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Tarjun stays silent for a moment. For all his grievances against Oakstead, he'd never consider that, one day, it might disappear. He wasn't too sure how to feel about that. What would his parents become, if they ended up alone in their house?
"Maybe we could attract more people to live there, then," he suggests. "Make something more attractive at the town! Like..." he gives it some thought. It doesn't come easily. "I dunno... a market... or something?"
Jewel smiles at Clara when she mentions "everyone" moving here. "I wouldn't want any of them that we met moving here anyway. Most of them were evil, or just looked the other way when we needed help and asked for it. And when we headed toward the ships anybody could have told us they were pirates!"
"Whenever anybody here needs help, everyone is interested and wants to know what they can do to help. Who wouldn't want to live in a community where everyone is nice." She looks over at Clara and starts to open her mouth to say more, but stops herself.
She puts a hand on Tarjun's arm and shakes her head. "We don't need to attract people. Dwayne and the younger lumberjacks travel back and forth to the city to sell the lumber. Sometimes one or another leaves and doesn't come back, but new ones come. So people are seeing our town. Word will get out and maybe a new family or two will come. Then we'll need to build new homes and other buildings for them. Who knows? We might double, or even more in a few years."
"As long as we two don't flutter our eyes at one of the lumberjacks, none of them will settle here." Clara states matter of factly.
"Well, maybe if a lumberjane comes..." she adds.
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"As long as we two don't flutter our eyes at one of the lumberjacks, none of them will settle here." Clara states matter of factly.
"Well, maybe if a lumberjane comes..." she adds.
"Speak for yourself," Tarjun shakes his head - refusing all solidarity.
"I don't think the lumberjacks will ever settle there. It's the woods they want, they don't care 'bout the houses." He gives it some thought. "Now, if we could find people who'd want to protect the woods from the lumberjacks... Help us be Guardians... Maybe they'd stay... 'Cause that can't be done in two months and then bye-bye nice-to-have-met-you."
"Flutter our eyes? Clara! Those guys are Gross! I think Dwayne hires the ugly ones so he won't be in trouble with our parents. Can you imagine what your mother would say if you got obsessed with one of them? She'd pin him to a tree with arrows and have Paddington rip his guts out."
She rolls her eyes at the 'lumberjane' comment. "I think Dwayne might set up a home here if he ever found a woman that could stand him. But we don't need to declare war on them. The woods don't need to be 'protected'. The land just needs to be re-planted, like we've been doing. And haven't you noticed that Dwayne is in favor of that? He's actually helping with the planting, and he was really worried while we were gone."
Jewel chuckles quietly at Tarjun's opinion of Dwayne. She feels slightly different, but she's worked with Dwayne for a while now and seen a more 'human' side of the man.
"Re-planting isn't to bring new people here. It's just to slow down the way they're destroying the edge of the forest, and maybe even reverse it. The new people will be ones that want to get away from the crowds of the city for a simpler life in a small town. It will be a slow growth..."
"We could go to the city, whack people over the head and drag them here." Clara suggests. "What has Erastil to say about building communities by force?"
"We could use magic instead of knocking them out though. Then they would come along on their own feet and wouldn't run away."
"Magic isn't permanent though. I've got a Charm hex, but I never use it on anybody that we'll be around for any length of time. Once it wears off, if the person realizes that you charmed him or her.... It can make them mad at you!"
"Whacking them over the head would probably make the really angry!"
"Isn't there magic that lasts long enough? And we need people who will find it nice here once they arrive. We use magic to tell them that this is the best that could happen to them, and once they are here and see it, they believe it."
After getting a bit overexited Clara realizes that this idea has the serious flaw, that it is Oaksteadt that they should be exited about and adds "We just need to find the right people who are into that." with a gesture towards the village as a whole.
"As for whacking, if they still have it in them to be angry at you, then you haven't whacked them hard enough."
Jewel considers Clara's statement and starts to giggle. The giggle grows to open laughter and she has trouble choking out what she's thinking. "Clara... Whacking.... We don't need.... more brain dead.... like the lumberjacks!"
She mimes pounding on someone or something with a stick or club. "Just whack him really hard, and take him to Dwayne!"
"But for now we're stuck here. Unless we throw more pebbles into the well..." Clara jokes.
