John replied, “I understand you’re a one-man fishing operation named Dag. Your wife Marion sells your hauls everyday.” “Aye” said the fisherman, “what’s it to ye?”

John explained who he was and that he’d gotten a new idea to study insects. He had heard that different insects were better for catching different kinds of fish. The old man nodded and John continued “Might I ask where you get your bait?” “The dock boys” Dag said, referring to the youngsters that lived near the docks and made their livings fishing, trapping, and catching various types of bait and selling them to the different fishermen. John thanked him and headed out to wander the wharf and see if he could locate any dock boys. He found a bunch of them lounging in the shade of a wagon that was waiting to have its contents loaded to a ship.

“Hello boys, I’m John” he began.

“Hiiii Jooohn” the boys all said in unison, mockingly. John laughed.

“I hear you guys are good at finding bait for the fisherman, old Dag says you sell to him and the others.”

“What’s it to you?” the oldest boy asked.

“I need some bait, a lot of it of as many types of bugs as you can find. I’ll pay you handsomely for them, 1/10^th of a gold per bug.” The boys immediately sat up at attention. “You serious?” they asked. “Usually” smiled John, “I need them all alive, I’ll only pay for living ones.”

“Hah, just like the fishermen. Come back here in 3 days at dusk with a wagon, and bring money.” The oldest boy said. John nodded and left as the boys all ran off.

——

3 days later John arrived at the appointed time and place with the wagon. He and the driver inspected and counted the 50 large jars of still living insects. All the jars were half stuffed with various pieces of plant and other materials, John assumed as makeshift habitats for the bugs. “I count 237” said the driver “added to my 303” said John, and that’s 530 insects. John pulled a pouch from his belt and added 3 more coins to it from another pouch. “53 coins, as promised” John said, tossing the pouch to the oldest boy who smiled ear to ear. “You be sure to come back any time you need more bait” the boy said to John before the group of them ran off.

John smiled to himself and said “Let’s go back to my workshop.”, the driver nodded and off they went.

——

Over the next several weeks John busied himself with the insects; experimenting with different notes on different instruments, dragging different materials across other materials, observing and recording how all the insects reacted to each sound, vibration, or intensity. Restocking his bug supplies by working with the dock boys.

Eventually John found his golden note. He had been experimenting with different sizes of dock whistles made of different materials. He found one that made no apparent sound he could hear, but every time air went through it, every single insect went crazy, smashing into the farthest sides of their jars as possible. “Yes!” John thought before heading to Ryan’s office.

——

At Ryan’s office his secretary said “Hi John, what’s up?” “Just here to see the man and show him something I’m working on, is he busy?” “he’s in a meeting, but I’ll ring the ‘John bell’ and let him know to wrap it up” “John bell?” John asked. “Yes,” she replied “He had a special bell made for when you come in wanting a meeting. He and his father realized that you only come here when you have something that will make them a ton of money, so you get priority.” And John laughed.

A few minutes later he was ushered into Ryan’s office. “Sorry for the wait John, how can you help me today?” Ryan said with a smile and John laughed again.

“I’m here about my latest project” John began, and explained how he was preparing to get ready to go on a trip to research about his past, when the notion of travelling through the swamps with the bugs got to him and so he put off his trip to address the issue.

“So you’re telling me, you created a whistle and repels every insect, but we can’t hear it?” Ryan asked raising an eyebrow, “I don’t suppose you brought it”.

“As a matter of fact” John said, pulling the small whistle from his pocket and a jar of a half dozen different insects from the other. He set the jar on Ryan’s desk and blew the whistle. The bugs went nuts trying to get away from him. “A whistle of this size only has a range of about 10 feet before it stops working, this will keep it from aggravating the apiary or any birds or other animals who might be impacted by it too seriously. Attach it to a wind tracking windmill design and it can be made to blow automatically when the wind does. Do you think there’s a market?” and Ryan burst into laughter.

“You just solved the bug problem for every city, healer’s temple, and caravan. I’ll bring news of this to my father at home this evening, and we’ll meet you with the lawyers to get it drawn all up in the morning. After we make a deal, you can give all your work and materials to the scholars we’ve hired from the university, and your prototypes and designs to the liaison from the tradesman’s guild to deal with the setting up of mass production.” Ryan was very excited. John thanked him and left.

