Winged One
Not the Simurgh
- Location
- definitely the ground
- Pronouns
- They/Them/It
Floridania: *is still screaming*
Last edited:
The True Confessions of a Nine-Tailed Fox
- Thread starter arianedartagnan
- Start date
At this rate, Floridiana's gonna be doing a lot of screaming....
Chapter 110: The Magnificent Lychee Eating Contest
Chapter 110: The Magnificent Lychee Eating Contest
The instant the candle wick caught fire, the Earl of Black Crag seized a lychee. Because the fruits were so fresh – had just been shot from a tree, in fact – the shells were soft and pliable, not brittle as they often were by the time they reached the City of Dawn Song.
I watched in horrified fascination as he jabbed a thumbnail through the shell with no care for tidiness or aesthetics. When he broke the translucent flesh of the lychee too, clear juices welled up and flowed over his fingers. He ripped off the rest of the shell, dropped it onto the table, and popped the whole fruit into his mouth. He chewed and sucked the flesh off the pit, swallowed, and spat the pit into the waste basket.
From my perch on Floridiana's shoulder, I could smell the sweetness. Ooooh, I wanted a lychee! Despite all the time I'd spent in a place literally named Lychee Grove, I hadn't gotten a single bite yet.
"Don't you dare," Floridiana muttered out of the corner of her mouth.
I resettled my wings, which I hadn't even realized I'd begun to spread. Of course not. I was merely critiquing his peeling technique.
She didn't need to snort.
The Earl of Yellow Flame, on the other hand, was already lagging behind. He'd wasted precious seconds poking through the top layer of lychees in his basket to select a beautiful, round, red one. Then he'd delicately removed the stem, pulling it off to reveal the top of the pit. After that, using the tips of his nails, without breaking the flesh and spilling a single precious drop of juice, he'd removed the rest of the shell in one curling piece. Then he put the fruit into his mouth and chewed slowly to savor the flavors, covered his mouth with a hand to spit the pit into his palm, and finally dropped it into the basket.
Okay. Maybe refinement was overrated in an eating contest.
By this point, Black Crag was already tearing into his third lychee. Sticky juices dripped down his wrists onto his sleeves. Standing behind him and monitoring the scene for any untoward spells, his mage winced at the mess.
Why didn't you make peeling technique part of the victory condition? I hissed at Floridiana.
"Why didn't you say so earlier?" she retorted.
How do we get him to eat faster?
"We don't."
Floridiana obviously had no faith in Yellow Flame's ability gulp down his food. Probably because the man had never lacked for it a day of his life.
Since it was waaaay too late to try starving him now, I hunted for ways in which a mortal sparrow could slow down Black Crag.
I could…chirp at him and fly around his head in circles – but such blatant interference would only make him cry foul.
I could…sneak under his tunic and tickle him – but sparrows were too big. That was more something I could have pulled off as a bee, so many lives ago. Who'd have thought I'd miss White Tier?
Should I ask Bobo to speak to the bee queen? But Black Crag's mage would instantly recognize a bee spirit creeping into his liege lord's tunic.
So what else could I do?
I could…have Bobo do a weird dance behind Yellow Flame's back – aha!
I zipped over to the bamboo viper, who was watching the contest next to Dusty. Come on! We're going to do our ventriloquism act!
"Our ventriloquisssm act?"
Yes! We need to distract Black Crag so he loses the contest.
"Uh…okay! How're we doing it?"
We're going to provide a running commentary on their eating skills for everyone to hear! We'll talk to each other, but move your mouth and pretend that you're saying my parts too.
Wait, that wasn't how ventriloquism worked.
Pretend that you're pretending not to be saying my parts, when in fact you're actually saying them. Got it?
"Uh…yep!"
Okay! Let's go!
