavengers anyway. Take a whole bucket."

"Um, I only have one cat, and no refrigerator," said Lexie. "I was thinking maybe a bit less?"

"How about a cupful?" Aggie had finished cleaning her fish while Lexie and Norby talked fish guts, and now she set aside her knife, carefully, and trotted over to the harbour master's office. She was back a few minutes later with a white paper cup and a lid.

"Will this do?"

"Perfect!" said Lexie.

The little girl matter of factly scooped a pile of fish guts and heads and skin and whatever else was in the mix into the cup and carefully sealed the lid. "You can have as much as you want," she said. "Come back any time. I wish I could have a cat, but my brother is allergic."

"Thanks," said Lexie.

She didn't trust the lid on the cup, so she carried it home in her hand. She spent the walk trying to think of good cat names.

"Assuming he's even there when I get home, he probably had a nice nap and then when I wasn't around any more, wandered off back to wherever he came from."

She felt a little ache inside even as she said it, and was a little surprised to discover how much she didn't want that to be the case. She distreacted herself trying to decide on names.

"He's got that patch, kind of like a pirate. Pirate names, pirate names. Redbeard! No... He's black, not ginger. Blackbeard! Except he's not really beardy looking. Patch! Except that sounds like a dog name..."

She talked to herself, trying out names. "Wasn't there a song with a cat called Mephistopheles? But I'd get tired of saying that all the time. How would you shorten it? Meph? Or no. Tolley? Hmm, Tolley could work."

She came up with a few more names that might work, remembered she should have gotten a litter box too, while she was in town, and immediately promised herself that if Blackie/Tolley/Fredo/Peter/Mister Catman was still there, she would get one tomorrow.

When she got to the cabin, Lexie's heart sank. She didn't see the cat anywhere. Not on the porch, not lying in the grass. She sighed and resigned herself to solitude again. She'd enjoyed falling asleep with another living creature in the house though. She remembered how adorable he was, sleeping sprawled on the rug in front of the fire.

She opened the door to the cabin. She still had her groceries to put away.

She put the cup of fish parts on the table, and set her bag on a chair. She opened the food safe and was transferring items one by one. "Shoot, I should have remembered to ask Mrs. Sprübeck about ice packs. Or maybe Iris at the diner. I bet they have a huge freezer. Maybe she'd freeze them for me. I could take them some veg from my first harvest and ask."

While Lexie was talking to herself, she felt something brush against her leg.

She looked down.

It was the cat.

"Winston! You're still here!" she exclaimed. Before she thought about it, she scooped the cat up off the floor and gave him a gentle hug, rubbing her face along the soft fur on top of his head. "I'm glad to see you, buddy. I thought you'd left. And how did you get inside? I know I closed the door--" She glanced at the window which she'd opened for the cat the night before in case it wanted to leave.

"Oh, that was careless of me. But I'm glad you're here! We'll have to get you a proper cat door put in." She hugged Winston again and felt a deep rumbling purr through his thick fur.

"Wait until you see what I got you! You're gonna have to eat it up because it will be bad by tomorrow."

Lexie grabbed a spoon and scooped a quarter of the fish remnants onto a suacer. The smell hadn't been noticeable in the open air at the docks, with the sea breeze blowing in. It had carried the smell of the fish away, or it had mingled into a miasma that Lexi'es brain identified simply as "sea" without too much effort spent on what the individual components might be.

She started to put the plate on the floor, and then thought better. There was still afternoon sun on the porch, and the floorboards were warm when she stepped out in her bare feet and set down the saucer with the fish parts for Winston. The smell would be better out here. Winston followed her, winding around her ankles, purring, and punctuating his purr with the occasional meow, clearly telling Lexie that yes, he would like some of what she's having.

"All for you, buddy," she told him. "There's more for later too."

The cat crouched at the saucer, snarfing the fish parts and purring as he ate.

Lexie sat next to him. "How is that even possible?" she said. "Won't you choke if you do that."

Winston purred louder. It was probably just the combination of fish dinner, sun, and a friendly voice that made him happy. Now you're just showing off, " said Lexie. But the cat's happiness was contagious.

When the cat had finished eating, and parked himself in a sunbeam to daintily clean his face, she picked up the saucer, rinsed it, and added it to her dish tub.

There were a couple hours until dinner, and Lexie decided to put the time to use clearing some of the weeds and saplings that were growing up around the cabin. She took the small hatchet from the chest, and grabbed the scythe where she left it leaning in the corner with the spade and other long tools, and headed out into the field.

This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

She'd simply made her first field conveniently close to the cabin and the pump behind, knowing she would have to carry water. But what she was thinking about now was an orchard.

The trees in Sprübeck's catalog were expensive. 500 coins just for a basic apple or cherry sapling, and twice that for plums and pears. There were other trees too, but none that Lexie could grow in this climate. Not until she leveled and had skills.

The trees would set her back, but the sooner she bought them, the sooner they'd start bearing fruit. Trees took a lot longer than field crops, especially since she didn't have any tree related skills yet.

