It seemed like a good idea at the time. (Nightcandle)

[Anonymous]

Renzo stared up at the stars, head pillowed on his interlaced fingers.  He refused to look at Joachim.  He was very cold.  He was less than pleased, and he wasn't sure he'd banked the fire properly.  What to do, what to do... they'd have to head for the mountains, deal with provisions somehow, and then what?  Serendipity, that was a possibility.  They could get well clear of all of this.  Make a fresh start.  Fallon wouldn't follow them, they'd--what would they do, exactly?

They had no horses.  No skill at tracking, no skill at hunting.  They were as likely to die crossing the Kilanthro Mountains as returning to Connlaoth.  Not that they should do that.  Maybe Fensmuth.  It wasn't far away.  They could lay low there and it'd all blow over.  He'd just have to control Joachim.  Ha, ha.

He was freezing.

"Gimme your blanket."  Joachim, typically, had taken both of their available, and Renzo hadn't had the energy to argue.  Until now.  He tugged at it, propping himself up on one elbow.  "I hope I don't have to say I told you so.  Again."  

He sighed, looking back up at the sky.  "What're we gonna do now, huh?"  Renzo wasn't a long-term planner, he wasn't a big-picture idea man.  He was one for details and on-the-spot damage control.  Not plans.  The little voice in his head tended to interrupt those with, for instance: 'It's stupid.  Don't do it.  Don't try to scam Vilnor, he's a mean bastard who has his gardeners flogged.  Don't let Joachim go and talk to the pretty boys who're supposed to be off-limits.  Don't take bets you know you can't pay off.  Don't ever dice with John Fallon.  Don't do any of a hundred thousand thousand things that can get you killed, or sent on a camping trip through the freezing wilderness, or to jail.  And for the love of all that's holy, never, ever listen to Joachim.'  

Joachim's little voice was obviously broken.  And the condition seemed to be contagious.

"Eh?"  He poked Joachim.  How could he be sleeping at a time like this?  "I said--what're we gonna do now?  And give me your damn blanket."

[Anonymous]

Having decided that everything was going to work out in their favor, Joachim drifted off to sleep soon after Cas started the fire.  He made a pillow out of his cape and curled up under his blanket on the ground like it was a straw pallet at a cheap inn.  The ground got a lot colder than the straw did, so Joachim stirred to a partially awake state and groped around for something else to barricade himself from the ground.  His hand, unfortunately, found Cas' blanket before his cape and it was soon tugged off, draped over himself and rolled around in.

Everything would have been perfect if he hadn't had that spicy stew for dinner.  It was touching his stomach pretty bad.  Felt like it was jabbing him.  Joachim groaned, then began hearing voices.  

They sounded like Cas...

Was it Cas?

Joachim opened an eye just in time to hear him ask what the plan was... and ask for his blanket.  Didn't he remember to bring his own blanket?  They didn't cut out of Lord Vilnor's manor that fast?  Or maybe they did.  Joachim made sure he grabbed his supplies before they dived out the window.  It wasn't his fault Cas was too concerned with saving his hide to remember his stuff.

It took a while for Joachim to shake off his drowsiness, so he stared dully at Cas for a few seconds, half thinking about how he'd remember to keep his blanket on him in the future.  Or get a cape.  Capes were useful.  Especially when they had pockets.

"I'll think of somethin' in the mornin' Renzy.  I'll let you borrow my cape for tonight, but I want it back in the-" Joachim paused, having looked down and seen both blankets wrapped around him.  He narrowed his eyes and looked back at Cas.  "Why'd you put your blanket on me if you were gonna complain about it later?"  Joachim huffed indignantly, pulling the topmost blanket free and holding it out to Cas.  "Now get some sleep," Joachim yawned widely and scratched his jaw.  "We've got thinking to do in the morning."

