Sherry-By-The-Bend.
Clive wasn't sure what to feel at this moment. Disappointment? Vindication? Frustration? All the above? He couldn't really tell. Neither he nor Kilpa, to be honest. It didn't really help anything when said causes of said feelings were sitting across from him. Covered in all manner of things from food, soil, oil, and something that looked and smelled an awful lot like shit.
He sat in his mayoral seat within the assembly tent with Kilpa standing beside him. Whereas the assembled group of halflings, laborers, National Guard, gnome, and dwarf could see all of the aforementioned emotions on her face, Clive had his face hidden within his own hands. A few hours, he thought tiredly. They were gone, for a few hours.
He wish he had a crystal ball to ponder that would reveal what exactly was the cause of this mess. But all he had to rely on was the testimony of said parties. Who barely got a few words in before a dozen different objections and counters and all sorts of other arguing and shouting erupted. Making getting anything resembling some sort of timeframe damn near impossible.
The laborers said this, the halflings did that, the National Guard did this, the gnome was being a gnome. Clive had an immediate headache when he saw the chaos of what the halfling colony had become in the time they had been gone. He was just starting to relax and actually feel good too, he thought as he freed his face from his hands and gave the best disappointed look on his face as he could muster. Which wasn't hard to do after years of playing ref between Jeb and Morty over the pettiest of things.
He wasn't at all tempted to try and proceed. But he had to at least try. He massaged his temples and spoke in a voice that held the weight of someone that was done with everything.
"So. Let me just see if I can get this straight. The laborers were doing some work on the colony. Correct?"
"That's right." An elf said while covered in what he hoped was dirt but by the smell knew otherwise.
"Work that was building a septic tank just outside the colony, correct?"
"That's right! We were out there doin' our jobs and these pecks start tauntin' us!" The elf continued heatedly.
"Was not! We was merely statin' tha obvious we was!" One of the halflings 'clarified'.
"And that obvious statement being?" Clive asked tiredly.
"Tha' they looked good shovellin' our shite!" The halfling said with a far too smug smile.
"Since we got here they've been throwin' all manner of taunts and bits of refuse at us! I'd rather be back guttin' fish on the docks than dealin' with troublesome halflin's!" The shitty elf retorted.
"Jus' makin' sure you stay in yer place elf! Dinnae 'arm none ta keep you 'umbled!" The halfling said with some support from the other halflings. Those that weren't part of the constabulary that is.
Speaking of the cops. Unfortunately for Clive, they weren't much better when it came to this shitshow. The whole reason he even gave power to them while they were gone was in the hopes of avoiding this very situation! Instead, while the commonfolk were taunting the elven laborers, the constabulary were seeing to matters related to "gnomish tomfoolery". Whatever that was. Though by the look on Dylan's face. He was assuming there may be some merit to the claim, he thought with a groan as the elven laborers and halflings quickly devolved into shouting and sniping... again.
As for the National Guards' part in this? Well, despite the fact that halflings seemed to care more for humans than elves, it didn't stop the halflings from turning their attention from the elves, to the elves and National Guard! At least that was what he managed to drag out from the shouting and the fact that Corporal Vance and some of his men were in the same condition as the elves were right now.
Given the sheer amount of trouble that had happened in a short amount of time, he was sure that the Big Families were the cause and would be eager to use this as proof against his continued mayoralship. So he was actually shocked and surprised to find that the Big Families weren't spared from the trouble either as several of the heads sat quietly nearby or were off getting clean.
How they got involved was still a mystery to him though, Clive thought. Could be that they started the trouble and it got out of hand even for them, or they sought to exploit it against him, or maybe they really did have no part in it and this was just a silver lining!
Clive wasn't sure. What he was sure though was that if he didn't sort this out, things around here won't get any better. The colony needed the help of the National Guard and the laborers if they wanted everyone to get a house before winter. They also needed some basic water and waste filtration. None of that would get done before the winter gets here if the halflings drove away most of the help. Sure the boys from the train yard would remain, but desperately needed progress would be crippled.
Then the matter of the Artificers. Their presence here hasn't exactly been... welcome. He was loath to send Dylan and Alban up the road like the dwarves did. But if he couldn't find SOME way for them to cooperate, or at least stay out of each other's way, then he might have to for their own good.
"We've done nothin' to you!" Another elf shouted.
"'Nd we'll see ta it tha' you ne'er do! Cannae trust an elf! They're liars tha' think they're better than e'eryone!" A halfling retorted to shouts and cheers from the other local halflings.
"What a Goddamn nightmare." Clive muttered as the tent devolved into shouting yet again.
"Sorry." Kilpa muttered.
"Not your fault. It was only wishful thinking that things went smoothly." Clive replied back and took her hand in his with a tender squeeze.
"Aye. But it dinnae make me feel better." Kilpa replied with a sigh.
"Alright, quiet!" Clive tried to order.
