Closed Scout Testing (Khara)

Azira demands that Khara go hunting with her

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The westernmost tip of Kalea, Wind Reach is home to an amazing group of people and their giant eagle mounts. [Lore]

Scout Testing (Khara)

Postby Azira on November 20th, 2014, 11:00 am

The scout was still moving around looking under bushes and so the huntress went back to her net weaving. She turned it around again so that the workable end of the rope was to her right again and began the same process all over again. Make a loop, tie it into the loop above, continue on. She'd only finished a row and was beginning on another when Khara appeared before her. The Chiet was done already?! The Avora's eyes dropped to the net that she was making and flew back up to the girl. She wasn't even halfway down yet and the girl was done ahead of her. She didn't know what she was supposed to do now. She needed to finish but what was she supposed to tell Khara?

"Good I, uh... I'm not done. You'd better sit, this could take awhile," she sighed, going back to her work. She tried to move faster now, her fingers fumbling the knots that she had so much difficulty doing anyway. She didn't want to just have the Chiet sitting there and watching her. It was making her feel incredibly self-conscious and she didn't want to have her shoddy work examined while she was doing it. Her knots seemed clumsy, the loops were uneven and she was terribly slow. She tried to work steadily, to get into a rhythm so that it might go faster.

The huntress worked in silence, a crease between her brows and an intense stare as she knotted each new loop into place. When she came to the end up the row she turned it around again. Half a foot in length now but she'd need a few feet in total. Khara was going to be in for a long wait although maybe it'd interest her to see Azira at work. Still they couldn't keep up the silence for the whole time that she was net weaving or she was sure that one or the other, or quite possibly both of them, would go mad. Khara from having to stay quiet without anything to do (maybe) and the Avora from being hyper aware of the attention her work was receiving. Make the girl talk and she could tune her out a bit as she yammered away. No way the Chiet could focus as much on what Azira was doing if she could be set talking.

"You said that you found four burrows. That's good," she commented at last, still knotting away on her net. Another row done and it was twisted round again. "How were they looking? Where did you find them exactly and do you think that they'll fit our purposes? Not blocked? Enough room in one for a fire to be set? I've done the fire setting before and it does a good job of flushing them out. I'll need other burrows found nearby and blocked though because I need the escape routes to be limited. Can't tell you if all the ones you might find are connected though. Guess you'll just have to assume they are and do the best that you can. Find them but don't block them yet. We'll block them once we've trapped three just in case they run."

A dismissive gesture was made the huntress glad that she'd done one better than she'd intended by finding a task to occupy the girl a while longer. She had no idea that would buy her by the time she'd reported on what she'd found so far and set about her new task. Azira could only continue to work with that crease between her brows and her fingers feeling too large and cumbersome as they worked on each sheet bend knot.
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Scout Testing (Khara)

Postby Khara on November 22nd, 2014, 1:35 am

Khara had fully expected Azira to be done, the image in her mind complete with arms crossed across the huntress' chest and a toe being tapped in annoyance for being made to wait. When the exact opposite had proven to be true it was more relief than anything else, though the offer to sit instead of immediately be given more tasks to pass the time was a little unexpected.

She lowered herself to the ground cautiously. It wasn't like she knew Azira to say things she didn't mean, but the Chiet never had been very good on picking up on thinly veiled sarcasm, either. When she wasn't immediately told off, she let herself relax a bit and tried not to stare at what the Avora was doing. The concept of creating a net from a single length of rope was entirely foreign to her, and it was fascinating to watch the loops be created and knotted, the lack of explanation and commentary made it near impossible to follow along and understand what she was witnessing. As slow as the motions were, Khara figured they were done far more out of care and difficulty rather than any sort of lack of familiarity of the process on Azira's part. Just when the game scout believed she might have started to get a handle on exactly what was going on, even if the silence was unbearable, the huntress spoke up and dashed all comprehension of how the net was coming together entirely out of Khara's mind.

The series of questions were fired out in rapid order, surprising the Chiet a little. She never thought that her being quiet would mean that Azira would seem to try and make up for it. Not that she was, but a rather guilty part of her couldn't help but find a tiny bit of amusement from the thought. It was crushed back down as Khara thought over all that had been asked.

