Natalie had stayed with her brothers as they walked around getting use to the layout of the Village, then they had parted ways, Brian disappearing into the forge while Natalie and Jake moved off to the Fletchers shop.
When they entered the Fretchers shop he was still at the counter in the back with another bow, this time a long hunters bow, which he was carefully applying a coating of oil to the raw wood of it. The big human looked up as they approached but then went back to his work, the two of them walked slowly down towards him looking at the different bows on display.
They reached the back counter and stood quietly and respectfully to one side, waiting for the Fletcher to finish his work. Natalie was looking at a bow in the racks beside her they were very beautiful, you could easily call them works of art. The Fletcher obviously liked to embellished his bows, which showed true love for the work he did.
Her brother wasn't waiting as patiently, he shifted from foot to foot,sighed a little looked at a few bows, then turned back to see if the fletcher was finished yet, Natalie growled at him to be still, which startled him into obedience if nothing else.
"So little one you at least know the value of patience," The Fletcher said suddenly. Natalie looked up to see him watching her, she didn't say anything since he didn't seem to need a reply and had turned his attention to Jake.
"You on the other hand have much to learn," he rumbled. "Tell me Dogkin do you expect your prey to just stand in the open waiting for you?"
Jake looked at him in confusion, then belatedly realised the human was waiting for a reply, he shook his head no.
"That at least is a blessing then, for if you cannot stand still and quiet for the few minutes I held you here, how do you expect to stalk a rabbit or a deer in the woods?" He said. "Much less avoid danger,were silence and patience is a must."
Jake looked down then glanced at his sister, she was watching the Fletcher intently, how did she know this stuff? He knew this was her first time playing any type of VR game, but she was just powering though things.
"Sir?" Natalie said. "I would like to buy a bow and if you have the time some lessons on how to care for it and use it please."
The Fletcher turned his gaze back to her, studying her intently once more then he stood up and walked around her, finally he gave a nod of his head and walked over to a rack of smaller bows across the room, he stood looking at the various bows on display, then selected one made of ash wood of a very pale colour almost bone white, that had small rabbits engraved into it on either side of the hand grip, the hand grip itself was wrapped in what looked like soft rabbit fur.
The outer arm of the bow had stylised deer antlers that curved outwards and were inlaid with metal blades. The bow could be use in close range if needed to slash or stab enemies. Small as it seemed it was built very sturdily to make it very strong yet flexible.
The whole bow gleamed softly in the sunlight coming though the window. It was a small recurve bow, she had never seen anything as pretty as that before. But it was also done in such a way as to leave no doubt it was made for killing things, it had an almost deadly look mixed into its beauty.
"Come here girl, let's see if you can draw this," the human said, holding out the bow to her.
Natalie approached and took the bow she looked at it and then tried to remember how the people in the pictures and movies she had watched had done it, then moved to try and imitate them. The Fletcher watched her efforts, then moved forward and put her hands into the proper places moved her elbows into the right position and nudge her feet until he was satisfied she was standing right. Then he stepped back and nodded.
Natalie pulled hard on the bow, straining to draw the cord back to her cheek. With a lot of effort she managed to do it. The Fletcher nudged her gently and to Natalies surprise she found herself on the floor. She picked herself up and was please inwardly that she had managed not to drop the beautiful bow in her hands.
She put herself back into the position the Fletcher had shown her and tried again. He corrected her stance, and stepped back to watch her, then again he nudged her this time before she managed to draw it completely. Three times she picked herself up, scrambled to put herself into the position he wanted, on the fourth attempt he nudged her and she only swayed slightly, he turned the nudge into a push, which she resisted for a second then fell, only to pick herself up again. The Fletcher looked at her stance then smiled.
"Good child, now you just need to learn how to deepen that stance and draw the bow fluidly," he told her. "It should be done effortlessly, without thought, while maintaining awareness of possible danger from all directions, like this."
After saying that he picked up a very large bow and with no effort fell into a deep graceful stance drawing the bow back to his cheek while his eyes remained ahead, yet Natalie could feel that he would know if a mouse walked across the floor behind him. She stared trying to imprint what he was showing her into her mind.
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"Once you can accomplish this, as closely as you can then you will return to me for the next lesson." He told her. "That will be 15 gold for the bow and 2 gold for the lesson."
Natalie thanked him and placed the coins onto his counter and stood back again, The Fletchers attention was now on Jake, he followed the same routine with Jake as he had done with her, only Jakes bow was twice the size of hers and he was rougher in his teaching then he had been with her. Halfway though the Fletcher stopped Jake studied him again, then he shook his head, taking the bow from Jake he walked across to the other side of the shop and chose another which he gave to Jake.
