06. The Festival Grounds

 

The Festival Grounds

Further into the rings of booths, deeper into this meadow but still far from the tree at its center, there is an axe-throwing booth. The booth is one of the few open for business already, and as such there is already a line of early risers. The line consists mostly of teenagers, somehow able to get out of bed earlier on this most anticipated holiday than they ever seem to for school. Sprinkled amongst the teens are some young adults and three or four old fathers showing off for their younger children.

The booth is simple, more a large box with an opening and a counter. On the counter hand axes are strewn haphazardly, some teetering on the surface’s edge, ready to fall to the ground if even slightly jostled. Behind the counter there are three vaguely person-shaped dummies made of cloth and stuffed with hay. A teenaged wood-elf named Tiffani operates the booth. He is very bored. 

Tiffani is brown skinned and tall. His dark brown hair is styled in dreadlocks that fall to his upper back. Within some of the locks are threads of golden fabric so thin that they go unnoticed by most everyone. It is evident that the locks have not been maintained in a while, though each lock is consistent in size and shape, undergrowth covers his scalp, hiding the once-neat rows. 

His elven lineage is obvious in the dramatic point of his ears and the perfect symmetry of his face. However, despite that—or maybe even because of it—he does not stand out from any of the other people here. A born and bred citizen of Embryveil through and through, he looks like he belongs in the forest. He is dressed as all residents of Embryveil are during the summer months, in a light tunic and loose-fitting pants, though his look is a little sloppier than most. His tan-colored linen shirt has the sleeves cut off, and he untucked the bottom of it from his loose-fitting green pants to allow a cool breeze to circulate through if one passed by.  

He leans against the inside counter of the booth, only doing the bare minimum to still be considered working. He moves his arms just enough to collect coins from customers and drop them into the cash tin before gesturing for them to select an axe themselves from the collection piled beside him. 

His attention is hardly on the game he is running, it grew boring long ago to keep an eye on the exhausting routine of watching folks pick up a weapon, toss it at a target, and miss—which happened far more often than any other outcome. He didn’t even bother trying to cajole the customers into playing more rounds.

“Oh, another miss,” he drawls distractedly. “That will be another copper piece if you wanna miss again.”

Most people do not stay for another round after this, but Tiffani hardly pays them any mind. He is more interested in watching the ebb and flow of people moving in the festival grounds. He has been here since just after dawn, tasked with preparing the booth for operation. What had been a small trickle of adults has turned into a flood of people of all kinds and ages. However, even people watching gets old after a time. Now he is trying to guess how close he is to his break by the position of the sun, and he toys with the thought of setting a little trick up for some amusement. 

As his gaze sweeps lazily over the fairgrounds, he catches the familiar uniform of the city guard. His eyes snap back to the sight, and he quickly stands straighter at his post as Rendal Zylris approaches. The little red badge pinned to the older Wood Elf’s chest denotes him as captain, while the furrow between his brows denote him as already short on patience for the day.

Smiling at the captain’s approach, Tiffani pulls on the hem of his shirt trying to yank the wrinkles away. He doesn’t bother tucking the shirt in; at this point, the captain has mostly given up on nagging him about it. 

“How’s the booth?” The man asks when he stops in front of Tiffani, tiredness already leaking from his tone and it was not yet nine in the morning.

“Fine.” The smile falls slightly from his face and his tone is instantly defensive. He does not like being checked on, like he’s a child that cannot manage on his own. 

“Okay… please…” The man closes his eyes and rubs his face a little too hard. Tiffani feels a little bad, watching the man collect himself. He knows that the captain works diligently for the city and that he been a long and faithful friend to Tiffani. But still, it rankled to be looked after. He is nearly 100 years old, practically an adult!

The captain huffs out a tired breath and catches Tiffani’s gaze. “We can’t have another incident like last year.”

“What happened last year?” 

Tiffani remembers very clearly what happened last year. And how mad Cap, as Captain  Rendal is called, had been, despite the fact that no one had been seriously harmed… And for the one person who maybe was harmed, there had been a healer nearby and everything had been fine.

“Tiffani.” The way the older Elf stretches out the word puts a smile back on the teen’s face as he attempts to redirect.  

“Oh, actually no. I know what you’re talking about. That was when Loren was on duty. Yeah, we talked about it. He can’t be careless like that.”