[Anonymous]

"We've got thinking to do now."  Renzo rolled over into his blanket (mm, pre-warmed!) and prodded his friend sharply in the shoulder.  "Be serious for once in your life.  I know it's difficult.  But you've lost the blond excuse.  So what're we going to do?"  He poked Joachim again.  "Stay with me here.  I thought we could go to Fensmuth, it's a little town near the border.  I may have cousins there, and if we behave, they'll let us stay on for a bit."

He sighed, and reached down, grappling for the flask hooked to his belt.  He extracted it fumblingly, hands shaking a little from cold and anxiety.  Not like he was going to be able to sleep any.  He took a long, searing swallow and paused to blow fumes over his chilly fingers, then offered the flask to Joachim.  

"At least admit this is all your fault.  C'mon.  Give me some hope."

He sunk with a sigh, bumping downward until his elbows hit the ground and his chin hit his palms, the picture of dejection.  "And promise me you won't make trouble in Fensmuth.  If we can even find the place, I haven't got a map, what do you know about stars...?"  He didn't know any more than Renzo did, of course, but it gave him some security to watch Joachim confidently bullshit his way through obstacles.

[Anonymous]

Joachim groaned in protest, rolled into the remaining blanket and tried to go back to sleep.  It was useless.  Somehow, either pulling off the second blanket or maybe talking to Cas, he was completely awake.  Ugh.  Now he'd have to sit here and listen to Cas worry until he wore himself out before trying to sleep again.

"I am serious," he muttered, snorting afterward.  "Serious about sleeping.  We have to do that eventually or we'll end up walking in circles because we're tired.  We might even walk back to Lord Vilnor's manor and all because we couldn't get a couple hours of sleep."

While Cas fumbled with his belt Joachim tried to remember if he ever heard of a place called Fensmuth.  It seemed familiar, but it was some place he'd never been before.  If Cas had cousins there, that was the place to go!  Or... since they were going to the border anyway, maybe sneak across the mountains into Serendipity.  That would be an adventure.  They'd just creep around the bottom of the mountains while anyone that was actually looking for them went up, and they'd be across them in no time.

They would have to stop and get supplies from Cas' cousins though.  If they lived on the border they should have all sorts of mountain walking-around gear.

He accepted the flask when Cas offered it, taking a long gulp.  Then almost choked when Cas told him to admit that this was his fault.  He handed the flask back and thumped his chest, coughing a little.  "This isn't my fault.  I didn't do anything that Lord Vilnor's son didn't want me to do.  He was the one that freaked out like I came pixie dust.  It's his fault."

The booze had the opposite effect, instead of making him drowsy it sent a fresh burst of energy through him.  Joachim hopped to his feet and cracked his knuckles.  "We don't need a map to find it!  As soon as we can find a road, we can take that into Fensmuth!  We could use the stars to find a road!"  Joachim looked up at the stars and crossed his arms.  "The really bright ones are the ones are always right above where people are.  If we see a string of them, that means there's a road close by and there are people on it."

Too bad there were a lot of people outside in Connlaoth tonight.  The sky was peppered with stars.  There had to be a few neat rows of them somewhere though, just a matter of looking.

[Anonymous]

He shouldn't've been surprised by Joachim's indignance.  After all, it wasn't like his friend was dodging blame or responsibility: he just believed, quite sincerely, that he'd done nothing wrong.  And he'd trusted the people around him to tell the truth.  Why he might be inclined to do so Renzo had no idea--after spending so much time with him he might've learnt something about deceit by now.  But there it was.  

He sat up and leaned elbows on knees as he watched his friend pace and gesticulate enthusiastically, making--even Renzo had to admit it--no sense at all.  

"You never think about the 'if's.  You never think about the 'if we're caught' or 'if my pretty-boy boy-toy decides to sell us up the river, which he'll undoubtedly do' or 'if his father has an alligator pit or--"

He broke off to collect himself.  Joachim's fuckups had, up until a certain point (this point) been charmingly naive.  But this was the first time they'd really risked, oh, almost certain death.  

