Chapter 2; Wanderer:
Thanks to Lola93091, vixen1991, and Guest for their kind and thoughtful reviews! Here for your enjoyment is the next installment of Why the Caged Bird Sings.
I would like to mention that here, I give no physical description of the main girl. That's because I wanted to establish her personhood…and I just didn't know at the time what I wanted her to look like when I was writing this. For all that, please enjoy!
Raelynne Thimblsting never understood the appeal of whistling while one traveled down a nameless road. Keeping a chipper tune while one stumbled over clumsy rocks or fields of dry, itchy grass felt out of place and unwarranted. The road was no place for mirth, let alone any sort of feigning of it in the form of perking her lips together and blowing a shrill note. In fact, Raelynne saw no mirth in traveling whatsoever. There was nothing to meet you but hard roads, hostile weather, and strangers that most unpredictably could offer kindness or danger.
All this in the end, only served to irritate her to unknown ends, as it so happened to be that she was a traveling minstrel.
If only, she sighed, there was a way to take the traveling part out of her occupation description. But alas, a music maker went where music was wanted, which, to Raelynne's continuing shock, was very near to nowhere.
It seemed that no one had an appreciation for the arts anymore. She could only afford to stay in a village for little less than a few days now, the people only willing to give her enough to occupy their local inn during festivals. No one wanted singing at weddings anymore, or tuneful mourning at burials. Alas no.
No one wanted a traveling minstrel that wanted to put off her travels.
Then again, perhaps it was not so much Raelynne's craft people did not want to idle around their homes, but her aggressiveness of said craft. Or perhaps her aggressiveness in general.
Yes, perhaps it was the latter, seeing as how the last town she had played at threw not just rotten vegetables at her and her instruments, but quite a share of arrows as well. She could not help it though, Raelynne knew herself to be a creature of passionate moments, her fine way of spinning her temper. But in a world so ready to selfishly wield the slightest of known feebleness, Raelynne saw no sin in being quick to spurn, or, at least, quick to defend. Though true, her sharp tongue and raised ire often did lead to the most unsettling of her troubles, but she could rightly claim that no one had ever had the pleasure of taking advantage of her. Not once, not since she had left her home long, long ago.
Granted, the sweeter tongue is more capable of endearing the wolf than the daggered one, as her mother had once said. Promising to rethink her manners and lessen her abrasive ways of twiddling her earnings from tight fists at a later date, Raelynne sighed in relief as the cloud covered village of Lake Town finally came into view.
It was not a sight for any eyes, sore or otherwise. The city was impressive in that, somehow, it was still standing. But other than that, nothing more than the cheeriness of grey could be found. The docks, stilted and unsure, stood the pile of homes above the lake it was so named after, much like a lazy turtle dragging itself into the water. Of the people, they were not of the sophisticated or really of the noteworthy, merely simple people with simpler desires, a background not unlike Raelynne's, one she'd rather forget.
This was her destination.
As reluctant as her steps where now, Raelynne continued onward, prompted by the distant clanking of the coins that were hers to claim. Where there was money, there was Raelynne to be sure. Earning money was of her chiefest pleasures, next to the winning cheer of a crowd. And in a few days, this place would be as close to a mithril mine some peddler like her could ever hope to see. In the coming full moon, the settlement known as Lake Town would be celebrating its Cair Day. Cair merely meant boat in Elvish, but the people of the Lake Town thought themselves quite clever to have borrowed the word for themselves.
Cair Day was the one day though that the people forgot things like Elves, troublesome wizards, and war; it was all their own and of their own devices. There was boat racing, fishing contests on boats, dining on boats, drinking on boats, all a person who spent their lives in such contraptions could ever long for really. As for Raelynne though, she would take great, underived joy in entertaining dock wobblers and having them give her their money, too drunk to count to make sure they weren't being overly generous to her greedy palm, or even notice that their purse was missing entirely…
No, no. Raelynne chided herself as she set foot on the first dock that reached out towards her. No more stealing, remember? You promised.
Walking on, she spun her body round to follow the movements of a rather sluggish cart carrying a hoard of apples past her, it's driver paying more attention to the tangled reins that guided his horse than to his produce. It would be only too easy, with quick fingers such as hers.
Promises do not fill an empty stomach. She grumbled to her morality, which had won this moment as Raelynne went on, focusing on finding what she needed rather than what she wanted, which happened to be a full stomach just now. At the creaking turn of the raised wooden path she had chosen, she spotted a group of men pushed tight under the eaves of a weather torn building. It was apparent to Raelynne that these particular men were getting ready for Cair Day ahead of time, the over poured flasks in their hands passing much fermented drink into their mouths and onto their beards.
Ahh, but fools do. Raelynne smiled to herself, a sweet expression she kept up as she made to stand before the men.
"Gentlemen, if you'd be so kind, would you direct me to the center point of this fine city's merriment making so that I might be able to offer my services to prolong it's joviality?" She asked, tone civil and ending on a delighted note brought on by the thoughts of the amount of money she could make.
Slowly, very slowly, one of the men, potbellied and curled nosed, turned his languid attention onto her. He squinted at her hard, unable to pair her soft voice with her appearance, which admittedly was disconcerting. Dressed in loose tunic and trousers, dirt smeared on her face and hair tucked under a lavish hat, she looked every part the gangly boy she strove to pass for when traveling. She very rarely came across trouble whilst wandering, but it never hurt to be prepared for when her bountiful luck to turn sour, and so to put on a slight masculine countenance was in her best interests.