“Look, I just want to make it home before my kids are in bed tonight. Can you please just keep the chaos to a minimum? And bloodless?”

“I will certainly relay that message to Loren. I’ll make sure nothing happens this time around. I’ve got it covered.”

The captain looks unconvinced.

“Honestly, Cap, don’t worry! I don’t know what you’re expecting, but the job’s not complicated. Nothing has happened and I have been here for hours.” The captain’s stare remains unchanging, but Tiffani can see in the man’s eyes that he's beginning to bend. “Just relax. The day will be uneventful, and in the evening I will clean this all up and you won’t have to worry about anything.”

The captain takes a belabored breath. “Yeah, okay. Thanks, Tiffani.”

Tiffani grins winningly and pats the older man on his shoulder.

“But when do I get paid though?”

The exasperation returned in volumes, but there is fond humor mixed in. “At the end of the festival.”

“Like… at the end, end?”

“That’s what you signed up for.”

“Yeah, I know. But what if in the middle of the day I want lunch or something?”

“Tiffani, I don’t have time for this.”

“I’m kidding, I’m kidding.” He is not kidding. But he lets it go for now. “Just go. And tell Cellica I said hi.”

The man pauses in the act of turning away to look back at the teen. “Why? Are you not going to stop by for dinner?”

“Of course I am. I wouldn’t miss it. You know I love dinner at your house.”

“Well then you can tell her ‘hi’ yourself, Acorn-head.” The captain reaches forward to rub at Tiffani’s head affectionately but Tiffani dodges, long used to his habits.

“Too slow, Old Man.”

The captain laughs and holds up his hands in defeat, the tiredness he had approached the booth with erased from his face.  

“I will make sure Cellica knows to set a place for you.”

“Thanks.”

Shouting rises over the clamor of the festival from a lane over. The captain groans and pulls back on the mantle of responsibility, banishing the laughter from his body. 

“Keep things tight, Tiffani,” the captain says as he makes his way toward the disturbance.

Tiffani gives a mocking salute at his disappearing back. Once the man is out of sight, Tiffani returns to his thought of setting a prank. Nothing to cause Cap too much of a headache, but enough to keep him on his toes. Just a little mischief.

He has some sap glue in his satchel he’s been holding onto.

Retrieving it, he repositions himself near where the axes lay on the booths counter, pretending to straighten out the mess somewhat. He rolls some of the tackier sap into small, oblong logs and affixes one of them to an axe head. He presses the head firmly against the counter, using his elbow to complete the task surreptitiously; he wants them to be good and stuck, but makes sure that he will be able to collect them later for clean up. He does this to three of the axes. The next person to try to pick it up might embarrass themselves but there would be no chance of an incident like last year. 

He also finds a thinner sap and uses it to carefully coat the handles of a few of the axes laying on the counter. Most people wouldn’t notice until it was too late and then they would have an axe on their hands. 

Tiffani laughs to himself as he carefully sets the axes down and waits for his next mark. He leans into the side of the booth once more, his visage slowly dropping into boredom again, but it’s only an act. His eyes are alert. 

He watches for long minutes as customers come up and select axes that are not booby-trapped. His anticipation grows with each close call. 

A tap on his shoulder startles him. He turns and sees Loren, a skinny, little human with a large grin that is too big on his pimpled face. His beady eyes are forever shifting from one place to another and never seem to settle, and his hands twitch and wring with anxious energy.

“Uh… hey, Tiff. What’s up?” The boy’s words, as always, are halting and abrupt, full of uncomfortable pauses. He fidgets and shifts as he stands, making Tiffani a little seasick just looking at him. The combination always makes Tiffani want to poke at him. “How’s the booth going?”

“Great. Making money. We’ve got the biggest line around.”

“Cool, cool,” Loren lets his eyes drift slowly along the line for a few seconds before snapping his gaze back to Tiffani. “Wanna switch shifts?”

“Nah… nah man.” He doesn’t know what the human boy is looking at, but Tiffani wants to keep his focus off of his pranks so he moves, claps Loren on the shoulder, and steers him around. “I think I have about thirty more minutes in me. How about you go grab some food or something for yourself. I think there is a magic show just some lanes up. Enjoy the festival a bit, yeah?”

“Ok-ok. I can do thirty minutes.” The human boy smiles wider, stretching dry lips across impossibly straight teeth before slowly shuffling off, eyes still darting about furtively. 

