It took another day for Niall to complete chopping the tree into usable logs. As he placed the last log onto the covered stack, he was surprised at the sense of satisfaction that he felt. Too often, he could come home after a day at work and not be able to think of anything tangible that he had achieved. The busy work of meetings and calls and presentations, not leading to anything. However, this, this was real. A stack of wood that would dry out for a year, maybe longer, ready to keep Devon and his family warm through the winter.

He sharpened, oiled and put away the axe as he had been shown and then walked round to the front of the house. Devon and Alana were sharing a mid-morning coffee. They did not see him as he approached and he felt a pang of, well, he was not quite sure what it was. What he did know was that something about the older married couple giggling together that struck a bittersweet note in him.

Devon saw Niall standing watching them and waved him over. “Coffee?”

Niall nodded with a grateful smile and took a seat on the bench while Devon went to fetch him a mug from indoors. Alana gave them both a smile and went back to the kitchen garden where she had been working all morning.

“So,” Devon handed him the steaming coffee as he spoke. “The tree all done?”

“Yup, and the logs are stacked to dry under the rafters as well as the tools all oiled and put away.”

Devon grinned. “Which were my next two questions. Good work. We’ll make a lumberjack out of you yet. How’s your Testimony looking?”

Niall called it up.

TESTIMONY: Niall Vendra

ATTRIBUTES

Strength: 6

Endurance: 6

Speed: 3

Agility: 3

Will: 3

Perception: 2

CLASSES

None

UNALLOCATED SKILLS

- Flow 3

- Minor Healing: 1

- Steelmind 12

- Telepathy 1

- Woodcutting 4

“Better than they were. I’ve got another couple of points in Strength, Endurance, and Will. My Flow Skill is up to three and my Woodcutter is up to four.” He frowned. “No change to my Minor Healing Skill though.”

“Well, that’s to be expected. You’re only dealing with blisters and the like. But that’s a solid increase everywhere else in just a few days. Let’s put those new muscles to good use. Like I said, there are a dozen other jobs that need getting on with. Follow me.”

Over the next few days, Devon and his family started to involve him in the myriad tasks that needed to be done around the smallholding. Niall was intellectually aware that there was a significant proportion of the world that lived without electricity or running water or indoor toilets but now he was living with what that meant in practice.

Over the next week, Niall started to fall into a pattern. He soon did not need to be told which of the regular jobs he had to do that day, getting up before breakfast like the rest of the family to pull his weight. What the jobs would be on any particular day would vary from fetching water from the well, feeding the animals and collecting the eggs, bringing in wood and lighting the fire, heating water for washing, or making breakfast for them all.

Once Kiran had headed off to school, Niall would head out to work in the kitchen garden under Alana’s direction. He had never seen the appeal in gardening before but planting seeds, or weeding plants knowing that he would be eating the results made a lot of sense to him. He caught himself once with his gloved hands deep in the soil and gave a small smile. The designer-labelled person that he was just weeks earlier would be horrified at what he was doing. Then, with a shake of the head, he got back to digging up the potatoes.

With Kiran home by lunchtime the afternoons were varied. It could be anything from carrying out small repairs around the site with Alana, to pitching in with everyone else with washing day, to learning how to cook with Devon. The last was a slow start. Cooking for him meant calling for takeout or, if he was being particularly adventurous, putting a pizza in the oven. This was not that. Although Devon hid it quickly, Niall could see that his inability to even peel a carrot was not what he had expected. Nonetheless, despite his ineptitude, the process of learning to cook had the additional benefit of forcing him to learn how to heal small cuts and burns.

His favourite activity was going out to forage in the woods with one of the family. The amount of knowledge that Devon, Alana and, even, Kiran had about what was safe to eat and, more importantly, what was dangerous humbled him. However, while he absorbed the information eagerly, it was the feeling of peace as he crunched his way under the browning canopy that he cherished. It was something that he had never known before.