She slithered and I flew back to the table, where she shaped a coil for me to perch on. Together we faced the audience of Black Crag soldiers and Household Guards and daring Lychee Grovers who'd crept up to the tree ring to watch. Some humans had even climbed onto the branches for a better view – a bold move to be sure, but it was just like humans to act suicidal when you were trying to save their lives.
Humans and ssspirits! I cried, but my voice lacked carrying power and sounded thin and reedy even to myself. Clearing my throat, I did my best to bellow. Come one, come all, to sssee the most chivalrous sssight you ssshall ever behold!
When I started speaking, everyone in earshot jumped and gaped. All the mages put their hands to their seals on reflex, before they realized that it was just a street performance and relaxed.
After a quick glare, Yellow Flame seemed to decide that we were too crass to deserve his attention, and he went back to peeling a lychee. He had yet to get any juice on his hands. As for Black Crag, his brows knit in a ferocious scowl, and he nearly crushed a fruit.
Two noble human men, great in ssspirit, dessscended from the blood of kings, locked in a contessst that will determine the fate of Lychee Grove! Who ssshall prevail?!
Bobo had forgotten herself and was gawking at me along with everyone else, but hopefully the audience attributed that to superb acting skills. I gave her a minute nod, signaling her to say something herself.
"Um, um, we know that a lot of you are too far away to sssee clearly, ssso we'll tell you what's going on!"
A few tentative whoops drifted over, coming from the idiots in the trees, of course.
At the moment, His Grace the Earl of Black Crag has the lead! It is five lychees to three! What will His Grace the Earl of Yellow Flame do? How will he recover?!
Yellow Flame pointedly turned his head so he couldn't catch so much as an accidental glimpse of this comedy routine. Swallowing and dropping his fourth pit tidily into his basket, he selected a fifth lychee.
We really needed to starve him a bit, to teach him to eat faster.
Black Crag, on the other hand, clenched his fist around his crushed lychee and growled, "What is this nonsense?"
Floridiana pasted her widest, most ingratiating grin on her face and flung wide her arms. "Your Grace! This is another tradition from the Imperial Court, described in the annals of that time!"
Silently, I willed her not to cite A Mage's Guide to Serica, just in case Black Crag's mage had read the cursed thing. Fortunately, she opted to leave her sources vague.
"To watch the contests of that time, aristocrats would pack themselves into the great hall of the palace, but those at the back would be unable to catch more than the merest glimpse of the combatants. Hence the tradition of the – the – the announcer! Who would narrate the battle for all to hear!"
"Yes," Bobo agreed happily. "I am the announ-ssser."
"This is absurd! Remove the snake at once!" shouted Black Crag.
A perfectly peeled lychee halfway to his lips, Yellow Flame remarked, "Come now, Black Crag, 'tis tradition. Surely you can't quibble with tradition." He popped the fruit into his mouth and chewed, the faintest smirk on his lips.
And the Earl of Yellow Flame is onto his fifth lychee! Can he do it? Can he catch up to the Earl of Black Crag?
"This is – 'tis – " Black Crag sputtered, shoved the mess in his fist into his mouth, and spat it back out.
"I'm afraid that one does not count, Your Grace," Floridiana said in a dispassionate tone. "Only pits from which you have eaten the flesh of the fruit will be included in your total."
With a growl, Black Crag hurled the mess onto the ground and grabbed a new lychee.
Meanwhile, in a much better mood as he savored both the lychees and his opponent's discomfit, Yellow Flame plucked a sixth lychee from his basket somewhat at random, and broke off its stem.
Seriously, would it kill the man to get a bit of juice on his hands? Still, he was ahead for now, as Black Crag mangled his next lychee.
I darted a glance at the candle. It had burned halfway down to the notch that marked the end of the contest.
And they're both on to their sssixth lychees! They're peeling them! The Earl of Yellow Flame ssstarted firssst, but the Earl of Black Crag is catching up! And he's done! He's putting it in his mouth! Oh! Oh! But does that one count? Sssee the amount of flesh he's thrown away with the peel! Aaaaaand the judge is pausssing the contessst to decide!
