The Frewyn Herald: Home of the Haanta Series

A piece about Rautu's many dislikes and his one true love: dark chocolate A Giant’s Delectation                  Though many in Frewyn were disposed to pay tribute to the Den Asaan, acknowledging his gallant efforts to save the kingdom and honouring his general splendor, it was unknown to the denizens of the kingdom as to whether he had eaten and enjoyed their tribute or had merely cast it off with a laconic and diffident huff. Some conjectured that he accepted his gifts with a pout and a very good grace, but then was wont to give them away, the confirmation of this being a defined form betraying no distinctive hints of his having ate anything so agreeably unwholesome. His daily training must be owing to his excellent condition; he must exert himself if only to relish in all the pleasures of eating so much, that every arduous movement or strenuous exercise must have been done only for the object of...

I was writing a piece in one of the later books in which Rautu has a hallucination. Twisk and I both discussed what would be his worse nightmare. Here it is:  T here, swirling along the beams of the stone ceiling, were two large floating strawberries. They seemed in want of his attention, making silent beckoning to be touched, to be admired, to be tasted. They drifted nearer, bouncing about with weightless oscillations. This cannot be real , was the giant’s first cogitation, but the closer they came to him, the more fearful he was. Deliberately assaulting him with their delicious rinds, impressing their succulence and sweetness upon him was all his horror. He stood from the table and stepped back, evading their gyrating attacks. They sang to him, called out his name in inviting tones,  glittered and glistened under the dim light, professing themselves delicious and remarkably fresh. “Away,” the giant bellowed, his hand gripping the hilt of his sword. Twisk drew this af...

Rautu is taking the failure of the peanut crop very seriously. R autu could rejoice in the failure of the fruit and vegetable crops. He was all private elation at the idea of being made to eat nothing but meat and baked goods every day. While everyone around the keep was grave and conferring and pondering, he was prancing along the battlements in high glee, deciding which of the wild beasts and foul would do for his dinner that evening. He might be prevailed upon to hunt enough to feed the entire keep. He began forming a schedule in his mind as he sulked down the stairs to the training yard: Gods Day could be pheasants, the next could be smoked meats, and the next could be brined slices, and the next could roasted boar, and the next could be marinated steaks of various elk, and the next could be baized lamb, and the last might be eggs or turkey merely to give him mate one day of reprieve from her duties at spicing. He saw this impending famine as no famine at all, for Frewyn could do ...

An awesome picture from The Rat story that Twisk just finished A nxious that the cake had never arrived, Kai Linaa paced the length of the main hall, ever spying the entrance with a vexed look and a craned neck while keeping within sight of her door in the guest quarter. She wished to remain tolerably close to keep Unghaahi’s suspicions from impeding the delivery, but when two hours had gone and no delivery was made, she began to agonize in a frantic fit, proclaiming her ill-luck, reproaching herself for having ordered from the same bakery that had so slighted her before. Why had she done it when she knew she ought to have asked Martje to bake and dress the cake for her? He would have eaten it if she had made a point of its being a gift, and now he would have nothing for his birthday. Surely the commander had something planned, but that was always a private celebration between them, and here she wanted to do something more for him. She was growing too nervous and aggrieved, she wou...

H e raced down the main hall, silently begging for his cake to be unsoiled by her hands. Thrusting aside the scullery maids and yeomen about who were clearing away the accoutrements yet lingering in the great hall, Rautu hastened to the kitchen, and there, upon the table was a chocolate cake, the perfect rotunda of icing unblemished, its top sprinkled with chocolate shavings and its bottom a delicate chocolate crust. It was here, it was safe, and the giant must be satisfied. His chest surged with consoling breaths but his distress soon returned when he observed Martje standing at the entrance to the larder with a knife in her hands and wry grin on her round face.                   “Did you take that cake out of its box?” was Rautu’s furious and terrified inquiry.                 “Aye,” said Martje, sauntering complacently toward him,...

Rautu’s Birthday                  While the Great Hall was being cleared of the day’s festive remnants, Kai Linaa was secretly conniving at continuing the celebration later in the evening. Though the Haanta did not celebrate birthdays with all the gaiety, the gifts, and the bustle that such a commemoration usually required, she, with all her powers of merriment, decided that Rautu must have a cake. He might deny an acknowledgement of his birthday in the ways of supernumerary knitted socks and sweaters, might dislike a public feast though he could not decline a handsomely roasted boar, but cake and certainly chocolate cake, one carefully tailored to his tastes with dark chocolate icing and teeming fondant within, could never be refused. Here would be Kai Linaa’s triumph: a fresh cake from Diras Delights, all made for Rautu’s delectation, delivered personally and done in quiet manner, to secure his approbation...

