Long, Long Way From Home

((OOC: Sorry for the delay, things kept getting in the way of me posting))

"Sorry to burst your bubble kid, but that is exactly what I am. Just a runaway who learned to swing a blade," she said that very quietly, almost under her breath as if she were talking to herself rather than the kid. She wasn't even sure if he'd heard it.

Whatever the case might be they finished their walk in silence and reached the camp shortly after. She wasn't surprised to see the destruction, but she was surprised by how widespread it was. In one of the corners of the camp, stinking up the place, was the carcass of one of the animals, surrounded by a couple of ruined humanoid corpses which looked like some of the bigger scavengers had already ripped a meal off of.

What had once been a verdant forest surrounding the campfire was now a wreck of its former self. Many of the trees were heavily burned, and many more had been trampled to the ground, their barks looking like massive split bones jutting from the earth. Flies were buzzing around the carcasses, their flying emitting a constant droning as they feasted. The cart was tucked away in a corner and looked mostly intact, but she feared the fire might have hit it as it spread out of control.

"Looks like they tried to either calm the damn things down or to kill them. Either way a silly move. You don't stop eight hundred pounds of muscle from rampaging. Silly raiders," she shook her head in mild disappointment as she moved about the camp. She was absolutely unaffected by the gruesome sight of the ruined bodies as she searched for more of her swords on the ground. She'd left several of them behind in her rather hasty escape and this seemed like the perfect moment to retrieve them. In all honesty this sort of scene was fairly common, hell this particular one was actually less bothersome than most because she wasn't really looking at destruction caused by herself. She had to admit the smell of charred human flesh was a bit annoying, but again, not the first time she smelled it.

"That cart should be usable, but give it a quick once over would you?" she called back at her young companion. "Make sure the fire didn't eat at the wheel or the axle in particular. We don't want the whole thing to collapse on us," her tone started out as being flat and dead, but cheered up immensely when she found one of her trusty weapons stuck to the hilt in the back of one of the raiders.[/color]

She sent a few more minutes and retrieved a couple more of her weapons, but that still left a few as missing, much to her chagrin. While looking about she'd also found what appeared to be full money pouches on a few of the corpses, and she dumped those in the cart as she made her way around it to Jonathon. She'd also managed to dig out a wine skin, and a couple of long, deep gulps from it made her feel immensely better.

"You should take a swig," she commented idly as she held the wine skin up to him. "Are we ready to head off? I'd rather not stick around to see how the local spirits will react to this if I'm perfectly honest"

Jonathon checked the whole cart while she scavenged the area. Pushing down on the back and being satisfied that it wouldn't fall apart under him he shrugged and went back to the front. He gave the wine sack a strange look when she handed it to him. Jonathon had never had any sort of alcohol, he was taught that it dulls the nerves, and thus was confused to be offered it be a skilled swords woman. "Uh...ok." Taking the container and taking a long long drink from it he coughed and heaved as the wine burnt it's way down. "What the hell is that? Are you trying to kill me?" He looked up at her. Of course, as he was saying it, he did begin to realize the burn wasn't that bad and the taste of it was almost...pleasant. He still handed the wine skin back to her and went to start pulling the cart. "Come on, let's go get the goods."

"Trust me kid, if I was trying to kill you I doubt you'd still be breathing," she replied before taking another long draught from the skin. His reaction to the drink took her a little aback, the wine wasn't particularly strong, she'd go as far as to say it was rather fruity in a pleasant way. She sniffed at the wine, maybe all her long career of drinking from questionable containers had dulled her taste buds to the point where she couldn't taste a beverage's strength anymore, but no. Even her nose couldn't detect anything strange from the drink.

"That's your first drink isn't it?" unless both her taste and her smell had somehow been dulled, which she highly doubted, she couldn't find another reason why the kid would be so taken aback by the feel of the wine. "Your tolerance for a strong drink is one of the best ways for anyone to shows he's manlier than another without either dropping his pants or unsheathing his sword. Trust me on this, people have a tendency to not toss so much crap at you after you drink them under the table a couple of times," she fastened the skin to her belt and put away her now extinguished pipe. "When you feel like you've grown a pair feel free to ask for more," she didn't doubt he would. If not today then later in his life. She knew of few people who stuck to this sort of work without drowning themselves in drink.

As she was speaking she stepped under the cart, positioning herself next to Jonathon where the draft animals usually were. She grabbed one side of the yoke, and after a few seconds of useless pushing into the mud their combined efforts finally managed to dig the wheels out of the muck, and they were on their merry way back to the goods.

It wasn't the most comfortable of tasks, they had to be weary when travelling down a slope, if the cart got out of their control it would certainly crush them under its wheels, and when travelling up a slope they had to double their effort. Thankfully the way back was mostly flat enough. Thankfully the wagon the harrier had been using was quite light, a simple two-wheeler meant for transporting goods around on short trips rather than a big heavy wagon intended for transporting people.

Jonathon didn't say much to her as they walked. He just didn't have much to say at this point. "This is the spot." He said, dropping the wagon and going over to where he stashed the boxes. Moving aside the brush he picked up the first crate and moved it over to the cart. "Now...remind me again, how far do we have to take these now?" He asked her, putting the second crate into the cart and heading back for a third.

"Not too far," Tamura looked at the sky for a few seconds before clarifying. "We should be there by sundown. Early evening if we make good progress. Mid afternoon if we don't take a break for lunch."

As she made her predictions she let her side of the cart fall to the ground and set about prying the wine skin open for a couple of seconds then took a gulp from it and shook it about a couple of times. The heavy sloshing inside assured her that the thing was at least still half-empty.

"You take this," she gently tossed the skin at Jonathon, fairly sure he'd be able to catch it. "If you stick to this path you'll need the liquid courage more than I do. Trust me on that. Plus I can get a replacement easily enough, unlike you."

With that she walked up to the crates and began loading up the wagon. They were exactly where they'd left them, haphazardly surrounding their makeshift camp. She picked one up, her feet spread wide and pulled up. She'd expected the things to be heavy, but not this heavy! She exhaled sharply in surprise. That kid had carried all of these by his lonesome from a burning camp? She could hardly believe it, but then again she didn't have much choice but to believe it. It's not like she'd helped him out and for some reasons he highly doubted the harriers had lent him a hand either.

Still, she did her part of the carrying this time, and she did it in silence, concentrating on not dropping anything and on not breaking herself in half. A few minutes later everything was loaded and ready. She swung her hands about in a few simple motions and blasted a gust of air at the remains of the fire, scattering it completely and ruffling the nearby grass, leaving no obvious trace of their presence.

"There. Anyone who passes by should see this as the inconspicuous patch of grassy ground it now is," she declared, slapping her hands together. "Shall we be off then? No point dallying about here, unless you want to say goodbye to the patch of grass where you sat for an entire night twiddling your thumbs."

Jonathon caught and fumbled with the wine skin. "Uh...thanks..." He said, taking another drink from it. The burn wasn't as bad this time, the flavor was becoming better then the drawback. Hooking it to his belt he picked up his end of the cart. "Well, let's go." He started walking, dragging the cart behind him. "Would you like to stop or not? I don't particularly care."