#where every recipe is preceded by like 3k words of rambling
Note
For the writing prompt list: 18 & 15
18: Autumnal
The old ostler put out a notice for a horse trainer, when the Rorikstead crops were coming into their height. A small room for my boarding built into the stable, a meal and ten septims a day were, apparently, enough to buy me, to my own surprise. Still, it is only until the ostler’s son returns from some wedding or other, and I’d grown tired of sleeping on stony ground.
It’s been rather a delight for me here, truth be told, though the pay is poor and the work leaves my body numb with exhaustion. Horses are a fondness of mine, and even the meanest and foulest-tempered of the beasts passing through the ostler’s yards can kindle a little tenderness from me. I’m tasked to breathe a little spirit back into these worn-out old carriage drafts, to take wild-eyed Reach ponies and make them fit for the smallest child’s first saddle, and by and large I do succeed by some measure. Having no friends here to speak to nor inclination to find any, I spend all of my time with the horses, and the training goes all the swifter for the closer attention. The ostler seems pleased with my progress, as am I.
Is this what it would have been like, to have held more conventional employment?
The mare I’m working today is a lively young Chorrol Red, near leaping out of her skin with excitement to be out of her stall. I can feel, in the shiver of her flank against my calves, how badly she wants to canter headlong into the open field, kicking free the stiffness of those long and boring days in the stable. Her previous master ought to be ashamed, to have let such a high-natured beast molder away indoors before trading her to us.
Her hooves churn the dirt as she dances anxiously in place. The brass bells about her bridle and breastplate, the training-tack for horses prone to flight or nerves, chime at every restless step. I hold her reins just firm enough to let her feel me; I prefer the more subtle touch of directing from the knee, but she’s liable to bolt without the extra guidance. Her breed is known more for racing and courier work than for level-headedness, more spirit than sense perhaps. She sees open grass before her and nothing else, and I’d best not let her have her head or else she’s likely to throw me at once, or snap a slender leg on some hidden stone outcrop.
But still, how beautiful she is, how uncommonly fine for this place. That rich chestnut coat shines so lovely in the pale sun, bright as a new-minted copper flashing between a street-magician’s knuckles. Her restlessness is infectious; I find myself, too, looking over those rolling plains with sudden, aching longing. There’s a crispness to the morning air that would feel wonderful raking through my hair, a sluggishness to my blood from my days here that I can’t wait to shake loose. Honest labor has its sweetness, but precious little thrill has stirred me since taking up the old ostler’s offer.
Perhaps a sprint down the road to the bridge would let us both focus a little better…
15: Soup.
I’d had such hope for a good fish soup for tonight. I should know better than to think of cooking before the catch, it’s bad luck to fish with a certain recipe in mind. My nets came up in empty tatters, gnawed through and picked clean. I’d thought slaughterfish, of course, until I heard those bellowing, ugly barks from a ways past the shoreline. I was surprised to see one in a lake; Skyrim’s fauna continues to astound me the longer I stay here.
But, regardless, curiosity does not fill the stewpot. No fish soup tonight, but my recipes adapt.
Tonight, then, it is seal.
I have heard horker is best treated like pork, and a seal shouldn’t be much different, I imagine. With this in mind, I selected a shoulder, diced middling-sized, and one fin to enrich the broth. The skin I set aside; its fur carries lovely marbled markings, and should be a fair trade for a new net at the tradehouse.
The raw meat was a deep red, less like an apple and more like wine, almost the same as the wine I poured into the hissing iron pot to steam and spit. Some cabbage I added next, some garlic, a little mora tapinella from the morning’s walk. Finally, a couple of bees, finely ground, just for alchemical safety-- I don’t believe the mushrooms’ poison to survive a long cooking, but you can never be too careful.
Now, the house smells quite delightful, and I can put my feet up for a while. The soup will want a few hours over a gentle fire, and I have some reading to catch up on.
#anonymous#asks#askmemes#Moraelyn “Horse Girl but Transmasc Edition” Ithren#Moraelyn has been forcibly thrust into Cozy Pleasant Times whether he likes it or not#I can't help imagining Morry writing one of those unbearable 'please get to the point already' cooking blogs#where every recipe is preceded by like 3k words of rambling#but I've butchered carcasses before I know how exhausted he is rn#let him read his trashy romance novels by the fire#I'm hungry now
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