Wizard of Jatte by Rowan Erlking (librera reader txt) 📕

Once his traveling companions all appeared situated, Theissen turned and walked out of the barn with a strolling gait, resting his hands on his carpenter’s belt with a growing feeling of satisfaction.

“Hey! Where are you going?” One of the former molemen shouted after him. He scrambled to the doorway of the stall. 

Turning, Theissen said, “I’m going to scout around, see if I can find some work.”

“Work? After all that walking?” A former birdman yelped, leaning heavily over the edge of the loft, peering down at him.

Theobold snickered, crawling over to the edge next to the ex-birdman, watching Theissen go. “Are you kidding? He thrives on work.”

“But what about us?” Someone called after Theissen, practically chasing after him to the barn doors. Admittedly, Theissen had yet to really get to know more than three of the people he had cured. Beyond his birdman friend, he hardly knew any of their names. He had a hard time telling a few of them apart actually, somewhat putout that he had to tend to them like one tends to a gaggle of geese. In his heart he really just wanted to go on his way and forget he ever met the molemen and birdmen.

With a firm, yet tired voice, sighing loudly for all to hear, Theissen said, “You are all human now. Do what you want. Just don’t leave those carts unattended.”

“Don’t worry!” Theobold cupped his hands at the sides of his mouth to be heard. “I’ll be here with them until you get back.”

Theissen didn’t worry. He figured both the old molemen and the old birdmen would not want their futures to suddenly vanish in the hands of thieves or bandits. He had given them a grilling on both during that first month of walking. He had recounted enough of his own troubles on the road with embellished fervor. Most of them were now paranoid of anyone even looking at their carts and bags.

Trotting off as he planned, Theissen walked around the side of barn and headed towards the village road.

*

“Resident carpenter? Well, no actually. We usually hire out from the guild down south for regular furniture, and if we want fine furniture we hire from the capitol.”

Theissen wondered slightly if the guild in the south was where Tolbetan had settled. He had mentioned it once. But it had been such a long time since he had been home. It was possible that Tolbetan had moved on.

The shopkeeper watched Theissen with some interest, waiting for what he wanted next. Mostly the shop sold odds and ends like sugar and random pieces of tools for farming. All of the merchandise was stacked neatly on shelves of wood, displays of ham and dried beef hung next to barrels of pickled eggs, pickled meat, and various kinds of pickled vegetables. On far walls were glass jars filled with preserves and fruit sealed with wax and cloth. Honey in clay jars were stacked carefully next to them. They had rock salt and even bolts of cloth obviously imported from another town. Theissen had come in originally because of what he saw in the window display: brass instruments such as a mechanical clock, a gas lantern, and sharpening stones lay on a cloth next to what looked like a Lumen style whetstone. Theissen had discovered along the way that he had lost his pocketknife. He also sought a few other items for their journey, like candles, soap, dried meat, and pickled vegetables. It seemed the best place to start gathering supplies as well as information.

“Do you know anyone in the village that needs a carpenter right now?”

Glancing back towards his shelves where a few pegs were gone and things were dangerously tilting, the shopkeeper said, “Oh, I’m sure all of us could use a little help. Do you have a carpenter in your caravan? Because it first sounded like you were seeking one.”

Theissen bowed. “No. I was just checking out the competition. My name is Theissen Darol Mukumar Carpenterson of Lumen Village, and I am—”

“Lumen Village did you say?” The shopkeeper’s eyes grew wide, inspecting Theissen’s face more with surprise.

Nodding, and looking up, Theissen replied, “Yes. Lumen. And I am seeking some temporary work.”

Still staring, the shopkeeper immediately gestured to the shelves. “These need fixing. Lumen Village. Well, I’ll be.”

But Theissen did not go to them. He held back. “Why do you keep repeating that? Is something wrong with being from Lumen?”

Shaking his head vigorously, the shopkeeper practically jumped back to Theissen in the posture of begging. “Oh, no! Not wrong. Just unexpected.”

“How?” Theissen slowly walked towards the shelves, maneuvering around the shop counter to reach them, sure that the man was not angry or frightened. There was no stink of either in the flow that he could smell. His manner was just strange.

Nearly cowering, the shopkeeper said, “Because, Lumen is famous for its carpenters. It is said that the master carpenter there has the hands of a god, and that his sons are equally skilled to the point of magic.”

Theissen flushed. He wondered if the steward to Lord Baron Kirsch had told his master that he was a wizard after all. That would be troublesome.

“But we thought that all his sons had gone out by now. One of them is down with the guild.”

Smirking, Theissen nodded to himself. So Tolbetan was there.

“The other is in the capitol, and his fame is enormous,” the shopkeeper said, grinning and wringing his hands.

Nodding again, Theissen smiled broader. “That would be Dalance.”

His eyes going wider, the shopkeeper nodded. “Yes! That’s his name. Dalance Carpenter. Master.”

Lifting his eyebrows, Theissen thought it was funny thinking of Dalance as a master carpenter. However Dalance was married and had a shop. Technically, his oldest brother would be a master by then.

