B2: Chapter 6 - What Did I Do?

“Why am I not surprised he knows how to butcher things…” Willow murmured with a tone I couldn’t quite place.
“Hey, you’ve gotta be able to have a really steady hand for those clean cuts and that kinda patience’s gotta be admired. Though maybe you shouldn’t stare so hard, hun,” Mary giggled. “How are you going to cook it all, Lana? That thing’s massive.”
“Oh, our kitchen is really well stocked and we’ve got plenty of different ways I could cook that thing. If you came in and looked around you might start asking for a job,” Lana said rather proudly.
“Um, Ms. Willow… where are we going to store all of that? Cold storage in the basement still has all of the veggies, where should we start putting stuff?” Wendy asked, walking out the side door, sweat dripping on her forehead.
“Got an answer for her?” Willow raised her voice, though I’m not sure why. They had to know that I’d been able to hear them…
I looked up anyway, one hand holding the skin of the Stardeer taut while I pulled my knife along it. The four were all watching me from the terrace and I paused just long enough to think about it. Wendy, a younger lady who’d moved into town with her father, did have a point.
None of us had admitted just how, uh… crazy for lack of a better term, the kill had been. After Wulfric had missed his shot and startled the thing, the Ed’s had tried to create loud noises to wrangle it back in the right direction, nearly getting themselves ran over by the beast before I’d yanked out a bow of my own and—whether Garth approved of it or not—used an arrow coated in a quickly made Homing Salve to put an arrow right through its lung and into its heart.
While Garth mumbled something about me being a “bad example” he also was quick to be on board with hauling it back when I mentioned getting it back in time for Lana to actually be able to do something with it for dinner.
And since Willow had refused to let me do this in the basement for “sanitary reasons,” I’d set up the large pavilion tent I had along with an oversized table that I’d unceremoniously dumped out of my bag before we hauled the beast up and onto it… then I added a few extra supports below it when the center of the table had started to buckle.
I didn’t exactly see how this counted as a better option, but for each section I cut away, Wendy or Lana were quick to haul it down and into the cellar storage and I’d somehow gained an audience watching me with amusement from the terrace.
“Right now the cellar is temporary, but it’s not going to work long term, especially not fresh like this. It gets cold enough for most of the produce we are keeping down there but not quite enough to guarantee this stuff would stay good. So we’re really gonna need to use up most of it today since there’s just so much of it. After that, or maybe tomorrow, we can start looking into better preservation techniques,” I explained before turning back to my work. I made a quick, sharp motion and cleanly cut the skin away from the body.
I didn’t exactly have a leather drying rack, nor had I actually tried it since… well, I always hired people to take care of those kinds of things. Even with as long as I’d lived, there was only so much time and I just couldn’t be bothered to become a master, or even competent, in every single trade and craft. That said, with its overall rarity, I did know that Stardeer Leather was pretty valuable in its own right and I was sure there were a few uses I could get out of it.
“If we’re not gonna store it raw, what are we going to do with all of it then?” Lana asked, a curious gleam in her eye. “Did Willow tell you we could expand the kitchen with a Curing Shed now that I’m level three? We could probably turn a lot of it into jerky and cured bites for stews.”
“She didn’t, but if stuff like this is gonna spawn enough we might need to. Then again, Danwood might need a dedicated Butcher at that point, amongst other things,” I said, then looked over at the skin I still had precariously hanging over what amounted to a clothesline. “Like a Tanner too…”
I slid my knife along the midsection, getting up as close to the bone as possible on this side of the Stardeer just as I had on the first side. I briefly looked over at the twin racks of antlers, the faintest glow coming from careful patterns that were carved throughout the exposed bone. I stopped my cut only briefly as I did the mental math and a realization hit me.
Maybe it had been related to that feeling the Underpfeffer had brought up earlier in the day… it was still plucking at the back of my mind and I tried to focus more on the carcass in front of me to bury it just a bit.
More than likely it was just the unusual air of calm that was lingering, which itself felt odd knowing that the Church of Dawn was due to arrive… well, knowing my luck they’d be walking up just out of sight. I looked up at the sky after I’d realized just what day it was since I’d reset only to realize, with the full moon tonight, there was actually something special about the night in particular. Unfortunately for me, even if they were coming, something about this place made it practically impossible to keep my big mouth shut, especially since it would let us use up a good portion of the Stardeer without having to worry about the best parts of it going to waste.
