Out for a swim

[Quint Caravel]

70th of Autumn, 513 AV

A few days after arriving in Sunberth, Quint brooded on his narrow escape from the clutches of Laviku's realm (on the occasion of visiting his sister) and decided to do something about it.

First of all, he decided that from now on he would spend most of his life on land and avoiding the water. Best way not to drown, he figured would be to never get more wet than necessary to take a bath.

Secondly, he decided that from now on he would improve his ability to swim so that if by chance he ever did have occasion to set sail again, he would need not fear falling overboard.

And so, as Sunberth had a river that seemed to snake all over the place, Quint decided that the best place to practice swimming would be in waters deep enough to give him a decent workout but shallow enough so that he could always just stand up if something went horribly wrong.

Easier said than done as it took him a day or so to find such a place where he could swim in optimal conditions and not worry about being used as target practice in an archery contest or worry about being mugged the minute he stepped in or out of the water. This was Sunberth, after all. He had to use his minimal powers of observation just to avoid the most obvious dangers, such as having his clothes stolen or stepping on a fish-hook. He spent some time watching where the crowds went and he paid attention to what areas of the river were avoided out of fear and which were avoided because they weren't worth bothering with. He then picked one of the latter spots.

Once all that was taken care of, Quint found a spot of water that didn't cause all his teeth to chatter the moment he entered it, and he started splashing around and getting used to making waves. Rather literally. It would be several seasons before he could figuratively make any waves in this town, he imagined.

But he was a patient and easy going man, two qualities you needed to have if you wanted to get anywhere in a town like this. They were also good qualities if you didn't want to get anywhere and were content to be a bottom-level minion or thug. In fact, any way Quint looked at it he could see no flaws in his outlook.

Then he remembered his day-- and his terrible night-- in the ocean. The moment he almost drowned, and the certainty that he was about to die without ever having accomplished anything or improved himself in any way.

Well, he never wanted to feel that way again. Even if the improvements were incremental, he was determined to become more than he was. He was determined to improve himself and make a mark on Mizahar. He wanted to be a man who could make waves. A man who could snap his fingers and get things done. A man known in every city in Syliras, for better or for worse.

And if he was too patient, he would keep endlessly procrastinating and dilly-dallying, waiting for a perfect moment that never came. There was never a good or a bad day, there was just today. And today he had penciled in time to go swimming.

Which he now did, splishing and splashing, jerking his arms and legs all around. He was in point of fact an absolutely terrible swimmer with no sense of rhythm or efficiency of movement. He rather looked like a little boy doing the dog paddle after having just been thrown into the water. But he stayed in the water for as many bells and chimes as his muscles could handle without cramping.

And, truth be told, he rather enjoyed it. Being half-Svefra, he found being in the water a serene and calming experience. He would never be a religious man-- or at least not a pious one, but he felt a moment of genuine gratitude and expressed it sincerely, as best as he was able to do so. "Huh. This is kind of nice. Laviku, you're not my guy and I'm not yours, but today, today I respect what you're on about. Thanks for the pleasant swim. Next time I see my sister I'll help her with her offering to you. You've kept an eye on her when I'm not around, and that's a more of a boon than I could ever ask for."

[Quint Caravel]

While he swam, Quint looked around. In his opinion, it was a beautiful day. He felt a twinge of sadness that he really wasn't able to enjoy it as much as he might have otherwise liked, but this had been one strange autumn season. Especially in Sunberth. As someone who had himself spent a few years in the Suvan Sea, he was used to being around water; he had dealt with floods and with rivers that had overwhelmed their banks for a good part of his life. But the poor people of Sunberth were mostly of the sort who spent all their time on land, and the seasonal flooding had proven both costly and deadly.

Sunberth prided itself on its lawless state where every man could declare himself king of a one-man kingdom beholden to none and where rival gangs fought for position and power. This was probably the best way to govern a city during summertime when most people were in the mood to simply relax and enjoy themselves. Summer was for the most part a season of flirting and fun, dancing and drinking. People wore the least amount of clothes and shed as many inhibitions as items of clothes. In a situation like that, a talking Pycon could rule Sunberth with limited problems.

But in the fall and in the winter, things happened. Snow and storms and rain and floods, and those were just natural disasters. Many fires were started to keep warm which went out of control, and some businesses lost themselves to arson. People who had not properly stockpiled food would fine themselves forced to eat out often and would then have to resort to robbery and burglary when the Mizas ran out. Children got sick in the winter, sometimes rather fatally so.

And without any sort of infrastructure, without any bureaucracy or authority, Sunberth had no one to deal with such problems. There was no one to organize fire fighters, or merchants, or constables, or healers.

As he dog-paddled along with the river currents, Quint sighed sadly, thinking of all the collateral damage caused by chaos. He himself hated Syliras because of the Knights and Squires and all the law and order, but he wasn't sure he was a fan of pure chaos either. He thought there should be some sort of middle ground, but he wasn't sure what that would be. Syliras and Sunberth were like two sides of the river. As a swimmer, he preferred being in the middle. As a man, he disliked extremes. And Sunberth was as extreme as you can get and was now paying the price.

Still, little to none of this was Quint's problem, and especially as he was an outsider in Sunberth, no one would care about any of his ideas or solutions, and if he did come up with something worth listening to, his idea would just be co-opted and stolen by the nearest gang leader or local crime lord.

Besides, he was probably wrong about Sunberth. It clearly functioned, albeit in its own way, so somehow some part of his theory was wrong. Because if he was right, then by now some functional if rudimentary system would be in place. A corrupt Mayor. A sheriff in the pocket of a gang. But something.

