Firith absentmindedly tapped the barrel he was using as a desk as he considered the blank paper in front of him. He was using another barrel (turned on its side and wedged between two others for stability) as a chair, and the lists and ledgers he'd temporarily put aside were on top of yet another barrel. In fact, he was entirely surrounded by wooden casks. "So, to review, our job is to find a more efficient way to transport barrels back to the lake, if possible."

"Okay." The elf across from Firith, a friend from work—which was what they happened to be doing—considered that statement for a bit. "Why can't we keep sending them all back with the humans?"

Firith flipped his paper over, revealing the notes he'd taken yesterday while discussing the problem with the other stewards. Isakian was technically the royal cartographer, though he helped the stewards in his free time, so he hadn't been there then. "Well, the root of the problem is that since we're paying the humans for bringing us the wine, we're sending other things back with them."

"Why is that a problem?"

"Because," said Firith, "to take the empty barrels from the last time back as well, they have to carry a larger volume of things. Say each shipment includes forty barrels of wine; they'd then have to take back forty empty barrels plus all the stuff we gave them. They end up having to bring larger carts or carry some things outside the carts. Either way, it costs more for us. Plus, we don't empty the barrels on a regular schedule, so it's hard to coordinate getting them all back. That's why there's no empty space down here right now."

Isakian frowned. "Why can't we put all the stuff in the empty barrels?"

"We tried that. It helps, but not everything's small enough and the empty spaces between barrels mean we have to stack some things on top, and... it gets way too complicated."

"Oh."

Firith waited, hoping his friend would think of something that hadn't already occurred to the others. Though Isakian was more known for being the nicest, purest elf around (a title Firith thought should go to his father or brother instead, but the cartographer was a close second), he was also surprisingly useful to bounce ideas off of because he often noticed things Firith didn't. He was a lot like Galion, actually; in fact, if not for his blue eyes—a rare color among full Silvans like him—he would've fit in perfectly with Firith's family.

"We could go... well... no, we'd want to..." Isakian pulled a folded map of the area out of his pocket, which would have surprised no one who knew him. "If we went along this road here..." he muttered to himself, tracing the map with one finger. "Can't build a tunnel, that would be way too inefficient..."

Firith waited.

"These roads would be the best," Isakian decided finally. "But I think... yeah, you can't really take carts along there. It's too narrow and there are roots everywhere... actually, I think the way the carts are already going is the best. Sorry, Firith."

Firith sighed. "But sending our own carts that way would be less efficient than what we're already doing... Hmm. Let me think." He picked up Isakian's map and leaned back against yet another barrel; the cartographer took out another map and began studying it quietly.

Maybe I should've asked Tathor, Firith thought. His ideas are crazy, but sometimes they work. What would he say if he were here?

Firith looked up from the map in his hands, analyzing the barrels for any clues they might hold. Think, Firith! What would Tathor do?

He looked down at the map, and his eyes settled on one long, winding line.

The river.

"Aha!" he yelled, making Isakian jump.

. . . . . .

"You want to float the barrels down the river?" Taensirion repeated, taken aback.

Firith shrugged and nodded. "It's worth a try."

Taensirion checked Isakian's face to make sure this wasn't a joke, but the cartographer looked a bit bewildered as well. "Isakian? Could it work?"

He shook his head quickly. "Too many waterfalls! A bunch of them would probably crack and sink. We could maybe put them in a boat, but that might crash too... And we'll still have to ride horses to keep up with them. No, I don't think this is a good idea."

"I was thinking we could tie them all together," Firith said quickly. "To make a raft, of sorts. And we could guide them with poles or something." He bounced on his heels, looking remarkably like Tathor in his enthusiasm. "Control them so they wouldn't break or get lost, you know?"

Taensirion thought it was an odd plan, especially for Firith, but the young elf was so excited he hated to say no. "We may as well try it, though surely there is an easier way. It sounds a bit over-complicated."

"Yeah, that's kind of what I was thinking," Isakian agreed. "We could experiment, though. We'll just drop them off at the location, in four different groups, at four different times, and see if any are damaged at the end of the trip... We'll need some way to not let them slip by us, that'll be tricky... And we'd need to make sure they couldn't go faster than us..." Another map, like the one Firith still held but showing just the river, was in his hands again.

"This should be interesting, at least," Taensirion decided.

. . . . . .