That night he met with Ryan and the old man over dinner and they came to an agreement. “Standard contract then? A million gold, and a royalty? What would you like this time” the old man asked. “I think I’ll ask for 5 percent from the profits of every sale, as these are a ‘one and done’ sort of deal for everyone who buys them.” The old man laughed and said “Your canniness still surprises me, young John. But it’s a deal.” And the next morning the contracts were signed and John found himself a millionaire a second time with yet another regular source of income.

That night John sat in his workshop playing with one of his whistles and a hand pump, attaching them together with a hose, he found that squeezing the pump he could make the whistle repel the bugs. He attached the hand pump to the bottom of his travel staff prototype, ran the tube up the side to where he mounted the whistle to the top. Now every time he took a step with the staff, the bugs in his jars went crazy. John smiled.

——

After getting all his materials to the scholars, and explaining it to them, and then getting all his prototypes and designs to the trade guild liaison and helping them set up mass production, converting one of the smaller unused warehouses into a mini-factory, John was ready to get back to work on his staff and preparing for his journey.

——

As John sat and tinkered with his staff designs, he realized he really hated consumable things. Especially for the idea of travelling. He knew he’d need a portable light source, and while the glowing rocks he got from Petros were able to store the sun’s light all day and maintain a fairly bright glow for a decent length of time after sunset, they weren’t very good for radiant light, more for just making beacons. Torches, lanterns, and the like were the go-to source for portable lights at night. John wasn’t fond of having to carry around fuel for them, nor was he fond of their potential dangers.

He decided he needed some time to think, away from the city and reconnect with some old friends, so he jumped on the next caravan back to Greenhill. 3 weeks later he arrived to find Nathan, Hulda, Sven, David, Patrick, Petros, the glassblower, Sarah, and all 3 of his apprentices all waiting to welcome him home. They had a small party in David’s pub and John caught everyone up on his life since he’d first established that tidewalkers could be used for communication.

They informed him that one day the king’s soldiers came with some bankers and finance ministers to audit Lord Quezzel and found that he had been milking the town dry for years. He and his “town guard” thugs were all arrested. The guards were jailed, but the king had Quezzel executed as an example to the other lords.

The king had installed a new lord, Lord Glanburry, to manage the town and surrounding lands going forward, and now the people had functioning roads and a guard to protect them from bandits and to help during natural disasters like when the river flooded last year.

John smiled, quite pleased with himself. “So Patrick” he said “Tomorrow I’m going to head to your smithy, I have a project I’d like to discuss with you”. “Sure,” Patrick replied, “It’s really good having you home John, we all missed you.” And they all had a toast.

After the night was done, John walked back to his cottage, entering it for the first time in over a year. It looked like the apprentices used it regularly and kept it up. John collapsed happily on his bed and slept like a rock.

The next morning John met Patrick at the smithy “So what did you want to get into?” Patrick asked. “Well, I’ve been trying for months now to start a journey to try and finally discover who I am and about my past, but I keep running into obstacles, becoming obsessed with overcoming them, making a ton of money from my inventions and then finding the next problem.” “Tons of money eh? Sound really stressful” and they shared a laugh.

John continued, “I had just started to become obsessed with figuring out a better and safer way to make portable light sources at night, and decided I needed a break. Come home, meet my old friends, and simplify things.” “Makes sense. You want to start woodworking again to take your mind off things?”

“No,” John replied “I realized we don’t have a watch maker here in this town. You’re the closest thing to someone who works with metal. I’d like to take that up, and who knows, maybe it will give me some transferrable skills, or help jog my memory.”

“Okay” said Patrick, “What do you need from me?” “A space to work and materials and tools” John answered.

“I’d like to rent part of your shop, buy any materials I need from you, commission you to make any tools I find myself needing, or custom parts I can’t make myself. What say you?”

Patrick smiled “After everything you’ve done for all of us, brother, you got it. Let’s get to work!”

