Ragged Red
Part 3So I’ve been in Falkreath for all of one minute and one to the locals has already told me to piss off essentially. What a nice place.
I walk a little further into town and find Grey Pine Goods, the general store. Great. Maybe I can offload some of this crap I’ve been carrying around… uhm… I mean, trade some of this fine merchandise I have aquired in my travels. “Got something for just about everybody in here” says Solaf, the shopkeeper. I wonder if that covers red-eyed homeless dudes hauling around various dead animal parts.
It does, as it turns out. In the end however, I decide to hold on to my pelts. If I can find a smithy were I can craft them into some fancy leather duds then they might be worth a few more coins. After selling a tomato, a goat leg and the dead couple’s necklace, I’m sitting at 123 Gold. Not a bad start. I browse his wares but decide I can save a few pennies by trying my hand at the forge. If I sell or use what I create, I’d be considerably better off, in theory. The transaction complete, Solaf signs off with “If you steal anything from my shop and you’ll regret it.”
Nice man. Not ten seconds ago he mentioned he was far more tolerant of strangers that his brother. I wonder if he is the meathead who greeted me outside earlier.
I leave the store and begin my search for the blacksmith’s place. Then my search ends as it is right next door. How convenient. As it turns out however, I had less than I realised in terms of animal pelts. After creating a couple of sheets of leather at the tanning rack and then producing some strips with one piece, I only have enough left over to make some bracers. Still, it’s a start.
I decide that in order to improve what I learn, I’m going to need more pelts, so I’m off to hunt. But to hunt, I need a bow. I check with Lod, the blacksmith but the hunting bows he’s selling are 155 septims which is just over my price range. I could sell my mace, but I’d rather keep it handy in case I run into that thief again. Not to fight with, but maybe he’d accept it as a bribe of sorts, rather than trying to carve me into hobo-mince again.
It seems I’m going to need to find some other way to scrounge together the gold I need. Then I remember:
Herbs! Or rather, weeds! If Solaf at the general goods store is telling the truth with his whole “something for everyone” policy, he should be more than willing to pay me for ripping up the weeds from people gardens and taking them a few feet to his shop counter.
While I’m plucking all sorts of plant out of the ground, I stumble into a graveyard where some kind of ceremony is going on. I don’t really care, this place is littered with Nightshade! Jackpot. I bump into a man named Mathias.
Apparently this is a funeral for his daughter who was ripped apart by some crazy guy in down. That’s cool. You gonna eat those flowers? He’s still staring at me as I rummage through a nearby rockery for mushrooms. I continue back up the hill, plucking everything that I pass, until I reach a small farm. It’s Mathias’ place and he’s just getting back from the service I barged in on. Eager to help him harvest his crops (and sell them back to him) I barge into his garden and tip over his cart, sending cabbages flying all over the place and pelting a nearby cow who just stands there looking all bewildered and cow-like.
Sure enough, I pick up the cabbages, harvest the ones still in the ground, then rip up the potato plants and some gourds. Then I head back over the Mathias and sure enough, “Honest pay for honest work.” The guy hands me about 50 septims in total for pulling up all of his crops. Wow. Maybe the brutal murder of his daughter has made him drop a few IQ points.
I can already afford the bow I wanted, but I need arrows too and I’m eager to show Solaf all the flowers I found in the cemetery (but not before I steal all the eggs from Mathias chickens.)
Bursting through the door, I shove all manner of mushrooms and weeds into Solaf’s hands and the bewildered nord throws plenty of gold my way. Finally I’m standing at 224 septims. I don’t really need the bow I was saving up for, but I can only imagine what these idiots would pay for something I actually crafted, rather than pulled out of the ground. Hell, in Mathias’ case it was his own damn crops in his own damn ground. As I leave the shop, I say a silent prayer for the nine divines.
“Thank the Gods. Thank the Gods for this town of absolute fucking morons.”