The next few people who step up narrowly avoid the sticky axes, and Tiffani is beginning to think he should have just taken the out when Loren gave him the option.

But then up steps a teenage girl. He recognizes her from school, though he can’t quite remember her name. She is among a group of girls who seem really excited to try their hand at the game. The girl he recognizes steps up first.

She goes for one of the axes stuck fast to the game counter. She tugs a few times, but it doesn’t budge, and Tiffani can see her excitement waning. He feels bad; he had been hoping for some arrogant strongman, not a cute girl. 

“Let me help you with that,” he says as he moves around the counter. 

She looks so grateful. “Yeah, please. That would be awesome.”

“Don’t worry about it. Sometimes when it gets too hot out the metal and the wood fuse.” He’s talking nonsense to distract her while he stabs a finger into the sap glue hidden by the head of the ax. He wiggles it around a little bit to create an air pocket and then pushes the handle forward and up until it releases from the glue. “See. It just takes some doing sometimes.” He hands her the ax with a charming grin. “Now there’s nothing to stop you. Give it a go.” He waves her attention toward the dummies. She smiles shyly and shakes her shoulders a little bit as though warming herself up. 

The girl pulls her arm back and throws the axe. She misses so badly that Tiffani is glad he is not standing behind the counter for it. He would be missing a leg. 

She looks a little embarrassed about the failure, so Tiffani reassures her. “It’s alright, you get a couple tosses for your coin. Try again.”

He hands her another axe, and she misses again.

“Oh, but that was so close. Here, try again. Do you mind if I help you with your form?”

The girl smiles coyly at him. “I know what you’re doing, Tiffani.”

“Just trying to be helpful.”

“Sure you are,” she says, but her smile is flirtatious and the ladies with her all giggle. Tiffani smiles in that smug way all young boys do when they believe they have game. When the girl misses again, he hands her another axe, not breaking eye contact as she flutters her lashes up at him. When he releases his hold from just under the ax head, there is a sharp pull at his little finger before the ax rips away as the girl takes it. 

He examines his finger with a frown. There’s sap on it. He looks up sharply just as the girl winds back to toss again. But this time it doesn’t release, and she stumbles forward, banging her legs into the game booth. He sees her fingers wriggle as if she is trying to drop the ax, but her grip remains firm. He sees her go from confused to scared to freaked out very quickly.

“Hey now—” he tries to head off the scene, but that was as far as he gets before she swings around in a wide circle to her friends. 

“I can’t let go, I can’t let go!” The group of girls jump back with a collective screech.

“Easy now,” Tiffani says but the startled girl flips back around and Tiffani hops back just in time. The ax head buries itself into the wood of the booth and the girl yelps. She tries to pull it out, but it is stuck fast. 

She starts screaming.

“No, no, no, it’s okay. It’s alright. Listen. Come on breath with me.” The girl looks up at him, and though she does not match his breathing, he does have her attention. “It's okay, it just seems a little sticky. Something must have fallen on the axes. My co-worker Loren is really clumsy, and that happens sometimes. Maybe we could clean it off.”

He reaches over the counter and digs in his bag for the dissolving solution. He soaks a piece of cloth in the liquid and then rubs it along the length of the handle and between her fingers. She is able to release the axe in less than a minute. 

“See now. Everything’s okay, right?” He asks in the most soothing voice he can manage while also surreptitiously looking around to be sure that Cap isn’t rushing over after the commotion. 

The girl immediately bursts into tears. “Oh my gosh, I can’t believe that this is happening to me.”

“Not at all,” Tiffani assures her. “Hey now, this could have happened to anyone.” Tiffani turns the charm way up to get her attention from freaking out to anything else. “Honestly, whoever left that sap there is the one to blame. People need to be responsible and clean up after themselves.”

The girl sniffs but calms. Her nose does a tiny, cute little wrinkle of disgust. “Thank you for your help. Sorry you had to touch my gross hands.”

“Hey, nothing is gross about you.” 

The girl blushes and laughs, pulling her hands from his. She returns to her friends, and they welcome her with open arms and plenty of giggles. The girl turns back before she walks off. 

Tiffani
(ai generated image)

“See you around, Tiffani.”

Tiffani has no idea what her name is so he just waves and goes back to manning his booth.

                                 

{Part Seven: Observations}