"They all looked fairly active, mostly under or near the thorny shrubs over there," Khara paused, shifting how she sat to look toward and to point in the direction of where she had been earlier, a small moment waited before she turned back towards the Avora. "There are probably others, but the few I came across should be good for the snare and the nets, I think. One of them had a good line of sight to it too from various angles. I found one that might work more for a fire, it wasn't as covered but there still may need to be a bit of clearing done. I found a few disused ones as well, I can make sure to prep those to be blocked up too. Just because the rabbits aren't using them currently doesn't mean they won't if they become desperate. I'll see about finding others that need to be blocked as well and keep an eye out for one that may work better for the fire.”

Partway through the report Khara had gotten to her feet, ready to head out as soon as she was finished speaking to avoid the urge to say more. A tick was taken to see if the huntress had any additional comments, but she seemed intent on finishing the net and so the Chiet hurried off back towards where the burrows were located.

At first she returned to the one she thought might work for the fire, another look over it didn't entirely convince her it wouldn't work, but it was far from ideal. It did seem like it might be better for a trap than one of the others had been, though. Settling on going with what she had told the huntress, the girl returned to each of the burrows she had ruled out, collecting rocks and other large debris as she went and deposited the materials near each one in turn. With what she had already discovered reassessed and set up, Khara set out to find more burrows.

She knew that around the bushes were bound to be more, but other areas nearby could possibly be linked underground as well. Not to mention the fact she wouldn't have to clear as much around the burrow for the fire to be viable. As she walked towards a small cluster of young trees Khara couldn't help but wonder if the very fact she was just walking was sending vibrations through the possible tunnels underground, alerting the rabbits to the fact the Inarta teens were there. No matter, Azira had said that she'd use the technique with the fire before and that was more than enough to leave the concern of the rabbits being stubborn far behind her.

The first disheartening thing that Khara noticed was that the ground near the trees looked undisturbed for the most part, no rough patches where rabbits had dug at the dirt, no freshly unturned earth to signify where a burrow was placed. The trees themselves were examined once she was close enough, they too were lacking in chew marks or other bark damage that would show the rabbits were about. It was frustrating, the bushes seemed so close, closer than those other trees she had first come across. There must have been something she was missing, but Khara couldn't even begin to guess as what it was.

Her steps were traced back to the active looking burrows and she picked back up on the signs of the rabbits' activity. Khara began slowly walking away from the bushes, keeping her eyes open mostly for the small scat of the creatures as the fairly light-footed animals didn't seem to leave a lot in the way of prints for her to follow, at least none that she could see easily. Shame there's no snow yet, she mused, amused that it was probably the first time she had actually wished for an early cold snap. At best were small scuffs in the earth where an animal had made a move suddenly, but they were few and far between and there wasn't much in the way of undergrowth to make any of their runs easily seen, either.

As the droppings became scarcer, Khara looked up and back towards the bushes. She wasn't exactly very close to them anymore and the possibilities of connected burrows this far out seemed unlikely to her. Fine, she thought dejectedly. Stick to your petching thorns, then. The scout let out an annoyed breath before heading back to see about what other active burrows she could find among the shrubs.


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Scout Testing (Khara)

Postby Azira on November 22nd, 2014, 8:38 pm

This time when the Chiet was given permission to speak she didn't stutter over her words. Azira was glad. She didn't want the girl almost choking on things that needed to be said. If the girl choked in an important situation then it could mean their ruin. She didn't have the patience for such stuttering either but was aside from the point.

Her gaze flickered up to the bushes that Khara indicated, her fingers stilling for a few ticks as her attention was drawn away before she resumed her work. One knot, two knots... The scout's report was a good one. She'd clearly done all the checking that Azira had asked her too, even going so far as to check whether they were recently used or not. The huntress knew how to check for recent activity herself so at least she knew if she'd been here alone she wouldn't have been stumped. She wasn't completely reliant on Khara's tracking skills. The Avora had a fair idea how to recognise rabbit droppings at this stage and so could spot them around the holes. Scratchings were a good sign too.