On regular occasions, as he was carrying out a task, Niall would pass the open forge door. Niall found it fascinating and could not help but pause for a moment and gaze in at the glow and the sparks. He had not been the sort of person that would do DIY around the house, instead getting someone in to do anything more complicated than changing a lightbulb. However, he watched mesmerised as Devon, through heat and raw muscle, would take a lump of metal and transform it into something usable.

A welcome side effect from being involved more with the family was a rapid improvement in Niall’s ability to understand and speak Gwillish. The instruction ranged from Devon and Alana teaching him individual words to Kiran chattering to him non-stop as they ranged through the woods with the dog. It took time, but the immersion in the language meant that within a month he felt able to have simple conversations with the family, and that confidence grew day by day. They were even able to start teaching him to read and write in Gwillish.

Through all of that, Niall could feel his Flow improving. Whether it was the repetition of hoeing a trench or enjoying the feeling of running through the woods with the dog, or the tactile pleasure of kneading dough or putting clothes through a mangle, every day he found it easier to lose himself in the activities.

Days passed, then days turned into weeks and it was a beautiful late autumn afternoon that saw Niall, Devon and Kiran attempting to catch fish on the riverbank. It had become a regular weekly activity for the three of them. Alana would sometimes join them, but would often encourage them to go on market day. As she said, that gave her an excuse to go into town to buy a few things or just catch up with friends.

Niall was about to cast off when he caught sight of his reflection and paused. He could barely recognise the face that looked back at him. The expensively cut hair had degraded to a shaggy brown mess around his face, the dark bags that had been a permanent accessory under his eyes had gone and cheekbones that he had never seen before stood out on the tanned skin of his face. He looked down and realised that his paunch had gone. Light muscles that he had only ever seen on other people’s bodies had appeared on his.

He felt a familiar presence in his mind. “Not so weak any more, hey Pobble?”

The Fae shard gave a sniff. “Less weak, still clueless. But at least Niall has got a class now.”

“Class? What?”

Without waiting for an answer, Niall put down his fishing rod and called up his Testimony. As he did so, he realised that it was the first time since he had done so since he had finished chopping all of that wood.

TESTIMONY: Niall Vendra

ATTRIBUTES

Strength: 10

Endurance: 10

Agility: 4

Will: 5

Perception: 2

CLASSES

Junior Smallholder 1: +2 Strength, +2 Endurance. You have the skills to be able to carry out key tasks required to work on a smallholding under supervision. ‘Under supervision’ is the key phrase here.

- Cooking 2

- Fishing 1

- Foraging 2

- Gardening 2

- Woodcutting 4

- Animal Husbandry 2

UNALLOCATED SKILLS

- Flow 3

- Minor Healing: 2

- Steelmind 12

- Telepathy 1

Note: since your last review of your Testimony your general activities have led to the following increases: +2 Strength, +2 Endurance, +1 Agility, +2 Will.

Don’t get too excited though. You’re almost done with these and, anyway, it’s only because you started off so pitifully weak.

Niall gave an involuntary yelp.

Kiran and Devon looked over. “Did you get a bite?” Devon asked.

“No. More good. I got class.” As he forced himself to do as often as possible now, Niall spoke in Gwillish. It was improving but was still poor. Nonetheless, he persevered, no matter how awkwardly things came out.

“Awesome.” Kiran jumped to his feet. “Which one?”

“Junior Smallholder.”

Kiran flopped back down. “Boring. Even I’ve got that one. If Dad allowed me to use the big axe for woodcutting without supervision, I would’ve even evolved that to Smallholder by now.”

Devon ruffled Kiran’s hair as he walked over to Niall. “Be nice. Just because everyone in our family has it, it doesn’t mean it’s common. In fact, around here, it’s mostly the few of us that live outside of town that have it. Also, Niall’s managed it fast. Faster than you at least. That’s impressive.”

As Kiran stuck his tongue out at his father, Devon held his hand out to Niall. “Congratulations. I thought you would be getting that one. I’m guessing that you just needed to get the Fishing Skill. Given how you’ve been throwing yourself into our lives, you must have all the other Skills. Alana and I were saying just last night how much easier things were around here with you.”