So Patrick and his apprentices helped John clear a space to work and set up a workbench. John spent a week drafting out tools he’d need made and parts he imagined he’d need but couldn’t yet build himself, just based on everything he’d seen and learn from the watchmakers in the city. He paid Patrick and his team well, and they got to work, furbishing him with everything he needed. And thus John began his career as an amateur watch maker.

As the weeks went by, with Patrick giving as much assistance and tutelage as possible, John became quite the mechanist. He learned more and more about mechanical engineering and how energy is transferred. Teaching himself about coils, springs, gear ratios, locks, and pins, it was great fun and he found he was quite proficient in it. Since money wasn’t an issue for him at all, he gave away the watches, clocks, and other knickknacks he made to the people of the town.

One day after giving wind up toys to a group of children, one of the boys untied the bracelet he was wearing. He handed the bracelet to John saying “This is because you’re always so kind, and because my Mom says you’re going on a trip someday.” The charm on the bracelet was a small lodestone compass. John was very touched and thanked the boy, putting the bracelet on immediately.

A few weeks passed and one night, working half in the dark because he’d gotten too distracted with what he was doing, John had just finished rolling a batch of copper wires into copper springs. He stood all the springs up on small clamps Patrick had made for him, pleased with himself. These were going to make some neat things. John hadn’t specifically decided what yet, but he figured they’d be neat.

As John reached across the springs to sweep some of the metal dust and particles into the bin at the end of the table, he noticed something. In the dim light of the room, whenever he would wave his hands passed the springs, he could see a faint blue glow from their tips. John waved his hands a few more times to make sure he wasn’t hallucinating, and then doused the lantern he’d been using the rest of the way. He waved his hands across the springs again and much more clearly in the dark, he saw sparking from the springs he’d made. “What is going on?” he marvelled.

——

The next day, he dragged Patrick into the smithy early “You’re never going to believe this” John said. “I believe I need coffee” Patrick replied “what is it?” John closed the shutters, sat Patrick at the work bench, doused the lanterns, and started waving across the springs. Patrick fell over backwards in the chair.

“SORCERY! JOHN YOU’RE A SORCERER!” Patrick exclaimed. “NO! No, no I’m not, I’ve never had a magical inclination in my life, that I can recall” John said “I think this is something else.”

Patrick met his apprentices at the door and told them to head home, they would get full pay for the day off, he and John were trying to figure something out and needed quiet. They shrugged and left.

John and Patrick spent the morning with John waving his hands above the springs, he noticed that Patrick couldn’t do it, and he couldn’t seem to do it with his right hand, only his left. And that’s when he realized it wasn’t him, it was the compass. When he’d wave the compass across the springs, they’d glow blue. The faster he did it, the brighter they glowed. He handed the compass to Patrick to try and had the same results.

“You see?” John asked, “It’s not magic, it’s something else, something about the compass. What’s this made of?”

Patrick looked at the compass “This is one of mine, it’s a lodestone compass. The loadstones themselves stick to anything with iron in it, and if you balance them with a counter weight or float them on a leaf in water, they always point north. That’s how a compass works.”

Fascinated, John asked “Do you have a bigger one?”

The post The Amnesiac Woodcutter – Chapter 3 – Insect Whistles and Clockwork Glowing *DRAFT VERSION* appeared first on NovaVerse Online.

He was surprised at how quickly they took to their new environment as long as they were provided with salt fish and fresh water. He had built brood boxes, not knowing if they’d be needed or used, but to his surprise they were. After spending a few weeks feeding and watering the tidewalkers and getting them used to his presence, he began trying to train them. John decided he needed to tag them and make them easily recoverable should they escape. He asked the jeweler for advice on making tags for them after explaining what he was doing. “Have I got a deal for you, John” said Petros, the jeweler. “I bought these minerals from a travelling merchant for quite the price” the rocks were pinkish and red, with whites, grays, and yellows. “They’re fantastic gems that capture the sunlight!” and he took John outside into the street and held a handful of the rocks up in the direct sunlight. To John’s surprise, they began to glow bright pink and orange. “What are these?!” asked John in wonder. “Some kind of mineral the merchant said they dug up from a mine up north. They cost me a lot of money, and sadly, nobody can afford to pay my prices for them, so I’m just sitting on them.”