"--And I realize it's generally my job to think of the 'ifs,' but in future, remember to ask me!"  

Now he was on his feet, pacing opposite his friend, one hand on his forehead and the other fluttering thoughtfully, as he always did when nervously trying to plan.  "First of all, you can't be serious.  That's got to be the most--the most--"  He peered at Joachim, the up at the sky.  "Do you see anything glimmering above your head?  Not that I'm surprised--no, no.  Here's what's going to happen.  I know it.  Either we turn around and somehow stumble back to Connlaoth, which is a very bad idea, since we're wanted dead or alive and it's much more convenient to haul in a corpse--or we press on and wind up half-dead in the wilderness or the mountains, where we'll meet up with lions, bears, giants, orcs, trolls, gnolls, kobolds and bounty hunters!" Renzo found he'd stopped dead and stood staring down his partner, arms outflung, panting from the effort of his vituperation.  

"We are fucked!"

[Anonymous]

That first 'if' made a little sense, they could get caught if they left themselves open to being caught.  Like letting people watch them exorcise something.  Joachim's eyes started to glaze over at the next two 'if's.  They were just so, well, weird.  Why did all pretty-boy boy-toys have to sell them up the river?  Maybe that's just how it worked for Cas... which was probably why he never got laid.  Nothing could ruin the mood faster than asking your partner whether or not they were going to sell you up the river.

Alligators was just silly though.

Joachim pretended to be busy investigating the stars so he could say he didn't hear Cas remind him yet again to ask about all the ifs.  There needed to be a book of ifs... whenever Joachim thought he found them all a new one would raise it's iffy head and start messing things up.  There was probably one about trying to use the stars to find a-

When Cas began pacing Joachim looked down and watched him, raising his eyebrows in alarm.  He did take a moment to look back up to make sure that - yes, there was a star above his head.  There was one over Cas' head too and if the stars were right.  Which they were.  They were close to other groups of people.  

"Or!"  He announced, holding a finger up in the air and grinning widely.  "We go to Fensmuth right?  We go see your cousins and they lend us everything we'll need to go around the base of the mountains and avoid all those nasty things.  Then we go to Serendipity and lay low there.  No one knows us there.  All we have to do is make sure we don't get tainted ourselves.  See Renzy?  We're all good!"

Satisfied that they were now assuredly not fucked, Joachim walked back to his blanket and sat on it.  He took a deep breath once he was seated, sighing as he breathed out.  "We'll be out of trouble in no time - easy as breathing."

[Anonymous]

Renzo slumped, winded, and ran a hand over his mouth.  He peered out into the gloom, half-steeped in the echo of his own tirade, chest still heaving.  With his luck, someone would've heard them and come after them.  With his luck...

The echoes died away.  His breathing slowed, and he he picked his way through the chilly grass and back to his blanket.  He sat, head hanging, with a painful creak of his shoulder, which he'd strained hanging onto the window-ledge amidst their epic escape.  Why did they run schemes that ended this way?  This was going a bit far, even for them.  In the dark, alone, wet.  Mira would not be impressed.  On the bright side, he'd probably never see her again.  Joy.

"Yeah, but what're we gonna do when we get there?"  He poked Joachim in the shoulder, but it was a sighing gesture, aware of its own futility.  "We'll need money again.  And they'll still be after us, you know Fallon.  Y'know, if you just slept with the right people it'd get us out of trouble, not into it.  There's a thought."  

He lay back with a deep sigh.  His blanket had sopped up dew and cold, but he huddled into its reaches anyway.  

"Someday you'll tell me your secret."

[Anonymous]

There couldn't have been that many hours left in the night, hopefully Cas would settle down a little so he could catch some sleep.  Try as he might, Joachim just couldn't sleep once the sun came up.  It was like the sun was a little brilliant enforcer of wakening.  If he didn't get enough sleep he wouldn't be able to find his own ass, much less the town where Cas' cousins lived.