She stood on the porch and looked around the clearing, trying to decide on where an orchard would work best, when she caught a flash of movement from th corner of her eye. Something in her field.

There was a large, dark brown hare, lazily hopping through her field, stopping to munch the tender green sprouts, and then moving on to a fresh patch.

"Hey!" cried Lexie, taking off at a run toward the field. "No, get out! Don't eat that!"

She still held the scythe, but she waved her free hand in the air.

The hare looked up in alarm and fled with haste back to the treeline.

Lexie slowed as the creature fled, and walked between the rows of crops inspecting the damage. There were still a good number of seedlings, but the damage was noticeable. And as Lexie looked around, she saw more evidence that hares had been in the garden earlier too. There were hare sized prints in the soft soil, and a few droppings. Worst of all, there were other patches of decimated seedlings!

"Oh, no." She sank down between the rows and leaned her head on her knees. "Look," she advised herself, "It's not that bad, it looks bad, but that's because you're upset. Calm down, and then we'll inspect the damage."

She took ten deep breaths, and release them slowly, counting each one. Then she raised her head and looked around.

It was still pretty bad, but it wasn't as bad as she'd first tought, when all she could see was damage. Some of the patches had been nibbled to bare dirt, but otheres had been grazed, a bite here, a bite there. Some of those might even recover, she decided. And the book from the library talked about thinning your crop...

"I guess I won't have to do as much thinning," she said ruefully, remembering the advice from the library book about thinning out the smaller sprouts once the plants were starting to grow. "Maybe I can transplant some to the empty patches. Then it's basically no damage at all. But I'm going to need to find a way to keep those hares out of the field."

Lexie picked up her scythe where she'd dropped it when she sat down and headed back to the house to consult the farming book about how to protect crops from hares.

She propped the scythe back in the corner. "Guess I'm not clearing a spot for an orchard this afternoon. Changing priorities."

She picked up the farming book and took it back outside, where she could sit on the edge of the porch, read, and keep an eye on the field at the same time. Hopefully the running and shouting had given the hare enough of a fright it would be some time before it came back.

She flipped to the index and ran her finger down the columns. "Crop pests" was about bugs and fungus. Nothing on "hares". A fair bit on "rabbits" but only raising them, not keeping wild ones out of the field. Oh, maybe "wildlife".

Bingo.

/* book text */

In outdoor, rural locations, farms can be attractive to the local wildlife, who often discover a smörgåsbord of new and delicious edibles. Depending on your location, you might find your fields plagued by one or more of the following.

Rodents

Rodents come in both above and below ground varieties. The below ground sort tunnel and enjoy delicious root systems, while the above ground variety wil eat the leafy parts of the plant, sometimes even digging up the root system.

Large Herbivores

In some locations, you might get larger animals, like deer or elk in your garden. They can do a large amount of damage in a short time and will eveneat saplings and small trees.

Birds

Birds love newly planted fields, and may eat the seeds as you spread them. They will also watch your field for ripe fruits and vegetables They have a keen sense of colour and can tell ripe from unripe fruits. That's why the crows only steal your ripe cherries!

Predators

If you're farming animals, you have to worry about predators too! "The fox in the henhouse" isn't just a saying, it's a very real danger if you have a coop full of chickens!

The first line of defense against all of these except birds is a good fence!

Advanced fence making is beyond this guide, but chances are, if you're reading this, you've just discovered someone in your garden, helping themselves. Because let's face it, no one says I'm going to be a farmer and then reads a book cover to cover about farming. No, they decide to farm, get started, and then realize they have no idea what they're doing, so they flip through a book looking for advice about whatever their current problem is. A problem that they probably wouldn't have, if they'd read the book cover to cover before they started digging holes and tossing seeds around.

"Okay wow," said Lexie. "I feel personally attacked right now."

She kept reading anyway.

The book recommended two other books on fence making, but provided directions for making a simple woven fence out of saplings that should be tight enogh to block smaller animals like hares, and deter larger animals. Though the book cautioned that a large, determined animal like an elk could push through the fence fairly easily.

Lexie sighed and looked at the field around her. Well, the good news was she'd wanted to clear a spot for an orchard, and she was planning on cutting down saplings anyway. The bad news was this fence was going to take a lot of saplings, even just to enclose Lexie's small field.

"Well, I better get to work. And you, Winston. Your job is to chase off any hares you see in field."

Winston opened one eye while Lexie addressed him, and then promptly closed it again. He was lying on the warm boards of the porch with his belly full of fish parts.

"I hope I can rely on you Winston," said Lexie. "You don't seem to be taking your duties very seriously."

Winston didn't respond.

Lexie pulled the hatchet from where she'd tucked it in her belt, and went after the first saplings. "Two and half to three meters tall," she said to herself, eyeballing the thin trunks that had sprung up here and there.

The book had said the "post" saplings, the ones the rest wove between, should be that height, since part of the length would be staked into the ground.

"You first," she addressed a willowy birch with scant leaves approximately the right height. She took her hatchet to the trunk and after a few solid strokes, cut through the trunk.