I willed Floridiana to take the hint. It really wasn't very subtle. In fact, it was about as subtle as Lord Magnissimus ripping the arm off a rock macaque to devour. So why wasn't she making her move?
"One moment, please, Your Graces." Floridiana pinched out the candle flame.
In the pause that followed, gasps rose from the audience. Armor creaked and weapons clanked as the soldiers edged closer. In the wake of the retreating army followed the suicidal Lychee Grovers.
Leaning over the table, Floridiana made a show of scrutinizing Black Crag's lychee peel. She twisted her lips to a side, pursed them, and bit them, demonstrating just how hard she was thinking.
At last, she declared, "I am afraid you have left too much flesh for this one to count. After we relight the candle, you may either finish eating this one, or you may choose a new fruit and we will strike this one from your total. Page."
The page boy stepped forward smartly.
"This is an outrage! I refuse to accept thy ruling!" Black Crag slammed a fist on the table, making the baskets jump and lychees topple out and roll onto the ground.
Murmurs rose from the crowd, soldiers in the back standing on tiptoe and craning their necks to see the lychee peel for themselves.
"Canst thou see it?"
"How doth it look?"
"How much is left?"
And the keen-sighted owl spirits puffed out their chests and answered.
"'Tis just a wee bit."
"A wee bit! My ma would have pecked us upside the head if we left that much!"
"Thy ma could afford to feed thee lychees, could she?"
Behind them, the Lychee Grovers were starting to provide their own expert commentary.
"The true measure of skill is the cleanliness with which you remove the peel, not the speed."
"Why did the judge choose eating speed?"
"'Tis such a waste of good lychees!"
A soldier, who'd apparently never eaten a lychee in his life, turned around and asked, "Is it that hard to peel cleanly?"
Bending down, one Lychee Grover picked up a stray fruit to demonstrate. A knot of people gathered around him, the soldiers looking on with great interest while his fellow Lychee Grovers criticized his technique.
Back at the table, Yellow Flame drawled, "Don't be tedious, Black Crag. Surely it won't be such a trial to lick the peel clean." His tone might have been lazy, but his attitude was not. He was balanced on the edge of his chair, eyes scanning his basket to pick out his next target. "Page, light the candle."
"I object!" roared Black Crag, but Floridiana nodded, and the boy lit the candle.
At once, Yellow Flame's fingertips flew over his seventh lychee, removing the peel in one piece.
Black Crag growled, stuffed his sixth lychee's peel into his mouth and then spat it back out, clean of flesh. As he reached for his seventh, Yellow Flame started on his eighth.
Meanwhile, on the erstwhile battlefield, the soldiers were getting onto their hands and knees, searching for and eating the precious fruits or tucking them into their pockets for later. Lychee Grovers enthusiastically led them to the trees and helped them pick lychees to take home. One Lychee Grover even challenged a pangolin soldier to an eating contest of their own.
As my focus shifted to them, Bobo took over the announcing duties. "The Earl of Yellow Flame is winning now! Eight lychees to ssseven!"
In the distance, peddlers were coming out of the city with bamboo poles balanced on their shoulders. Bulging baskets of snacks dangled from the ends. Excellent. Maybe we could stuff the army so full of good food that it couldn't fight anymore.
Returning my attention to the contestants, I declared, But the Earl of Black Crag is catching up! He is reaching for his eighth lychee! He is peeling his eighth lychee! He is –
Black Crag flung it aside. He leaped to his feet and flipped the table over, sending the Yellow Flame tumbling backwards and lychees flying everywhere. Bobo used her body to shield me from a hail of pits.
"Enough!" he roared. "I have had enough of this nonsense!"
"Indeed," said a cool voice behind us. "I have also had quite enough of this nonsense, Uncle."
The Queen of South Serica had arrived.