“So what’s your deal then?” asked John. “Simply this” said Petros, “I believe in your brains and ambition and what you’re trying to do. I think coming up with a way to move information across the continent so fast is well worth doing. I will make for you simple metal rings with gems of this material inlaid in them. That way should any of your birds escape, they should be pretty easy to track back to their nest, especially as the sun goes down. I will do this for free.” John was thrilled. “However,” Petros continued “should you lose any of them, I expect to be compensated full market value, my time included.” “deal” John said, shaking Petros’ hand. “Pick them up tomorrow morning”. And John did just that.

The next day, John carefully attached the glowing rings to the feet of every tidewalker. Then the training began. John began getting them used to being out in the yard on leashes one at a time, walking them around, gently restraining them when they tried to fly. Using salted fish to lure them back and forth with the help of the meat farmer who was also intrigued by what John was attempting. The rings did make it easy to track the couple who escaped back to their nest, and they were docile about being recaptured. After a month, the first generation of domestic tidewalkers was born in John’s coop. He tagged them too, right away and began their training, which was even easier. As time went on, they became more obedient and likely to do what they were trained to do. Flying to different markers, farther and farther away, until finally it was the day. John headed out with Nathan’s caravan again to Port Saltmarsh. He had agreed to synchronize times with his apprentices to let the 3 best trained tidewalkers out, each with a message a day after he and Nathan were supposed to arrive in the city. They should have let them out that morning, and that afternoon John was getting excited.

Then he saw a flock of tidewalkers on the horizon.

He ran to the docks where the flocks always landed to find their food and waited. And sure enough, there in the water, were his 3 birds. Each with a glowing bracelet and a small vial tied to their leg. John whooped for joy! “T’shaw t’shaw!” he hollered, looking like a madman and making the sound he tried to mimic from the birds. His 3 birds saw him standing with his salt fish and immediately rushed him. Nathan finally came to find him and found him with a bird on his head, one on his shoulder and one in his lap. Laughing and reading the notes from his apprentices. It had worked!

A little while later it was getting to be time for the tidewalkers to fly back, and John had to see if it worked. He put reply messages into the vials and left his birds on the ground where they took off with the flocks. “So what now?” Nathan asked “we wait. If they come back again tomorrow afternoon with more messages, it means it works and we head to the bank to talk to that clerk.”

It was the next evening near closing when John and Nathan ran into the bank, apparently babbling in excited hysterics. It took the clerk a full 2 minutes to calm them down. “Okay now WHAT happened?” “THE TIDEWALKERS!” John said “I trained them to carry messages between here and Greenhill during their feeding cycles! AND IT WORKED!” he said showing the messages to the banker. It took the banker a second before his eyes became wide as dinner plates. “You’re telling me, you trained TIDEWALKERS to fly messages back and forth between Port Saltmarsh and GREENHILL?!” “YES!” Nathan yelled. “Impossible, how?!” and John walked him through his last few months. The banker was suddenly VERY interested. “John,” he said “If you can prove this to me, and then repeat it. This is going to change everything and make you a very rich man”. John laughed “I just wanted a bank and bookkeeper in my town!” “Oh you’ll get that, and much more I assure you”.

The next afternoon John’s 3 main birds landed again with messages from his apprentices, but this time the banker was with him. He had the clerk write his own messages to prove what was happening with instructions to send the messages back with petals from the mystic blue iris, which only grew around Greenhill. The birds left with the rest of the flocks and the next afternoon John, Nathan and the banker were outside waiting for the afternoon tidewalker feeding rush. And sure enough, there were John’s birds amongst them.

John called his birds and fed them their treats, then he opened the vials and spilled out the flow petals. The clerk fainted.

It took a couple minutes to revive the clerk, but revive he did.

20 minutes later the three of them were running hysterically into he bank branch rambling like mad men. “FATHER!” yelled the clerk. “Gods, Ryan, what is it?!” came an answer from the loft in the bank. The old bank manager was bald, and stopped over, and small, but he had a wit far larger than anyone for a long way John estimated. After an urgent and sudden meeting, everyone had calmed down enough to discuss John’s achievement.

