3

Heemee closed her windows against the droplets of cold rain that were beginning to lash against the land. Morning rain in the Assol Outlands was often unwelcome particularly in the cooling autumn months because it often gave birth to the hideous roaming nightmares that haunted the Madman’s Mountains. Or so the legends went. Course not everyone believed in such tall claims AS WE ALL KNOW but the wisest discounted not the least of the Mysteries. It’s a fantasy land with fantasy elements.

Heemee tightened up the remaining windows just in time as a crackin’ blast of lightning speared itself across the darkening sky and lit her wine vines up in a purple eerie light. A terrific roar of thunder blew out the hiding birds’ brains and split areas of the ground open. Jeez! Heemee’s house rattled and shook like a howling Giantor.

“HA!” she let out in an involuntary moan. Scary stuff. Her wine cellar was likely fine, fortified against the Outland floods that plagued the region every few years. You gotta prepare for this kind of thing, and Heemee was nobody if not prepared. She wasn’t the most skilled wine grower in these parts (master of wine or grape master) for nothing. She knew things.

The summer was unusually dry, which was fine by her. Extra rainfall ruined the wine routes. She had no sophisticated shipping infrastructure in place (she was working on that) and relied on couriers and merchants to pick up and deliver her vintages to the Outland regions. Business boomed in the autumn as businesses had to stock up for the frozen winters. Run out of wine in mid-winter and hooooo hohoho you are flazzed, my friend. FLAZZED.

That reminded her, Glen was due for a pickup this morning. Blom’s regular orders of supply for the Ragged Maiden were keeping her dracoin coffers stocked and in happy company and ol’ Glenny would reliably pick up the barrels on the week’s start. At least that was the summer pattern. This autumn things were getting patchy. Glen was missing some of his pickups.

The rain hardened into pebbles, or seemed to, judging by the increased roar outside. It was a pleasing sound.

Heemee’s house and vineyard were situated out on the borders of the Outland villages, closest to Gilba Gilba but round the bend of the shroomy dune and back again for another quarter of the way from Blumberdan too. Those villages were her two best sources of customer. Living out here on the borders of the Wildness was challenging but rewarding, which was usually the case for all endeavors worth their attempts. It had been some time since the Jibberjabs came prowling out of the Madman’s Mountains, but the Autumn Storms always brought back memories!!! Bad memories.