In the following days life on the train settled into its own rhythm. Every day we would travel to a new station selected by the Council. Every morning and evening we would scavenge and forage. If there were large enough trees we would cut a couple. When there was enough light and time for it, Ortensia would run a LUMBERJACK class.

We remained in contact with the Citadel. The Outlanders on the train and the Citadel communicated via our tapstones but that wasn’t the only contact. Urslua, formally the personal assistant to the Chief Archivist and now our chief administrator, chatted with Gertrude via Crystal Mail. The few other Crystal Mail users, both on the Citadel and the train, kept in contact with their usual correspondents all across the continent.

All these avenues of communication served to remind us that the Ostians had not given up their pursuit. Worse yet, the Ostians knew that we had split up and were seeking out both the Citadel and the Exodites, which was what they had taken to calling everyone who had left the Citadel.

News reached us of those wealthy families which had fled the Citadel for their country estates. One by one they had lost contact with their friends. Their estates lay empty. Some were ruined or burned to ashes, some were just inexplicably depopulated. Something had come for them and we could only assume that the Ostians had something to do with it.

The remains of Moonstone city were still under Ostian rule. The Ostians held the entire city hostage for weeks before finally opening it up for trade and travel. The Ostians had not found what they were looking for but they refused to explain what that was. They would only insist that the Citadel and everyone who had fled on it must surrender to them.

###

Having agreed that Tensia was now ready to teach the LUMBERJACK skill I then had to pay her back. That meant spending time with the children. I wasn’t looking forward to it. It’s not that I object to children, it's more that I just don’t have much practice with them. Fortunately I had both Tensia and Nurse Trudy standing by so I only had to concentrate on what I was showing them.

I started by showing the children how to turn the bark, stripped from the logs we’d cut, into baskets. I was somewhat surprised at how much attention they paid. I was even more surprised at how much enthusiasm they had for making baskets. Clearly they were starved for entertainment.

Tommy particularly surprised me by making a large, sturdy basket and giving it to Nurse Trudy. In later lessons she would take it with her to carry the dried reeds and grasses the children collected to make twine.

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

When I taught the older children to whittle we ran into trouble because Tommy and a couple of the other frailer children lacked the hand strength to properly wield the tools.

I mentioned it to Asser Motram who taught those children a simple spell to heat up the tip of a metal tool so they could burn intricate patterns into the surfaces of the things the other children made.

Angela had no problem with hand strength and showed real skill with a blade. She and Tommy collaborated to produce a series of perching birds with detailed and accurate plumage patterns. They gave me a tiny Talian Sparrow that I kept in a small pocket of my leather jerkin, even though it meant leaving behind the small packet of fishing gear that I usually kept there. I was never all that fond of fish anyway.

The best thing about working with the children was that they started joining the foraging and scavenging crews to look for fallen branches or plants that could be woven, twisted or braided. It was heartening to see them getting out into nature. I did worry about them but they stayed close to the train and a surprising number of adults were willing to keep an eye on them.

###

For weeks the Council picked the stations we would travel to at random. Asser would tell us which stations were in range and we would discount those that anyone objected to and then pick one from the remaining stations by the roll of a dice or the toss of a coin. We feared that if we used reason to pick the best route the Ostians would be able to predict our decisions and would be waiting at the station. However, eventually we had to start picking stations based on our needs.

We were running low on medical supplies. We didn’t need anything exotic but many of the children were still fighting fevers and needed treatment. The scavengers and foragers had picked up a few injuries that needed taking care of. There were also a few frail, older people who needed medicines that were running out.

We pored over our maps and read all the intel we were sent until we came up with a short list of places to stop. There were medicinal gardens, a school for apothecaries and a couple of small towns with their own clinics. In the end we didn’t pick any of those.

We decided to investigate a Fever Hospital that had been abandoned after the last outbreak of the Fever. It was attached to a village that was still clinging to a few inhabitants. According to one of our maps there was a train station, probably long disused, but possibly still with usable sections of track.

I immediately vetoed actually using the train station. This caused an argument about resources and paranoia that lasted for a good half an hour. Eventually I managed to make my point. Which was that the Ostians probably knew that we’d taken the train, since they definitely knew that we’d left the Citadel. Furthermore, while they couldn’t wait for us at every station they could certainly wait for us at the one station that was close to a hospital. I said that after we’d gone to all the effort to gather the resources so we could stop anywhere we wanted to, it made no sense to risk stopping at the one place they were sure to be looking for us.

Fortunately Asser and the rest of the train crew agreed with me which put a bit of a dent in any of the counter arguments. That was how the Council decided to send the train to the north of Talia.