Part 72: Sirocco: Update 7

Sirocco's Year: Part Seven

It was midnight when I was tidying up some paperwork (I organise them into different origami shapes on the shelf so I can tell them apart) and I heard a noise outside my office.

It wasn't a loud noise... but it was there. I strained my eyes peering through the darkness. I could see a shape. It was getting closer.

'Hello?' I said. 'Who's there? If this is a surprise birthday party, my birthday was actually two weeks ago. Though I suppose it wouldn't be as surprising if you threw me one on the right day, right? Ha ha ha!'

A dwarf melted out of the shadows - it was Silento Boborachi. He looked at me grimly before saying:

'Hello, Sirocco. I came by to tell you that the work Eiba started is very important to the company. We would hate to see it... fail. We do not appreciate failure and we do not tolerate fools.'

Suddenly he beamed at me. 'But you are not a fool, right Sirocco? I can trust you will not be... foolish?'

'Would you like a lollipop?' I asked, raking through a jar on my desk. 'I've got them for visitors. Three different flavours!'

But when I looked up...

He was gone.

---

Daeren wrote :-

That works. Though the wisdom in taunting a fully grown, slightly unhinged executioner is...lacking.



_{I give in I'm making a journal goddamnit}



This is a Dwarf leather journal. All craftsdwarfship is of the highest quality. It is encrusted with Pink jade, encircled with bands of Silver, and decorated with Horse bone. The object menaces with spikes of Dwarf bone and Silver.

On the item is an image of Daeren Raysarmors the dwarf in Horse leather. Daeren Raysarmors is striking a menacing pose. On Daeren Raysarmor's hammer is a lock made of Dwarf bone.



Granite, date unknown:

Have arrived at Syrupleaf on schedule, as requested by Her Majesty Sankis. Initial reaction: this place is a frozen blight on the earth like that that Lord Litast emerged from aeons ago. What isn't frozen over is solid rock with no hospitable terrain for miles. Whatever, or whoever, lives here must be insane.

I believe I will enjoy it here!



Slate, date unknown:

Initial survey of the inhabitants of Syrupleaf show a deep seated melancholy amongst the inhabitants. Easily controlled, most excellent. Lady Sankis will be pleased. They keep babbling about the Spawn of Holistic. I would ordinarily dismiss these as bogeymen designed to keep the little ones out of trouble, but examining the boneyards within the fortress have turned up skeletons similar to Dwarven bones, but profoundly...altered. I shall keep an open mind on the matter.

The fortress itself is haphazardly designed, evidence of a population who can't decide who they want in power for more than a year. There are a disturbing amount of weak spots in the walls of the fortress that need to be weatherproofed, and the room layout is erratic and has left seemingly no space for noble quarters. Instead of doing sane things like forming it into weaponry and armor, these bumpkins have used the Adamantine they found to make some sort of enormous tower with a bridge to nowhere as a "tribute" to champions who were stupid enough to be squashed under a bridge. It's a wonder Lady Sankis didn't faint dead away at the sight of such a waste.

Tax Collector Eiba's head wound he suffered on the migration seems to have taken its toll. He is now obsessed with the verminous moles that infest the nearby chasm, and has sent some blithering idiot to catch them. As I write, his 'program' seems to be making some sort of headway, but it is a waste of resources. We should be farming these for meat, not training them for war. There's nothing out here to fight.



Felsite, date unknown:

My actions are justified.

This 'Dash Magnum' who was sent to catch the moles fell into a rage, dissatisfied with his lot. Fool should have looked where he was immigrating on the map before he started bitching about the local weather. He began to tear apart the Golden Road at the fort's entrance, showing the strength of madness, before calming down and fetching a drink. I requested permission from Her Majesty to give him The Queen's Justice, but she ordered me to stand down. She, in her wisdom, reminded me that I am a new inhabitant of the fortress, and executing a Dwarf so soon would not win me any favors from the peasantry. I still refused to let this criminal get off light with jail time for destroying such a valuable part of the fortress, so I quietly took one of the local guards, FlocksOfMice, aside. I told him I would give him a season's pay extra from my coffers if he made sure 'Dash' would never be able to break another monument, while keeping him alive.

