บท 395: Dotted With Woods

Brownie had been right about the cart; it broke daily. Either the wood split, or a stray rock fractured a wheel, or the whole thing needed to be smoothed down because it hurt his delicate rump. For each complaint or breakage, I was there and expected to fix it.

Food, oddly enough, was not as large a problem as I had expected. Well, except for Manahuru.

You think with all the mothers forcing children to wash their hands that the outdoors would be full of disease. The truth is less one-sided.

Oh, there was the occasional ill wildlife, or fetid mound of compost.

<In fall,> Manahuru complained, <These leaves would be decaying at a rate they could be tapped.>

<Well, then help me support you until fall. Stop finding things that aren't tappable, and find me something that is. There must be a corpse around here, somewhere.>

<Ick. Death mana remains bitter, even after conversion.>