Legends of Belariath
Roquai
Ice Fishing
Gulthang had never learned how to fly fish or play with those wispy lines, making them hiss back and forth through the air like some do. He didn't have any want to understand the need that some fishermen felt. Were they trying to coax the fish out of the water and somehow hang itself in that whipping noose, or were they showing off? Why would a real man depend on luck to turn the fish even stupider then they already are? These are questions that the barbarian put to himself as his anchor plunked into the water.
There were docks and a couple of large dinghies to his right at what he thought was a southerly direction. He also estimated that he was in the eastern section of the common's area within the Underdark. It had also been years since he had a reason, or even the slightest notion, to enjoy interloping in the haloed home of many of his closest living friends. However terrible the Underdark's fish stock was, the trip itself was a bigger rush then he gotten climbing the crags of the Frontier Mountains.
The anchor sank until the wooden bob countered its dead weight, making the two objects tethered to the same line dance and dip in the crystalline water. Gentle waves of a totally unknown origin (because this shaman knows that there are no waves where there is no wind. Just one oddity of Underdark of several thousand, he thought) broke up the otherwise clear vision that he would have had to the bottom of the underground lake. His sight was greatly enhanced, tripled from that of a normal humanoid's by means of magery for the duration of this little trip, but it did him no good. The cool waters that harbored a large and vastly untapped stock of fish also protected them. The line between the bob and the end of his pole was taut and ready for action.
Another factor that added to this trip's excitement was the fact that he was one kilt away from being naked and totally unprotected. Being armorless for the time being meant that he was soundless and was granted stealth needed to make the trek without detection. The pommel of his fishing pole was nestled in a crack on the rock he sat on, between his legs at the hem of his kilt, cold and smooth from the Dark Elf’s superb stone craftsmanship, nearly ageless with the magic of this sprawling city.
The placement of the pole might be misconstrued as a phallic one, but Gulthang didn't notice. The bottoms of his calloused feet were enveloped in the meniscus of the lapping water below. His thoughts wandered to areas both far from here and deep within.
He wore a backpack stuffed with all of his supplies: armor, food, necessities, etc. Basically, he wore his livelihood on his back as he waited for the fishes to bite. The only thing he was devoid of was a catch to show off and bring home to his wives. "That's embarrassing..." he muttered aloud, his bass voice skimming far over the water. He didn't care who heard. Few could harm him here.
Gulthang stared off across the water at the bleak outer walls of the underground city. Well preserved and made my mason's whose names are forgotten in history, they were an impressive sight. Beyond that, Gulthang was getting very relaxed.
That was until he felt a tug on his line. Grinning like the wolf happening upon the pigs having a feast, he jerked the handle and expected to feel a flurry of discountenance on the other end of his line trying to stay below the refracting waves, but there was none. Instead, his bob and empty hook flung themselves out of the water at him. His teeth instantly started to grit as the fallow line jangled in front of his face.
He threw the pole into the water like a spear and with a growl. It sunk fast, zooming downwards, but the bamboo rod began a steady ascent just a moment later, returning to the surface to tease him.
Gulthang leapt to him feet! His fists balled at his sides and his overdeveloped musculature went steely.
"OO-daukgi-nashlana!" he barked out, a feral curse. All at once a sliver of his soul was made personified and the air in front of him was briefly frozen. A space of nullified heat shot forward and stabbed the water like an ethereal lance, because that is exactly what it was. There is a loud crack, possibly loud enough to he heard by anyone within 300 yards, as the water's surface is covered in a jagged circle of ice about the diameter of an elephant's backside. Knives of frozen water grew upward as the hard frosty skin grew outward and the lance plunged deeper. Then, all at once, it stopped.
The chill in the air deadens all sounds except for the cracking of residual forming ice. The surface of the water, frozen in place in a large gaping oval, suddenly shoots up. Like an icy flower made to bloom, a tiny iceberg that could probably encased the barbarian if he had been in its path, was propelled out of the water by its own freakish birth and the tremendous offset of the buoyancy. Reminiscent of a whale or a dolphin trying to make a splash, the giant icicle belly flops, the iced halo that was the surface of the water getting shattered in the impact. Gulthang winces as the near-freezing water coats the front of his body.
"SONofaWHORE" he growls out, his voice audible even through a cage of white teeth.
But his sour mood evaporates in the moment. As the iceberg lies horizontally and its flank is revealed, he sees the haft of his fishing pole erected from the glossy encasing as well as something more pleasurable.
On the end of the ice formation, impaled by the tip as well as frozen completely solid, is a damn good-sized fish.
He perches on the edge of the stone wall and plunges himself into the artic waters. They were cold before. Now, the only thing keeping the water all around from freezing is stubborn magical normalcy. The below-zero temperature doesn't phase the barbarian one bit. He scoops handfuls of it over his long hair as he doggy paddles to claim his prize on the end of the ice shaft.
He thinks, ‘Meh, maybe I’ll take up fly fishing after all.”