A/N: Thanks to my awesome Patreon backers, Arif, Autocharth, BananaBobert, Blacklark57, Celia, Charlotte, Hookshyu, Lindsey, Michael, Pizzatiger, and TheLunaticCo!
The instant the candle wick caught fire, the Earl of Black Crag seized a lychee. Because the fruits were so fresh – had just been shot from a tree, in fact – the shells were soft and pliable, not brittle as they often were by the time they reached the City of Dawn Song.
I watched in horrified fascination as he jabbed a thumbnail through the shell with no care for tidiness or aesthetics. When he broke the translucent flesh of the lychee too, clear juices welled up and flowed over his fingers. He ripped off the rest of the shell, dropped it onto the table, and popped the whole fruit into his mouth. He chewed and sucked the flesh off the pit, swallowed, and spat the pit into the waste basket.
From my perch on Floridiana's shoulder, I could smell the sweetness. Ooooh, I wanted a lychee! Despite all the time I'd spent in a place literally named Lychee Grove, I hadn't gotten a single bite yet.
"Don't you dare," Floridiana muttered out of the corner of her mouth.
I resettled my wings, which I hadn't even realized I'd begun to spread. Of course not. I was merely critiquing his peeling technique.
She didn't need to snort.
The Earl of Yellow Flame, on the other hand, was already lagging behind. He'd wasted precious seconds poking through the top layer of lychees in his basket to select a beautiful, round, red one. Then he'd delicately removed the stem, pulling it off to reveal the top of the pit. After that, using the tips of his nails, without breaking the flesh and spilling a single precious drop of juice, he'd removed the rest of the shell in one curling piece. Then he put the fruit into his mouth and chewed slowly to savor the flavors, covered his mouth with a hand to spit the pit into his palm, and finally dropped it into the basket.
Okay. Maybe refinement was overrated in an eating contest.
By this point, Black Crag was already tearing into his third lychee. Sticky juices dripped down his wrists onto his sleeves. Standing behind him and monitoring the scene for any untoward spells, his mage winced at the mess.
Why didn't you make peeling technique part of the victory condition? I hissed at Floridiana.
"Why didn't you say so earlier?" she retorted.
How do we get him to eat faster?
"We don't."
Floridiana obviously had no faith in Yellow Flame's ability gulp down his food. Probably because the man had never lacked for it a day of his life.
Since it was waaaay too late to try starving him now, I hunted for ways in which a mortal sparrow could slow down Black Crag.
I could…chirp at him and fly around his head in circles – but such blatant interference would only make him cry foul.
I could…sneak under his tunic and tickle him – but sparrows were too big. That was more something I could have pulled off as a bee, so many lives ago. Who'd have thought I'd miss White Tier?
Should I ask Bobo to speak to the bee queen? But Black Crag's mage would instantly recognize a bee spirit creeping into his liege lord's tunic.
So what else could I do?
I could…have Bobo do a weird dance behind Yellow Flame's back – aha!
I zipped over to the bamboo viper, who was watching the contest next to Dusty. Come on! We're going to do our ventriloquism act!
"Our ventriloquisssm act?"
Yes! We need to distract Black Crag so he loses the contest.
"Uh…okay! How're we doing it?"
We're going to provide a running commentary on their eating skills for everyone to hear! We'll talk to each other, but move your mouth and pretend that you're saying my parts too.
Wait, that wasn't how ventriloquism worked.
Pretend that you're pretending not to be saying my parts, when in fact you're actually saying them. Got it?
"Uh…yep!"
Okay! Let's go!
She slithered and I flew back to the table, where she shaped a coil for me to perch on. Together we faced the audience of Black Crag soldiers and Household Guards and daring Lychee Grovers who'd crept up to the tree ring to watch. Some humans had even climbed onto the branches for a better view – a bold move to be sure, but it was just like humans to act suicidal when you were trying to save their lives.
