(( Urgh. Another revamp. I suppose you could call it a re-revamp. At any rate, I think I'm finally finding my groove. It got thrown off somewhere back there in 2005.))

Rain; that was all Jergan could see from his post at the gate. Rain that poured from the sky in torrents, rain that sloshed down the keep's walls and puddled at their bases, rain that found its way into the finest of cloaks and soaked a man to the skin. Jergan hated it. He huddled in the little wooden shack that was meant to keep the worst of the weather off of him, and marveled that it was still standing in a storm as bad as this one. The wind – though it was a constant this far North in Hardorn – seemed doubly angry tonight; it drove the droplets of rain before it like an aggressive sheepdog. It changed directions as often as a sheepdog might, first driving the rain westward, then south again, where it splattered water through the door and into the sodden guard's face. Unfortunately the lord of the keep had never allowed a door be added to the shack. He had insisted that a man who could close himself in was a man who could neglect his duties, and there were times when Jergan readily agreed. This was not one of them. What with the howling wind and an occasional burst of thunder, Jergan doubted that any man out here in this post would be able to sleep.

Somewhere out in the distance, a streak of lightning lit the sky. Jergan reminded himself to turn his eyes away from the source, lest his night vision be temporarily lost. He'd been set out to watch for a pair of riders, come all the way from a holding on Tyrant's Route. While the guard himself had no real care for who the guests might be, he knew that his master did, and if one wanted to live long enough to retire from a military career and raise grandchildren, one did not disobey Master Fitral, the lord of this keep and the man whose guests these mysterious riders would be. Nevertheless, it was no easy task for the man to remain entirely focused upon his duty. Especially not when the lightning made all number of odd shadows spring out on the landscape, and the wind sounded entirely too Otherworldly for comfort.

There was a leak in the roof of the shack that let water drip onto the small coal brazier he had been allowed for warmth. The continuous sizzle-spit noises the water made as it touched the hot metal sounded exactly like the evil hiss of a creature one would expect to find in the Otherworld, too. Jergan shuddered, and pulled his cloak more tightly around his body, even though it was already soaked through in most places. He was thankful – and not for the first time that evening – that it was a woolen cloak, for wool was the only fabric that stayed warm while it was wet.

Thunder snarled off in the distance, and for a moment Jergan thought he heard another, odd sort of noise within it. For a moment, he dismissed the sound as part of his imagination, and went back to feeling sorry for himself. Then the noise came again. Carried on the wind and distorted by the rain, he couldn't quite make it out. It was with a sigh that he begrudgingly admitted to himself that the best way to figure out the source of the peculiar sound was for him to investigate it himself. The hood of his cloak slopped over his head as he drew it up and went out.

No sooner had he left his shack than a gust of wind tore through the keep and threatened to tear the poor fellow right from the wall he was stationed on. He ducked low and scuttled to lee side of the wall. Again, the wind seemed to carry with it a strange sound, but this time Jergan thought he could make out parts of words. He peeked over the edge of the wall in time to see a rider cup his hands around his mouth and shout upwards, "Halloo-oo-oo!"

"Kernos' teeth!" Jergan crowed, and headed for the ladder down to ground level. The riders had arrived! Who knew how long they'd been out in that weather, how long they'd been forced to stand in it while Jergan had been wishing he were in a warmer place! So hurried was he that he nearly fell off the ladder on the way down, cursing and sliding and eventually skipping the last two rungs and jumping down into the mud. In this weather, even the packed earth of the keep's main courtyard was a boggy mire. "The man-gate!" he called to the guards that had the privilege of a sturdily-built stone hut near the gate crank. "Open the man-gate!"

The man gate was a door carved within the larger bulk of the main gate, designed to let a man through on foot in occasions exactly like this one. It was lined in metal and barred twice to prevent breakage in the event of a siege, and was wide enough to allow a burdened horse to walk through, if his head was lowered.

Thanks to the rain and wind, all Jergan could make of the men that came into the courtyard was that they had to be damned tired from their journey. They walked with their shoulders hunched and their feet dragging, which – he wagered – was not just because of the storm.

"Lucky you made it here in one piece!" he called over the howling wind, shouting despite the fact that he was less than a pace or two away from the man in the lead. He directed them with shouts and wide arm gestures toward the stables, where a door was cast open and light poured out into the courtyard. The wide square of golden light was like a beacon to the horses, who managed to find some last reserves of strength and pick up their paces.