The scout was off again as soon as her report was finished and by that time another few knots had been tied off. Another row done. The net was nearly a foot long now and she was hoping that it'd be completed soon. It'd seem ridiculous if she couldn't complete her net by the time Khara came back and she doubted that she could really be occupied for all that much longer. If that couldn't act as enough encouragement then she had no idea how she was going to keep this up rather than flinging the bundle of rope away from her. She was just going to have to allow her stubbornness and pride to take over and be useful for once.

Turning the foundation stick again, she began another row. The rope was fed through the loop above, the complicated twists of the knot made and tightened before she repeated the process on another loop and another until she'd come to the end of the row. All of her concentration was given over to the net making, the girl not bothering to look up to see what Khara was doing. The Chiet would return whenever she returned and in the meantime Azira was going to get as much of this done as possible. She was going faster now than she had been when she'd begun, partly because she'd established a rhythm and partly because she'd realised it was easier to tighten the sheet bend knot properly if she held her thumb beneath it. It stopped her from tightening the final loop below the knot as opposed to around it, which was what she was supposed to be doing.

A simple four count spurred her onwards, allowing her to work in a steady rhythm that helped her to work consistently rather than stumbling. Her fingers seemed to be working more on automatic although she still watched their movements intently to ensure that they did what they were supposed to be doing. Row followed row until she had over two feet and took a break. The net was set to one side as stiffened limbs were forced to work once more as the girl stood. Areas pushed against the ground had gone numb but burst into new painful life as the blood started flowing properly again. A few ticks of time were allowed to get over the new sensations before her net was picked up and examined at full stretch.

It was a square that was quickly becoming a rectangle as the side she'd been working on became longer than the width. It might have been a little narrow but she hoped to make up for any shortcomings in length. It still needed a fair amount of work done to it so she sat back down and began anew. Her eyes raised briefly to catch sight of Khara returning to the bushes that she'd pointed out to Azira. She had no idea where the girl was coming back from but it wasn't any of her concern right now. She had every intention of having the net completely finished by the time the scout came back to her.
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Scout Testing (Khara)

Postby Khara on November 23rd, 2014, 9:13 pm

Now that she knew what she was looking for, finding the extra burrow entrances became easier. There did, however, seem to be far more ones that appeared to be unused than anything else, but the Chiet still took note and quickly gathered a few sticks and rocks to place near each one to block them up. She hadn't entirely given up on the idea of finding a more suitable entrance for the fire, but it began to seem like her options were quickly becoming limited. More and more it seemed that the rabbits had chosen to make their entrances as difficult to access by anything not cony-sized, placing them under the bushes with just enough space cleared out that the creatures themselves wouldn't get snagged on brambles as they darted in and out.

Khara couldn't help but wish they could use something else to flush the animals out, maybe water? It was a silly thing to think though. Although she could hear a stream nearby the work it would take to try and divert water into the burrows would probably be quite obscene and hardly worth it and it wasn't like either of the teens could just magically create water from nothing. Not to mention the fact that drowning the rabbits didn't exactly sound like the best method for... well... anything.

Khara pushed the thoughts and images of bloated dead rabbits out of her mind as she continued to ready each burrow she found to be blocked up whether she thought it was active or not. When a quick sweep back down the line of bushes didn't show anything new she returned to where she had begun to clear the burrow that had been created between a patch of the shrubs rather than under it. She still wasn't convinced it was best for a fire, but it was going to have to make do. All that was left now was to try and make it more suitable.

The hunting knife quickly found its way into her hand again as she began setting about cutting away the smaller branches from around the burrow. It had sounded like they would only be making a small fire, after all, the memory of Azira mentioning green wood and want it to smoke were kept in mind as the Chiet broke off and sawed through as much of the plant life immediately around the entrance as she thought would be sufficient.

Khara took a step back to try and get a better look at the clearing she'd done so far. The space certainly looked a lot better, far more open. The dirt from where the rabbits had dug the entrance actually could be useful as well, perhaps it could be pushed up around where they would built the fire to help contain it a bit. Just to be on the safe side, the girl took a bit of time to gather up some more small stones that maybe could be used as well. After all, she didn't imagine that there would be all that much difference between the fire that Azira was going to start at the entrance and that you would normally make if you were making one at a camp site.

