• Memory • You get a line and I'll get a pole

[Oram Mednix]

Mid-Ashan? Arc 703

The hunter held a piece of witch hazel between his knees and chopped a deep cleft with his hatchet into one end with practiced ease. One, two, three, four sharp strokes, and the split went down several inches of the branch’s length. Awkwardly, the boy tried to imitate this move with his own hatchet on a similar length of witch hazel. The hatchet’s edge struck off-center and skidded down the side of the stick, barely making a nick in the end, and nearly scratching the boy’s finger.

The hunter jumped up, his eyes widening in alarm. ”Son! You Okay?” He walked over and touched the small hand gripping the stick. Oram looked up. ”I’m okay, Dad,” he answered, more concerned by his father’s reaction than by his near-miss with the hatchet.

Oleg calmed down, then knelt down next to his son. ”You’re swinging back too far with the hatchet. You’re not chopping down a tree with an axe; it’s more like a punch, remember?” The boy gazed attentively at his father’s face and nodded. Oleg put his hand around Oram’s smaller one and positioned it over the stick. ”There, start your punch from there. Choke up more on your grip, too. And I’m going to hold my hand here, just over yours, to make sure you don’t backswing, alright?”

The man held his large hand just a few inches over the boy’s. ”Go ahead,” he told his son. The boy chopped at the end of his stick with the hatchet. ”Good,” said Oleg. ”Again, keep going until you’ve got a good split.” The boy chopped again. And again. After a few chops -several more than his father had taken- the boys hatchet had split far enough into the witch hazel that it started to bind.

”Careful, Or,” the hunter said. ”Don’t try to yank the hatchet out, rock it out gently, remember?” The boy nodded, and rocked the hatchet, handle up and down until it worked free of the wood.

The hunter next grabbed a small stick, a bit longer than his thumb and much narrower, whittled slightly flat on two sides. ”You’ve still got yours, right?” he asked his son. Oram looked down to the ground next to his feet. He felt a trill of panic when he didn’t see the little stick where he expected it, but it was lying just a few inches away. He must have jostled it while he was splitting the witch hazel. When he found it he picked it up and showed it to his father.

”Good,” said Oleg. ”Now, you’re going to take that little stick and wedge it down into the split crossways. When it gets hard to push with your fingers, start hammering down on the ends until it’s down far enough into the split. You want about a split about the width of your hand.” He looked down at his son. ”The width of *my* hand.”

Oram couldn’t wait until he was as big as his dad. He grinned as he imagined that. ”Push down on the opposite end with your thumb while you hammer,” Oleg said, his voice cutting into his son’s reverie. ”You want your crosspiece as straight across as possible. Good. Now, when it starts getting hard to hammer down one side of the crosspiece, switch to the other side.” After a few trills of hammering, the hunter held up his split stick to show off the crosspiece. ”There, like that. Now show me yours.”

Oram showed his dad his progress. Oleg examined his son’s stick critically. ”A little farther down, maybe a finger’s breadth.” Oram hammered a little longer, than held up his stick again. ”Better”, said Oleg. ”Now we take a bit of twine and lash the crosspiece to the spear. I’ll just do both of ours right now so we can get to fishing. But this afternoon you can practice tying it yourself if you like.” Oram nodded. He liked learning stuff like this. He watched his father take a length of cattail pith and wrap it around both the crosspiece and shaft of his crawdad spear. Then he did the same with Oram’s. The boy was sure he’d be able to do it himself later that trial. Dad would be so impressed!

A thought occurred to him a few trills later as his father handed him back his now-lashed spear. "Do we need to sharpen the prongs?" he asked.

Oleg shook his head. "You don't stick the crayfish with those prongs. You *catch* 'em with 'em. You want them alive and well for as long as possible."

"Can you use them for live bait?"

"You sure can. I'll tell you all about that later." Oleg rose. "Now let's get to the water."

[Oram Mednix]

The nine billion names of Pinchy

”Dad, what’s the difference between crayfish and crawdads?” the boy asked as they walked along the creek. The sun was just starting to peek above the trees lining the banks, and the air was still cool enough for his breath to steam.

Oleg was peering down into the creek. Oram wasn’t sure what he was looking for. ”No difference,” the hunter said without looking up from his scan of the water. ”They’re different names for the same thing.”

The boy frowned. ”Why is there more than one name for it? And which one is right?”

”They’re both right, and more names are right besides. Crayfish, crawfish, crawdad, mudbug…the crayfish wanders far and wide, you see, and visits all the creeks and rivers of Idalos. And in every land, to every people, he is known by a different name. Among the Sev’ryn of Desnind, he is called the bawookawooka. To the river Mer, he is a god revered by the name Pinchy the Magnificent.”