With a handful of straw, Brendan scraped the last of the mud from his pony and reached for a blanket that had been provided to him by a stable hand. One stall over, his fellow rider was busy caring for his own mount. Both of them were soaked to the skin, and had been for some time. It was as though the storm they had been riding through was following them, and often times throughout their journey, the young man had voiced his concerns to his partner, but neither of them – superstitious as they were – wanted to consider their being cursed by a weather witch. After an attempt at waiting out the storm and three days' time wasted, the boys had accepted the inevitable: their journey was going to be a wet one.

"Don't forget her belly, Magnus," the older boy said as he leaned against the railing of the neighboring stall. The boy that stood within it was grooming a tired old mule, whose docile personality and utter lack of any sort of mean spirit was a perfect match for the younger boy's inexperience. As the family's only working animal, it had cost them a great deal to let their nephew take her. They had consoled themselves that they wouldn't need her during the winter months, but Magnus knew how important the old creature was to them. He'd done his best to care for her along the way, with Brendan's help. Brendan's pony, though, had been loaned to him from the folks at a neighboring farm. They owed the Shonar family a great deal, after being helped through the winter after their crops had burned in a summer lightning storm.

"And don't slack."

Magnus hadn't any intention of failing to groom his mount as completely as he was able, but he knew by now that saying so to his cousin Brendan would likely get him a wallop on the side of the head. Instead, he grunted to show that he had heard what the older boy had said, and kept working. Ginny, the mule, was buried nose deep in a bucket of warm mash. By the time she and the gelding had made it to Fitral lands, one could only tell the shades of their coats by removing the saddle and looking at the bare spots that were left. When Ginny had caught scent of other horses and clean hay, she had displayed the only stubborn bone in her body as she half dragged her rider into the dry stables.

Thankfully, when Magnus finally finished grooming the mule his exertion had warmed him enough that he no longer minded being wet, except for the uncomfortable chafe he got from the rough homespun fabric of his trousers. He tossed the blanket over Ginny and tied it loosely across her chest and beneath the belly, for though she would be secured in the loose box for the duration of the storm, Magnus knew her well enough to be certain she'd get herself into a tangle if he didn't. Brendan gave his cousin's handiwork a once-over, nodded in satisfaction and only then let Magnus close the stall door. A stable hand chose that moment to appear behind them and clear his throat.

"Lord Fitral will arrive momentarily," he informed them, and resisted the urge to examine the animals himself. As it was, he continually glanced around and behind the boys as though he expected to find something terribly wrong in those stalls. "He wishes for you to make yourselves comfortable in the mud room, while the servants bring you a change of clothing.

Brendan sighed with relief. "Thank you." What little clothing they had brought for the journey was now completely soaked through, despite the waxed canvas they'd been wrapped in. That driving rain and wind had gotten into every unprotected little crack and crevice it could find; only the salted meat they had brought along had survived the journey, in no small part because it was bone dry to begin with. At this point it had the same consistency as stewed squirrel: stringy, but chewable. He draped an arm over Magnus' shoulder and together the two of them followed the stable hand to the mud room.

There was a small wood stove in it, thank the gods, and it had been recently lit and filled with wood. Though it hadn't chased all of the cold from the small room yet, it had taken away the bite of chill. They accepted the rough sacking they were presented with and began to scrape mud off of their own clothing and boots, which were then removed entirely and handed to the servant who had come in with spare tunics and house shoes. The tunics were large and hung nearly to the floor on both boys, but they were dry, warm and soft, and that was all either of them cared about. The house shoes were canvas things with leather soles, worn and soft after so many uses by so many other feet. It was likely they were a part of the wardrobe provided to servants and young fosterlings, for they were made of inexpensive fabric and served a child just as well as a good pair of shoes would, provided he was indoors while he wore them.

In the same efficient manner as the soiled clothes were taken away and the new ones presented, another servant promptly appeared carrying a tea kettle and two mugs. She set them atop the wood stove to keep warm, bobbed her head and scuttled out of the mud room without another word. The boys hardly waited for the door to close behind her before they greedily snatched up the mugs and poured them both full. Then, hands wrapped around them to soak up every drop of warmth, they settled onto a wooden bench, sipped their tea, and waited in companionable and weary silence for the Lord of the House to arrive.