Humans and ssspirits! I cried, but my voice lacked carrying power and sounded thin and reedy even to myself. Clearing my throat, I did my best to bellow. Come one, come all, to sssee the most chivalrous sssight you ssshall ever behold!
When I started speaking, everyone in earshot jumped and gaped. All the mages put their hands to their seals on reflex, before they realized that it was just a street performance and relaxed.
After a quick glare, Yellow Flame seemed to decide that we were too crass to deserve his attention, and he went back to peeling a lychee. He had yet to get any juice on his hands. As for Black Crag, his brows knit in a ferocious scowl, and he nearly crushed a fruit.
Two noble human men, great in ssspirit, dessscended from the blood of kings, locked in a contessst that will determine the fate of Lychee Grove! Who ssshall prevail?!
Bobo had forgotten herself and was gawking at me along with everyone else, but hopefully the audience attributed that to superb acting skills. I gave her a minute nod, signaling her to say something herself.
"Um, um, we know that a lot of you are too far away to sssee clearly, ssso we'll tell you what's going on!"
A few tentative whoops drifted over, coming from the idiots in the trees, of course.
At the moment, His Grace the Earl of Black Crag has the lead! It is five lychees to three! What will His Grace the Earl of Yellow Flame do? How will he recover?!
Yellow Flame pointedly turned his head so he couldn't catch so much as an accidental glimpse of this comedy routine. Swallowing and dropping his fourth pit tidily into his basket, he selected a fifth lychee.
We really needed to starve him a bit, to teach him to eat faster.
Black Crag, on the other hand, clenched his fist around his crushed lychee and growled, "What is this nonsense?"
Floridiana pasted her widest, most ingratiating grin on her face and flung wide her arms. "Your Grace! This is another tradition from the Imperial Court, described in the annals of that time!"
Silently, I willed her not to cite A Mage's Guide to Serica, just in case Black Crag's mage had read the cursed thing. Fortunately, she opted to leave her sources vague.
"To watch the contests of that time, aristocrats would pack themselves into the great hall of the palace, but those at the back would be unable to catch more than the merest glimpse of the combatants. Hence the tradition of the – the – the announcer! Who would narrate the battle for all to hear!"
"Yes," Bobo agreed happily. "I am the announ-ssser."
"This is absurd! Remove the snake at once!" shouted Black Crag.
A perfectly peeled lychee halfway to his lips, Yellow Flame remarked, "Come now, Black Crag, 'tis tradition. Surely you can't quibble with tradition." He popped the fruit into his mouth and chewed, the faintest smirk on his lips.
And the Earl of Yellow Flame is onto his fifth lychee! Can he do it? Can he catch up to the Earl of Black Crag?
"This is – 'tis – " Black Crag sputtered, shoved the mess in his fist into his mouth, and spat it back out.
"I'm afraid that one does not count, Your Grace," Floridiana said in a dispassionate tone. "Only pits from which you have eaten the flesh of the fruit will be included in your total."
With a growl, Black Crag hurled the mess onto the ground and grabbed a new lychee.
Meanwhile, in a much better mood as he savored both the lychees and his opponent's discomfit, Yellow Flame plucked a sixth lychee from his basket somewhat at random, and broke off its stem.
Seriously, would it kill the man to get a bit of juice on his hands? Still, he was ahead for now, as Black Crag mangled his next lychee.
I darted a glance at the candle. It had burned halfway down to the notch that marked the end of the contest.
And they're both on to their sssixth lychees! They're peeling them! The Earl of Yellow Flame ssstarted firssst, but the Earl of Black Crag is catching up! And he's done! He's putting it in his mouth! Oh! Oh! But does that one count? Sssee the amount of flesh he's thrown away with the peel! Aaaaaand the judge is pausssing the contessst to decide!
I willed Floridiana to take the hint. It really wasn't very subtle. In fact, it was about as subtle as Lord Magnissimus ripping the arm off a rock macaque to devour. So why wasn't she making her move?
