If I had a few days and some material stronger than clay mud, I could make a chimney. Maybe some day in the future.
Pachi had come back with a squealing boar and finished her meal. She was now basking on a rock that jutted out a few dozen feet from the cave mouth.
I asked her, in my sweetest voice, Hey, buddy. Can you do me a favor?
She didn’t move a muscle. Maybe. What is it?
Maybe my snoring had been bad. My companion was rarely this grumpy. I was wondering if you can kill deer without wrecking their hide? I need a few of them, if possible. She remained silent for a time, so I added, You can eat them, I just want their hides. It will help block out the sun, so we can sleep in tomorrow…
She lifted her head and looked at me with sleepy eyes. Still refusing to answer, she stood up and flew off again.
Well, if it got the job done, I wouldn’t complain.
While she was gone, I gathered some dry wood and built a fire. I even had time to take a couple of the long ash poles I’d cut down and hack them into two-foot logs. I stacked those next to the fire to help them dry out as quick as possible, though they wouldn’t be good firewood for a while. I’d need to rely on deadfall.
Pachi returned shortly after, three of the Karnath deer dangling from her from paws. It was impressive to see, as each deer was well over a hundred pounds.
I marveled at the enfield as she landed, her sleek body graceful despite her uneven load. The girl’s wings looked to be over twenty feet by now, and she was taller than a horse at her shoulder. Despite her size, her legs were still relatively thin, which surely helped her in flight. Compared to Bastral the gryphon, she was practically dainty, though eventually, she would walk taller than him. Her legs were incredibly long.
How soon can you skin them? Pachi asked. I am hungry again. Her voice was still a bit snooty.
I walked over to her and found a place to itch behind her ear. Calm down, huh? I’ll skin them right away and you can feast then sleep all day. Sound good?
It sounds amazing, she admitted and lowered her head to give me better access.
Skinning the deer was not exactly a quick process, but with my enhanced skill level, it was over in an hour. I didn’t have to remove the offal, as Pachi liked to eat everything but the hooves and horns. These latter, I collected to sell when I could.
I dragged over the bodies for Pachi to enjoy, and she actually thanked me.
I took the hides to the stream and scraped them as well as I could, rinsing most of the blood away.
Then I made three frames from the sticks I’d cut away from the ashen poles. After, I used some spare bowstring to stretch the hides.
I set two in the sun to dry, and the third I brought inside the cave and propped near the fire. No way I could cure the hide into leather, but for a temporary shelter, this should work well enough.
A quick break for food and water was all I needed to move on to the next phase of my building. I hacked the long ash poles down to size, one by one. The entrance to the cave was roughly ten feet tall at the mouth. A few feet in though, there was a lip that hung down and provided a fairly even ridge.
Another two hours passed until I finished resizing the poles. I got two eight-foot lengths from each of the trees and made a pile with the thin tips that remained.
The rest of my plan came down to wrestling the poles into place, then placing them vertically to fit snug between the ceiling and floor. Thankfully, the cave floor could be dug out a few inches to accommodate the planks that were too long, and for the few that were loose, I lashed them to their neighbors.
Halfway through, I rested and checked on the hide I’d hung over the fire. It wasn’t completely dry, but I was not willing to wait. I cut dozens of long strips about an inch thick and set them near my entrance. This process was tedious, but it would be helpful.
When most of the hide was cut away, I cut off even thinner strips, and kept going until the entire hide had been transformed into two stinky piles.
I used a good portion of the thicker strips to bind the wall I had in place, tying each of the logs together. This improved the strength and gave the wall a springy feel to it when I gave it a shove. It was not perfect, and wouldn’t block the wind entirely, but it seemed to be enough to make us more comfortable.
More mud and the rest of my stones bolstered the base of the wall nicely.
When I was done, I stepped back to review my work. The yawning mouth of the cave was partially blocked off, and the vertical ashen poles made the cave look like a giant with one hand over half its mouth.
If it were just me, I’d have blocked off most of the rest of the cave, too, and perhaps used a hide flap as a door. With Pachi in the picture, I had to think bigger.
I dug a hole in the ground halfway between the ashen wall