This time Jake managed to draw the bow to his cheek and after a bit he also managed to keep his feet against rough handling. Around this time Natalie realised that Jake being fresh in the game would have no gold, she managed to put 30 gold into a pouch in her inventory, hoping that would be enough for his bow and lessons. When The Fletcher was finished with Jake she pulled the bag out of her inventory and held it out to him.
"Brack gave me this for you, Minstrel he said you forgot it again," she said hoping he would just play along. "He also said that if you forget it again he is going to sew it to your chest, then maybe you won't lose it again,"
Her brother glared then took the coins from her, she giggled the glare fit in perfectly.
"Thanks," he said then trying to act as if nothing had happed turned back to the Fletcher who was watching this with amusement. "How much Sir for the Bow and Lesson and if you have one could I please have a Sanctuary as well ?"
"18 gold for the bow, 2 gold for the lesson and 1 for the sanctuary." The human replied.
Jake nodded and counted out the amount needed. Then the Fletcher showed them how to unstring their bows and string them back up again, how to oil the cords to ward against wet weather and what oils to use to keep the wood of the bows supple and smooth. All of the things needed for maintenance of the bows cost them another three gold each but the Fletcher also included a leather case for them, a quiver and a hundred blunted practice arrows each.
When they left the shop both were sore and very tired, but well pleased with their purchase.
"Thanks Crystal for the gold," Minstrel said looking embarrassed. "I hadn't realised just how expensive that was going to be, Brack and I only had 4 gold between us."
"That's ok Minstrel, but we had better get to Brack he will need more gold if he wants to buy anything off Master Brethan." She replied while walking quickly towards the foundry and fixing another pouch up with 30 gold in it. This was only going to leave her with 8 gold for herself but she considered it a worthy investment. She handed it to Minstrel and motioned him to take it into Brack while she leaned against the wall and waited for them.
Natalie leaned there and thought about the day, she started to giggle, they had come looking for her to save her and help her, but she was the one doing the helping and in a way the saving, her giggles turned into snorts of laughter as she tried to hold it in. This is how her brothers found her when they finally came out of the forge, they looked at her in surprise then shook their heads, she snorted again then managed to get herself in control enough to walk.
Natalie led them to were she had placed her Sanctuary. She made sure they had permission to enter it then took them inside to see what hers looked like and told them what they needed to do, to get the other extensions. Once they had heard everything she had to tell them they went outside and placed their own sanctuaries up near hers.
Natalie left them to it, truth be told she was felling a little hurt, they hadn't said anything about paying her back the gold she had given them, their thanks had been perfunctory almost as an afterthought. Natalie tryed not to care it was only a game .... but it kept coming back over and over because this for her wasn't only a game, this was her chance to improve her life in the real world, a life her brothers owned with ease.
She took out her new bow and set herself to training the stance and drawing of the bow, at least this was hers now, she would make sure that the Fletcher would be pleased with her progress when she next went to him for lessons. She practice this for another hour, then went to her garden plots the wheat she had planted was almost done. She thought for a few minutes then started to plant the remaining plots with Blueguards, she needed to skill those up a bit more until she wasn't failing as much with them.
She looked at her new animal husbandry scroll, maybe she should put that up and see what she needed to do to get the animal side of her farm going. Then she decided to wait until she had the blueguards done, she would also need a site more wheat and the oats seeds she had in storage grown to feed the animals when she got them. She checked the time and found it was early yet to logout, but found she had no real desire to play anymore right now, so had Sam log her out to the virtual room.
She sat in there for a bit just thinking, then she started to write down her experiences of the day into her diary. Once that was done she left the pod and had a shower. Still feeling a bit flat she left the house and walked to the park, she spent the remainder of the afternoon watching the birds flying around the parks gardens. When she arrived home just before dinner she was feeling much better and was able to show a smiling happy face to her family, as they all sat down together in a rare family meal.
Natalie joined in with her brothers and older sister, in telling their parents all the things they had been doing in the game, often laughing at each other's mistakes. She took it good naturedly when Jake regaled them with detailed discriptions of her attempts to hold the bow the right way, then told them about Jakes attempts though she wasn't as detailed as he had been. After dinner she went in to watch TV shows in the other room, until it was time to get ready for her nightly work.
Natalie felt drained again as she entered her pod, but she just called Sam up and they went though the rafts of robots checking that the programming was still ok and that maintenance had been carried out as asked. They then settled in to do the work for the night, everything went smoothly as usual. Towards morning Natalie had Sam place her under with instructions to pull her back up to consciousness at 7 am to do the house chores.