With everything in place as best as Khara could figure it needed to be she headed back towards where the huntress was finishing the net. Hopefully the Chiet had readied everything that needed to be, if not, then no doubt she would find out rather quickly with some quick words from the Avora.


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Scout Testing (Khara)

Postby Azira on November 25th, 2014, 8:23 pm

It took time to reestablish the rhythm of the work she was doing but it came to her a bit faster this time, the huntress once more devoting all of her concentration to the repetition of the same task. Make a loop, knot it in place, make another loop, knot it in place, and on and on until she reached the end of one row and began on the next. The work was becoming easier as well as the amount of rope on the working end reduced as it became caught up in the net. It gradually became less and less fiddly until she came to an end of her work.

The girl stood, examining the length of her net and declaring it done as she measured it against her own body. The foundation stick placed at bust height left a net dangling down as far as her toes. It was definitely long enough for its purpose now and most importantly it was finished. She'd completed it before the Chiet had a chance to return from the tasks that had been set for her. If the work had lingered on any longer than she would only have embarrassed herself but to have it done gave her a feeling of complete satisfaction. She'd also admit to feeling a little superior. The scout hadn't carried out as complex a task as her own and yet Azira had managed it and before the other was really finished with her own work.

The rope that was left over was sliced off at a point that left a few inches of loose rope dangling from the completed net. This loose end that was in one corner of her finished work was knotted simply, the huntress forming a loop and passing the end through it before tightening it. The simple knot was completed again, the double knot hopefully holding the whole structure in place without danger of it unravelling. There was no reason for the whole thing to unravel anyway; she'd knotted it often enough already.

Once the end of the net had been tied off, the girl worked it off of her foundation stick with care. The starting knot that had been made around it was tightened further once it was loose of the wood. When she was content that it wouldn't come free, the other net and the animal snare were collected from where she'd left them on the ground and carried over to the bushes that Khara had working at. She passed the girl who was halfway in the process of returning and offered her a self-satisfied smile.

"The net's all done. We can get down to proper work now." The materials in her arms were placed beside the bushes and a quick survey of the area was taken. The area around a burrow had been cleared, the wood gathered together with some stones that were apparently to be used in the making of a fire. There were no sign of any dry materials though and the huntress found herself frowning. Had the girl not remembered the fire instructions that she'd given her earlier? Well earlier had been quite a while ago at this stage and so the girl wasn't fully to blame for forgetting something considering the time that had elapsed since the first set of orders had been given.

"This one you've cleared, is it where you think the fire should go?" she asked, pointing to it. "And the other burrows, the ones that you think are good for putting the traps at, where are they?" She needed to know where she should set everything as soon as possible. The sooner the traps could be set and the other escape routes blocked, the sooner they could bag themselves some rabbits to bring home. She was hoping for some fat ones. The creatures should have gotten themselves well fattened up for now and the more meat that was on them the better for Wind Reach.
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Scout Testing (Khara)

Postby Khara on November 26th, 2014, 4:46 am

Oh, petch. Khara was immediately glad the thought hadn't actually come out of her. She had seen the way that Azira had looked at the one burrow she had been clearing in distaste. Whatever fears the scout had about her selection were instantly reinforced as the huntress asked her question, Is it where you think the fire should go?

The girl had tried to pick the best one with the direction she had been given, but Khara was all too aware of the fact she was a complete novice when it came to these things. The little bit of prep work she had done was probably laughable and as her eyes followed where it was pointed out Khara fully expected an instant pointing out of everything that was wrong with it. Her back tensed and she instantly began trying to figure out if the others she had found would be more suitable but they just didn't seem right either!

No sooner had she thought of the other burrows than Azira made mention of them as well. Which, thankfully, meant the berating on her choice for the fire was held back for the moment. It didn't leave much in the way for trying to explain herself, though. Own your mistakes and learn from them. Where had that come from? Certainly not her own creation, the thought had sprouted from the depths of her memory; some archaic piece of advice she must have heard somewhere. But where? No matter, it was right, after all.