It seemed like Cas was starting to calm down though.  Good times.

Nope, thought too soon.  At least he hadn't managed to get comfortable before the questions and pokings came again.  Joachim rolled his eyes, how many times did they have to go through this?  Everything was going to be fine.  Joachim tried to mimic that sigh that older people did when a younger person said something foolish around them.  It didn't come out that good, probably missing some essential old person-ness.  "We're going to have to earn some money, if we can earn it fast enough we can stay one step ahead of 'ol Fallon and the guardsmen.  If I sell myself we could make some really fast money.  That'd take care of our money problem and I'd be able to sleep with someone that would get us out of trouble!"

For once, Joachim didn't see Cas retreating into his blanket as a sign that he'd finally get some sleep.  He had to get this thought out of his head!  "All we need to do is find some lonely person with some money lying around!  There's always a lonely person with extra money in every town!  Maybe your cousins know them!"

Joachim grinned, picking up his blanket and snapping the dew from it.  Afterward, laying it down flat and lounging across it.  Everything was going to be just perfect.

[Anonymous]

"... Y're not that pretty and there's no bloody money in little towns any..."  A chilly yawn interrupted Renzo's half-hearted rebuke, and he snorted himself into silence.  "... oh... b'Gods."  He was mumbling now, chastened and trying to trail the conversation with him down into sleep.  

Eventually, pillowing his cheek on one arm, shifting and clearing his throat and rubbing his mouth over his sleeve, he did.

He woke up with his nose pressed into something pungent.  And warm.  And not exactly pungent in a good way.  He snuffled and drew his head back, blinking painfully against the mist-haloed rays of the early sun.  Damn cold.  For a second he wanted to poke his nose right back into...

Oh, right.  Joachim's armpit.  He had, at some point, rolled over and wound up with one arm over his friend's chest and his face planted right in his shoulder. His other hand, he noted, was tucked under his own arm.  Armpits were Nature's little warm pockets.  So were groins, especially of the female variety, but that could get awkward.

Hm.

"Morning," he said, shoving himself upright, discarding vestigial morning horniness, and shaking the feeling back into his numbed fingertips.  He ran one hand through his hair, which stood wildly on end, matted thick by grease.  It was the little things you missed.  Baths.  Houses.  Warmth.  Food.  Renzo knew a lot about skinning animals but not a lot about catching them.  

On second thought, he collapsed against Joachim's shoulder once again, turning his nose pointedly from the offending armpit, and shut his eyes.  "Please tell me you have something fantastic to eat."  Joachim's pockets were ofttimes mysterious; stranger things than candy had been found inside.  Renzo held out faint and modest hope.  "Because you stink like old cheese and even that's making me hungry."

[Anonymous]

"Am too," Joachim would have fluffed his hair, but that took effort and he didn't feel like moving.  Moving would just keep him from sleeping longer.  It sounded like Renzo was starting to get to sleep too.  Good.  Joachim closed his eyes and drifted back to sleep.

Once again, he woke up to the sound of Renzo's voice.  The sun was involved too and he had to piss, but Renzo was talking.  Most of his mornings and the occasional afternoon began with Renzo talking once he finished untangling himself.  Renzo's night snugs came in handy on nights like yesterday's.  It felt like the snot froze in his nose, but his chest and one shoulder in particular could be considered warm.  His stupid blanket still had moisture in it and got a lot colder after he went to sleep.

Joachim groaned, dragged an arm up and over his eyes and curled his hands into loose fists, wriggling them when the warming up pins and needles started.  It was still so early.  They needed to sleep in a building next time, it was so much easier to sleep until a reasonable hour if there were walls to block out the sun.  Renzo thought so too, otherwise he wouldn't have curled back up on him.  

Eventually, the light creeping up under his arm would sear his eyeballs enough to wake him up.  There were still a few winks to snatch though.

