A Second Chance at Martyrdom

7 Tarsakh

Today was Guildsmeet, a day for each of the myriad guilds in the city to have their big meetings. Announcing new policies, discussion of future plans, that sort of thing. Reminds me of when Dad had his big union meetings in a way.

Not that that part was really relevant to us. Tulgor technically wasn’t actually in any guilds. There wasn’t a formal one for fishermen. It sort of surprised me when I learned about that months ago, considering how many other related guilds there already were. There was the Fishmonger’s Fellowship, the Guild of Watermen, the Master Mariners’ Guild, and the Order of Master Shipwrights.

Turns out that if you actually worked on the boats and weren’t a captain, you just didn’t get one. Maybe that was for the best though, the guilds weren’t unions. They were monopolies. You couldn’t operate in the city for long without either joining up with one or paying them for their services.

I have no idea what I’ll actually do to handle them, maybe use the lizardfolk as a proxy? I know there are some guilds related to the weaving of fabric, as well as the making of clothes. Then there’s probably a guild for apothecaries or poisoners in regard to any venom I could try harvesting. Who knows if there would be a guild to go through for things like harvesting the chitin of any of the larger species I might control?

Who would have thought the most evil thing I’d encountered so far in a world of wizards and dragons would be trading monopolies?

10 Tarsahk

Today is finally the end of Waukeentide, going out with what is less a holiday and more… a tax day? Leiruin, named after some event in which the goddess Leira was buried under a mountain of molten gold, is a day in which guilds charge their membership for their annual fees.

How those two things got associated is a bit dubious honestly, and I cannot fathom how it came about.

There’s also some amount of politicking in the background, higher-ups in the guilds meeting with various nobles or the government.

I ended up spending the day studying with Orsik as a way to keep myself busy. Jespa is starting to sort of go to a preschool nearby, while Pelsot and I have renewed our more regular lessons. I ended up just asking for some of the assignments and left to study with Orsik, with him vouching as a trusted tutor for me.

Which is interesting, since my understanding is that it is more reserved for the more wealthy children with more dedicated tutelage. The children of more wealthy shop owners or skilled tradesmen. Orsik is an oddity in that sense, as a trusted scholar in the local circles but not taking on students. I suppose that makes me something closer to an apprentice?

I’ve been learning more about guildlaw with Orsik though, a mutually novel topic for the two of us. He knew some information on the two he had interacted with the most. The Scriveners', Scribes', and Clerks' Guild as well as the Surveyors', Map-makers', and Chart-makers' Guild.

I, meanwhile, knew far more of them, but mostly only the ones associated with my father’s work on a boat.

As it turned out though, those tended to be some of the more… “moderate” guilds. Some of the others had a lot of internal conflicts pop up in the various books we could find, from fairly obvious sabotage to assassinations. They tended to react poorly to not at least brokering through them for the sale of material.

It’s likely that once I actually got any sort of weaving done on scale or venom harvesting done on scale, I’d have to actually gain membership at least by proxy. Less of a headache that way, even if it annoys me to basically pay into a protection racket.

13 Tarsakh

Today I finally got a chance to slip off to the Rat Hills to fulfil my promise to the lizardfolk. The weather had been fine the last few days, with barely any rainfall. I had made the attempt before, but an aborted attempt at trudging through the mud-filled road south dissuaded that idea after around ten minutes.

Having small legs sucks.

Today though was a success, in a variety of ways. I made contact with the lizardfolk at the hills quickly, the ones I had met in the city must have told the others about my capabilities. Some sort of giant trash-eating land crab waving at them got their attention after the second try.

After introductions, we got underway. I used what was around in the area to burrow and find anything that seemed like it could be of value, and then I had the lizardfolk help dig it up. It wasn’t a great success rate all things considered. I didn’t entirely know what to really look for as far as containers that might actually still have anything valuable, or had value themselves.

Now that I had the lizardfolk to help carry things, I wasn’t limited merely to lightweight trinkets. Valuable furniture likely thrown away by the nobility, worn-out tools that the lizardfolk could make use of, and so on. They figured they would take them into the city the next time they went to sell the pelts and bits from whatever they managed to hunt. That’s how they got money to trade with in the city.

There was even some level of danger to the day. Some sort of giant quadrupedal pale-skinned creature was disturbed by the digging at one point. It was massive, nearly as tall as the horses in the city, and thrice as wide. Its head was a massive japping mouth, and three spiked tentacles sprouted out of its back. Thankfully, the Rat Hills are full of all manner of insects, including venomous ones. The hide of the creature was thick, but covering it in a swarm of insects meant that my lizardfolk escort could put it down with their weapons.

They identified it as an Otyugh, some sort of common garbage eater. Certainly dangerous though, and really showed how correct I was last year about avoiding actually going into the hills proper like this.

I came home damp, after taking a quick dip into the ocean on the way back to try and purge the smell of the place. I’d have to remember to take some soap next time, as well as some extra clothes.

20 Tarsakh

Happy birthday to me. At least since I first came here. I guess I sort of have three now, don’t I?

I have a lot to think about. The day started so well too, I spent the noontime in the main market of the city. The variety of stalls was full of all sorts of goods, though today I was mostly interested in the street food. The flavours of this world were more hearty than I was used to, a less developed sugar production and spice farming industry likely the cause.

I drifted eastward after enjoying my fill, stopping a moment to listen to some sort of bardic street play. I thought I might cross the High Road to head towards the City of the Dead, with the weather as nice as it was, it made for a nice quiet place with comfortable benches to read. It was a massive idyllic park, the city putting effort to make the resting place for most of their dead a pleasant place to visit.

That trip was waylaid though, when I had that feeling again, the pull.

It was a familiar place. The Hospice of Saint Laupsenn. This must have been where that feeling before was trying to lead me when I ignored it. It was a dull presence in my mind, a tickle, like a bug flitting in and out of my old range. Noticed, but not attention grabbing.

So I went and relaxed there instead. They had some park bench memorials in a little fenced off courtyard area. I… went with the flow? I didn’t have a feeling of a demand while there, simply a wish for my presence. I read there for a few hours. An account of a party of adventurers that operated a little more than a century ago up near Neverwinter. Whether the contents were truthful was difficult to parse with the flowery language.

And then I left, feeling refreshed. The feeling abated.

Why?