"One moment, please, Your Graces." Floridiana pinched out the candle flame.
In the pause that followed, gasps rose from the audience. Armor creaked and weapons clanked as the soldiers edged closer. In the wake of the retreating army followed the suicidal Lychee Grovers.
Leaning over the table, Floridiana made a show of scrutinizing Black Crag's lychee peel. She twisted her lips to a side, pursed them, and bit them, demonstrating just how hard she was thinking.
At last, she declared, "I am afraid you have left too much flesh for this one to count. After we relight the candle, you may either finish eating this one, or you may choose a new fruit and we will strike this one from your total. Page."
The page boy stepped forward smartly.
"This is an outrage! I refuse to accept thy ruling!" Black Crag slammed a fist on the table, making the baskets jump and lychees topple out and roll onto the ground.
Murmurs rose from the crowd, soldiers in the back standing on tiptoe and craning their necks to see the lychee peel for themselves.
"Canst thou see it?"
"How doth it look?"
"How much is left?"
And the keen-sighted owl spirits puffed out their chests and answered.
"'Tis just a wee bit."
"A wee bit! My ma would have pecked us upside the head if we left that much!"
"Thy ma could afford to feed thee lychees, could she?"
Behind them, the Lychee Grovers were starting to provide their own expert commentary.
"The true measure of skill is the cleanliness with which you remove the peel, not the speed."
"Why did the judge choose eating speed?"
"'Tis such a waste of good lychees!"
A soldier, who'd apparently never eaten a lychee in his life, turned around and asked, "Is it that hard to peel cleanly?"
Bending down, one Lychee Grover picked up a stray fruit to demonstrate. A knot of people gathered around him, the soldiers looking on with great interest while his fellow Lychee Grovers criticized his technique.
Back at the table, Yellow Flame drawled, "Don't be tedious, Black Crag. Surely it won't be such a trial to lick the peel clean." His tone might have been lazy, but his attitude was not. He was balanced on the edge of his chair, eyes scanning his basket to pick out his next target. "Page, light the candle."
"I object!" roared Black Crag, but Floridiana nodded, and the boy lit the candle.
At once, Yellow Flame's fingertips flew over his seventh lychee, removing the peel in one piece.
Black Crag growled, stuffed his sixth lychee's peel into his mouth and then spat it back out, clean of flesh. As he reached for his seventh, Yellow Flame started on his eighth.
Meanwhile, on the erstwhile battlefield, the soldiers were getting onto their hands and knees, searching for and eating the precious fruits or tucking them into their pockets for later. Lychee Grovers enthusiastically led them to the trees and helped them pick lychees to take home. One Lychee Grover even challenged a pangolin soldier to an eating contest of their own.
As my focus shifted to them, Bobo took over the announcing duties. "The Earl of Yellow Flame is winning now! Eight lychees to ssseven!"
In the distance, peddlers were coming out of the city with bamboo poles balanced on their shoulders. Bulging baskets of snacks dangled from the ends. Excellent. Maybe we could stuff the army so full of good food that it couldn't fight anymore.
Returning my attention to the contestants, I declared, But the Earl of Black Crag is catching up! He is reaching for his eighth lychee! He is peeling his eighth lychee! He is –
Black Crag flung it aside. He leaped to his feet and flipped the table over, sending the Yellow Flame tumbling backwards and lychees flying everywhere. Bobo used her body to shield me from a hail of pits.
"Enough!" he roared. "I have had enough of this nonsense!"
"Indeed," said a cool voice behind us. "I have also had quite enough of this nonsense, Uncle."
The Queen of South Serica had arrived.
A/N: Thanks to my awesome Patreon backers, Arif, Autocharth, BananaBobert, Blacklark57, Celia, Charlotte, Hookshyu, Lindsey, Michael, Pizzatiger, and TheLunaticCo!