“Assuming this is all true” said the old man “It IS true Father!” said Ryan, the clerk. “ASSUMING it is true” his father continued “how much do you want for it?” the old man asked John. John looked at him puzzled “What do you mean?”. The old man said “You invented a new method of doing something incredibly grandiose and convenient. One that has the potential to make everyone on the planet much richer and their lives more convenient. You’re the only one who knows how to do it, or do it effectively, and other people know you’re the creator and know this. We believe you should be compensated.” John smiled. “One million gold, and a tenth of one percent of the profit from every transaction made using my method. To be payable to me, and then my heirs or people they appoint in whatever percentage I or they deem fit from now until the end of time. In exchange, I will help your scribes compile all my extensive notes into a training manual and give you the manual and said notes. I will teach any ten people you choose, not only my method, but how to teach other people my method of training. I will teach how to hunt and trap the tidewalkers, how to breed them, how to build their coops, I will personally train a thousand birds, and I will design and supervise the construction of a grand coop here in the city, as I imagine, you want your bank to be some type of communications hub for this method going forward.” The old man used his un-louped eye to look John up and down, then said “Done. You’ll stay in my house tonight, and tomorrow we’ll have the contracts drawn up and you’ll get to work.”

The next day John read through the contracts with help from Nathan and Ryan and an advocate counsel they insisted he hire. Once everything was properly negotiated and signed, John got to work.

He spent the next year fulfilling his end of the contract and living at Ryan’s house. The grand coop was huge and built to house birds trained to fly to every major city on the continent. Stopovers and relays at smaller villages were established along the way and soon the skies were filled with tidewalkers carrying messages and conducting business all over. John was now a very rich man.

He sat in his room, reminiscing about how far he’d come in the last 2 years. An amnesiac beggar, turned wood cutter, turned carpenter-woodworker, turned father of a new style of communication that changed the entire history of the continent.

——

John was a wealthy man now, his woodshop had grown thanks to the tidewalker communication system and creation of a bank branch in Greenhill. Heck the whole town had grown, everyone there lived better lives, though about a quarter of the people weren’t thrilled with its sudden growth and changes. The lord of the town was especially happy with what John had done as, through taxation, he’d become even richer off of John’s work, and off all his subjects. John resolved to fix that.

He had a meeting one day with Ryan, now official bank liaison to the Tidewalker Communication Guild. “How can I help you today, Guildmaster?” Ryan asked. “Don’t call me that, I’m not the guildmaster, I don’t even work there.” John said. “Fine fine, how can I help you, JOHN?”

“I’d like a full audit done of Lord Quezzel, all his accounts and his books with the kings finance ministers. I know you guys handle all of that.”

“I’m happy to do it,” Ryan said, “But why?”

“He’s too rich. Greenhill was a largely self-sustaining little hamlet, no crime, and they handled everything you’d expect a government to do themselves and out of their own pockets. The people there lead hard, poor lives, while Quezzel lived in a mansion with his guards. They were supposedly town guards, but they were never in the town for anything other than collecting taxes, or free booze.”

“I see. I’ll get right on it.” Ryan said. “Why are you doing this?”

John smiled “they took care of me when I had nothing, not even any memory or clothes on my back. It’s the least I can do.” Ryan nodded and John thanked him again and left.

——

As John walked away from Ryan’s office he thought to himself. “Where do I go from here? What do I do now? I’m wealthy, I don’t need to work, and I helped all the townsfolk who saved me. I guess I finally have the real means now to find answers.” He headed back to the workshop he’d set up in Ryan’s father’s mansion to prepare for his journey.

When he got to the mansion he realized that if his journey would be long, he’d need to travel light. He’d been working with a Port Saltmarsh blacksmith for a few months on small and collapsible multi-tools. John had a number of them now, mostly for woodworking and carpentry, but he knew he’d need others for a journey, camping tools, survival tools, and he knew he’d need a way to defend himself. John sat down at his drafting table and got to work. He had envisioned a staff, or walking stick, full of multi-tools of different types. Some on winders, and belts, others that popped right in and out of the shaft.

He knew he’d need to be able to start fires for cooking and purifying water, and included magnifying lenses from an old loupe, as well as a flint and steel in his design. Next, he incorporated 2 small collapsible spits and a thin, small, roll-up square piece of scale armor to use as a cooking surface. He had his camp stove.