But then she starts thinking. "Maybe if we think beforehand where we want to go before wishing, and tell out parents that we go on a wishing trip again, that they don't have to worry..."
Jewel stares at Clara, wondering if she's serious. "A wishing trip? And you think our parents would let it happen?"
"But where would we go? If we have to come back walking.... We don't want to go too far. Finding the original home of the Azlanti might be a bad choice. I wonder where that is?"
"The who?" Clara inquires. "Never heard of them."
Jewel thinks a moment when Clara asks. "I think I read the name. Some really old race from.... somewhere. Maybe your mother or Gran knows. But my point is that you wouldn't want to wish ourselves somewhere, or maybe even some when? and have no way back! What if they're on some island hundreds of miles across an ocean away! I don't think we'd be able to take over another pirate ship and sail back home. And I don't know if Erastil's spell would help me enough to sense a direction from that far away."
"Maybe we should just stay here until we grow up. Remember that we are supposed to be Erastil's Guardians...." There is an obvious look of concern on her face with that last sentence. Maybe because of the recently stated opinions of Erastil? Did they want to be the Guardians anymore?
"More like Erastil's Gardeners. You're protecting the village by planting trees. That is not exactly what I call exiting." Clara complains.
"I can get you some of that exitement. Just wait for it." Clara offers with a mischievuous grin.
The sun travels further on its way to the horizon and time for supper comes. Then all go to bed.
Once the night progressed enough to be sure everyone is asleep, Clara gets up and sneaks out of the house.
The night is very dark, but the trodden paths between the houses she could walk even without seeing. Getting into the house was another topic though. There were no locks, but simple bars blocking the doo ron the inside. Which would be hard to get at from the outside and even harder to remove without making noise.
But there was another way - the tiny openings on the gable to vent the loft. It would be hard to climb without a ladder, but magic solves this. Clara levitates up to the opening casts a light inside and squeezes in.
Inside she searches for the trap door and carefully opens it. Again no ladder needed, she simply glides down (featherfall).
From there she knows her way around and sneaks into the kids bedroom and into Tarjun's bed next to him. There she goes to sleep.
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Tarjun shifts in his sleep, but for a while, says nothing.
Hells, it even seems like he won't wake up at all - until he turns over, and his arm accidentally connect with Clara's elbow. He opens his eyes wide, and lets out a scream.
"WHAT THE HECK ARE YOU DOING HERE?" he loudly exclaims, realising a bit too late that he should really try to keep his voice down.
Jewel was quiet for the end of the conversation. She hid it, but she was troubled. When she lay down she had trouble going to sleep. She had quietly prayed to Erastil but didn't want to state her concern where Tarjun or her parents might hear her. Laying in her bed she mentally 'thinks' her concerns, sort of like a prayer to Erastil. "I said 'Remember that we are supposed to be Erastil's Guardians'..... But, really, am I the only one that still WANTS to be your Guardian? Why? I understand Clara. Her family doesn't follow your structure and way. But Tarjun? We've grown up together, and Dad taught us both. Erastil, Please help me understand."
She eventually falls into a deep sleep. She sleeps through whatever Clara is doing, but not through Tarjun's outburst.
"Tarjun!?! Shush! You'll wake everyone. What is? Oh. It's not the spider lady again, or the dwarves. Hi Clara? Decided on your excitement? I haven't heard the rooster yet so I assume the sun isn't up yet."
Clara grins her malicious grin and replies. "Now that we've slept together, we are married."
A moment later Will bursts into the room a stick in hand ready to beat up any intruder "What happened?" he calls out and quickly checks the room for any cause. As he realizes that Clara is in Tarjun's bed he looks confused.
"I know what is written in the book! When you sleep together, you are married! Jewel, tell him. You have read the book of Erastil."
Will's facial expression looks somewhat strange, with everything getting tense and his eye twitching, as he tries really hard to supress the laughter. He turns to the floor and calls With breaking voice "Shelly, come over, you have to see this." As he turns back to Tarjun, tears are running down his face.
"Sorry, son." is all he brings out, while shaking his head.
Shelly comes over to see a sleepy eyed Jewel, a panicking Tarjun, a smug Clara and her husband grimacing weirdly trying not to lose it.