Oram rolled his eyes. ”Dad!” he groaned. He was almost ten. Far too big for that sort of kid stuff.

Turning serious once more, Oleg turned and pointed. ”Let’s dig a shallow hole right here in the wet sand.”

”Is that for the crawdads -crayfish? Should we fill it with water?”

”That’s right. And this close to the creek, there’s water under the surface, anyway. That’s why the sand’s wet. So it should fill itself.”

Oram knelt down and started scooping out the wet sand with his hands. ”How deep?” he asked.

”Just deep enough for it to start filling up a little. You want them to stay wet, but not be able to hide from you.”

The boy kept digging. Sand yielded to moisture. He scooped out a bit more and water started to appear in the bottom of the hole, just as his dad had said. ”Is this deep enough?” he called out. His father, who had returned to scanning the water, turned and looked. ”Just a bit deeper,” he responded. ”A couple fingers. And when it’s deep enough, get some rocks to put around the edge, like you would for a campfire.”

When Oram had finished, he went to join his father at the water’s edge. Oleg pointed. ”See all these flat rocks, Or? Crayfish love to hide under rocks like this. So what you do is you find a rock and, if it’s a big one, you wait next to it for a crayfish to peek out. If it’s a small enough rock…” he bent down, reached into the water and moved just such a rock, ”…you flip and see if there’s anything underneath. Like this one. See it?”

The hunter straightened up and poised his spear.

”Oh, yeah! I see it, dad!” the boy said brightly, as his father struck with a short, sharp jab. Oram had, in truth, seen nothing but rocks.

Oleg pulled up his spear. Between the witch hazel prongs wriggled a dark, reddish crayfish, not quite three inches long. Oram watched it with fascination. ”How many legs do you see?”

Oram squinted. ”Eight.”

Oleg walked towards the hole that his son had dug. ”It’s ten, actually. You forgot the two big ones with the claws.”

”Aren’t those arms? You asked about the legs.”

”Heh, good point. Eight legs and two arms, then.” Oleg held the crayfish spear horizontally over the hole and rotated it so that the crayfish hung tail up. With a quick flick, he dropped the creature into the small pool. Then he started to walk back towards the water. ”Now how about you use that spear to help your dad catch some more.”

[Oram Mednix]

Stabby grabby, nab the yabby

Oram was getting discouraged. His father had already caught two more crayfish, and he had yet to even see his first one. ”How are you finding them?” he asked at length, his voice shaking with frustration.

”Look for movement,” Oleg said. ”Also, you have to get used to what he color looks like underwater. Here.” The father held out his spear point towards his son so that he could see the crayfish clearly. Then he lowered it carefully into the water. He didn’t put it all the way to the bottom, for fear the crayfish would escape. ”See that?” he asked his son. ”See what it looks like against the rocks? Look for that.” He stirred the tip slightly. ”Look for that moving.”

The boy looked, thought he understood. Nodded. Almost immediately his father pointed. ”There’s one!” he exclaimed. ”Do you see it?”

This time, Oram saw it. It was a tiny, inconspicuous thing, and he realized he might have seen a dozen such earlier and thought nothing of them. Excited, he poised his spear over the reddish form and then jabbed. When he brought up the spear, the dripping prongs were empty.

Oleg patted him encouragingly on the shoulder. ”That was a good jab, actually. Good technique. But your aim is off.”

”I aimed straight at it!” the boy protested.

”That you did. And that’s what you did wrong. Here, see the shaft of my spear? Watch carefully.”

Oleg stuck his spear shaft into the water and Oram, for the first time, noticed the illusion: it looked like the shaft broke, with the bit in the water floating separately, out a bit farther from his dad than the rest of it. ”Okay, son,” he said, looking up towards Oram and pointing to his son’s spear. ”I want you to pick a rock in the water. And then I want you to aim straight for where you see it, and try to touch it with your spear. See what happens.”

Oram picked a pale, round rock the size of his hand that stood out against the dark creek bed. Aiming dead center he jabbed, then stopped and looked. ”Woah!” he said in awe. His spear had struck the rock, but had only just caught the edge. Where it entered the water, the shaft appeared broken away from him just like his dad’s had. He looked up. ”Does all water do that, or just the ‘Run?” he asked.

His father thought a moment. ”All water, I think. Yes, I’m sure. You see the same effect at the docks, if you look at stuff like ropes or piles that go into the water.”

”Why does water do that? How?”

