Chapter Text
The figure hunched and pushed forward through anchoring snows, his shoulders braced against the jerking drag of the sled behind him. Sometimes he envied the easy way it perched atop the icy ground on its runners, untroubled by the gravity which seemed to be winding into his bones at each stride. Wind nipped and whistled plaintively into one ear where the fur on his cap had torn away last night and he instinctively moved to adjust it before remembering the clumsy mittens wrapped into leather traces which held his sled from crashing back down the slope. With a grunt, he bore it out for the last stretch of his journey by humming along with it as if it were music. Somehow, that made the pain fade away.
At last the house came into view and relief lightened his chest, quickened his steps. The thinner snow on high, rocky ground likely helped in that regard, he supposed. He stepped sideways and relied on one arm to pull, steadying the sled on the stones to avoid it bouncing and clattering over the edge of the narrow cliff path which led up to the squat white building he called home. As it loomed ahead, a trickle of dread wound in his gut and, although he squashed it down until the sled was fully under cover of the shed and the oilskins over the front were laced shut once more, he drew the mittens from his hands with slow anticipation of the worst. The touch of bare skin to wooden handle told him that his fears were accurate.
Kidre stared into the hollow, dark pit where the fire lived and sniffed the air with a heavy sigh. Where coals had banked a low heat to keep away the chill, there was silence and a damp thickness in the air which had him briefly considering closing the door and walking away again. Eventually, however, the chattering of teeth reestablished sense and he removed his boots, unlacing the thankfully well waxed leather with stiff, aching fingers and shrugging out of his oiled overcoat to hang it on the back of the double layered wooden door. The planks looked dry and the moss was starting to wilt - he must mend that soon. With a final disgusted glance at the fireplace, he approached it to begin the laborious task of emptying the wet, dead ashes and scrounging what coals he could from them.
Knees clicking as he lowered himself onto the bed near the fire a while later to begin eating his stew, Kidre relaxed into the hum of warmth finally entering his muscles and the almost determined crackle and hiss of chilled wood burning too hot and too quickly. Toes flexed perilously close to the flames and he shivered as the last chills began to leave his joints. Even his face felt less stiff and numb, now. Sighing with contentment, he allowed his thoughts to drift for a while.
"Find youself a wife before you are eaten by wolves and our line dies entirely." His mother had told him, time and time again. His mother was a drunken harridan and she was dead, now, but her words still echoed in the quiet cottage sometimes. The thought of her one fear, losing her lineage, coming true amused Kidre far more than it should have and he often wondered if the reason he was unmarried was because the witch had so desperately wanted him wed. Tucking into another bowl of stew from the pot, he tilted his head and eyed the flames. 'A wife would keep the fire from dying out.' He reasoned. On the other hand, she would speak to him and want things. Children, linens, chickens, more than one pot! No, heaven forbid it. He was too tired for such unreasonable demands. His life was fine.
Waking up to the bleating of goats, the man blinked and rubbed his face with a groan. Eyes stung from cold and smoke, skin unwashed before he had fallen asleep in his travel clothes. The seams and laces bit into his skin, leaving bruising marks where his weight had pressed them too tightly against his hip and shoulder. The bulky fur-lined jacket had left his neck at an odd angle and been too warm and he was lightly glossed with an uncomfortably sour sweat. The fire, left to burn too hot, was out again. With several curses directed at the goats, for lack of anyone else to blame, he shook himself out of bed and padded on cold feet across the wooden floor to the bucket he kept beside the wash basin. The floor needed waxing...
Firmly ignoring the still packed sled in the overhang and the goats, who nudged and bit him at every turn, Kidre managed to draw a bucket of water from the well after smashing through ice thick enough to jar his limbs. Emptying it into the goats' half-barrel, he drew another for himself and went inside, leaving the walls unlaced but firmly shutting the door between himself and the animals, a few of whom slumped against it for warmth. "Stop chewing my sled." He roared through the door, and heard a bleating skitter in response. Damned goats. They didn't even give much milk, now. If they were tended year-round instead of left to their own devices for much of it they would be more useful, but he had work to do. An image of sturdy legs jammed into boots, akimbo on a stool as soft, skilled hands milked a clean and shining goat and red cheeks crinkled long-lashed eyes at him as he passed had him hooking the bucket over the fireplace with more of a clatter than intended. Grumpily dismissing the infantile and futile notion once more, he set a proper fire - a slow one, this time, and busied himself cleaning and drying out his boots ready for oiling and waxing before unbuckling and unlacing out of his travel clothes to give himself a much needed wash.
There was a copper bath in the far corner of the kitchen, dusty from disuse. Sometimes, he wondered if perhaps the effort and time to fill it would be worthwhile, but he never followed up on these thoughts either. Today, however, he closed his eyes and imagined returning in the evenings, sun low and goats well fed and quiet in their newly built barn, to find it steaming by the fire for him. To spend perhaps even an hour! An hour bathing until his skin was scented with whatever she had put into the water and the scent of cooking food, prepared in more than one pot, surrounded him. What a world that would be.
Until she demanded that they moved to the town or built more rooms or... A garden. She would say that it was for vegetables but he would return from working to find flowers and then, when they froze, she would begin to beg for a greenhouse. The thought tied his stomach in knots and after that the cloth dipped into hot water but lukewarm by the time it touched his skin seemed perfectly acceptable again.
He emptied the sled, meat hung in the cold room below the house and the fish splayed and smoking inside its tent, wood stacked neatly inside the overhang shed and covered with woven cloth to season it properly. The few vanity items - soap which the shopkeeper had told him contained some kind of herb, golden tea leaves, salt and cinnamon, bunches of dried thyme, a replacement spring for his watch - these he brought into the house along with a few skins and furs which the tanner had cured for him last Autumn and kept longer than intended due to the terrible storms Winter had brought. When finally Kidre could warm himself by the fire and chew down several barely smoked fish along with his faintly acidic tea, he turned to glance at the bed behind him and mentally added 'fresh linens' to his list of tasks this Spring. Judging by the melt he had passed on his way up the passive peak below this one, Spring was not far away now. Some of the goats even seemed to be in kid, which was a good sign that the snow was due to disappear on his sunny little point of ground. The slopes, however, were another story. Most of them barely saw the sun and would remain treacherous, worse for the water flowing down them from above. The paths to town would be nigh on impassable for a while.
If he was going to send a notice to the post house, it had to be soon.