Yes! If you can find lychees at the store, they're definitely worth trying!
Winged One
Not the Simurgh
- Location
- definitely the ground
- Pronouns
- They/Them/It
Hm, yes, this development means we have reached the exact correct amount of this nonsense. Sucker.
Wasn't expecting her to show up in person, though.
Hm, yes, this development means we have reached the exact correct amount of this nonsense. Sucker.
Wasn't expecting her to show up in person, though.
Haha, it was a carefully calibrated amount of nonsense!
Yeah, Jullia decided it was safer to deal with her uncle herself.
Chapter 111: A Tragic Lack of Beheadings
Chapter 111: A Tragic Lack of Beheadings
Against an appropriate backdrop of courtiers and Household Guards, Jullia shone in an embroidered yellow silk robe. It had obviously been modeled after Cassius' Imperial Robe of State, because it featured the same design of five-clawed dragons flying above crashing waves. (The dragons all looked bug eyed, but maybe that was the subject matter.) Fabric like that was meant for cooler, drier northern climes. The woman had to be sweltering under all that brocade, but she acted as cool as if she were picnicking in the Jade Mountains – after Lord Magnissimus breathed on her, no less.
I approved. Here was a ruler who understood the power of clothing to project, well, power.
At the sight of their sovereign, all the commoners dropped to their knees, and the two earls bowed low.
Jullia pointedly directed her gaze at Yellow Flame, and not her renegade uncle. "Cousin. What have you to report?"
Her mages had already enhanced her voice so that it carried all the way to the city.
Straightening, Yellow Flame waved a hand at his own mage, who scurried forth to stamp the earl's throat. When he answered, his voice also rang out across the countryside. "Your Majesty, as instructed, I proceeded here with all haste. Upon my arrival, I discovered the forces of the Earl of Black Crag locked in a pitched battle with those of the Lady of the Lychee Tree."
Tree combat must have been common in the south. The queen gave the ring of lychee trees only a cursory glance.
"As I could not prevail upon him to obey Your Majesty's royal decree to cease and desist, I suggested that we settle the conflict by the time-honored tradition of single combat."
Jullia inclined her head, indicating her royal approval.
Behind her shoulder, Anthea's eyes bored into me. She knew that I appreciated nothing more than a good duel between a champion I'd primed to win and an opponent I'd sabotaged thoroughly. Or between two duelists about whom I cared nothing and whose deaths would provide a brief spell of entertainment.
I gave her a minute shake of my head. This particular duel had not been my doing.
Well, sort of.
"Single…combat, you say." Jullia's voice was delicate. She let her gaze rove over the dining table and the fruits, peels, and pits that littered the grass.
"Yes – "
"It's an outrage!" exploded Black Crag. "Julli– " His niece's cold stare cut him off. "Your Majesty, why do you take the word of this – "
"Uncle. We have not yet requested your side of the story."
Blood rushed to Black Crag's face, turning it as red as a ripe lychee, but he held his tongue.
As for me, I studied the queen with newfound interest. (Okay, fine, it was probably respect.) Her composure was at complete odds with my mental image of her. All along, I'd been picturing an inexperienced young woman, frail and weak and unsure of herself, consumed by grief for her father, swept headlong towards her destruction by currents at court that she could not control or, perhaps, even comprehend.
But of course she couldn't be all that young or inexperienced if she were Lodia's mother's school friend.
It was Katu's fault. Him and his overactive poet's imagination!
Leaving Floridiana's shoulder, I alighted on Anthea's, where my claws snagged and tangled in the filmy silk.
You got Jullia to come in person? I whispered as she winced and craned her neck to inspect the damage.
The raccoon dog spirit wrapped firm fingers around my body, pulled me off her shoulder with one hand, and used the other to work my claws free. "Stop squirming," she hissed. "You're making it worse. But no, I didn't 'get' Jullie to do anything."
Then why's she here?