In a pinch when he needed water and couldn’t boil it, he came up with the idea of using a reed tube packed with cloth, sand, and charcoal that he could use to suck up dirty water for safe(r) drinking. He added that straw and a small hose of catgut and a hand squeeze pump to his staff design to help siphon the water through the filter for cooking or movement, knowing the hose and pump might be useful for other things.

John added compartments for topical disinfectants and analgesic oils, sterile bandages, some collapsible splints, along with poppy gum for emergency pain killing and energy. He added some spools of fine horsehair thread and some stitching needles, along with glue, because you never know. He also tucked in a catgut tourniquet.

——

The next day while John was out collecting supplies for testing and tinkering with his travelling staff designs, he saw wagons moving the entire town apiary. “What in the heck is going on?” he asked one of the apiary workers following on foot. The worker replied “We’re having to move our whole operation across the city, there’s a new machine they built at the shipyard for planing the wood in the ships and it makes some kind of vibration that disturbs the bees and drives them away. We tried going to the council, explaining how important our honey and mead are to the economy, but they said they already sank too much money into the shipyard and gave us new land to move to away from the sound.” John was surprised, but it gave him an idea.

As the weather got warmer every year, there were many kinds of insects in this part of the continent that were bothersome, venomous, or carried diseases. People used netting and various types of smelling oils to keep them at bay. While John liked the netting, he wasn’t fond of the smelling oils, as some were expensive, irritating to the skin, or could run out at inopportune times. John headed down to the wharf to begin talking to fishermen.

The post The Amnesiac Woodcutter – Chapter 2 – Tidewalkers Take Flight *DRAFT VERSION* appeared first on NovaVerse Online.

As he was catching his breath, he noticed a beggar sitting in a corner, who looked at him with what he sensed was empathy. He felt grateful for the stranger’s kindness and accepted the pouch of coins the man offered. The beggar told him that he “looked like you could use the money more than me!” and smiled a half-toothless yellow grin, the man thanked him sincerely.

After taking the charity from the beggar, the man then decided to look for some clothes, and noticed a seamstress’s shop nearby. He approached the old seamstress and explained his situation to her. She looked at him with suspicion, but when he showed her the coins, she took pity on him and gave him some old, simple clothes she had in the back. She told him to keep his money and wished him good luck.

The man thanked her and asked if there was a cobbler nearby. The seamstress replied that her husband’s store was next door, through the hallway. She led him there and told her husband to fit him a pair of simple shoes for free, and that she would explain later. The man felt touched by their kindness and promised to pay them back someday. He then headed to the pub, hoping to find some food and maybe some answers.

He ordered some food and a drink, and sat down at a corner table. The bartender noticed him and struck up a conversation. The man explained his story and how he woke up with no memory of who he was or how he got there. The bartender shook his head and said, “You can’t even recall your own name?” and the man sadly shook his head. The bartender replied, “Well, that won’t do. You’re John now, after my favorite uncle.” John smiled sheepishly and thanked the bartender.

After some time, and finishing his food, John headed back to the cobbler to get his shoes. He thanked the cobbler and his wife and told them his name was John, a gift from the bartender. He then wandered around the town, trying to figure out what to do next. He knew he needed food, water, and shelter, but he had no idea how to get them.

Eventually, he saw a large woodpile behind the blacksmithy and headed inside to talk to the blacksmith. After explaining his story to the smith, John asked if he could split six months of lumber for the smith, in exchange for the splitting axe. He then said he would come back weekly to split for him if the smith kept his axe sharp and in shape. The smith laughed and agreed, and John got to work.

That night, John asked the smith if there was anywhere he could sleep out of the chill and wet for free. The smith told him about an old traveler’s shack on the outskirts of town. He warned him that it was rumored to be haunted, but John said he would take his chances and thanked the smith.

He made his way to the shack and found an old blanket and some straw for a pillow. After some startling encounters with rats, he fell asleep without incident. The next day, he began wandering the town, stopping at every home and business he saw, offering to cut wood for them for a bit of coin and food. The townsfolk pitied him and took him up on his offers. After putting in a 12-hour day, he was able to afford a night in the Inn’s cheapest room and still had money leftover for his savings.

