J'role stopped now, looked carefully into Garlthik's face for an understanding of his words
"You've got the spirit, boy. That's all I meant. You are an adventurer, aren't you?" He smiled a gigantic smile, his mouth forming into a cave, his huge teeth lining the edges like stalagmites and stalactites." You long for it, don't you? And I'll bet you don't even gee it for what it is, you're so hungry for it. You're a starving man let loose upon a feast-
eating everything up so quickly you can't even taste it."
J'role shrugged, uncertain.
"No! Look about you." Garlthik stepped up to J'role and turned him around, placing a strong hand on J'role's shoulder. Standing behind the boy he gestured out to the hills and rivers and mountains that rested on the lowlands below them." I'll bet you're thinking,
'Got to get to some treasure. Got to reach some monsters. Have an adventure.' But this is it, J'role. Simply being out-wandering, traveling. You've left what you knew behind, and now you're wandering into the unknown. This walk, this walk we've taken just today, how many people from your village have ever traveled so far? Right now they're toiling away in their fields, trying to prove that they're worth something in the eyes of their neighbors, struggling to get enough to eat, to feed their families. The children grow up just like their parents. They're all going to sit around on the patch of ground where they were born. They won't learn anything about the world. They won't live through anything they haven't been taught how to live through."
Garlthik stared down into J'role's face, looking for a sign of comprehension. Finding none, he drew in a breath and started to speaking again.
"That's what an adventure is, my boy. Doing what you don't know how to do. I've never traveled to a lost city before. I've never walked over this spot before. What's over that hill? What might try to kill us next? I've no idea." He spread his arms wide and tilted his head back and smiled at the bright sun. "This is it."
Then he leaned down toward J'role and lowered his voice. "You see, it may seem quiet now, but that's just a trick. In an adventure, the adventure is always present, even if it doesn't look like it. You're an adventurer because you're alert to that. I can tell. Saw it back at the cave when I threw you the ring. You're ready to seize the moment when it presents itself. Most folks, they could even be on an adventure, and when it got quiet, they'd think the adventure had stopped. They'd let their guard down. Then, next thing they knew, something would come flying in and kill them. Or a treasure would present itself and they'd miss it. Just like that. That’s why they have to stay home. At home you know everything. Now his gaze floated away from J'role and out along the tops of the hills. "You know everything oh so well at home," he added quietly.
Garlthik stared silently out at the hills for a good, long while, and J'role joined him in contemplating the land below. At first he could make no sense of Garlthik's words. Yes?
it was true he had never seen this land-the winding rivers the barren dirt, the scraggly trees, the hills and mountain tops. But similar sights existed a day's walk from his village.
What difference did it make?
He glanced up at Garlthik, who was staring out as if hungry, feasting on the sight before him. J'role tried to imagine what Garlthik saw, and looked back out at the landscape. He tried to suck the sight in through his eyes, as Garlthik seemed to be doing.
And slowly, something began to happen.
He noticed a bird, or at least he thought it was a bird, hopping around on the ground fare far away by a lone tree. It was only a dot, but it moved and bounced around, as if struggling with something.
Then he saw how the water in the river folded over just slightly as it passed a bend in the river. And he saw how the trees, what few there were, each bent in the wind, creating an odd pattern of motion when viewed all together from this distance.
He began to understand. Though he'd noticed many of the same things in his own village, he'd never seen this particular group of objects and motion before. This combination was unique. In fact, when night fell, the shadows would change, the bird would leave. Not only had he never seen it before, it existed only in this moment.
It all seemed terribly fragile.
Thoughts of his father came to him. His father was very fragile. Now gone.
Without thinking about it, J'role began to walk, continuing along the route he and Garlthik had been traveling all day. He watched his feet take steps over the ground before him, and then vanish from sight as his body fell forward again and again.
"Wait up boy," Garlthik called. J'role did not slow his pace, but the ork quickly caught up. They walked on in silence.
A question occurred to J'role: Did Garlthik have a father he loved? What had happened to his father? Did he ever see him anymore?
That night they made camp on top of a ridge that offered them a view of anyone approaching from the south and the west. "And if they're after us," Garlthik said, "that's how they'll come."
They built a small fire in an alcove formed by rocks they piled high to keep the light from giving away their location. Then they settled down to the food they'd gathered that day.
Purple berries with a somewhat bitter taste and half-ripe fruit from a tree that J'role had never seen before, but which Garlthik assured him was safe to eat.
Despite the meal, J'role was still hungry. He caught Garlthik's attention and pointed to his stomach. "Aye, me too, lad," the ork said. "But if there's a drawback to being an adventurer, it's this: you can't always have what you want when you want it. In four days'
time we might be- as wealthy as kings. Then again, we might just starve to death before four days are out."
J'role thought about the words. He thought of how much time the farmers of his village spent tending their crops, how much toil was involved, and how often they still ended up with very little harvest to show for it. Garlthik might be wise in many ways of the world, but not in all. Everyone risked not having what he wanted when he wanted it, just by being alive, adventurer or not.
As night came on, he stood gazing out over the land below. The cool air washed gently over his face, and the fire buried between the stones kept his legs warm. The mixed sensations delighted him. Extremes, he thought. I like them more and more.
Then J'role spotted two orbs of light bobbing their way across the land, still distant, but getting closer. Crouching down, he poked at Garlthik's chest. The ork, who had just closed his eyes and begun to drift off, at first pushed J'role's hands away. But then he opened his eyes, saw the look on the boy's face. J'role pointed over the rocks.
Garlthik quickly scrambled up and looked in the direction J'role pointed. J'role thought that Garlthik looked horribly frightened as the ork removed his torn cloak and used it to smother the fire. When the flames had become no more than embers, Garlthik stood up and stared back out over the rocks. J'role joined him.
The orbs had gotten closer, and J'role saw now that they were lanterns. He had only seen such devices once before, many years ago when a group of humans and a troll had traveled through his village. Each lantern hung from poles atop wagons that were making their way across the land. Drawn by horses, the wagons rocked side to side over the sloped and rocky ground. J'role could not make out who rode in the carts, but there seemed to be about three people in each one. He also thought he saw shadows, tall, like large men, moving alongside the carts, but he could not be sure.
Next to him, Garlthik relaxed. "Not them. Just travelers. Wonder what they've got?." He lowered himself back behind their shelter of boulders. "We'll light the fire again when they've passed on a bit."
J'role knew what they might have-and he wanted it. He tugged on Garlthik's arm, then pointed at his stomach and then over the boulders at the merchants.