"What's going on here? And what is Clara doing here at this time in your bed?"
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Tarjun's heart sinks when even his father seems to abandon him. A cold dread, and something close to panic begins to overwhelm him as he realises that he might be married.
Only one solution remained: a daring escape.
Reaching for his crutch, he stomps out of the room and past Shelly, yelling over his shoulder one last time: ""
As Tarjun is out of earshot Clara replies to Shelly's inquiry. "Nothing is going on here. Tarjun said yesterday that he is bored and that it is 'too bad you can't get excitement without fearing for your life, is all I'll say.'"
"So I gave him what he wished for." Clara replies with a shrug and a face of innocence.
"And even though no follower of Erastil comes forth to confirm it" she adds with a glare at Jewel "we slept together, so we are now married."
Shelly facepalms herself. "Tarjun, please come back. No one is married here."
"Will, you're having a talk with our kids about this topic of 'sleeping' and marriage."
"And I" she pauses to give Clara a stern look "will show Miss Johnson here the way home and have a talk with Gertrud."
Without further ado she grabs Clara's arm and drags her along out of the room, down the stairs and out of the house.
Jewel has to bite her tongue, hard, to keep from roaring with laughter, but then has to add..... "But Mom. You know Erastil and Jaidi require respect for marriage. If Clara is so determined to be married to Tarjun, maybe we should hold on before getting in their way!?!"
"And Tarjun? Why are you backing out now? You teased Clara with respect for her ways! Obviously you want her. And now that you've spent a night in your marriage bed?..." She has trouble finishing the sentence before a complete breakdown, collapsing back in her bed in mirth.
"Do I you know the difference between sleeping together and 'sleeping together' so we can skip this talk? Or do I have to explain it?" Will inquires from Jewel.
Shelly bangs her fist at the door of the Johnson house until someone opens. "Here take your kid. And explain to her that it is not ok to break into our house at night and into Tarjun's bed to force a marriage. Good night." With that she turns and leaves to get back into her own bed.
Gertrud looks at her kid and then watches Shelly leave.
Once Shelly is out of sight she scolds "Clara, it is not ok, to break into the Branston house at night and into Tarjun's bed to force a marriage."
"Now get inside and tell me what gave you that crazy idea."
Jewel watches Tarjun leave and chokes on her laughter. Hearing her Dad's question she struggles to her feet and works to get the grin off of her face. "Oh Dad. Come on. We live on a farm and around animals. Besides, remember that I can speak to animals. Besides, we're not old enough for that anyway. Clara's just doing her usual mischief. She said that she had an idea to make things more interesting. I guess that was it."
Seeing that they are alone Jewel sits down and looks at her Dad. "Dad. I'm worried. Or maybe I'm confused. About the whole Guardians of Erastil thing. I understand Clara. Her family is more focused on freedom, and not interested on Erastil. But Tarjun isn't interested in it anymore. I've tried to explain about Erastil, but.... I guess I'm just not good enough."
"Ah, Tarjun, you're back. You know, as long as you keep your boy parts in your pants and don't stick them into her girl parts, it is not that kind of 'sleeping together' that makes you instantly married."
"But I can understand that the prospect of having to share a bed and a house with a Johnson girl gave you the heebie-jeebies. Don't get me wrong, they are all nice. Usually. But occasionally you see it flare up in their eyes, when some unreasonably risky endeavour comes your way and everyone else would duck away. Or stand up for their family out of a sense of obligation. But for them it's fun."
"You know when your Mom calls me when there is a large spider somewhere in the house? Gertrud wouldn't call for Randolph if the spider was the size of a dog. And her mother probably wouldn't call anyone for a spider the size of a horse. It's a nice thing to have them on your side, if you meet a spider the size of a horse. But if you plan your life and you'd prefer it to be without horse sized spiders, you should look for a spouse somewhere else. Because eventually they'll get bored with the life of a farmer and search for more exiting things."
"And those exiting things will eventually kill you. Like it did with Clara's gandpa."
Will sighs. "And Tarjun, I heard you find life as a farmer boring too? Let me tell you, it isn't. There are life and death situations all the time. When the wheat is ripe but it rains all the time - you need to decide if you wait longer and risk it collapsing to the ground, or if you reap it and risk everything getting moldy. Then you'd starve in winter and the whole village with you."