Oleg shrugged. ”No idea. Maybe it’s a curse put on all water by Pinchy the Magnificent. But the important point is that you know how to correct your aim. Oh! And one more thing: aim a bit towards the back of the crayfish. They walk backwards.”

Oram tried a couple more jabs with his spear at the pale rock, correcting his aim until he could jab it in the center. Then he and Oleg both resumed looking for crayfish. Oram could see them more easily now, and he spotted one soon enough, but missed it. A couple breaks later he spotted another one, and this time he got it. Eagerly he brought it up and called out to his dad to look. Once he’d had a good look at it, he didn’t feel as excited, for it was quite small. ”Is it too small, dad?” he asked.

His father beamed proudly. ”Too small for what? You can eat a little crayfish as easy as a big one. You just have to eat a few more of them.” He peered appraisingly at the thing, hardly an inch long. There were bugs bigger than that. Oram could see why they were sometimes called “mudbugs”.

”That said,” his father added thoughtfully, ”I’d probably use this one for bait rather than eating it. Hold on.” He waded onto shore, stuck his spear prongs into the wet sand at the creek’s edge, and started to look around in some tall grass.

Oram watched him, spear poised in the air with the small creature hanging, mostly motionless, between the prongs. ”What do we catch with bait like this?” he asked.

”Smallmouth mostly,” his father answered, as he plucked a long green blade of grass. ”Sometimes drum. Even perch, if its big enough.”

He waded back into the water. ”Here, I’ll show you how we bait this.” He made a look and tied a simple bight, then slipped it onto the crayfish from behind. ”Obviously, you don’t come from the front because of the claws.”

”Can’t the claws get you from behind, too?”

Oleg shook his head as he slipped the loop over the creature’s legs and tightened it right behind the large forelimbs. ”They can’t reach over their shoulders like we can,” he replied. ”If they get an itch on their backs they have to get another crayfish to scratch it for them. Sometimes if you’re lucky you can find them together, scratching each other’s backs with their claws.”

Oram looked at his father skeptically. ”Is that really true?” he demanded.

His father’s face was blank. ”Of course,” Oleg intoned solemnly, ”I’ve seen it myself. But let’s stay focused. Once you’ve tightened the loop, you hook the fishing hook under it, facing backwards.” He pantomimed with a hooked finger. ”Then you tighten the look and finish with a square knot on it. You can tie it snugly and it won’t bother the crayfish any, on account of the shell.”

He worked the creature deftly from the prongs of Oram’s spear and dangled it from the long end of the grass blade. ”You put it in the water tail-up,” he continued, ”and you sink it as far down in the water as you can without actually touching bottom. The fish come at it from behind, and the hook get’s ‘em right in the roof of the mouth.” Oram nodded, only half-following. He was still trying to picture crayfish scratching each others’ backs.

His father walked over to their hole and dropped the small crayfish in, still tied to its grass blade. Then they fished some more. Over a little more than half a break, Oram caught one more, about the same size as his first, while his father caught about five, all noticeably bigger. The boy was just about to give up when he finally caught one of decent size, nearly three times the size of the other two, in fact. He cried out excitedly and held it out for his father to see. ”Very nice,” Oleg said, as he watched the thing writhe in the prongs of his son’s spear. ”Pinchy himself in all his glory.” He squinted up to the sun, which by now had risen well clear of the treetops. ”About time we finished here for the morning. We can fish some more come evening. We’ll make new spears, and I can show you how to lash the crosspiece properly.” The pair waded to shore and shook their last catches into their hole.

[Doran]

Oram:

Knowledge:
[Fieldcraft] Choke-gripping and push-cutting with a hatchet offers greater control.
[Fieldcraft] How to make a crayfish spear from scratch.
[Detection] Finding crayfish in the water.
[Fishing] How to catch live crayfish with a spear.
[Fishing] Using crayfish as bait for bigger fish.
[Fishing] Correcting for refraction when aiming at something underwater.

Loot: -
Wealth: -
Injuries: -
Renown: -
Magic XP: -
Skill Review: Appropriate to level.
Points: 10

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Comments: I like little Oram!

The interaction between Oram and Oleg was interesting, and the dialogue was entertaining and felt natural.

Oleg seems like a good father to me. He’s not mad at his son because of his near-miss, but concerned and tells him how to do it correctly.

When they talked about fish and Oleg mentioned “Pinchy the Magnificent”, I was rather amused.

I found their fishing trip really enjoyable, and I hope you’ll write more threads that take place in Oram’s childhood sometime.

Enjoy your rewards!