Chapter 10: The Growing Realm
Thorwen had Gareth on the table before I'd finished reporting to Halbarad.
"Arrow went deep," she said, not looking up from her work. "But it missed the bone. He'll live, assuming infection doesn't set in."
"I brought supplies from Bree." I set the satchel of medical goods on her workbench. "Willowbark. Clean bandages. A few other things the apothecary recommended."
Her hands paused. For a moment, something like relief crossed her face.
"Good. We needed this." She resumed her work. "Now get out. I need to concentrate."
I got out.
The settlement had changed in my absence.
More tents clustered against the palisade walls. More faces I didn't recognize moved between cookfires. Children ran in groups larger than I remembered. The familiar weight of too many people in too small a space pressed against me from every direction.
"Fifteen arrived while you were gone," Halbarad said, falling into step beside me. "A family from Archet—six of them, including a grandmother who can barely walk. Three traders who lost their goods to bandits on the northern road. The rest are wanderers, drifters, folk looking for somewhere that might be safer than where they came from."
"Population?"
"Eighty, give or take. Possibly more by week's end if the rumors keep spreading."
Eighty people. When I'd claimed this ruin two months ago, we'd had forty-seven. The numbers had nearly doubled—and we'd barely expanded our infrastructure to match.
"Food situation?"
"Critical, as you'd expect. But manageable now that the trade route is—" He stopped, eyebrows rising. "The trade route is established?"
"First caravan should arrive in three days. Grain, tools, cloth, medicine." I allowed myself a small smile. "Fair prices, in exchange for escort services."
The old Ranger's weathered face transformed. Not quite joy—Halbarad didn't seem built for joy—but something close to hope.
"You did it."
"We did it. You held everything together while I was gone."
"Barely." He gestured at the crowded camp. "Tensions are rising. The original settlers feel displaced. The newcomers feel unwelcome. And everyone is hungry."
Same problems, larger scale.
I thought of that first morning—standing on the broken tower, speaking words I barely understood, claiming a ruin and a handful of desperate followers. Two months later, I was responsible for eighty lives and counting.
[SYSTEM NOTIFICATION: EXPERIENCE THRESHOLD REACHED]
[LEVEL UP: 1 (CLAIMANT) → 2 (CHIEFTAIN)]
[NEW FEATURES UNLOCKED:] [— POPULATION MANAGEMENT PANEL] [— BASIC CONSTRUCTION MENU] [— RESOURCE GATHERING ASSIGNMENTS] [— SCOUT DEPLOYMENT (3 MAX)] [— FOLLOWER SPECIALIZATION] [— REPUTATION TRACKING (LOCAL)]
The System expanded in my mind like a flower blooming. New panels appeared at the edges of my vision—population statistics, construction options, resource allocations. Information I'd been tracking by hand, now organized and accessible with a thought.
Chieftain.
Not a lord. Not yet. But closer.
"Aldric?" Halbarad's voice cut through my distraction. "You had an odd look for a moment."
"Just thinking." I forced myself to focus on the present. "Show me everything that's changed. I need to understand what we're dealing with."
[AMON HEN-DÎR — THREE DAYS LATER]
The caravan appeared at noon.
Three wagons, six guards, a merchant I didn't recognize leading the train. They flew Hamfast's colors—a simple blue banner that meant legitimate trade in these parts.
I met them at the gate with Halbarad and Grimbeorn at my shoulders.
"You're the lord from the Weather Hills?" The merchant—a stocky man with suspicious eyes—scanned our walls, our guards, our carefully neutral expressions.
"I'm Aldric. You're Hamfast's man?"
"Ned. We've got grain, tools, cloth, and a few crates of medical supplies. Hamfast said you'd provide escort for the return trip?"
"Five of my best fighters. They'll see you to the edge of Bree territory."
Ned's suspicion faded slightly. "Fair enough. Let's get this unloaded."
The next two hours were controlled chaos.
Grain sacks transferred to our storage building—a structure that had seemed adequate when we were forty-seven people, now straining at capacity. Tools distributed to Grimbeorn's forge crew. Cloth to the women organizing shelter construction. Medicine to Thorwen, whose expression suggested she'd just been given a treasure worth more than gold.
I paid in coin and trade goods. Iron ore samples, mostly, plus a few items Grimbeorn had forged specifically for barter. The exchange left us with forty-five gold pieces—more liquid wealth than we'd ever possessed.
[QUEST COMPLETE: ESTABLISH TRADE ROUTE]
[REWARD: 200 SXP, +5 PROSPERITY, +3 INFLUENCE]
[TRADE STATUS: ACTIVE]
[BREE ↔ AMON HEN-DÎR: MONTHLY CARAVANS]
I dismissed the notification and focused on the present.
Ned was studying our settlement with professional interest. "Heard you had trouble with orcs."
"We handled it."
"Mm." He scratched his chin. "The boys back in Bree said you were probably exaggerating. New settlement in orc territory, barely fifty people—they figured you'd be dead by summer."
"They figured wrong."
"Looks like." Something shifted in his expression—not respect exactly, but acknowledgment. "Maybe this route isn't such a bad idea after all."
The escort departed that afternoon. Five of my militia, armed with weapons from Grimbeorn's forge, walking alongside wagons that would feed families who might otherwise starve.
Trade. Supply lines. Economics.
Oliver Smith had understood these things abstractly—spreadsheets, graphs, market analyses. Aldric was learning them in blood and grain and the weight of responsibility.
[AMON HEN-DÎR — EVENING]
She was maybe six years old.
Thin, like all the refugee children. Dark hair matted from road travel. Clutching something in her small hands—a flower, I realized. Wilted and half-crushed, but unmistakably a flower.
"For you," she said, holding it up.
I knelt to her level. "Thank you. What's your name?"
"Elsa."
"That's a beautiful name, Elsa. And this is a beautiful flower."
Her face lit up—the first real joy I'd seen from any of the refugee children. Such a small thing, but precious.
I tucked the wilted bloom into my collar, ignoring how absurd it probably looked. The girl ran back to her mother, already chattering about how the lord had accepted her gift.
Halbarad appeared at my shoulder.
"You know she'll remember that forever."
"It's just a flower."
"It's a lord treating her like she matters." The old Ranger's voice carried weight. "These people have lost everything. Homes, families, their sense that the world makes sense. When you do something small like that—accepting a child's gift, working beside them on the walls—it reminds them they're human. That they matter."
I thought of Farren. The first volunteer for the militia. The man I'd saved from fever only to watch die in an orc attack.
His children are here somewhere. Brina too. I promised him they'd never go hungry.
The grain shipment made that promise easier to keep. For now.
"We need to expand," I said. "More housing. Better organization. This can't stay a refugee camp forever."
"What did you have in mind?"
I pulled out the mental framework I'd been building since the System upgrade. Population Management wasn't just tracking numbers—it was understanding what people needed, what they could contribute, how to organize chaos into function.
"Three priorities. Housing first—families with young children get the new shelters, regardless of when they arrived. Labor contribution second—everyone who can work, works. Those who build more, get housed faster. Defense third—we're expanding the militia, training everyone capable of holding a weapon."
Halbarad was quiet for a moment.
"That's going to cause tension. The original settlers will feel passed over."
"I know." I touched the wilted flower at my collar. "But I'd rather have angry people than dead children."
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