John passed several months this way, becoming the town’s unofficial woodcutter. He had come to learn that the town was called Greenhill and learned the town and local area’s geography. He also familiarized himself with all 150 or so of the town’s inhabitants.

Eventually John decided he was tired of living in the inn and needed his own space, he had checked out a small, abandoned cottage on the outskirts of town and asked the mayor if he could purchase it from the town.

The mayor, a portly man with a booming voice, listened to John’s request and stroked his beard thoughtfully. “Well, John,” he said slowly. “That cottage has been abandoned for years, and no one has shown any interest in buying it until now. I suppose we could sell it to you for a fair price.”

John nodded eagerly. “Thank you, sir. I’ll take good care of it, I promise.”

The mayor smiled, revealing a row of yellowed teeth. “I have no doubt you will, John. You’re a hard worker, and the people of this town have grown to trust you.”

They shook hands, and John handed over the agreed-upon amount of coins. He practically skipped back to the abandoned cottage, excited at the prospect of having a place to call his own.

He spent the next few days cleaning and fixing up the cottage, using his woodworking skills and some borrowed tools to fashion a crude table and chairs. He even managed to scrounge up some old blankets and a pillow, making himself a makeshift bed.

As he settled into his new home, he couldn’t help but feel a sense of contentment wash over him. He might not know who he was or where he came from, but he had a purpose now, and a place to call his own.

The next morning, he woke up early and headed to the town square, where he saw a group of people gathered around a man with a loud voice. The man was dressed in fine clothing, and his hands were adorned with expensive rings.

John approached the crowd, curious. “What’s going on?” he asked a woman standing next to him.

“The lord has come to collect taxes,” the woman replied, rolling her eyes. “As if we have anything left to give him.”

John frowned, watching as the lord’s men went from house to house, collecting coins and valuables from the townsfolk.

As the group dispersed, John made a decision. He couldn’t stand by and watch these people be taken advantage of any longer. He resolved to do something about it.

When it came to be John’s turn to pay his taxes, he handed over everything in his pocket, explaining that until a week ago he’d been a homeless woodcutter and only had recently been able to afford to move into the old shack by the river on the outskirts. The lord’s man laughed at him and said “this amount is fine” and still chuckling “if you ever end up making more though, we’ll expect a bigger sum.” And with that he patted John on the shoulder and walked away chuckling.

John was annoyed but kept his annoyance in check. After a couple more weeks of his woodcutting, he had earned enough money to buy his own set of carpentry and woodworking tools. He was very excited when he entered the smithy.

—-

When John entered the blacksmith’s shop, he immediately gravitated to the tools on display. “What can I get you John?”, Patrick the blacksmith asked in his typical jovial tone. Patrick had been the town blacksmith since he was a teenager after inheriting the shop from his father. He was a large man, with arms like tree trunks, and a pot belly betraying his love of ale and potatoes.

“I want to start wood working” said John, “really woodworking. I just bought the old cottage and managed to get it passably livable with some borrowed tools, but I want my own and I want to make it great.”

Patrick laughed “That’s great John. I’ll give you the best deal I can on all the gear you’ll need. We don’t have a carpenter or woodworker in town anymore, so you might even find yourself some business in that regard, if you’re up to it”. John smiled and nodded.

After their transaction, John headed home and got to work.

He rounded up any wood he could find around the town, asking for donations and offering to purchase from all his clients. He also began to scout the forest and teach himself about the trees and the different types of wood from them. He began work on proper wooden shingles and, with some advice gleaned from Patrick, and Nathan, who owned the general store and caravan, began making his own pitch by commissioning the distillery. With his handmade shingles and pitch he was able to replace the roof properly with one that would last for years.

Time passed and his skills and builds at woodworking grew. Eventually the townsfolk began commissioning him to make them things or build them outbuildings, barns, and house extensions. John had enough money coming in that he hired a boy from the village to take over his wood cutting and when the boy was confident and skilled at the job, John gave him the business to focus full-time on his woodworking and carpentry.

