In Step
originally posted February 14, 2006
Travelling south and and west along the Torcadino Road, we are beginning to escape the shadow of the Voltai and press on into the open. The pace is somewhat slower than I am accustomed to, but certainly worth the protection a large group offers. Mathor is a vigilant sort, scouting ahead of the procession. It is festive, this slow march. Many of the itinerants are fun-loving fellows who live stipend to stipend, satisfied to have a piece of meat on their dinner plate but once per hand if that is all they can manage. Kal-da bubbles over on several of the small fires each night and they sing, regale one another with tales of their imagined exploits or simply enjoy the company of others until they can no longer keep their eyes open. Their life is not a simple one, but there is much to be said for it for they are happy. Musicians, too, travel with this motley crew. It is not long after one fellow with a flute breathes a few notes into his instrument that another joins him. Soon after others, those with hand drums and small cymbals and the like, are drawn into the fray. On occasion, a dour peasant at roadside will look up from his difficult labors and break a smile. Such men, I imagine, have little opportunity for diversion. Who will plow the fields, herd the goats if not them?
The coffle, given a few days to acclimate, moves well. With Tasta prowling beside them, they are not an unattractive bunch of wenches. Given the opportunity to be first, if only due to her statuesque, deeply hued form, Portia leads them well. She, like the others, fear they are coffled in anticipation of their eventual sale. Have I not painted the red doors white? Did I not chain them at the wrist and give them, brief as it was, instruction how to walk so chained? Still, despite the trepidation, common amongst her and the others, she walks well in the afternoon embrace of yellow Tor-Tu-Gor. She costs three copper per ahn. You, too, can own her for that price.
picture is copyright Markus Harris 1997
Travelling south and and west along the Torcadino Road, we are beginning to escape the shadow of the Voltai and press on into the open. The pace is somewhat slower than I am accustomed to, but certainly worth the protection a large group offers. Mathor is a vigilant sort, scouting ahead of the procession. It is festive, this slow march. Many of the itinerants are fun-loving fellows who live stipend to stipend, satisfied to have a piece of meat on their dinner plate but once per hand if that is all they can manage. Kal-da bubbles over on several of the small fires each night and they sing, regale one another with tales of their imagined exploits or simply enjoy the company of others until they can no longer keep their eyes open. Their life is not a simple one, but there is much to be said for it for they are happy. Musicians, too, travel with this motley crew. It is not long after one fellow with a flute breathes a few notes into his instrument that another joins him. Soon after others, those with hand drums and small cymbals and the like, are drawn into the fray. On occasion, a dour peasant at roadside will look up from his difficult labors and break a smile. Such men, I imagine, have little opportunity for diversion. Who will plow the fields, herd the goats if not them?
The coffle, given a few days to acclimate, moves well. With Tasta prowling beside them, they are not an unattractive bunch of wenches. Given the opportunity to be first, if only due to her statuesque, deeply hued form, Portia leads them well. She, like the others, fear they are coffled in anticipation of their eventual sale. Have I not painted the red doors white? Did I not chain them at the wrist and give them, brief as it was, instruction how to walk so chained? Still, despite the trepidation, common amongst her and the others, she walks well in the afternoon embrace of yellow Tor-Tu-Gor. She costs three copper per ahn. You, too, can own her for that price.
picture is copyright Markus Harris 1997
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