I must say he was thorough in his duties. I may have to train him in the art of Hammering.

Addendum: I have discovered a secret passage behind a cabinet near the smelters. The strange airlock system I found is similar to an extremely small-scale Obsidian farm like those in the Mountainhomes. The only strange sign I found was tiny fragments of bone in the Obsidian encrusted in the airlock. Must investigate further.



Felsite 26:

I fear for the future of this fortress. Eiba fell into depression after Dash's mysterious beating and traded off the position of Overseer of the fortress to a Dwarf with more brain damage than HE has.

The Nobility held a meeting in a Litast-damned closet with Sirocco to get our demands across, and he could barely hold the list up to read without going crosseyed. I'm not exactly a dour fellow, but Sirocco was so infuriatingly happy that I wanted to smash his head in there and then. The Queen and I managed to drill the need for a Royal Guard for me to command into his skull before he wandered off.

Also, a peasant named Bobatron made an artifact miniskirt. Wonderful.



Hematite 5:

The Royal Guard has been formed with a Captain who answers directly to me. Noble quarters are being mined out, and yet Sirocco is building something called a Gazebo instead of doing his duties. The filthy Human merchants are gathering outsi
[The Journal entry ends here mid-word, as if the writer left in a hurry]



Hematite 8:

Filthy traitorous Humans! They distracted us with their goods while Sand Raiders burst in through the walls! THERE ISN'T ANY SAND FOR HUNDREDS OF MILES FOR LITAST'S SAKE! WHY ARE THEY HERE!? They followed the Humans- no, the Humans BROUGHT them here to TAKE our Adamantine. I will remain silent with my suspicions, as they will only cause Lady Sankis panic. I will bide my time.



Hematite 10:

A summer home. On a glacier.

I'd fucking kill him if he didn't carve out my rooms so quickly once he realized its necessity. They're actually quite nice.

---

The Deadly Hume wrote :-

Dear mother and father,

As usual, things continue to be weird around here. Not in such a bad way at the moment, although we still get the occasional visit from our friends with the hewn faces, as well as the sand people who seemingly make a pilgrimage from halfway across the world just to provide the soldiers with something to kill.

I would've thought that with the arrival of the Queen, we might've seen a little more order around here, but as it turns out, idle hands are soon given something to do. I haven't been particularly idle myself, I've been doing a lot of digging lately since more and more nobles seem to keep piling into the place and been demanding spacious quarters all to themselves. At least we have prepared... contingencies... in case they get a little too wrapped up in their megalomania.

Presumably at some point I'll be told to breach the adamantine vein and let the inevitable madness in, as has happened at other fortresses. So I may die because of that. C'est la vie, as the elves say. But I'm more inclined to think that the demons will check out the place and wonder if something's beat them here, because frankly it's already sort of crazy around here. We've had a run of overseers who indulged their big ideas and then when it came to the hard part of keeping the fort organised they've decided, nah, this is too hard.

Recently we had some guy who decided we should set up a moling industry, which was actually not a bad idea, as they apparently make quite loyal pets, even though they're not as cuddly-wuddly as kittens. Then one day we found out that he'd passed things on to, of all dwarves, Sirocco. Of course he's gone and built a fellcursed rotunda or something, I guess all the lovelorn idiots will have somewhere they can have their wedding receptions and that.

Also, some of the lads got a little crazy on Summer's End and dressed up as goblin axemen and ran around the halls making mock gobbo noises. Of course they imbibed too heavily on the beverages and ended up spewing their guts all over the rotunda when they decided to check it out. They were blaming the glare of the sun but I doubt it was anything bar a lack of ability to hold their liquor.

But as it is, Sirocco's kept going with his duties and has actually been handing out orders like he knows what he's doing. I think it's helped that he isn't the drill sergeant type so most people are willing to go along with his suggestions, though people are perhaps getting a little lax. I mean ____ will probably be making another appearance soon so I hope that at least the military are keeping alert.

I'm doing well so far, I haven't fallen down any holes or had my arms ripped off or gone mad and decided to build a coffin out of stone and mole skins, so you can consider that a success.

I will write with the next caravan,
The Deadly Hume.

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