![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Uncharacteristic creative urge
The peace in Hazard's Edge was coming to an end.
Everyone in the town knew it, but nobody could have told you quite how they knew. The crazed rumourmongers who had terrified the people during bad winters in the past were silent; this time the denizens of the Edge didn't need rumours to be sure something bad was coming. The instinct for approaching trouble was ingrained into their very bones, and they knew it without having to be told.
Everywhere you looked, you could see people preparing. The Demons hadn't haunted the nearby forests for years now, but the smiths were making stocks of shields and armour, in case they came raiding again. The owners of public buildings were beginning to leave their doors wedged open, to ensure that if one of the moons turned red then anyone caught in its burning light would have somewhere nearby to run to. Watchmen had been stationed on the cliff itself, to provide advance warning if something nasty rose out of the pit below. A volunteer crew were beginning to build a wall around the town, far enough out that at least some farming could continue inside it, and anyone whose normal routine took them out beyond the line of the wall was giving serious consideration to a change of occupation.
The old men in the inns had ceased their carping. Where once they had complained that the youngsters who had arrived since the peace began were somehow less than real men, and where the young men in turn had retorted that the oldsters should take life less seriously and enjoy the peace for what it was, now as if by magic there was truce between them. The youngsters looked to the veterans with respect, since they knew their experience would be invaluable in the times ahead; and the oldsters as one had stopped their griping, and now seemed confident that they could trust the young men to do what would need to be done.
The odd thing was that nobody really knew what the threat was going to be. Everybody took it for granted that there was one, that the time for complaining about the passing of the good old days was gone and the time to prepare for their return in earnest was here; but nobody could have told you exactly what form the coming troubles would take. Half the town was busily constructing defences and precautions against all the old dangers that had plagued Hazard's Edge in times past, but at the same time everybody was half expecting a completely new threat to emerge. In every knot of people talking in sombre tones on a street corner, there was always at least one person warily watching the skies for anything out of the ordinary, or sharpening a knife in case they suddenly needed it … or often just keeping an eye on the people passing by, against the possibility that the enemy was already inside the town and just biding its time to strike.
no subject
no subject
(Anything else I should know..? *hugs*)
no subject
I should write morte myself. I'm somehow rarely in the mood, buyt I do ewnjoy it when I get going... ah well.
no subject
(no subject)