An uncomfortable swallow was taken before the Chiet nodded her head at the first question. "I think it's the best I found that will work for that, so... Yes."

No matter how much she had wanted to sound confident, Khara knew it came out sounding entirely unsure. It bothered her to no end but at least she felt quite a bit better about the other burrows. The only regret there was that she hadn't yet managed to get a hold of any of the fabric strips she was planning on buying in the near future. True, it wasn't exactly their purpose but no doubt they could have been useful to better mark the exact location of the more hidden entrances under the bushes.

"The other three," Khara began after taking a breath to steady her voice and at least sound like she mostly knew what she was talking about. Her arm raised and pointed to each in turn as she spoke of them. "Are there, there, and the last one is mostly under the brambles there."

Her mind instantly brought up two others that she had found but had been planning on blocking up. A little harder to access, maybe, but if the huntress wasn't pleased with her original findings... "There's others as well that may be suitable, but I think those are the best three."


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Scout Testing (Khara)

Postby Azira on November 27th, 2014, 5:14 pm

A flicker of worry in the scout's gaze - did she have to doubt herself in everything? - before the answer finally came. The burrow Azira was looking at was indeed the one that Khara had intended for the fire. It looked fine to the huntress so she didn't know why the other looked so worried. Was she expecting her to bite her head off if she'd chosen the wrong one? Was there such a thing as a wrong one? The Chiet was a game scout not a hunter or a trapper or anything else. The only real job that she knew how to do was track so it wasn't like the Avora expected her to be all knowing. She wasn't all knowing herself.

"I was only asking, it looks fine. I can either build the fire in the hole or waft the smoke down into it regardless of where it goes." The other three suitable entrances were pointed out to her and after making note of the location of each she went to check them. One allowed her to put the snare down the hole, which was what she needed to make sure that the rabbit didn't swerve around it. It'd be a bit of a tight squeeze but she thought that she could manage it, maybe even dig the hole out a bit more once the other entrances were blocked. The other two afforded her room to place her nets, which the rabbits would hit on the way out and get tangled in hopefully.

Her assessment complete she returned to the scout and her traps and gave the girl some final orders. "Block any other entrances you found, harder material that can't be pushed out of the way easily would be best. Stones, maybe some earth, some twigs, whatever you can find. If you find anything that I can use for kindling, anything dry then that'd be good. Their fur catches on brambles and things sometimes so that'd work or dry leaves, dry grass and that. I'm going to go set some traps." As if to make the meaning of her words more clearly, the traps were gathered in her arms and raised a little for Khara's inspection before she carried them away to her new working sites.

The first worked best for the snare and so she left it beside it, vowing to come back to it when Khara had had a chance to get some of the blocking done. She moved onto the ones that she was going to stick her nets over instead. Her first net was folded almost in half, one part longer than the other. The longer part was placed over the hole so that its narrowest point stretched over it and positioned the shorter part just before the opening. The net was doubled over itself now and when it was held in place would form a small pocket to trap a rabbit or two in.

Cutting sticks from the surrounding bush with her knife, she began to secure the net in place around the burrow entrance. Each stake was positioned so that there was one on each side of the rope and pushed in as far as it would go before she hammered it in place with the hilt of the blade, making sure to keep her hand out of harm's way. Once the net on the far side of the opening was secure she raised the top layer of netting so she wouldn't secure them together and hammered in stakes at an angle so that they'd be less likely to tangle in the netting above. Once the trickiest and most important sections were held firmly in place, she hammered stakes along the sides. Each stake was wiggled to make sure that it wouldn't dislodge easily and Azira gave the net a few tugs to be sure that there were no weak points. Gaps were looked for so that her prey wouldn't be able to slip out before she moved onto the next burrow.

The procedure was repeated at the new burrow occupying the huntress for a considerable amount of time. There was no point rushing things. Rushing things would lead to mistakes and mistakes weren't something that she could afford. A simple mistake like a poorly secured stake could lead to the loss of a rabbit. A rabbit could provide as much as four pounds of meat and that could provide a sizeable portion for as many as seven people depending on what way the meat was divided up. That was a lot and so she couldn't even afford the loss of one of the small creatures and she might well be able to get more than one in a net, which was bigger than the snare and so it was even more important that it didn't pull loose.