If Renzo would be quiet.
Renzo wouldn't be quiet though.  Not if he was awake.

"Hmmmm... I dunno," he murmured, his tongue feeling thick and heavy and cold, couldn't forget cold.  "I'll check after I have a leak.   Inna minute, just gimme one minute."

[Anonymous]

Renzo flopped backwards onto the ground and covered his eyes with his hands.  The damp grass that suddenly tickled his neck shocked him awake, which was, he thought with some pained reluctance, all well and good.  He had to sort out what to do now.  They would get lost if he didn't pay attention.

Renzo and Joachim had never set foot outside of Reajh in their lives.  He was going off of vague bits of lore he'd heard in taverns and stories his mom had told him about hunting.  Something about snares.  There was a special kind of knot.  Renzo knew knots, particularly the ones that secured curing meat to the rafters, but not so much how to place a snare, or.  He didn't want to have to know.  He'd spent the bulk of his life ardently avoiding practical knowledge.  It felt demeaning to realize, now, that he'd missed out on all sorts of life skills.  In the city he had known himself to be cleverer than everyone around him, playing a much trickier game.  Out here it was just him and nature with lurking things and the mysterious shapes of magic in the distance.  

And Joachim.

Okay, so he had Joachim.  And Joachim would look to him to sort out how they ought to behave.  Well, Renzo could do that.  

He opened his eyes slowly and peeked out from beneath his hands, shutting the sun on and off.  On and off.  He could hear his friend stumbling off to take a piss.  His own bodily functions seemed to have shut off due to trepidation or discomfort.  Once Joachim was done, Renzo stood, dragging his blanket up to cover his shoulders like a cloak.

They would look so pathetic if someone found them.  He wished someone would find them.  Fuck.

"First order of business, food," he said, running his tongue over parched lips.  "Second, water.  Then we can keep going... north... no, south... west," he hazarded, shading his eyes and looking at the sun.  His emphatic gesture made him appear much more certain than he was.  "And, look, you can see the mountains in the distance, that can sort of keep us oriented in the right direction, and then of course there's the sun.  Very important for navigation, the sun.  Rises in the east.  It's all coming back to me."  He tapped his own temple, posturing, and then let his shoulders sink and braced his hands on his hips, looking over at Joachim.  He indicated with a movement of his eyebrows that he ought to search himself for edibles.

"We'll be rugged travelers," he added a little sourly.  He squinted toward the mountains.  "I'll tell stories of our hardships and exploits and pretty girls will give us free drinks and... you got anything?"

[Anonymous]

Once Renzo flopped off him with no sign of crawling back on anytime soon, Joachim was left to keep himself warm.  Getting up to have a piss would get that goal off to a good start.  He scrambled to his feet, took a few jerky steps away from the blanket and Renzo and had the same annoyingly short piss he had on most mornings.

Other than wondering if human pee would turn the grass brown, if it weren't brown already, Joachim felt that this was a sign of things being all right.  Good days had a certain pattern, once you cut a lot of silly details out of them.  Like waking up the wilderness with a furious ex-mark and a moneylender to avoid back home.  That didn't count as a sign that the day was going wrong.

In fact, it'd be even better if he remembered to stash something in one of his pockets.  Yesterday wasn't too good a day, so he probably wouldn't have anything from then, but there were a few good days before yesterday.  Since his cape served as a pillow the night before he couldn't rifle through his pockets while pissing.  Which might be for the best, since he wasn't sure what kind of food he put in his pockets.  All he could guess was that it wasn't too hard.