"Or an accidental fire burns your fields, some bugs eat the plants. It's not as exiting as a horse sized spider, but the stakes are high anyway. You will be responsible for the well being of a whole village. Not alone, but it is an important part of what makes the community a good thing. And if waking in bed with - and the prospect of being married to - a Johnson girl makes you flee screaming, then you're not the adventuring type. You should read Erastil's book and see if you can't find your calling in there."
Jewel listens carefully to their Dad's words to Tarjun. He was so wise! She covers the grin on her face as she realizes that he is talking to her at least as much as to Tarjun. She didn't know as much about farming, and of course didn't "fully" understand about being married. So of course his words were so much more than she could have put together....
When he mentions reading Erastil's book she thinks about it. She'd read it through a couple of times.... But maybe if Tarjun wanted they could read it together? In the evening, with a Light spell they could take turns reading it aloud. Maybe? Her eyes practically glitter waiting for her brother's response.
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Tarjun is at first relieved to get some sort of explanation as to why people get married and how best he could avoid doing that, but then, as always with his father, the first few perfectly valid points turn into a moral lecture.
He listens through the speech morosely. At this point, he's pretty tired, and honestly just want to go back to a Clara-free bed to get some more sleep.
For a while, he sticks to just nodding along non-committally, preferring to just pretend to agree with everything so the whole thing can be done with faster. But then it gets too much. The jab at his reluctance to get married, the insistence that he should go back to study something he hated, and Jewel's grin - all of it just pile up and fills Tarjun with righteous indignation. It's probably the wrong move and will further delay his bed time, but he can't shup up.
"Why do you always think that the answer to every problem is in just one book?" he cries out. "One book I don't even like!"
"Look, thanks for the explanation on marriage, and all that. I don't wanna get married to Clara. I don't wanna get married to anyone when I grow up!"
"And I don't wanna become an adventurer - I mean, maybe, but I dunno. But at least I don't know what I wanna do -you're always so sure of what you want for me, and you never listen! It's all Oakstead this, Oakstead that, and it's like nothing ever exists outside Oakstead!"
"I know y'all like this place, and I kinda like it too, if I'm honest. It's home. I grew up there. It's nice."
"But I'm gonna be an adult one day, and I'm gonna have to find a job and a place to live and all that, and Gods, I really don't see myself becoming a farmer and praying to Erastil and all that. Is that really so hard to understand?!" His voice cracks. "Grandma Johnson left. She moved to a city. She's done some s%%+ as an adventurer. And yeah, having to find a way back to Oakstead after being teleported to the middle of nowhere was scary. I've been super scared out there for days. But if I just stuck to becoming a farmer, I'd be bored. That's worse!"
"I'm not saying it sucks and no one should do it. I'm saying I can't! I'll help you with it while I'm here. But I can't! Jewie would be way better at it than me, and you know it."
"You don't have to become a farmer. You don't have to stay in Oakstedt. It is far too small and too far away from the next town to learn something else here. Well, butcher or carpenter would work."
"And of course I suggest what I know best and like. But you don't know anything else but the life in a community according to Erastil. Johnson's have chosen the community life for now, and Dwayne doesn't care, but doesn't intervene in any way, because it works for him."
"If you want to go another path, read the books of other world views. See what they are about. And first and foremost, what goes right out of the window with those philosophies that you take as a given, because you don't know anything else."
"I would love to see you become happy following my footsteps. But if you chose something else, I still love you. The pirates had gladly made you into a slave to their cause. And Clara would gladly make you her personal slave/husband. Most people want you to be something. The question is why. Erastil is what I know and what I believe to be a good path to live a safe and happy life."
"And I'd be really happy if you find a way to be happy too in Erastil's ways. Not because I need you to follow Erastil. But I'd rather not have you try out random other ways, just to find they don't make you happy either, after living through all the downsides they come with."
"But I'm not a good guide about how to find happyness in other worldviews, because I haven't seen a lot of them in my life - with Oakstead and all that. I just know that there is more than one philosophy out there, where you try to gain at the expense of others. And I really believe that you can't find true happiness on those paths."