“Do any of you know what day it is?” I asked and all of the women seemed to simultaneously get confused.
“Umm it’s midweek so Hill’s Day? Or, do you mean in relation to the month?” Willow asked when no one else offered. “Dawn’s Harvest isn’t until later in the year, hmmm…”
“You’re on the right trail,” I said, smiling up with her. She rolled her eyes at me.
“Okay oh wise Lord of Dusk, enlighten us,” she said, giggling slightly, “what day is it?”
“Well last week was the Summer Solstice and Stardeer are more likely to spawn on or near the Full Moon… which is tonight,” I said, trying to guide them to the answer. It was Wendy that seemed to figure it out first.
“We could throw a Dawn’s Moon Feast!”
I scrunched my nose slightly and my slice stopped just shy of separating the meat from the bone.
“I prefer the Ashborn’s name for it.. The Feast of the Darklight Moon.”
“If you think taking a name from the Ashborn is a good idea, then you might as well just call it the Neverdusk Moon and move on,” a new voice interrupted and Daniel stepped around the side of the tent, whistling as he took in the carcass. “Stars, Garth wasn’t joking about how big that thing is.”
“Ooo how about we call it the Neverdusk Moon Festival? We could make it a little yearly tradition,” Willow said, staring right at me, almost like she was daring me to object.
“Not exactly enough time to throw a whole Festival, Willow,” Daniel said, shaking his head. “Barely enough time for a feast… I’m guessing you just want to throw this whole side on a spit and roast it over a fire, right?”
“Without any seasoning!?” Lana thankfully protested before I had to.
“Obviously you’d season it! Sheesh, are all of you starting to think we have to spell out every step of everything we do?” Daniel groaned. “The better question is, are there enough in your stores for all the sides?”
“Are the town coffers paying for it?” Willow asked, I stopped before starting my next cut, then looked between her and Daniel.
“Yes… I’ll pay for whatever you guys use to supply the feast tonight…”
“And our labor?”
“You’re pushing it Willow…” Daniel said, then sighed and turned back to my work table. “You’re a bad influence on my sister, you know that right?”
“What did I do?” I asked. He just stared back at me. “What?!”
“We’ll pay for the labor too. Probably should run this by the Council but I think with Garth spreading the news about the Stardeer, the ship has already sailed…” Daniel relented, grumbling as he turned to walk away. “Better to just set the precedent now I guess if this does become a yearly thing that we pay the people who help…”
I stared after him for just a moment, watching as he stopped and looked over to Willow.
“How much time do you guys need?”
She immediately looked over to Lana who stared off into the distance. Much like Frederick had, she went through the unnecessary motion of moving a hand to control the interface in front of her.
“Four hours? Give or take a half hour for all the prep work?”
“Okay, make it happen. Bring on a few others if you need to… we’ve got enough in the budget right now to make it work and Dartigan is coming back through soon,” Daniel said, stopping for a second as he seemed to realize something. He let out a chuckle and shook his head. “Bet he’s gonna be mad he missed this… He was already upset he wasn’t the first one to stay at the inn here.”
With that, he was off and I was briefly left wondering if he’d only come over here to check if Garth had been exaggerating about what we’d brought back. Before I could vocalize my confusion, Lana cleared her throat.
“Okay… I think we can actually do this pretty easily. Mary, do you think you can round up Jules and Bernice. I could use the help with the sides,” Lana finally said. Mary rattled off a quick answer before she turned and walked off. Then, Lana turned to Willow. “Can Yurick help get the pit dug and the fire started, maybe set up that spit we have down in storage so that we can just get the big slab Corbin has there cooking?”
“Wait, isn’t he my foreman? Shouldn’t you be asking me?” I protested. Neither of them paid me any attention.
“I’ll go get him,” Willow responded with a nod, turning and walking off the same way Daniel had gone. Lana started muttering something about spices before she went rushing through the doors, presumably to go check the kitchen.
Which left the terrace empty except for one person and me standing there, knife in hand and half of a Stardeer carcass still sitting in front of me. I tried to reasonably parse the last ten minutes and failed miserably, instead looking to Wendy, hoping she might have an answer. Even though she looked just as confused… I asked the question anyway.
“What just happened?”