Once the nets were in place Azira returned to her small snare. Setting the trap she lowered it carefully into the hole. A little too snug of a fit, fishing it out with difficulty and setting the trap off in the process, she scraped some of the earth away from the hole's sides with her knife. Once it was enlarged enough that she could squeeze her hand in more easily but not enough of a gap for a rabbit to get out through - she hoped - the snare was set and returned into the opening.

She wiped her hands clean on her bryda and returned to the place where they were going to make the fire. During her trap setting she'd found a few tufts of soft rabbit fur and a handful of dry leaves but it wasn't much of a contribution. Hopefully Khara would have found some more material for them to work with.
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Scout Testing (Khara)

Postby Khara on November 29th, 2014, 9:39 pm

The fact Azira seemed entirely unfazed by her choices caused much of the worry that grabbed at her thoughts to be dropped. It was okay then. Well, at least good enough, and that was all that Khara really could ask for in that moment. With new instructions given the scout set off, letting the fact she hadn't apparently screwed up lessen her nervousness over the whole thing.

She was glad for the preparation she had done with each entrance. The stones she had gathered and placed near each helped to quicken the process of blocking them up. Whether the burrow looked to be in use or not, each got the same treatment. Rocks she had placed near the entrance were piled up and stacked atop one another, braced with small twigs she pushed into the soft dirt in front of and behind to create small walls.

Dirt followed, using the loose material the rabbits had pushed out when digging their burrows to fill back in and partially undo what the creatures had created in the first place. A rock with a flat edge was used to help with the process, pushing and patting down the soil until Khara felt it couldn't just be shoved out of the way by a panicked animal. As one last precaution she used her knife to cut away several pieces of the surrounding shrub and planted those into the ground as well, adding another barrier to each blockage.

As she moved from one burrow to the next, the scout tried to keep her eyes open for any dry material that Azira could use and had instructed her to gather. Khara wasn't finding too much in the way of tufts of fur, but small brittle leaves and grass that had given in to the past Summer's heat was plucked up easily enough. The small pile followed with her from each entrance as she blocked them in turn, growing in size but still far from unmanageable. By the time the last burrow was sealed up, she had a small armful of dead vegetation that almost wanted to fall apart if she held onto anything too tightly.

The small bundle was placed next to where Azira had begun preparing for the fire. It didn't seem that the huntress had gotten too far along with it so the Chiet couldn't help but hope it was because they had managed to arrive at that burrow almost at the same time rather than have left the Avora waiting on her... again. That hadn't been much of an issue so far today and Khara was determined to keep it so.

She hesitated a moment, considered the fact she wasn't supposed to speak, but she didn't want to mutely stand there and just wait either. Not if there was more work to be done. "Is there anything else you need me to do?"


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Scout Testing (Khara)

Postby Azira on December 7th, 2014, 9:48 pm

As she waited for Khara to return from burrow blocking and hopefully with materials they could burn, Azira began constructing the fire. She didn't have a lot to work with but she could at least lay out a stone barrier so that she had control over where the fire went. The scout had gathered some stones and the huntress placed these into the hole, lining them up carefully and twisting them into the ground so that they wouldn't roll into the burrow. The dirt around the entrance was gathered up onto one side where there was a bit of a breeze. Air was good for a fire but she didn't want it blowing out before she could even get it going. When it was properly alight and was smoking then she could fan it to direct it wherever she wanted.

Her meagre collection of tinder was placed in the centre of where her fire would be going, the rabbit fur placed on the bottom with the leaves on top. It was pitiful but it was all that she could manage for now. She started cutting a few more twigs to make sure that she had enough to arrange over her fire. As she was cutting away, the Chiet made an appearance carrying a pile of materials that she needed. It wasn't a large pile but compared to what Azira had gathered it seemed massive. Her hands were held out eagerly to receive it and she was quick to arrange it. The leaves and the fur tufts were packed into the centre, the grass kept by for now as she arranged the kindling twigs over it in a cone shape, using a stick stuck into the ground to hold it up in the middle. It took a few tries to get it to stay up without support but when it was up, she left a gap so she could still get at the tinder. The grass was separated into little bunches, most of these placed in and around the kindling to help it light and she was careful not to topple the whole structure.