We're a set of quiet and simple folk, but sometimes we do need to get out. A Day in the Keep                 Although Alasdair was not fond of patrolling in the winter months, on account of his hair being to freeze and the horror of it breaking off with the waft of a gentle wind, he must at last venture outside the warm auspices of the keep. It had been a tiresome day at court and he was in desperate want of an airing: the indefatigable nagging of Count Ross, the idle prattle of the two Ms Roberts, the complaining voices, the tittuping of heeled shoes, the waft and flicker of fans muting the witless banter of the front rows, the murmured chuffs from the elevated pews; Alasdair had done with all of this. Enduring the din of the courts for a an hour or two, the fidgets of tedium the hems restlessness, was one thing, but to suffer them for the better part of a frigid day where he had only the wealth of his only int...

A Gathering                  Dorrin, Ouryn, Fionnora and Ennan had finished with their individual lessons for the afternoon: Ouryn and Dorrin with their fencing, Ennan with his archery, and Fionnora with her healing, and when they all came together at the kitchen table, they delighted in telling one another of what they had each learned, holding high revel, professing to one another of their abilities and demanding to know what their friends had learned that they might glean some powers of understanding into each of their specialties. When Soledhan and Little Jaicobh arrived, there was an end to any peace in the kitchen. Martje was assailed by the sounds of giggles and tinkling voices, all of them eager to share with one another, and all of them equally keen to listen to each other’s tiny lectures. Ennan discussed the importance of a practiced hand with regard to mounting arrows and began his dissertation on...

Martje soon recognized her error and recollected herself. How could she smile at the monster who had forever haunted her kitchen? And with such blithesomeness and good fellowship too- she reproached herself. In her moment of splendor, she had forgotten to be malicious, and now the giant would think her unserious with regard to her abhorrence of him. She frowned, and lifting her chest huffed, “So much for your doin’ anythin’, monster.”                 His fists tightened around the hilt of his weapon, his nostrils flared, and his arms shook with growing rage. “Very well,” he snarled. “Since you claim responsibility for this kill, then you will do the same for the mess that created it.”                 Martje spied the overturned dish rack and besides the rat and severed tail, there was nothing else that required her attention. She had clean...

The trapper soon came, but his efforts bore no lasting effect: the traps around the kitchen were placed, baits were duly set, but only an hour had passed when all of them were sprung, with every bait absconded and with no signs as to where the rat was gone. Tension raised throughout the keep, the trapper’s methods were again engaged, and again they were unsuccessful. Many began to wonder at the cunningness of the rat, rumours of a dark mage in guise began to spread, and the Den Asaan scoffed at every new report and machination. Had he been asked to hunt this elusive creature, the subject should have been closed long ago, but as he had not been applied to on purpose by Martje’s command, he must only observe and sneer at their ridiculous attempts. All of their contrivances would not do where his hunting prowess might, but his office for the day was to stand by and witness the trapper’s numerous failures while making his dry “heh” and fleering at Martje’s expatiating panic.   ...

It was the first snow today. Twisk therefore made some cute stick pictures of everyone enjoying themselves- or not- and I had to make a story. Winter Discomforts                 The preparatory signs of a heavy Frewyn winter were everywhere when the party returned to Diras: the first light snows blanketed the capital, the streets that had been used to the bustle and gaieties of the autumn harvest and holidays were now subdued, a frost began to gain power over the air and what was once a delicate tinge of cold was now a frozen gale; denizens shuffled about and huddled together for warmth, wearing clothing that was hardly warm enough for such a sinking climate; the skies churned a foreboding grey, cider carts were being wheeled round the square, a early fires glowed amber in the windows of every home, chimneys billowed with grey-black smoke, the scent of hickory and mulled spices lingered, and the ca...

The giant remained in his mediations for some time, murmuring the words of his people’s passages for added consolation, unmoving until the afternoon snows had passed. With the advent of evening, the winds at last subsided, the clouds drew back to reveal a grey sky and subdued sun, leaving behind a few flakes flittering down from the skies and added to the glistening coat of snow encasing the giant. His white locks were adorned with a damp mantle of snow, his furs lining with icicles, and the only place within his confinement that was not encrusted in the remnants of the storm was the small space he created within the shelter of his pelts, between his arms and his folded knees. That he had been left outside during such an unpleasant gale did not recommended Frewyn’s abundance of hospitality, and that he shivered even through his ruminations did not suggest the nation’s winter as something he should like to suffer again. It seemed a frigid wasteland all around, devoid of the brilliant hu...

The Seamhair Cake Twisk make a Leraa pumpkin. I had to post it.                 Autumn soon came and with it came all the gaieties of Seamhair. The Frewyn holiday commemorating and immortalizing the dead was celebrated by the kingdom through the usual avenues of brewing mulled apple cider, of guising and carousing about the town in quest of treats, of attending Church services if only to enjoy the feast of spiced bread and sugared apple dumplings, and of ornamenting the square and homes with all the supernumerary decorations that would require more exertion to take down than had been employed in putting them up. Though all of these traditions promised merriment for the day, the one that many enjoyed best was the baking and eating of the large spiced cake usually prepared and consumed on the morning of the holiday. By the time Seamhair morning had arrived in all its festive triumph, smoke billowed from chimneys...