As soon as he was through, and put away and all, Joachim trudged back to his cape, knelt and began the search.  For some reason he had a whole pocket full of feathers, which were good props if he needed to do something vaguely magic-spirit banishing, but not worthy enough to take up an entire pocket on their own.  He glanced up at Renzo when he mentioned water, then looked at the blobby bits off the distance that could either be mountains or really big trees and finally looked up at the sun, which was too bright to stare at for any length of time.  "We were by a river for a little bit.  If we can find it again, that's where we can have our water.  We can-"

Rugged travelers sounded really good!  Even if Renzo said it the same way he said alligator pit the night before.  It was a shame neither of them had a big impressive scar.  That would make them at least ten times more rugged and would only increase their chances of getting drinks (or better!) from the pretty girls Renzo planned on talking to.  Joachim was sure he had a candle in one of his pockets, if he had any rouge stashed in there they could fake a scar.  

Food was slightly more important now though.  There were no girls to charm with stories and impressive scars.  Joachim went back to fishing and, with an unbecoming squeak, finally pulled out a paper cone that must have spent most of the night under his head.  "Found some nuts," he said cheerfully, holding up the paper once-cone and grinning.

Today was definitely going to be a good one.

[Anonymous]

Renzo whipped out a hand, honed to haste from carsharping, and snatched a handful of nuts from the unraveling paper.  He opened his palm, picked one up between two fingers, and squinted at it suspiciously, then decided it had suffered no ill from its time in Joachim's cloak.  He popped it in his mouth.

"I think we can definitely say the one thing we are not short of is nuts," he said, and tossed the rest of his handful into his open mouth.  He chewed angrily, taking out his frustration on the food, eyebrows moving in time with his mouth.  

"Right!  Come on, loverboy.  We're going to go and follow the river."  Renzo had, by this time, turned away and started doing their blankets up in bundles.  He'd let his slip off from around his shoulders.  The sun had already burnt the sting from the morning air.  "And I am going to make some plans.  And do you know what you are going to do?"

He looked back at Joachim with labored, false patience, the bundle of blankets slung over one shoulder.  Okay, so he held just a little bit of a grudge.  Maybe because this whole situation was his bloody fault.

[Anonymous]

Joachim tipped a mouthful of nuts into his mouth and continued patting his cloak down with his other hand.  His mouth was too full to tell Renzo that he was right about the nuts.  It felt like he had another cone of them tucked away in another pocket.  Unless it was a pouch of stones or some other nut-like objects.

Or maybe Renzo was just talking about the crazy sort of nuts?  Joachim stopped pawing his cloak and rolled his eyes up, moving a nut between his front teeth and nipping at it.  He wouldn't say they had nuts, what they had was guts.  Yeah, guts.  No one would like you if you went around telling them you did things because you were nuts, but it you did it because you had guts.  That would only end up in more free booze and pretty women.

Joachim swallowed.  "It's guts we've got Renzo," he announced happily, swirling his cloak over his shoulders and tying it down.  "We're definitely not crazy."

Since Renzo was taking care of the blankets, Joachim studied the remains of their fire and tried to remember if there was something you did to fires after they were done burning.  He vaguely remembered Momma sweeping their hearth, but they didn't have a broom and the fire was just sitting in the middle of the wilderness.  Joachim nudged the ashes with his foot, looking back at Renzo with eager anticipation once he announced that he was going to start planning.  "I'm going to help you make plans, of course!  You might forget about something if you have think on your own."

[Anonymous]

"No."  Renzo whirled and chucked the rolled-up blankets at Joachim.  "You are going to carry those and you are going to be quiet.  And think--"  He put a finger to his temples and screwed up his face.  "--about all the stupid things you won't be doing to fuck up my plans!"

He spun on his heel, chest heaving, and marched off.  The exercise had warmed him, and he felt incoherent anger working in the muscles over his scalp.  Sometimes he just needed to blow up at Joachim.  He muttered to himself, stewing in his own annoyance.  

Half out of the camp, he picked up a long fallen branch and started thrashing at the tall grass.  "... bloody hate you sometimes..."  He wasn't sure who he was talking to.  "Whore's arse.   Bastards.  Motherfucking..."  He trailed off into nothing and continued on, shading his eyes and peering ahead, toward the river.  He walked quickly enough, taking long strides through the grass, that Joachim would have to rush to keep up; Renzo had longer legs.