“Any mention of Kinnerlin in Coastal Town?” Theissen asked, turning his head curiously.

The shopkeeper shook his head. “No, but we do not hear much from the distant west. News of the famed carpenter of Lumen comes from Skarbrone City. A lord baron over there owns practically all of the Master of Lumen’s best pieces.”

Theissen smirked. The shopkeeper noticed the look and blinked at him.

“Pardon? You don’t think so?”

Turning towards the shelf, Theissen lifted off the merchandise and set them aside on the selling counter. “Well, I met Lord Baron Kirsch of Skarbrone City, and he’s the kind of man that likes to push his weight around. And personally,” he gave the shelf a heave, dislodging it from its spot, “I thought his demands of my father were unreasonable.”

“Your father?”

Theissen nodded. “He had my father working morning to night for an entire month to finish a job that should have taken him three months to finish. Unreasonable. My brother and I were worked to the bone also, though my father took the brunt of the lord baron’s lunacy.”

“But…” The shopkeeper followed as Theissen took a tape from off his belt to measure the shelf space and the damaged peg holes, then feeling about for a way to mend the shelf. “You are talking about a lord baron. They are powerful men.”

Turning his eyes from his work to see the man, Theissen nodded. “And my father constantly does business with lord barons. Lord Baron Kirsch was no one special.”

“No one special?” The shopkeeper seemed to go weak hearing that, leaning against his counter. “He owns half the land between Dhilia City and Skarbrone City.”

Theissen blinked, stopping his work and setting down the tape measure. “He does?”

“Didn’t you know?” the shopkeeper asked.

Shaking his head, Theissen then shrugged, going back to work. “Nope. But it is not surprising. He had talked like he owned half the world.”

The shopkeeper stood speechless for several minutes. In that time, Theissen requested any spare wood the shopkeeper had on hand to use as a rest to attach to the shelf side. As soon as he got the piece, Theissen proceeded to attach it with glue and nails, all acquired at the shop. The shop had nearly everything he needed anyway. In the end, Theissen made the shopkeeper’s pay an even exchange for the carpentry supplies he needed.

“So…so…you do all that elegant carving like the carpenter in the capitol does?” The shopkeeper wrapped up some dried herbs and pickles for Theissen also to take with him.

Giving a nod and then looking out into the street through the shop window to where the shopkeeper said was the baker’s shop, Theissen replied, “Of course. It is our particular trade.”

Suddenly the shopkeeper clasped his arm. “Then wait just a moment!”

Watching him rush through the back room door and up the stairs to his living quarters above, Theissen could hear the shopkeeper stomp about upstairs, the roof creaking along with the rafters. The dangling oil lamp swung on its chain, rocking along with the other lamps. The windows lightly shook as his footsteps thundered overhead. Dashing back down his steps, the shopkeeper sprinted to where Theissen still stood in the doorway. He crammed a piece of paper into Theissen’s hand.

“Please…” He was breathless. “…come back when you are done over at the Baker’s and make this cabinet for me! I promised my wife I would go to the capitol and buy one. But you must know how traveling is. I’d rather die than get jumped for my goods on the roads.”

Opening the worn and folded paper, he turned it in his palm. Theissen’s eyes scanned over the rough sketch of a two-door cabinet with glass windows and edges with daisies carved into it. Grinning with a nod, he raised his eyes to meet the shopkeeper’s with a smile. “It would be my pleasure. Just purchase the materials before then. I cannot provide the wood or the glass, or even the silver handles you have here since I am just a journeyman on foot right now.”

The shopkeeper still trembled with excitement, smiling wider like a man who had just found his first love. “Of course! Of course! I’ll be waiting for your return!”

Taking that as a release, Theissen stepped back outside then down into the muddy road. He crossed it straight over to the Baker’s.

His meeting with that man went in a similar fashion. After gathering supplies for his fellow travelers, the baker jumped when he heard Theissen was a carpenter from Lumen. Mostly the baker needed work on shelving and his chairs. He also required a step stool for his shop, needing it as soon as possible. Then he referred Theissen to the Bookseller who requested several shelves to be fixed and a rolling ladder to reach the high shelves, the moment after Theissen introduced himself. The Cobbler wanted more shoe molds made in exchanged for shoes to replace the former birdmen and women’s weak soled shoes, and the Hatter requested several stools along with racks for selling hats in exchange for a handful of hats for Theissen’s companions. Each one passed him to another person with work that needed to be done. By the end of the day Theissen returned to the barn with seventeen orders from the village, most of the jobs dealing with common household items that needed to be fixed or replaced. The rest were orders for ornate furniture pieces the villagers were willing to pay large amounts of money for.

“You look happy,” one of the former birdmen said to him with a less than happy grind in his voice.

Theissen cast him a tired look as he walked to the stall. “Would you prefer that I was unhappy? Honestly. I go out to find work so we will have money and supplies for our trip, and you complain.”

“We’re hungry, tired and footsore,” that man snapped, still glaring at him. If he still had wings, he would have ruffled them. “And