Hello everyone, this is Asclepius, with the next chapter in this wonderful story by Olthadur, entitled

The Pilgrimage of Virtue

Background music by Smartsound

Chapter 4, “The Sailor’s Tale”

The campfire crackled as we all got comfortable. Our eyes and, more importantly, our ears were directed to the Sailor.

“You are certain it is safe? I heard there is a troll that lives in the pass,” the Scholar said.

“There are nine of us,” the Sailor said.

“Not all of us are fighters,” the Tailor added.

“Virtue is on our side,” the Elder said. “Tell your story, Sailor.”

“Worry not, this is a happy tale,” began the Sailor. “It ends well, unlike the Soldier’s.

“My tale is about a boy. A man, verily, when this tale is all told. He was born in a small village in Verdantis in a modest home. He had little to show for himself. His father was a cobbler. His mother was a seamstress. They made clothing and shoes in the hamlet they lived in. It kept them fed, but gave them little else.

“This boy was well liked, true to himself, fair to look at despite the dirt that was seemingly always on his young face.

“His heart was set on the mayor’s daughter. She was his age and beautiful. She was well dressed, wealthy and well educated – for the area. She wasn’t a Brittany scholar, or a wealthy Lady of Resolute – but she was beautiful.

“Our hero courted her, picked daffodils and dandelions for her, cleaned his face in the puddles of the street, and learnt to sew his own fine clothes from his mother.

“His love, the mayor’s daughter, endured him. She smiled and accepted the flowers. She spent time with him and was kind to him. But she did always speak about going to Harvest to live. Other times she spoke about leaving to Valhold. Or even Brittany. She wanted to live in a large city with stone houses and stone streets and hundreds of people.

“Our hero smiled and nodded and said ‘Where ever you go, I will follow.’ He said this so often that the Mayor’s daughter began to believe it to be true.

“By the time they were in their late teens they were the couple of the hamlet. When they walked by, hand in hand, people would smile and say ‘There walks true love!’ and ‘He saw through the class and silk and she saw through the burlap and dirt.’

“It was true, you know. They did love each other. As much as they were able to.

“Time went on. Our hero wanted to give the entire Island of Norgard to his love. So he started to look at how to get her there and give her a place to live in a stone house on a stone street.

“He needed a job, something that would pay their way and would buy that stone house on the stone street. He couldn’t make that coin in the small hamlet they lived in.

” ‘I must go my love!’ he said one day, holding her hand tightly.

” ‘No! I can’t go on without you!’ she replied.

“They went on like this, as lovers do. Our hero eventually persuaded his love that he must, indeed, go. He was offering her everything she wanted, and it was the only way she believed she could get it. They would talk through letters. He would constantly update her on how things were progressing and how close they were to moving to Norgard.

“I won’t tell you the details of what he did. But he worked. More than most would. His heart was in it. He worked two jobs if finding work was difficult. He worked through his free time. He worked the land, on boats, underground, protecting caravans, anything that gave coin. And he saved every coin he could.

“And he wrote a book of letters to his love. He spoke of his work, where he went,