Recovery in the Enclave — Song of Arventis, Part Two
The Fabled Bard Arventis Recovers From His Wounds in a Druidic Enclave
Link to The Song of Arventis — Part One
Gastric disaster haunted Arventis for the remainder of his life after drinking the sour water from that pig trough. Bloody, battered, and full of pig water, he crawled his way out of the sty, away from where Giovik’s thugs might find him again, and through sheer force of will, made it out of town to the edge of the forest. But then his bowels betrayed him.
“How’s this?” said a chirping voice somewhere beyond the fog of Arventis’s discomfort. He rolled on his back, covered in mud, blood, and excrement. Above him stood a druid painted in her people’s mud swirls, carrying a bag of supplies from town. A pretty face stared back at him.
“Ungh,” Arventis said, trying to form a sentence. Even with death groping at him, he felt the flush of embarrassment at a beautiful woman seeing him so feeble. The druid bent to inspect, but straightened back up when the smell of him assaulted her nostrils. She took pity on the poor creature, and brought him back to her enclave to treat his wounds. But his bowels never did recover their former glory.
For the first several nights, it seemed he would die. He drifted in and out of fever dreams, unsure what to make of the painted people working around him with their heads adorned in antlers. The druids brought him to their Pool of Frogs, and laid him with care into its sacred waters, which he fouled with his effluvium. Despite the desecration, the warm waters worked wonders on Arventis.
The following evening, he had recovered enough to sing for them. He chose a song he knew about their sacred frog — perhaps the only song he knew which didn’t mock frog worship. The forest dwellers loved it. Wouldn’t cease their requests for him to sing it, night after night.
To Arventis’s ear, it sounded awful. His beloved lute undoubtedly decorated Giovik’s shelves, stolen to recover some of Arventis’s debts, and without the lute to accompany, the song felt unfinished. And besides, his voice still scratched and rasped with pain. But it didn’t seem to matter to the druids.
So he passed a moon, his gashed leg healed, and he sang “The White Frog of Marva” every night. Fed on well-spiced mushrooms and berries, bedded on soft boughs with blankets of brindle fluff, he almost enjoyed himself. The adoring fans certainly helped. He began to imagine a life with the druids, wherein he joined them at the circle to chant under the moon, and in the forest to forage during the day.
But his imagination left much to desire. He didn’t want to learn to identify plants. And chanting felt too much like singing for the talentless. His voice should be front and center, of course.
So once his leg could bear his weight, he decided to leave the enclave. The time had come to refocus on his mission: get the fuck out of Dellin. His disdain for the place grew the longer her stayed. Sure, the country had some kind druids. It had bustling cities, full of spiced foods Arventis delighted in gobbling down. But, as far as Arventis was concerned, the Four could take the country and sink it to the bottom of the ocean. He thanked the druids with one more song, and made to leave.
“Return to us when you have recovered your instrument, bard,” said Hilgar, first among equals in the enclave. “We would hear you play.”
“Of course,” Arventis said and bowed, his back laden with supplies given him by Hilgar moments before. “You have shown me such generosity. Showing you how ‘The White Frog of Marva’ is meant to be played is the least I could do.”
Hilgar shook his head, a “Our duty to the Forest Spirit mandates we care for those too weak to care for themselves, whether they be man or beast,” Hilgar said, bowing his head so the antlers almost brushed Arventis’s nose. The bard frowned at that, but reworked his face to a mask of gratitude.
“You have a lovely… tree… village. It would be lovely to visit again.”
As he walked through the forest, his feet shod in grass slippers given him by the druids, he laughed at the thought. He would have himself flayed before he returned to this place. Dellin had shown him his true self, and it was the worst part of himself. A lecherous, greedy, easily manipulated seeker of joy. The man he was in Bergot would not have gambled away his entire purse on a couple hands of cards to impress a woman. And not just because gambling halls were harder to find there, and the women lest interested in gamblers. No. He preferred a better version of himself, one more dedicated to the purity of music. In his head, he composed a song for this land of thieves and brutes and beauties. Something heavy and slurred, and absolutely venomous.
If you stuck around this long, hopefully you enjoyed the story and didn’t simply finish it out of spite. And if you liked it, do my ego a favor and throw some claps, maybe a response, or a follow my way.
Arventis has a long journey ahead of him. I can promise music (on the page), violence (on the page), and disease (on the page, as well as in my own body on occasion). New chapter every Thursday.
