An old man in tattered clothes nearly colapses against a tree near the pond in Hlint. His face is weathered, like the sun and stinging salty winds have tanned it over and over for most of his life. He reaches to his hip with cracked hands, which nevertheless move with precision, and returns them deftly to his lips holding a few wafers.
He seems somehow unthreatening despite being out of place, a combination which draws a few of the local children to his side. The old man is quite pleasant with them, seemingly well practiced in the arts of entertaining children. It doesn't take long before he begins to tell them stories.
He tells the children of a huge swordfish he caught one day. And in the next breath he rambles on about the tidal wave of 1369. "But that's nothin' compared to the terror tha be chewin' up Hurm and surrounds these days. I seen a shark bigger than," and he looks around for a comparable object, "longer than that there bank," he says with a slight tremble as he points off toward the bank, "and fin taller than that there guard tower." The children all reel back in pleasurable fear.
"It came fer me, and it bit me boat in two. As she passed she swept her tail against me and hurled me twenty feet outta the water. Crushed me leg," and he reaches down and knocks against this pant leg with a wooden rap. "The sea she was smilin' fortune on me that day, fer when I landed I was just long reach from a rock. I pulled meself up and layed on it fer days."
With faces agape with morbid interest, the children lean forward. "I though meself dead fer sure kiddies. I gave up and lay wit me eyes closed, ready fer tha lady of the sea ta take me home wit her. But instead I woke up on tha beach, not but a few coves from me home."
The old man looks out at the kids with a passionate gleam in his eye, "that be a miracle, see. The lady of the sea lifted me outta that bay and laid me safely on the shore. I be blessin' her name every day since, and then some."
He fidgets around a bit and slowly stands, not ashamed to use one of the young boys for help. "I best be goin' now. Time ter head back to that miserable excuse fer a port yer got round here and gather up me family. Let 'em know there ain't be good fishin' to the east." He sighs and looks off longingly, "we'll find somewhere where the fishin' be good yet. Just be patient. She'll provide." And with those last words he winks lovingly to the children and hobbles off toward Hlint's western gate.