Niall smiled as he shook Devon’s hand. “I say it but not believe that I say it. I feels much happy to get class.”

Devon winced. “Still a little more work to do on learning Gwillish, huh? Don’t worry you’ll be there in no time. But, getting a class is no small thing for anyone. I have a bottle of Dwarvish Firewater that we should open when we get back. But, unless we want to drink on an empty stomach, we need to have some fish to take home for dinner.”

Right on cue Kiran jumped back to his feet. “I got a bite!”

Not wanting to be left behind, the two men went back to their spots as Kiran crowed with triumph at having caught a large trout. Niall cast his line back in the water but, with no hint of immediately catching a fish, he pulled up his Testimony to have a closer look.

“Pobble, have I really learnt all of those things in the last few weeks? It feels like that’s a lot.”

“Of course not, stupid Niall. Niall has only started to learn how to do those things. But, his Spirit has seen the grooves of knowledge that he has started to carve out. It can see what Niall is trying to do and helps to ease him along that path. Niall needs to keep doing those things until he consolidates that learning and it sticks. If he stops now then in a few months, or years the skills and the benefits will fade away. Even if he does consolidate them, if he does not use them for enough years then they will disappear as well.”

“That doesn’t seem very fair.”

“What has fair got to do with Niall being able to increasing his Attributes after just a few weeks of effort? Put it this way, if Niall does not chop up another tree then why would he expect to remember how to do it efficiently in a couple of years? If Niall spends the rest of the year chopping up trees then the chances are that, even if he doesn’t chop another one for a decade, he will still remember.”

Niall nodded reluctantly. He had been hoping to quickly pile up lots of skills to supercharge his attributes, but that clearly wasn’t going to work. Irritatingly, it appeared that he was actually going to have to put in some effort. “But don’t I get to choose which attributes I get to increase? Why don’t I get to choose how to allocate points?”

“Why would Niall be able to do that? That would make no sense. He has the increases in attributes because of the effort that he is putting in to learn things. If he puts effort into healing his Will increases because that is what he is using. Why would Niall be allowed to choose to let his Strength increase in that case? He has done nothing to earn that.”

“I suppose. It would be nice to have some choice though.”

“Of course Niall has choices. If he wants to increase a particular attribute then he needs to work to get a Class that will increase that attribute.”

“Well what Classes should I get then?”

“How did Pobble end up with someone like Niall? Has Pobble mentioned that Niall is very stupid? Pobble has access to Niall’s memories but Pobble does not know what Niall’s goals and desires are. How can Pobble tell Niall what he wants? What does Niall want?”

The question hit hard. What did he want? As Pobble faded into the background Niall worried at the question in his mind as he carried on fishing. What did he want?

Despite his musings, Niall managed to keep up with the others and in a couple of hours the three of them had landed eight freshwater trout between them and were ready to head back. Niall paused as he cleaned and gutted the last of the fish on a stone by the river. He shook his head wonderingly. How was he the sort of person that would not only know how to catch a fish, but know how to prepare and cook it as well? He was built for cities and offices and screens, not the outdoors. He was the go-to person in the office if there was a killer presentation required. He had skills. Just none that would help him here.

Niall paused and thought back to the board presentation that he had been losing sleep over the day that he had arrived. With a start, he realised that he couldn’t remember any of the details about it. In fact, with some guilt, he realised that he had not thought about anything to do with home for over a week now.

As he did so now homesickness washed over him in a wave. Everything that he was doing here, while fun, felt like some kind of themed holiday. This wasn’t real life. He didn’t know what it was, but he needed to get back. Pobble had not said anything yet but he would sometimes wake up in a sweat as he remembered the shadowy knives that hovered around his family.

“Niall is not off course yet. Pobble will tell him if he is.”

“Thanks, Pobble.”

He finished cleaning the fish and followed Devon and Kiran back to the house.

The melancholy continued even through dinner into the evening. As the sun was setting, with Alana still not back from town, the two men sat out on the porch of the house with their heavy cut crystal tumblers of the potent dwarvish spirit.

Devon took a sip from his glass and winced. “OK, spit it out.”