"Here goes, I guess," Firith announced, and he gave their barrel-raft a gentle nudge with his pole to push it into the current. They'd decided to start with twelve barrels tied together, hoping they would go slowly that way, and they were releasing them close to where the river flowed out of the underground fortress.

The barrels floated away, slowly at first, but gathering speed rapidly. "Uh-oh—" said Isakian.

"I have them." Taensirion jogged past the barrels and hooked the ropes with his own pole, though their momentum almost pulled him over. "Oof. This may take more than one elf."

Firith joined him on the other side of the river; Taensirion, who was easily the strongest of the three (they'd tried to arm-wrestle to make sure, but Firith was pretty sure Isakian had let both of them win on purpose) was opposite the two Silvans. "Just don't let them go too fast."

"Right."

They continued to guide the barrels, which was much easier than they'd thought, even over the rapids—just so long as the raft didn't slip away from their poles, because if it did, they all had to run to catch it. Firith almost fell in once when he caught the barrels and was yanked forward by his pole.

"I think," Firith called to Taensirion after a while, "one of the storage rooms is right above the river. If we moved the barrels there, do you think we could put in a hatch so we could drop them directly into the river?"

"I would think so," the Sinda mused. "I do not know much about architecture, but surely it would be possible."

"What if someone tried to break in that way?" Isakian wondered. "Or out?"

"It'd be right over the river, so no one would be able to get in. And... out?" Firith snorted at the thought. "Who'd try to escape a palace through a hole in one of the storage rooms?"

Taensirion was watching ahead better than they were, and he yelled to get their attention. There was a waterfall coming up.

"Here goes," Firith muttered to himself.

"Keep them going as slowly as you can," Taensirion said, wading a few steps into the slowly-widening river to stay closer to the barrels; luckily, he'd changed into tall, waterproof boots.

Together, the three of them dragged the barrels almost to a halt as they came to the edge of the waterfall. Taensirion had to brace to keep from being swept over by the current.

"Now what?" Isakian yelled over the rushing of the waterfall.

"Let them go on my mark," Taensirion called back. "Three... two... one... NOW!"

The barrels tipped over the edge and splashed into the water with a loud SMACK sound, then bobbed to the surface and continued downstream.

"Huh," said Firith. "I thought they'd break."

"Me too," Taensirion and Isakian agreed at the same time. Then Isakian added, "Uh, shouldn't we be chasing them?" The barrels were making rapid progress toward the next obstacle.

"Definitely," Firith decided, and all three took off after the barrel raft.

. . . . . .

"Well," Taensirion remarked a while later, as they drifted down the calmer lower part of the river, all three now sitting on the barrels and using their poles as makeshift oars. "I, for one, think this was a brilliant idea. It seems we may actually implement it."

"Nice job, Firith," Isakian congratulated him with a grin.

Firith shrugged. Sure, he'd given them the idea, but he felt weird taking credit from it. He'd just thought about what his brother would do, after all; it was almost more Tathor's idea than his.

"Hello," came a call from the bank, which was now several pole-lengths away. "What're you doing?"

Firith jumped. "Tathor! How'd you find us?"

"The trees; I brought you lunch. Why are you floating on a barrel-boat thingy?"

"Hold on a second." Firith began rowing toward the shore with his pole, but before the other two could join in, they heard a splash.

An instant later, Tathor's head popped up next to the barrels; he'd left his cloak and the food he'd brought for Firith on a rock. "Hi, Taen. And you're Isakian, right?"

"Tathor..." Firith groaned, his face in his hands.

"What?"

"Never mind." Firith and Taensirion helped the soaking-wet elfling clamber up onto their slippery barrel-raft.

"So, what're you doing? Aren't you all supposed to be at work?"

"Actually..." Firith quickly summarized the morning's events, from his meeting with Isakian to their decision to jump onto the barrels before the river got too wide to reach them with the poles.

"Wow," said Tathor when the story was done. "And this whole thing was your idea?"

Firith shrugged noncommittally.

Tathor took that as a yes. "You think of the weirdest ideas sometimes; this never would've occurred to me."

Firith started to protest that Tathor had thought of it, sort of, but then just shook his head. He wasn't ever going to understand his brother, was he?

I'm not planning to have Isakian become a major character-he's too much like Galion, Taen, and Firith. But he may appear now and then as Firith's friend and/or Greenwood's top cartographer.