Arodin Chronicles

Chapter 2

Chapter 2
Papers and Gears

I woke up next to a pile of old gears and other clockwork like items. I sat up and surveyed the room around me. There was the small gem on the desk, my unmade bed, and I noticed that the window was open again. I sighed, stood up from my chair, and walked over to the latch I had on my window. It must be broken if it keeps opening on its own. I took one of the screwdrivers on my shelf and unscrewed the latch. " Hmmm I bet Iren can fix this."  Iren, my friend, is the daughter of the local blacksmith who hopes to one day take over her dad's  shop. I grabbed my coat and headed out the door. As I walked down the road I looked around and noticed that there wasn't as many people outside today as usual, and the people who were out, looked very tired. I even saw a man sleeping on his porch. Well, that one wasn't very unusual, he usually sleeps there till noon anyways but that's beside the point. As I closed in on the forge I heard shouting coming from a distance. I raced quickly to the noises to see Iren's father chasing rather large rats out of his house. "Go on, get outta here! Get! I swear those things get bigger every year." He mumbled. I walked over to him whilst watching the rats run off into someone else's shed. "When I ran over here I worried that someone's house was on fire. What's with all the shouting? They're honestly kind of harmless." I chuckled. "Harmless?" He said with a slight smirk, "Well first it's rats, then rats attract snakes then it's mongoose then eventually wolves, then next thing you know we got bears attacking our village again!"  We both laughed and went inside. " Is Iren upstairs?" I asked. He shot me a stay-away-from-my-daughter look which gave me shivers. I quickly pulled out the latch from my window and showed it to him. He smirked again and said "Yeah she should be upstairs in her workshop." I thanked him then hurried up the stairs. As I entered the hallway leading up from the stairs, I heard moving gears and Iren mumbling to herself. I opened the door to her room and saw her focused and bent over working on some apparently complicated clock. "What are you working on?" I asked barging in suddenly. She shot up, grabbed a heavy wrench, and turned around startled. I threw my hands up in sign of surrender to try to avoid getting hit in the head...again... "Oh Fredrick, it's just you." She turned back around and faced her gizmo as I carefully approached her. "So, what's with the hostility?" Iren looked back at her wrench embarrassed. "Oh yeah, sorry about that. I feel kind of nervous today. I didn't sleep very well because of a freaky dream I had last night." Dream? Did everyone sleep terribly last night? I wondered. "What happened in the dream?" She leaned back in her chair and tried to remember. "Huh well there was a tall, dark, shadowy guy." It was super creepy, and I felt like I was in danger." "Did the shadow guy say or do anything?" I asked. "Hmm? No he just stood there freakishly. Why do you ask?" I was busy trying to piece everything together that I almost didn't hear her. "Hello, anyone in there?" She waved her hand in my face to snap me out of it. "Oh sorry. It's nothing, I've just noticed that not a lot of people seemed to sleep well last night." I said. I wanted to get off the topic. It was all far to odd for me to even begin to explain. I pulled out the window latch and handed it too her. "Anyway, The window has been opening for some reason lately so I think the latch might be broken." She grabbed the latch and examines it for a moment. The she tightened one screw and said "Done." "Done?" I asked. "That was quick. What was wrong with it?" She turned and looked back at me. "It was barely broken genius. The only problem is a few scratches here and a loose bolt. You must have attached it wrong if it keeps opening." I laughed nervously. She stood up and faced me properly. "Anyway, I'm bored. Are you doing anything today?" Wow that was fast I thought.  "Ummm yeah I was going to go check out my grandfathers old airship." I said. "Well it's the middle of the week today anyway, probably not going to have too many customers...hmmm...Alright I'm coming with." Before I could even ask why, Iren unexpectedly grabbed me by the hand and we both hurried downstairs. Oh well, this was kind of to be expected from her considering she's barely ever able to get out of the house. If she wants to take over the shop some day she has to get her work done so she's usually in her room/workshop working on random things. We walked back downstairs and Iren's dad waved to her as she left but as I was walking out the door he gave me the I'm watching you gesture. I quickly closed the door behind me.