Chapter 50: Day 49

Day 49,

Morning thought: Where are Cass’s grandparents?  Dead maybe?  No one’s ever mentioned them so it feels impolite to ask.

 

I spoke to James on the way into town about the animal or whatever it was that was stalking me last night.  He said that there are some big cats that live on the north half of the island that sometimes wander down to where people are and have been known to attack on rare occasions, but the continuous droning growl I heard wasn’t something he’s heard of.  One of Cass’s siblings (Manfred, I think his name was?) piped up and said that he’d heard of other weird, dangerous animals on other islands, but it seemed unlikely that one would have wound up here.  I felt compelled to point out that it very well might have been the nature sprite messing with me again.  James conceded that possibility but encouraged me to talk to the guards about it anyway just in case.  He also said that he’d send Manfred back early today to let the rest of the family know to be on the lookout and check that part of the fields for tracks and the like.

There are always at least one or two guards around on market day, so I went ahead and took James’s advice once I’d finished helping unload.  The kid – he really couldn’t have been more than late teens – honestly seemed more excited than anything about the news.  I suppose he saw it as a chance to do something cool and heroic instead of just standing around all day or walking in a big circle for several hours in the middle of the night.  I tried to explain that I’m also being haunted by a nature sprite (even after all this time that feels like a weird thing to tell a stranger) and therefore it might turn out to be nothing more than another one of its pranks.  I’m afraid this element of the supernatural just added more glamour to the request instead of the intended tempering of expectations.  At any rate, the eager young guardsman told me he’d report this to his seniors to see about getting an extra night patrol to look into it.  He even said something about promising to join that patrol personally.  I’m not sure if he was trying to impress me there or if he was just that excited about the whole thing.

Not much else of note today.  I think Cass and I are both wanting to attempt the floating island ride before the rainy season starts, but we’re still not sure how to go about getting the supplies for it or how to make sure her parents won’t object to the idea.  I mean, I could say that joining me for exploration and documentation of this sort of thing is a part of the apprenticeship, but I would pretty much just be making that up, as I am with nearly everything else about this job.

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