Plans, plans, plans.  He'd think of something.  What did he know about Serendipity?  One always picked up gossip in the taverns, and Renzo specialized in collecting information, but there was a world of difference between the information one found useful for kicking around Reajh and the information one found useful while fleeing to a foreign country.

And where was the river?

Reluctantly, Renzo stumbled to a halt and looked around, nonplussed.  Ought to have reached it by now.  He pointedly ignored Joachim.

[Anonymous]

"What?" Joachim froze, eyes wide, the blankets hitting his chest and flopping down to the ground.  What was the use of thinking if he had to be quiet about what he thought up?  Thinking was no good unless you got to share what you were thinking about.

Now there was no point in telling Renzo what was on his mind.  He was angry and needed a little time to cool down before he'd listen to anything.  In the meant time Joachim was not going to think about he always screwed up plans.  It wasn't always his fault that some of their plans didn't work... sometimes it was the target's fault, occasionally it was his fault and sometimes it was even Renzo's fault.  Like that time he couldn't pull that barmaid's skirt up and over her head to keep her from eyeballing him while he swapped out the cards in his hand because it involved touching a woman below the waist.

If Renzo staid angry into the afternoon, then Joachim would remind him that he wasn't the only person trying to screw up the plans.  Now he crouched to pick up the blankets, put them over his shoulder and walked after Renzo.

Who was practically running, like he thought they were still being chased.  Joachim hurried to keep up with him for the first minute or so, but didn't feel like hearing him take his anger out on the poor grass and fell behind.  He kicked a few clumps of grass while he walked, looking left and right for any signs that water was nearby.  Not that he knew what would gather around water out in the wilderness.  Living things usually liked to crowd around fountains in the city.  There were a couple birds flying overhead, but they were going back to Reajh.

Actually, going back to Reajh might not be too horrible.  They could lay low on the outskirts of town and get some things that might make traveling easier.  If they came in on the right side they could probably avoid everyone.  The trouble was figuring out where to walk to come in on the right side.  Joachim tried to remember, tried visualizing what path they took out of Reajh.

It didn't help that the world map according to Joachim was composed of a very detailed map of Reajh with a few hazy villages and the palace sketched into the blank expanse that surrounded it.  They needed to get a better look at their surroundings.  Maybe... there were some trees up ahead.  How hard could it be to climb a tree?

Joachim jogged to catch up to Renzo, who stopped and was probably looking for river signs too.  "Hey Renzo.  Maybe we should go climb one of those trees," he pointed, trying not to grin.  "We'll be able to see pretty far from up there."

[Anonymous]

Renzo stopped and eyed the grove ahead, crossing his arms.  He had to admit Joachim had a point, but he wouldn't admit it immediately.  He let a few seconds slide by, face caught in a skeptical expression, and then relaxed his posture.  His elbows unlocked.

"Fine.  But I get to climb the better one," he said.  He ran his fingers through his hair thoughtfully, then turned toward the treeline.  An amused note had crept into his voice.  He'd taken to saying the same thing when Joachim--inevitably--pointed out attractive women they ought to seduce.  Since Joachim would push him to make moves, it'd become his retaliatory gesture.  He claimed the better one.

He never got her, but that wasn't the point.  Ah, Joachim.  Everything seemed to come so easily to him.  He looked out at the world with those big, vacant blue eyes and somehow it looked back just as happily, whereas it met Renzo with his own suspicious squint.  

Tossing his grass-flogging stick to one side, he ambled toward the stand of trees, narrowing his eyes until he could make out a few potentially profitable low-hanging limbs.  His pace slowed enough to accommodate Joachim, a silent softening of his annoyance.  He'd never stay angry, anyway.  After all, when it came down to it, he was the one responsible for everything they did.  Joachim would've been content with a thousand other plans of action; Renzo was the one who just had to make this one work.  Egh.

