After morning chores, Garth and Beleg ran the assembled through stretches and basic exercises. Kre had to admit that the Red Feather Adventuring Company took their physical health very seriously. Even Dain joined in the activities, setting his books aside and shedding his usual layers of robes for lighter garments that were far easier to move around in.
Truth be told, Kre was in the worst physical shape of them all. He never made it through the first full calisthenics session and had to take a knee in order to catch his breath while the others continued their physical exercise.
This was the morning of the sixth day since the others had departed on their mission. Ras had returned three times, twice for half a day and once for an overnight, while Talimar only returned twice, each for a short stint. During those visits, he took a quick meal, packed some additional trail foods, and held some private conversations with Garth and Dain mostly before heading back out. Still, despite his abbreviated visits and hurried manner, he took a few minutes to check in on each and every member of the company still at camp.
“Should we expect Talimar and Ras today?” Kre asked aloud as he mimicked the stretches Beleg was showing.
“They’ll show up when they show up,” Beleg replied from the front of the group. “No sense in wondering or hoping about a thing until the thing happens.”
Kre nodded then turned to Dain who was exercising just next to him. “Didn’t you say something about using past data to get extra conclusions?”
Dain sighed and stopped his calf stretches mid-move. “Not even something I would call remotely close.” He resumed his stretching and continued, using that same kind of professor tone that Marxin used. “What I said the other day was that you can use past data to extrapolate… that is, to estimate based on how that data are trending… in order to infer what might happen next.”
“Snooze!” came the call from the back row where the dweorvkin were lined up. Dain shook his head slightly at the resulting snickers and laughs but otherwise didn’t show that it fazed him in the slightest. “Thinking on the timing of their past visits though, I believe that you would be correct in your estimation that they would both be due for a return today. Though you still have trouble with the specifics of how the logic works, there is not faulting your natural ability to deduce the way of things.”
Kre had to repeat Dain’s words in his own mind a few times before he could really parse the full meaning of what was said. “Thanks,” he finally responded. “That might actually be the first time I’ve ever been told that I have a natural ability for anything, especially with something related to school stuff.”
Dain chuckled, “Sometimes it just takes a different teacher to unlock a student’s potential for a subject. That’s one of the great problems with the schools in the smaller towns and out on the frontier. You usually only ever have one teacher for your entire education unless you happen to be lucky enough to get selected for higher education in one of the cities.”