image [https://i.imgur.com/uNVbnVr.jpg]
Over the next week, we kept a steady rhythm as the workforce moved from lumberjacking and reed collection to the construction site. Since we didn’t need a lookout, Lloyd joined the team. He became Ally’s gofer and companion.
The extra bodies made a difference as the effects of the party’s afterglow waned. After eight days, our motte and bailey efficiency fell to 76 percent, dropping six points daily. It got low enough that I cracked open a few kegs to lift the mood.
Morale
72 percent (upbeat)
Factor Events
300 percent
Factor Security
60 percent
Factor Culture
55 percent
Factor Health
73 percent
Unlike previous celebrations, the party didn’t raise the event factor to 350 percent. The diminishing returns for parties didn’t surprise me—settlements didn’t exist on alcohol alone. Still, it would only take a minor bump to sustain our spirits until we finished our fort. Once completed, a 12 percent jump in security eased our security issues. Then, we’d embark on our town hall and unlock our tier 2 buildings.
Even though we’d only been out here for a few months, my impatience grew. I didn’t mind the work, but the lack of character progression caused wanderlust. I enjoyed moving forward with the settlement but also wanted more excitement. At least in Belden, Charitybelle and I pushed our skills. Collapsing in our bunks and ridding ourselves of Exhaustion debuffs served as our only reward for a hard day of labor.
This ennui helped me convince Charitybelle to join Fabulosa and me in investigating the mysterious circle on the kobold map. Wishful thinking convinced me it had to be a dungeon. The novelty of building a town had worn out—I wanted to adventure.
The more we worked on the fortifications, the safer everyone felt. Even with the defensive ring half-built, we hadn’t seen attacks from the monsters in the wilderness. Beasts and dinosaurs still seemed to respect the ward worm’s territory, and it already looked to give defenders an advantage—enough to repel unsophisticated attacks.
As the moat took shape, the structure became worthy of admiration. The planted logs weren’t the spindly timber on Earth. Their proportions matched closer to Stonehenge. Aside from the ward worm, I’d yet to see a creature strong enough to push through them.
Having Oscar and Glenn witness our dedication bought us credit. Building something so stalwart might help convince them to take us seriously.
The ditch around our protective curtain spanned two yards wide and deep, and the earthworks bolstered the fortification to a fifteen-foot height advantage. On the inside, narrow steps led to a catwalk that allowed defenders to see and shoot arrows over the 250-yard-long wall of timber. The gate amounted to little more than a bridge that defenders pulled up into a wall. Against an army, the fort’s laughable defensive implications wouldn’t provide security, but it repelled beasts and gave everyone inside a little psychological assurance. But we weren’t preparing for sieges. The design only lacked a hill. Higher ground compounded a fort’s effectiveness, but Hawkhurst’s flat terrain offered no disadvantages to hostile forces.
We didn’t encircle the fortification around the roundhouse on purpose. Its exclusion served a tactical purpose. I preferred to hedge my bets in base-building games. Like our motte and bailey, the iron-reinforced gate on the roundhouse kept it safe from beasts, but it presented no challenge to an organized force. An undisciplined army might waste time razing the roundhouse during a siege, distracting them from our fortifications—buying us precious minutes.
After Hugo, Olive, and Fortune finished the camp’s bedding and clothing needs, they began helping with the fortifications.
Lloyd also joined the crew, declaring it an all-hands-on-deck drill. He helped Hawkhurst’s tailoring team lash the palisade logs together, which they performed after the dwarves planted the heavy logs into the ground. Lloyd called it weaving the bulkheads and sewing the stockades. He encouraged citizens to give attacking waves something to break upon.
Lloyd told stories about his early life in the Arlington streets during dinner. “When I was a pup in Arlington, me boys and I would rig the hydrants to spray the passing gentry.”
His delinquent childhood reminded me of my skateboarding days. “That sounds like a lot of fun.”
He winked at me. “Causing havoc is the prerogative of wayward lads. I saw it as my duty to keep the nobles in check. But I can’t confess that I don’t owe them anything. In a way, I can oblige them for my life at sea. Nobles buy their way to army command—but not so in the navy. At sea, an officer earns their commission. Ye can’t afford to blunder a vessel over someone’s nephew. Ships run by a fool rarely see sunset.”
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Charitybelle waited for an opportunity to change the subject. “You mentioned hydrants. What are they for—fire prevention?”
“Aye, cap’n, and more. The city is chock full of fountains, street flushers, and lifty-rigs.”
Charitybelle leaned forward. “What are street flushers?”
“The flushers clean their streets every night—as regular as a grain-fed gull, they are.”
Charitybelle’s forward posture betrayed her fascination. “And what are lifty-rigs?”
“Lifty-rigs elevate folks and cargo to different decks of the city. Arlington has layers and a warren of hydraulics. Rigs use water power and dive into an underground labyrinth called the Underworks. The boys and I would get into all sorts of mischief below—but navigating the Underworks is treacherous, even if you know the ropes. I’ve heard tell of people disappearing. My gang knew it well—we hauled wind into the maze whenever someone chased us. Nothing finer than riding the aqueducts.”
I crossed my arms in disbelief. All of this sounded out of place in a fantasy world. “Wow. That sounds high-tech.”
Charitybelle shook her head. “Not really, compared to Roman baths. They used elevated water to power fountains. We only need a kiln to make ceramic pipes to make fountains.”