But none were listening as the entire tent continued to devolve. Shouts and threats were flung at one another. If he didn't try and get a hold of this soon he might end up seeing them throwing actual punches or even drawing weapons, Clive thought with worry and concern.
However, despite the fact he was mayor, none were willing to listen to him as each of the assembled parties all were airing their grievances. He wanted, no, NEEDED to get this settled and sorted so that things can return to normal. As normal as things could be nowadays, he thought tiredly.
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"Enough!" He shouted again.
When that failed he tried again, and again. But his shouting amounted to little more than added noise to the chorus. Even taking the ledger and smashing it against the table in some sort of improvised gavel to get their attention. But what little he got was quickly reverted back towards the others as his calls for silence and order were continuously drowned out.
Kilpa did her best to assist him, but she had about as much success as he did if even less so. Despite her and Clive being a thing now, the halflings themselves still didn't hold a high opinion of the former adventurer and it showed in how they dismissed her words even quicker than his own.
Everything was falling apart, Clive thought. Things were going so good. Not perfect, but better than he had hoped for or even thought possible. Yet it was looking like all the progress he had done for the halflings and the colony were about to be undone by sheer fucking stubbornness! Yet he couldn't do anything about it. At least, if there was something he could do, he didn't know what it was.
He didn't want to end up like Morty, ruling over the halflings with an iron fist. They were people and they deserved the rights and respect afforded to them same as everyone else. But every chance to improve and advance he gave them was met with frustration and difficulty. How was he supposed to be a mayor to a group of people that were so fundamentally different from him in pretty much every way possible, he thought as his mood and demeaner fell with every second.
Even what plans he had that the halflings were interested in, like a proper schooling system, was looking less and less likely as his authority was eroding by the second the longer this fighting continued. Constabulary yelled at Dylan while his brother stood between the halflings and the gnome. Elvish laborers yelled at halfling shit stirrers who yelled back. Big Families yelled at the National Guard who also yelled back.
He... he couldn't do it. He just didn't have the will or mindset to try and hold this all together. Especially when it seemed it was all working against him. Fine, he thought with finality. If they want to tear themselves apart, he wasn't going to stand between them anymore. At least Jeb and Morty would listen to him enough to not kill each other. Though they came damn close on several occasions. But he's known them for years. He knows the little stuff between them, why he was never truly worried of one of his friends killing the other because of a stupid game! But this? It was like going from some sort of hyper-advanced society and being put in charge of some pseudo-Amish commune. EVERYTHING was so different!
"I tried." Clive muttered at last as he started to stand.
"Wha'? Wha' do you mean?" Kilpa asked.
"I tried to be a leader. But I just don't have it in me. I tried to stand my ground and put my foot down and it worked, for a time. But this?" Clive said with a wave of his hand.
"This is more than I can deal with. I'm used to being between two people. Not entirely different societies that are so polar opposite of what, who, I am. I just can't do it anymore." Clive admitted with defeat.
"But Clive-" Kilpa started before Clive just walked away. If the rest of the parties even noticed his departure they didn't seem to care.
Kilpa sighed and followed after him. Leveling a glare at the rest of them as she left. She came out of the tent and looked around for Clive. Seeing him walking away with his hands in his pockets as he made his way towards his tent. Her appearance sent some nosy halflings shuffling away as they tried not to make it too obvious that they were listening in on the arguing within the tent.
"Clive! You cannae jus' give up!" Kilpa said as she hurried after him.
"I'm not giving up. I'm simply admitting that I can't do the job." Clive stated.
"Tha's still givin' up!"
"No, I'm acknowledging that I don't have the skillset to run a colony is all." Clive explained.
"Yer givin' up! No matter 'ow you phrase it yer givin' up!" Kilpa stated in an annoyed tone.
"Fine! Yes! I'm giving up! Happy?!" Clive shouted heatedly.
"I don't know how Morty or Jeb can corral goblins and kobolds into a proper society. You'd think trying to manage halflings would be easier somehow. But nope! It's not! If the universe dropped a bunch of gnolls in my lap and said, here you go, I'd probably be better off! But no! I get the race that is so close yet so opposite of myself that I can't even do the basics without feeling like I just got my teeth pulled by a pair of pliers!" Clive continued to rant.
"Clive, I ken it's frustratin'. I ken more than most 'ow halflin' society can be ta those lookin' in. But you cannae jus' give up!" Kilpa pleaded.
"Why not? It's obvious that they don't want my help. We were gone for a few hours, Kilpa. What would happen if we had to leave for longer than that? Or am I just supposed to abandon any sort of prospects and people outside of the colony? Friends and family? Can't visit them because the colony might burn down while we're gone. Also means goodbye to any plans to travel to Charleston or even D.C. for recognition. Going someplace to meet with buyers or sellers for trade is also out the window now too. I know leaders are supposed to sacrifice a bit to be leaders, but why does it seem like the cost of running this place is my entire life? Why does it seem like in order to not give up on the colony I'd have to give up on everything else?"