And as far as he could tell, the place was pure anarchy. And was now paying the price: homes had been flooded. Houses had been destroyed. Crime was up: there were many stories of people mugged this season. And lots of reports of items being lost.

Quint took a deep breath. Thinking about all this stuff had distracted him and he nearly got caught up in an undertow. Perhaps swimming in the river during a season of flooding had not been his most brilliant idea. He stood up, waded for shore, and went back to his shallow starting spot, deciding to sacrifice some exercise and experience for the sake of safety.

[Quint Caravel]

71st of Autumn, 513 AV

The next day Quint decided to do a bit more swimming. There would be little chance to do so once Winter arrived, and he knew that the fall season was almost over. Svefra had to be very attuned to the rise and fall of the moon and to the annual weather cycles, because such things affected the currents and winds and also how warm or cold the water was at any given time during the year. Quint himself was pretty terrible at all that sort of thing, but he had picked up on some rather general and obvious facts such as the fact that it was impossible to go swimming in a river that was frozen over, and that winter was the season when rivers sometimes froze over.

And while he had not yet been in Sunberth during a winter season-- at least not that he could currently recall-- he decided it was best to proceed with caution and assume the worst. From what he had seen of his interactions with the natives, such an attitude would be warmly welcomed here, where everyone always assumed the worst about themselves and each other. Well, it would be if these people were capable of giving out warm welcomes, which they clearly were not. His life had been in jeopardy several times since arriving here, and he had the feeling such would be his fortune in life for some time to come so long as he called Sunberth his home. Which was mostly the reason why he was now so keen to work on building up some physique and muscle, hence his recent spate of running and swimming.

"Speaking of running," he said to himself. "I should go for a brief run and warm myself up before I go swimming. Besides, it's only been a few chimes since I ate and I don't want to cramp myself."

And so he ran up and down the outer enbankments of the river, observing the landscape as he ran along. He kept an eye out for roots that might trip him, dips and pitfalls in the grass that might send him tumbling, and the presence of any man-made flotsam or garbage that might indicate he was trespassing where he wasn't supposed to. (He wasn't just worried about gangs and territories, though that was a thought he kept tucked safely in the forefront of his mind, but he didn't want to accidentally stumble on any romantic trysts or on anyone seeking a moment of solitude, for purposes either meditative or nefarious. He valued his time alone and always attempted to respect the boundaries and spaces of others.

As he ran he did stop on occasion to pick up certain twigs and branches.

Then he went swimming. He found a large tree where he could cache his stuff in the shadow between two large roots without any of it being seen and camouflaged his personal booty cache with the twigs and branches he had collected. His Uncle Pondar had taught him the rudiments of concealment at a boy and while he could not shield himself from a determined stalker or hunter, he felt this would do against the average run of the mill person.

"That should do. I've a long way to go before I can camouflage something the way Uncle Pondar once hid a stolen wagon in plain sight of the caravan Wagon Master, but this will do for the few trinkets I have that I don't want to get wet."

[Quint Caravel]

He paused for a moment to survey his work. Quint walked away from the tree, spotted something glinting, cursed his own incompetence, then went off to gather a few more twigs and then some grass for good measure. He went back to adjust the camouflage on his cache, then took another run around the tree a few times until he was satisfied. Then he ran around the general area and pretended to do something at the base of a few other trees, as he realized there was no point in having a concealed cache if he spent all his time loitering around it and guarding it; that is to say, he himself would give away its location by his own presence.

And so he picked two other trees at random and attempted to conceal a couple of copper Mizas at each location. This way if someone stumbled upon one, they would think this was the real tree.

"There, that should do it! Or my name isn't Quinton J. Caravel." He slapped his hands together over a little mound of twigs he had built under the mossy side of the tree. "Okay, that's good! Time for a swim."

Not one for speaking to himself at length-- lest he be seen as crazy-- he decided to wade into the water and sing an old Svefra sea-chanty about Laviku and a female Pycon who was a water elementalist. He splashed around a bit to keep himself warm, then started swimming in the shallows while singing pitifully. "There was a female Pycon, and Haiku was her name. Hey ho, Hiddley dee dee. Yow ho, fiddley dee dee. Svefras sail the seventeen seas and the Suva is the finest... Hey Ho Hiddley dee dee. Yo yo yo, fiddle dee dee!" He didn't remember the rest of the words, and absolutely could not keep a tune, he had never learned how to produce pleasing musical sounds with his voice and it could honestly be said that he had no knowledge of tonality or rhythm.

But he didn't care. He liked singing and was very enthusiastic about it. "Hey ho, widdle wee wee! Yo ho ho the something life for me! The little Pycon named .. something... sailed down to um.... Old.. uh Sunberth... Yo ho ho and a bottle of thundergrog, fiddle widdle widdle wee weeee!"

Quint relaxed a bit with his back against the edge of the riverbank, then dog-paddled around for a little while, splashing back and forth in a circle for many chimes. He was conscious of his lack of ability in the water and was thus willing to work on his form and technique slowly and in small increments. He knew eventually he would plateau out and have to find a more experience swimmer to give him some instruction, but that could wait for the spring. For now, winter was approaching so he was happy just dog-paddling along.

And he was happy. Once he got out, he bowed to the water, as a genuine token of respect to the Svefra traditions of his mother and sister. "Praise Laviku and whatever Alvina he has watching out for this river. It's been a good day."

One of his fake caches had been looted, but he wasn't sure if it was by a squirrel or a random passerby. Either way, he was glad that he had the foresight to do it as now he was only out a handful of coppers and not the stuff that mattered to him. He gathered his belongings, unsure if it was still there because he was good at what he did or if it was simply worthless, then went out and did some more running before calling it a day and going home.