"You can find something we can use as a fan and some thicker wood so that I can get this going properly. Then you can wait until I get this going properly," she told her companion as she took out her flint and steel. The largest nest of grass had been kept for this purpose. The steel was struck off the flint until she managed to get a spark, her strikes aimed in such a way to get the spark to land in the middle of her tinder nest. As soon as she saw the small red ember in the grass and burning through the material, she cupped her hands around it to protect it as she gathered grass over the little spark. She blew on it gently, small puffs of breath until the glow spread and grew. She brought it down close to the hole and when she had a sizable flame in the grass it was lowered down into it and pushed in amongst the rest of the tinder. The gentle blowing continued until the grass had fully caught and started to spread to the rest of the tinder. The gap was covered with twigs and then the huntress sat back on her haunches and waited.

The smoke began to curl out from the gaps between the twigs, an orange glow visible within that Azira waited to spread to the twigs. It'd take a few chimes but was content to sit and watch it until then. She had more twigs to put on it when it was necessary, which would be soon because those twigs wouldn't last long once the fire truly caught. It wouldn't be long before they'd need more substantial fuel and a fan. Once there was enough smoke coming off it, it could be wafted down into the rabbit tunnels and hopefully they'd come out into the traps that she had waiting for them.
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Scout Testing (Khara)

Postby Khara on December 13th, 2014, 12:54 am

With new instructions the Chiet was off in a flash to quickly see about filling the requirements. She tried to take into consideration the lessons she had learned as a Yasi, about how to properly start a fire in the wild and maintain it. Normally she would be looking for good dry material, branches that had fallen or been damaged at least a season ago if not more. But Azira had mentioned wanting more fresh fuel so that it would smoke more as well. Maybe a bit of both, then?

Khara set out, gathering what she could as she came across more robust debris. A small bundle began in the crook of her left arm again, but it seemed almost entirely unnecessary as there wasn't much to be found. What she wouldn't give to stumble across a branch like she had that they had managed to convert into a sled the last time they worked together. There was no such luck to be had, though, not this time around. Instead the Chiet was forced to give up her scouring of the ground and turned her attention towards the nearby trees. An unfavorable look was given to the blade as she once more readied her hunting knife. It wasn't meant for this sort of thing, not really. Perhaps it wouldn't be a bad idea to pick up a small hand axe at market day, it seemed like such a thing would come in handy more often than not.

Going was tough as Khara sawed through branches with a blade that wasn't intended for such a purpose. Each motion was taken with care, not wanting a repeat of the severe cut she had earned on her hand last Summer. Eventually she tripled the amount of wood she had collected and without hesitation returned to where Azira had already lit the fire and dropped off what she had gathered. Hopefully the ratio of green wood to dry wouldn't hamper things too much.

That left only something to fan the fire with. A simple large leaf wasn't going to work, that was for certain. They were at a higher altitude than they had been for the moose hunt, though. So, finding a fern to use didn't seem like it was going to work out, even if it sounded ideal in her head. Sadly Khara hadn't taken notice of any on their journey to the rabbit burrows in the first place and a glance around revealed much of the same absence.

The thought struck her to try and make something, but it seemed a waste of time. A bit of string would have been necessary for that as well - yet another item that Khara was going to have to try and remember to look into buying. For a tick she wondered if any other hunters or scouts often found themselves with so many seemingly random items in their pack.

In the end, Khara settled on the least bad of the other options roaming in her head. The hunting knife was once more used to cut out a section of one of the bushes and further used to strip away portions and thorns off of it to make for a better hand hold. She worked as she approached where the huntress and the fire were, finishing as much to her satisfaction as she could manage. A small flick of her wrist gave the remaining bundle of twigs and leaves a test against the air. The small breeze that followed her action wasn't much, but it would certainly make do. Rather than laying the fan down next to the huntress and have it be mistaken for further fuel for the fire, the Chiet stood off to the side dutifully holding on to it until it was asked for.


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