Havilah Hanusøvska

(Author Note - TheProletariat - Day 1/4 completed, all others are storyboarded, just need to get them down with the linking events and conditionals. Please comment things you’d like to see more of. Thank you for reading!)

Havilah Hanusøvska, an aspiring alchemist works in the taverns by day. Her clients always giving gruff and pandering comments, but in turn tipping well. Her saffron red curls of divinity drew envious eyes, and her delicious curves enticed passions from patrons. But in truth, Hanusøvska had not the intention of being a tease, or stuck in that bar slinging watered down drinks. Rather she lived for twilight and dusk. But those hours seemed far away now. The morning open was slow, but evening would soon be upon her, the only relief was Angus Cod’s drunken absence.

As she laid in the stables for her break, a minor imposition which her employer laments, she stared into the gem, thinking about how she might fashion it into some form of jewelry. Maybe fastened as a necklace, or turned into the centerpiece of an enchanting circlet. Either way, something delicate, she thought. Taking her time she sat up and dusted off her dress, holes hewn posthumously to every idle dangerous thorn or corner piece.

“For the gold. For the gold.” She said to convince herself, then began her shift anew.

In the sunlight her saffron curls bounced like springs of silk, and the ground beneath her feet barely left impressions, only faint whispers of her passing. The shift had been long, her legs ached from the standing and her back was flaring up with a mighty pinch whenever she bent. The kegs at the tavern aren’t well suited for the Halfling waif, a lowered stature does occasionally produce problems for her.

She wiped a corrosive vomit pile with a disintergrating towel holding her nose high to escape the fumes. She had taken this job as a tavern wench to help her mother who has become infirm. Long hours, few breaks, and the patrons are dreadful. Seeing the moonlight cast down through an open window in the tavern excites the waif, but she knows that her mother will be waiting for her. Before departing the halfling takes two tarts and wraps them in a cloth, along with a chunk of pale cheese and a bottle of cheap red wine that some patron ordered but never became sober enough to drink. “Their loss,” she thought.

Closing the door of the tavern behind her, the door gives off a chunky plunk as she sets the lock in place.

Worrying her mother would be a foolish endeavor, besides, her feet were aching from that shift. Her mother would appreciate the cheese and wine too. Putzing past petunias, pansies, plus pinethrush, poor petered putty-like Havilah slumps through the garden into the hobbit hole dug into the rolling Forest hills with a willow weeping above the halfling hideaway and melting before the fireplace.

“Havi, is that you? Come here please.” her mother’s ebbing voice croaked from her room. A mess of blankets coated the bed, inside the crinkled face of a tired woman looked brightly at her proginy. “Work was okay?”

Havilah nodded and held up the feast she had carried with her in the cloth, “hungry mama?” The evening was jovial between the two, her mother spoke of the neighbors, Bree had come to start the fire while she was infirmed. Aubrin had even come by to pass the time with stories about the Chernasardo Rangers. Their bravery, exploits, and victories in the fight agianst Molthune. They had some black tea with their last bit of milk before Havilah kissed her mother goodnight and tucked her ailing body into the shambling mound.

“I love you mama.” whispered the door.

“I love you too Havi” croaked the lump of cloth.

…

As the day broke, the sun was clouded and the skyline muddled in a glum gloomy gusty gale which guzzled all manner of leaves about. The winds slammed the windows and pulled at their latches, as though yearning to enter. Her mother was comotose, unable to recognize or respond. She summoned Bree who confirmed the illness was in its final stages. The elder woman held Havilah’s shoulders tightly.

“I’m sorry this is happening honey, no child wants to see their mother suffer like this.” She waited for a response but received none from the mop of curls that refused to gaze on anything but the shambling mound. Bree continued, “the medicine is expensive, 500 crowns, and we’ll have to take a boat up to Yamshire to get it. Your mother mentioned your alchemy exploits, maychance you brew her the potion?” The waif grew red and anxious, she had already looked into the solution and it required ingredients unavailable to her and could ruin at her skill level. “I wouldn’t even know where to find the mushrooms, phycomids, rare sentient cave shrooms. They’re dangerous and I haven’t been able to find any yet. I wish. I should be doing more for her, but I can’t, I feel so useless here. I hate this job, Angus is a creep, the crowds are rude and I feel so worthless.” Her tears were rushed and a composite of her work and family stress. She knew she was her mother’s only chance for survival. That weight and burden sank her heart.

“Honey, you’re very pretty, but if you keep on like that, you’re going to get eaten alive.” She said with a serious dismissive tone as though speaking to a child, though Havilah had seen 21 winters. “She may last but three days and nights. I worry beyond that,” the older crone muttered. Bree agreed to watch over her mother, providing water and small amounts of broth to sustain her.

Havilah contemplated, “Asking Angus Cod for a raise seems foolish, though he does have the coin to spare. Being in debt to that lecher is the last thing I desire. Any number of places could hide a cave with the right conditions for Phycomid growth, let alone enough for a reduction! Rats! Or I could spend my days studying, see if I can manage something? No cures will come of it, I already know that answer, but what choice will save my mother?”