"Wha ya say ther laadddeee?" The man finally slurred, and a bit of spittle flew towards Raelynne when he susurrated his last word. She sighed.
Ah, yes, right. Remember Raelynne, these are simple folks. People of the lake. You know, dunces, so use smaller words.
"Where can I find a pub? A large, popular one?" She restated, placing her hand impatiently on he hip.
"Oh, ya be wanin the Two Hea'ed Rat. Bes place a'ound."
Noting which way he sluggishly pointed, Raelynne forced a smile and a bob of her head to mimic a bow.
"Thank you ever so kindly gentlemen. I bid you all a good day."
Traveling boots colliding heavily against the wooden docks in her lazy gate, Raelynne's neck craned to take in the changes the town had experienced since her last visit. It had been merely six years ago, when she had first started to travel around to utilize her gifts, she just a girl of shy of seventeen. And as certainly she had changed since then, for the better, so too had this place only with the opposite effect. It had sunk into itself, its colors had run into one another like an unfinished and bleak painting, and even the waves of the lake's water looked somehow affected with a kind of slow poison, turning all into this dreary sight Raelynne saw before her.
Still, she had to admit, there was a life in this town, and in its people, to be admired. A stubbornness to cling to whatever hope could be grasped proliferated this place in a way that Raelynne was all too familiar with. Though, what continued to plague this place was something Raelynne only had rumors to go off of. Some said it was its new mayor's poor choices, others that the elves were cursing this place, and some, more interestingly, blamed the Red Dragon.
Stopping upon noticing she had hit a dead end, Raelynne's brows furrowed into confusion. Looking around, she spied a lump of a human hazardly leaning back on a stool with it hat pulled low so all Raelynne could see of the head was a plume of bleak feathers.
"Is this the Two Headed Rat?" She came forward to ask. Without lifting the hat, the stranger pointed to a swinging sign placed above them.
"Depends. What that lock like to ya?"
Raelynne felt a grimace of annoyance cross her lips as sized up the sign, but kept it out of her tone.
"A two headed rodent."
"Then it locks like yav come to da place yur fixin' for."
Being of easily spired temper, it took little to no effort of strangers to vastly irate Raelynne, and this one was no exception. But she had her way of coping with such things, namely, by the most unhelpful means. That is being, of course, speaking.
"I can tell by your elegant way with speech that you were not burdened with an overabundance of schooling, my good sir."
Finally, the brim of the stranger's hat was lifted, and Raelynne instantly regretted what she said. Not the insult she uttered, no, but the 'sir' part, as the chubby face of the stranger revealed a hidden, but present femininity.
"Wha ya be sayin' to me?"
Damn. Not starting on the right leg, are we Raelynne? Concentrate. We need the money!
"Perhaps we can start again?" Raelynne went on hurriedly, taking off her hat to release her telling long hair and offering a low bow that bent her awkwardly "I am Raelynne Thimblsting, traveling minstrel seeking to bring only more joy to your infamous Cair Day here in Lake Town. Perhaps you are hiring?"
The stool the woman sat on creaked forward as she stood herself up to an unexpected height.
"Minstrel eh?" Scratching her wrinkled chin, the woman, who now Raelynne was starting to assume was the owner of the tarnished tavern that leaned before her, raked her eyes over Raelynne in consideration.
Raelynne did not feel worried in the slightest about her being hired. Bar Keeps were often to hire their own entertainment on festival days, to draw the crowd inside for further celebration into the waning nights. But what assured her confidence was that she, unlike so many others of her kind, stood out in a way that they could not. It was the trademark she was born with, one she was grateful for and resentment of, but soon enough, the bar keep woman herself spotted it, and a smirk of approval was born on her face.
"If it's a job ya want, get insid'. Got room and board. You'll play every nigh' and on Cair you'll play all day, got it?"
Raelynne once more bowed, this time in true earnest.
"Madam, for you and that swelling coin purse at your side, these fingers will fly and this voice will weep jewels."
Following the woman, who had pointedly stated Raelynne was to call Lady Bern, up a tight staircase that led up from the ground floor of the Two Headed Rat, the now employed minstrel was shown to her quarters. Lady Bern quickly left Raelynne and the four, hole ridden, leaky walls to get acquainted, much to the young woman's relief.
She cared not that the straw mattress stank of fish oil and tar, her pillow reeking of stagnant water. Nor that the view outside of the barred window was that of the bleak wall of the neighboring building. Only that she finally, after months of wander, had somewhere to lay her head.
O bed! O bed! Delicious bed! That heaven upon earth the weary head, lay me to such still sleep that others might think me dead!
Was her last exhausted thought before she fell onto the bed exhausted, body succumbing to a quickly spurned sleep.
Greedy little goose, isn't she? I rather like Raelynne, as she is sort of a first for me. Sure, she's sarcastic, which is kind of requirement of my characters, but I've never written a character this smug before or who enjoys being on center stage as much as you will come to see she does.
For the next chapter though (which will be up this Sunday or Monday), things get worrisome as Ciar Day arrives, and Raelynne preforms. But, lurking in the back of the crowd and in the corner of her eyes is a most unwelcomed attendant…