Although he had managed to conceal his concern for his daughters welfare by professing complete confidence in her abilities, even fooling his wife who was somewhat soothed by Garms apparent confidence, the dwarf was beginning to feel uneasy about her.
Normally someone like Blaise setting off on a voyage of self discovery as it might be, would take care to leave a trail of messages of various sorts be it spoken word or even just initials carved into a tree or whatever else was
handy, even a messenger pigeon if all else failed.
A complete absence of any such trail was a potentially ominous sign depending on that persons last known heading. Blaise had announced that she was going into the deep forest and had last been seen heading in that direction but Garm had been sure it was simply a gesture, a false trail and that she'd change direction once beyond the tribes ken.
All day he patiently plodded from one place to another of the burgeoning lakeside village which had grown in size considerably since his last visit. Whilst this was a good sign in terms of general prosperitym it meant that these newcomers were strangers and some were very suspicious about him and not prepared to provide any information unless or until convinced of his honesty.
Trust was hard to come by in the border lands so Garms search for information was unsatisfactory being both sparse and of dubious worth and even this meagre result had required payment albeit favours not coinage which was a rare commodity of uncertain worth.
There had never been, could never be a central ruling , body be it royalty or government and so trade was very limited and entirely based on barter or fair exchange, call it what you will. What sparse coinage did exist was
a variety of coinage mainly from ship wrecks and the elves held almost all of it since their lands were along the coastline, which was a maze of savage storm tossed reefs and outcrops. Rarely did any unfortunate mariners survive their ship wreck, Sykes was the rare exception.
So according to his sources Blaise had been seen walking along the lakeside of the deep forest or else in a small craft like a coracle from which she was fishing when spotted by a passing woodsman who had remarked upon the unusual vessel to a hunter who had passed through the lakeside village some six days before.
However the description was a very close approximation of Blaises appearance and so Garm was much relieved but determined to set out in search of his daughter who he assumed must have set up camp somewhere along the lakeside. However the deep forest was generally regarded with dread by most folk except those prepared to face danger with suitable weaponry be it axe, sword or bow.
The dangers that the deep forest concealed were many and varied, some said that forgotten cities of goblins and worse were known to exist but no one knew where and the wolves, bears and other predators were sufficient to keep anyone on their guard. The deep forest was vast and covered most of the barrier lands, encircling the lake except at its eastern end where Sykes boatyard and its community were situated.
So when Garm finally returned to their encampment it was to discover Tim fast asleep in his bunk and a pot of stew atop the stove for which he was deeply grateful to devour before going to sleep.
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