She moved on to the next, and the next, pausing now and then to catch her breath or evaluate the options. After a couple hours, she'd amassed a pile of saplings beside her field.

And she was starving.

She gave Winston another plate of fish parts. It wouldn't keep, so he might as well eat it today. Winston enjoyed his dinner as much as he had his late lunch, and Lexie made herself another dinner of scrambled eggs and toast.

It was still light when she finished her dinner, but she was tired from all the chopping saplings. The days were warm but the nights still cooled off and Lexie decided to wash at the pump before the evening chill took hold.

That done, she decided to sit on the porch with Winston and read the book on farming. She would have to take it back to the library in a couple weeks, so she might as well get as much information about her new class as possible before she did.

Farmer, as she'd read before, had branching class change possibilities every 5 levels,and depending on what she chose, her skills would come from different pools. She'd already eliminated animal farming as a path. Plant farming seemed to diverge down four main paths: standard food crops, ornamental plant farming, orchard keeping, and forestry related crops -- if the right unlock combos were met to open those paths.

Like she would need some forestry related skills to even make the last a viable option.

She still felt that focusing on one of the plant based options was her best bet. Though based on the number of eggs she was buying from Sprübeck's she was starting to seriously consider getting two or three chickens.

She flipped to the section on chickens.

/* book formatting */

Congratulations of your brave decision to raise chickens! Why brave, you ask? One word: dinosaurs.

Dinosaurs? thought Lexie.

Yes, dinosaurs.

Modern birds are the evolutionary descendant of dinosaurs. Somewhere back in the family tree of that little hen scratching for corn in your yard is a T-Rex or a maybe a velociraptor!

But more on that later.

The first thing you need to know is chickens need some shelter, so before you get chickens, the first thing you need to do is build a coop. Now, I know there are kits you can buy and assemble or even fully premade models, or you can hire someone to build a coop for you. But even if you're gonna go that route, you need to understand coop design so you know what your getting will make your chickens happy.

First, the coop should be up off the ground slightly. This makes it harder for other animals to get in. Snakes and raccoons like to steal eggs, and foxes and other small predators will eat your chickens.

Your coop should also have a door, for the same reason. A human sized door (assuming you're a human, otherwise adjust accordingly) obviously. And a chicken sized door.

You should have a small ramp running from the door to the ground so the chickens can easily exit and enter, and you should close and latch both doors at night.

Now, some people let their chickens roam the yard. I don't recommend starting off this way. It's best to fence off an area around the coop when you're new to chickens, and the chickens are new to you.

Great, more fences thought Lexie, glancing at the pile of saplings lying next to the garden, ready to be turned into fence tomorrow.

She continued reading:

You can enlarge their area over time, once they get used to their new environment. Letting your chickens roam eventually can be beneficial to your chickens, they'll enjoy it, anyway. But if you're in a location with nearby neighbours, road, or predators, it may be a good way to lose chickens as well.

Lexie flipped the page and studied a diagram of a chicken coop, interior with nesting boxes and the doors marked out, and exterior, showing the raised coop, ramp, and fence.

Lexie, who had never built anything in her life, thought it looked very complicated. She resolved to check the catalog for chicken coops next time she was in Sprübeck's.

Turning the page:

Feeding your chickens is easy. Chickens will eat just about anything. Your leftovers, chicken feed, grubs and insects they find in the ground. If you have a compost heap, I recommend keeping it in your chicken enclosure. Your chickens will love it!

Like all birds, they also need access to gravel or tiny pebbles, so keep that in mind. If your chicken run is a flat grassy lawn area, you may need to add some rocks.

Besides feed, and gravel ,your birds also need fresh water, of course.

Lexi closed the book. The sun was low, turning the horizon, and the sea, orange. Her eyes were getting heavy even tough it wasn't dark yet. And her stomach growled. She'd been working hard.

"Alright, Winston," she said as she stood up. "how about a snack and then we hit the sack?"

The cat, who had been asleep nearby, perked up.

Lexie remarked, "Heh, already learned my 'we're gonna eat now' voice, huh?"

She put the last of the fish on another saucer for Winston and set it on the porch, then rinsed out the cup with some water before she dropped it in the trash. It would stink by morning if she didn't.

She found herself an apple and made half a peanut butter sandwich, which she ate, standing in the door watching the sun set while Winston ate his fish.

Lexie noticed that he was taking his time, eating at a reasonable pace. Not like before, when he was scarfing down the food as fast as he could, as though he was afraid she might take it back, or that someone else would come and eat it.

"Starting to fill up, huh?" she said to the cat. "Good."

When she finished her sandwich and apple, she brushed her teeth outdoors, using a mug of water, and when she was done, Winston, who performed his own ablutions, followed her in.

She left the window open for him again, and climbed into bed. After a few minutes, she felt a weight settle against her lower legs. She could feel the cat purring through the blanket.

"We should make you a cat door," she remarked sleepily. "Goodnight, Winston."