Kilpa... didn't have an answer to that. Because she felt the same way to a degree. She gave up everything she had in her town to become an adventurer to save it. In return, her own family barely talks to her, and she still failed to save it. Yet here she was trying to get Clive to commit to something he didn't even WANT to do. He was right, with how the halflings acted, he'd have to practically give up on everything outside of the colony just to keep it running. Sure it might get to a point where it didn't turn into a mess if he left for a time. But how long was that? A few months? A year or two? How much of his life outside of it would need to be put on hold for him to play babysitter?
"Yer right." Kilpa said.
"Shocking I know." Clive replied sarcastically.
"I'm not mockin' you. Yer right. Why should you put yer life on 'old fer folk tha' dinnae wan' you?" Kilpa continued.
"I'm sure I'm exaggerating about them not wanting me. But if even trying to get some basic stuff done is such a chore, what will that say when we need to discuss bigger stuff like trade? Or rights? I want to help them, but I just don't have it in me to LEAD them!" Clive said tiredly.
"Wha' 'bout Fallmeadow?" Kilpa asked.
"What about him?"
"You've been wantin' ta talk ta 'im. Why not go see 'im befer givin' up?" Kilpa asked semi pleadingly.
"What good would that do? He was the one that made me mayor in the first place! From the sounds of it the colony wasn't much better off when he was in charge anyway!" Clive retorted.
"Still, thin's ran smoothly fer a long while with 'im in charge. Maybe he 'as some advice?" Kilpa asked.
As much as Clive hated being a leader with all the frustrations it gave him. She noticed he also got his feet under him from the experience. If he just gave up and went back to what he was doing before, what confidence he got from it would vanish.
Clive stopped and sighed. He looked up at the cloudy sky and thought for a long moment. He HAD wanted to talk to Fallmeadow for more than a few reasons. Some of them being personal, like why did he make him mayor to begin with. As well as official mayoral business like retrieving some things that he apparently still had with him that he didn't leave behind.
"Fine. I'll go talk to him. But if his advice is just 'let things work out for themselves' I'm washing my hands of this mess." Clive declared.
Kilpa sighed gratefully as Clive turned around and made for Fallmeadow's tent. She remained behind as she felt this was something Clive himself needed to do without her. She pushed him enough in trying to become a leader. The rest was up to him, she thought.
-----
Longfellow Residence.
Carrie looked in the mirror on her side of the tent. She twisted and turned and gazed questioningly at her stomach. Surely she should be showing signs of pregnancy by now, she thought as she ran a hand over her supple flesh. She knows others from around the time of the Harvest Festival were already declaring that they were with child. But Carrie had never given birth before, so how was she to know the feeling of life growing in her womb?
She wasn't particularly thrilled to be a mother. She knew what kind of pain it caused, as well as the toll it took on one's figure. But the point of being a mother, to her, was to secure ties to those of influence. While Clive was influential when she had laid with him, now he was mayor of the colony! A position that she hadn't been able to get her finger in with Fallmeadow and his wives there.
But now? Now she had a chance to become powerful and influential! If she was with child, Clive's child to be exact, then she and her children could hold power over the colony for generations to come! Technically they would still have elections. But such things were more for show with the actual elections being decided in dining rooms and parlors over an assortment of food and drink while marriages were traded and offered in return for support.
But surely she was with his child, she thought huffily. She was beautiful. Every halfling not already married wanted to lay with her, and those that were had expressed their appreciation of her figure during certain festivities on more than one occasion.
Yet her belly looked no more bigger. She still bled during her times of the month. But she didn't feel what others who had children had told her. She didn't feel sick during the morning. She didn't have strange cravings, even by halfling standards. She wasn't moody. Well, no more than usual.
Her husband didn't seem to notice his wife's attention to her belly. No halfling would dare suggest that he was concerned with his wife's love-handles. It wasn't unexpected for halflings to "experiment" during such festivities like the Harvest Festival. But if she wasn't with child from that time she would need to be clever in making sure she was. Infidelity was waved away during a drunken good time as beds, and spouses, tend to blur under ale and the onset of a food coma. But when there wasn't such an occasion it amounted to shame and sometimes even shunning!
She shook her head in worry. She WAS with child! She knew it! That human doctor, as rude as she was, had told her she was bearing! So maybe it just hadn't begun to show yet, she thought with a jittery chuckle. Perhaps she might even retain her perfect figure during and after the birth, the thought boosting her mood somewhat.
But then why did she feel so... empty? Like something was missing? She held her hands protectively over the place where her womb was. Why did she feel incomplete then? She shook her head again and gave an even more jittery chuckle as well as a brittle smile in the mirror. Mood swings! That's all it was, she thought franticly. Surely that meant she was with child!
She ran her hands over her stomach at the thought of a new life blooming within her. Surely the child will be as beautiful as she was, she thought as her husband peered around the divider between their parts of the tent in concern. Watching her voice crack as she chittered away at herself in the mirror while she continued to hold her hands possessively over her stomach.