[Anonymous]

Wait... "How do you know which tree is better?  You wouldn't let me climb up a bad tree would you?"  Joachim stuck a hand out to grab Renzo's shoulder, but he was already moving.  He jogged at first, thinking Renzo was going to go at his full speed and nearly ran past him.

It looked like Renzo was busy looking for the best tree to climb.  They all looked the same to Joachim, a bunch of big wooden sticks with leaves on the end.  At least they were kinda big trees.  If they tried to climb a tree in Reajh they might end up breaking it, and they wouldn't be high enough to get a good view of anything.

He still had no idea which trees were good trees and which were bad trees once they reached the trees.  They were all brown on the stick part and green in the leaf part and looked like they were there since the world was created.  Joachim watched Renzo for a couple seconds, waiting to see which tree he went to and tried to pick one that was similar.  Not an easy task.  The only significant thing about the tree Renzo was looking at was that it had branches that he could reach.  

That seemed good enough.  "Renzo, I'm taking this one!" He said, a bit too excited for someone who hadn't climbed a tree since he was a child.  Joachim set the blankets at the bottom of his chosen tree, rubbed his palms together and jumped for the closest branch.  He managed to grab it, but pulling himself up was a lot harder than he imagined it.  So he dangled, legs kicking the air as he tried to pull himself up.  He gritted his teeth, pulled until the veins in his hands and temples were bulging from exertion and finally let go.

Climbing a tree was nothing like climbing up the side of a building.  Joachim rubbed his hands together and looked at the main, stick part of the tree.  It didn't look like the best foothold, but it was the best solid thing he was going to get... Unless Renzo thought of something better!  Joachim looked back at him, grinning, thinking that Renzo must have had a plan about this already.  Why not?  He let him have enough quiet time while they were walking to think of one.

[Anonymous]

Renzo stood back, scoping out the tree he intended to climb.  He always planned a route up.  As he drew invisible zigzagging lines between branches, swinging his arms a little to loosen up,  Joachim simply attacked his claimed tree.  

Renzo couldn't help it.  Watching his friend dangling, kicking, grunting, and red in the face, from an ambitiously high branch, he let out a bark of laughter.  Joachim's grinning face once he landed only made the whole thing better, somehow.  And Renzo liked that when he failed he still looked to him to help.  

He realized he found that comforting.

"I hope that wasn't your orgasm face.  Lemme handle this tree business.  I am the tree-slayer.  Scourge of forests, conqueror of, uh, yeah..."  

Renzo patted down his pockets and came up with a couple of strips of rough cotton, which he wound around each palm in turn.  Traction established, he wrapped his hands around an overhanging limb, tensed his stomach muscles, and swung his body up so that the back of one heel landed on another, slightly lower outspread branch.  He hung there, strung lengthwise between two branches.  

"Ungh."  And writhed his way up, kicking at the far branch with his feet, until he lay with his stomach on the branch he'd used to pull himself up.  Then managed to straddle it, the tree's bark damp and green-smelling against his skin.  

"Ha.  Made it."  He was panting.

"Just gonna rest here for a little."

[Anonymous]

That sounded like a good idea.  They needed a pair of eyes on the ground anyway.  It was tactical... in a way he hadn't quite thought up.  He could think about it while Renzo was busy doing his tree slaying thing.  Joachim leaned back against the tree he tried to climb and slid down to the ground.

He forgot to think of a good tactical reason for staying on the ground when he watched Renzo prepare to climb the tree.  Never knew when they would need to climb another one, so he stared, eyebrows furrowed and lips pursed.  Then grinned widely when Renzo pulled himself up and lay across the branch.

"Atta boy Renzo!  Can you see anything better from where you are?  I mean, why climb all the way to the top if you can see just as well from there.  It's kinda high if you stand up."