Finally, the demand for John’s work grew so much through Nathan’s caravan, that he had to expand. He got permission from the mayor to build his own outbuilding next to his cottage and make it a wood shop. Once it was completed, he bought some more tools from Patrick and some doubles of his other ones and hired 3 young men from the village to be his apprentices. They were all eager to learn and worked hard. He had agreed to pay them profit sharing on every commission and project in addition to their wages and they were very happy with that.

With all the money coming in now, John needed some help with tracking orders, cash flow, and paperwork. He needed an accountant. Nobody in the town had such skills or ever needed them before. So the next time Nathan’s caravan headed out, John climbed aboard and made his way to the city for the first time.

The trip took 3 solid weeks of travel, 12 hours a day, but the caravan was long and wide, even bigger now that much of it was occupied with commissions for John’s customers. John and Nathan made it to the city at Dusk and made camp on the outskirts for the night. The next day John got his first look at the city.

Port Saltmarsh, so named because it was an ocean port that backed into a marsh. “The town founders were creative” John thought with a sarcastic smile. Once in the port city, he knew exactly where to go.

Elias and Sons Banking was the largest banking company on the continent and one of the only ones in most towns. John entered and spoke to a clerk, a short overweight man with curly brown hair.

“Hi. I’m looking for someone to manage my money for my woodworking and carpentry business. Take care of orders, paying my apprentices, managing the money, and paying my taxes to the local lord.”

“Where are you from?” The man asked, giving John a strange look. “Greenhill” said John. “Well,” said the clerk “it sounds like you need an accountant for larger, longer-term things, but a book keeper for your day to day, unless you want to do that yourself.” “I do not.” said John bluntly. “I didn’t think so” said the man. “The problem is, Greenhill isn’t big enough to justify us opening a branch there, you’re the very first business from there that’s actually grown to this size, but even you aren’t enough to justify the expense of opening a branch and then running a messenger route.”

John couldn’t hide his disappointment. The man continued “Unless you can figure out some way to move the information faster than messenger, I can’t help you. You’ll have to keep doing the books yourself and then bringing them to us every quarter for deposits and managing your taxes.”

John thanked the man and left. He and Nathan spent a few days in Saltmarsh, meeting some of his clients and helping to deliver their commissions himself, they were all so friendly and grateful. Eventually after 3 days, it was time to head home.

The ride back was largely uneventful, until one day John asked Nathan about the birds. “What kinds of birds are those Nathan?” “You mean the tidewalkers? They’re all over the continent. Terrible to eat, no fat, stringy meat.” “Do they always fly back and forth like that?” “Oh yeah, that’s how they live. They eat this type of ocean minnow, but they nest inland near freshwater. They go in and out like the tide, hence the name.” John smiled. “you’re a genius Nathan” he said. “I know” said Nathan with a smile.

John began to plan.

——–

The next 3 weeks were like slow torture for John to get back and enact his plans, but it gave him plenty of time to come up with scenarios, traps, and training methods.

When he got back to Greenhill, it was 6 weeks later. His apprentices were thrilled to see him and he was thrilled to see his house and shop still intact. After catching up with them over dinner and ales he explained his plan. He was leaving them in charge while he began a new project, capturing tidewalkers.

All 3 of them laughed until they could see John didn’t smile. “You’re serious?” said Axl, the oldest of the three. “Deadly” said John. He spent the next week or so making various traps and asking Jacob, the town hunter, for tips. Once he was confident enough in his trap designs he went scouting in the forest near still waters for tidewalkers. He found some easily and began trying to bait them with salted local fish. To his surprise it worked, they loved the fish. “It must be the salt content” John thought to himself.

Upon his realization it didn’t take him long to trap a bunch of the tidewalkers. He would leave the traps near their nests for a few days while they were gone and leave food behind. After he got them comfortable with taking the food over the course of a few days, he snapped the traps shut and took home his new pets.

He kept the tidewalkers outside his house, and they squawked and pooped and generally did not love to be caged up. He fed them salted fish and fresh water though and they all ate and seemed healthy. They were hardy birds. Eventually after a few days of just seeing if he could keep them alive, the meat farmer showed up at John’s house and suggest he build them a coop.

Coop build, he did.

The post The Amnesiac Woodcutter – Chapter 1 – Amnesiac Awakening *DRAFT VERSION* appeared first on NovaVerse Online.