Lloyd waved his hand. “Nothing fancy about it, lad. It seems to me that this town could use a fountain or two. Ye already got an upriver water source. Nor would ye need a long feed tunnel neither, maybe a mile or two. It would give your otter friends somewhere to play.” He gave Charitybelle a wink, and she turned to me to see if I shared her enthusiasm.
I gave her what couldn’t have been a convincing grin.
“We could make water slides for the pups! The otters would love it, and I bet it would raise morale.” Charitybelle gave me a pleading look as if the power rested in my hands.
“What am I? Your fairy godmother?” I waved my spoon like a wand and spoke in a falsetto voice. “And so it shall be!”
Charitybelle playfully slapped my shoulder. “No, seriously—think how cute it would be to watch them play.”
“We’ll fast-track otter slides instead of a town hall.”
Charitybelle smacked my arm again. “Oh, shush. You’re no fun.”
“Why would the otters want a fountain anyway? There’s a river and a lake nearby.”
Charitybelle’s eyes widened while she spoke. “When you and Yula took the canoe, I talked to Mara about training her pups to swim.”
“Don’t otters naturally know how to swim?”
Charitybelle jumped up and down excitedly. “No! That’s the crazy thing! Mara grabs them by the scruff of their neck and drags them into the water. Can you imagine how that would look?”
“And why would they do that in a fountain instead of a more natural environment?”
Charitybelle’s forehead furrowed with worry. “That’s the thing. Nearby riverbanks and lakeshores are too steep. They have to travel to shallow waters, down south—and that’s dangerous territory because it belongs to other otters. Plus, with the pups unable to swim, they’re vulnerable to land predators. If we built a fountain with shallow pools, otters could train here in Hawkhurst without risking their families. It would be so cute to watch them.”
Her pleading expression melted my arguments against dreams of otter fountains. I hadn’t the heart to point out that such exotic constructions lay years away from our settlement’s capabilities. We needed to focus on our survival first.
Besides, news of new dungeons piqued my interest more than cutting down the otters’ wander radius. My natural competitiveness made me want to reach the dungeon before other players. Besides, progress on our defenses became an excuse for Charitybelle to leave Hawkhurst.
I hugged my girlfriend to reassure her we’d do everything possible to help her furry friends. At the same time, Fabulosa and I exchanged glances about the possibilities of exploring the wonders of Arlington.
The Underworks held something for us all. Fabulosa would want to plunder it for lost treasure. Charitybelle, the daughter of a civil engineer, would no doubt marvel at the low-tech hydropower. And with all my gold, visiting the hub for magic meant a proper spending spree in a magic shop.
Driving pointy spikes into the moat put the finishing touches on the motte and bailey. We’d been saving tree limbs as byproducts from two months of logging, knowing that the project required defensive spikes. With such an ambitious project completed, we turned our attention toward smaller ventures.
We planned to put Forren’s idol inside the bailey. Altars counted as minor structures—movable if necessary. Even a stone altar only took hours to create.
Charitybelle and Greenie already had an approved altar blueprint, which used wooden piles driven into the ground instead of masonry for its foundation.
If Ally ever finished her hearth mother idol, we could plug it into the altar and see if the goddess’s bonuses suited us. We would probably settle for anything beneficial. After hearing Ally hammer away at the idol for weeks, it would be cruel to reject Forren’s blessings. Besides, it wasn’t as if other deities vied for our patronage.
I queued the pile-driven town hall blueprint to begin directly after the altar. It would take months to quarry the stone and lumber but only a few days to build. A town hall unlocked tier-two structures and provided a free battle college.
With the motte and bailey coming together, I felt better about leaving Hawkhurst for a day or two. The kobold map gnawed at my curiosity. Even though Otter Lake’s coastline served as the only recognizable feature, I studied the map like a puzzle.
Charitybelle sympathized with my fixation—she, too, couldn’t resist mysteries. Convincing her to go on a short expedition proved more manageable with the prospect of finding another source of stone. Her fruitless efforts to build a town hall without masonry and inability to unlock blueprints made her presence at camp unnecessary.
The map’s circled area fell inside kobold territory, about ten miles south of where we’d fought the talax rams. I hoped our legs would be in shape for climbing because I remembered the region to be hilly.
When we finally left to investigate the enigma, I requisitioned the Dark Room from our newcomers—who’d been using it since their arrival. Hugo, Olive, Fortune, and Mrs. Berling took our bunks in the crowded roundhouse. Oscar and Glenn slept downstairs in the common area. The thought of Rocky waking them while preparing for breakfast made me smile. Welcome to the outdoors, gentlemen.
Fabulosa, Charitybelle, and I piled into a canoe after breakfast. We had so much walking ahead that the canoe seemed a novel way to start the journey. It also gave my allies a chance to get a peek at Flatrock Island.
Charitybelle remained quiet on the way to the island, preoccupied with worries over the camp’s well-being. Ally had settlement powers if anything went awry, and Yula, who showed no interest in kobolds, could keep Hawkhurst safe for a day or two.
When we arrived at the small island, Fabulosa exited the canoe and wandered around. She returned quickly, waving her hand at flies in the air, declaring it a bird poop sanctuary too stinky to be a quarry. Her excursion concurred with my assessment—Flatrock offered us nothing.
We paddled west until hitting the lake’s most northwestern shore. We pulled the canoe ashore and hid it behind some bushes. I considered casting Compression Sphere to splash away our muddy footprints, but the noise would only attract attention. We had to hope the kobolds wouldn’t find our boat.