She eased a loop of thread off a claw. "Because she wants to be."
Because you put it into her head that she needs to see the situation for herself?
Another loop of thread slid off a claw. "I didn't 'put' anything into her head. I'm not you. I told you, I don't get involved in politics."
A likely story.
Tagging along with the queen seems pretty involved to me.
She couldn't shrug because it would damage her gown more, but I heard it in her voice. "I'm just here for moral support."
Yeah, moral support definitely counted as getting involved in court politics. But whatever. It wasn't my problem if Anthea were too dense to see that much. It wasn't like I was her mentor (anymore). Really, all I needed her to do was survive long enough to introduce me to the Kitchen God.
" – did it for you, Jullie!" Black Crag's shout interrupted our conversation. "You have always been too soft on the nobles! They are your vassals! Do you really think an Empress would have allowed her nobles the degree of license that you do?"
Yellow Flame was too much of a courtier to snort, but he did raise both eyebrows.
Jullia's voice remained cool. "Yes, about that, Your Grace."
Clenching his sticky fists, Black Crag growled, "I did it for your sake, Your Majesty."
"And we acknowledge the intent, but we cannot condone the action. You are hereby banished from court. Confine yourself to your estate until further notice. If we hear of further attacks upon our vassals, you will answer to us."
Hang on a sec, is that it? She's sending him home? She's not beheading him or anything?!
What kind of puny punishment was this?!
"Not everyone is like you," Anthea muttered.
After working the final loop of silk free from my claws, she didn't bother setting me down anywhere. She simply opened her fingers. I plummeted several inches before I got my wings coordinated. Then I flew around and dug my claws into her other shoulder.
Hey, if she had to get one side of her gown repaired, I might as well make sure it stayed symmetrical, right?
"Why must you be so perverse?" she hissed. "I'd forgotten how much I didn't miss you."
Awww, so you did miss me? I gotta say, though…I didn't miss you at all.
She gnashed her teeth, got me untangled from the silk, stalked forward, and thrust me at Floridiana.
Startled, the mage jerked her head up. She'd been keeping it lowered, peeking at the queen and earls through messy strands of hair.
"This is yours, I believe." Anthea made me sound like a clod of earth kicked up by her horse's hooves.
"No – " began Floridiana, who had no particular desire to lay claim to me – "I mean, yes, gracious lady. I apologize deeply for my, uh, pet sparrow's…misbehavior. If there is anything I might to make up for it – "
"Just keep it away from me." Dropping me into Floridiana's hand and turning on her heel – which would have worked better on a polished marble floor than on coarse grass – Anthea flounced away.
"Are you okay?" Bobo whispered.
She inspected me all over, but I was fine. Anthea hadn't squeezed me hard enough to crush any internal organs. She knew she needed me to implement that kingdom-wide network of temples to the Kitchen God.
"Ssshould you go into the city to tell the Lady what happened? Ssshe must be very worried – "
No.
My answer came out so sharply that Bobo blinked.
Out of the corner of her mouth, Floridiana asked, "Why not? Thought you were friends."
No. I clenched my beak, remembering the Lady of the Lychee Tree's dispassionate tone as she threatened to take my friends hostage. She proved to be undeserving of trust.
"For real? What'd ssshe do?"
"Yes, for real, what could she do to make her undeserving of your trust?"
What was for real was that I didn't appreciate Floridiana's implication.
She hinted that if I didn't side with her, she would find the three of you and hold you prisoner. It's like she doesn't trust me.
"Really?!" gasped Bobo.
Floridiana, on the other hand, heaved a weary sigh. She didn't act nearly as upset about it as I had been, even though it would have been her neck on the line. "Why does that not surprise me at all…."
Hey! What's that supposed to mean?
"If you haven't figured it out on your own by now, I have better things to do than tell you what you have no intention of learning. Anyway, what's the plan now?"
Awwww, does that mean that you do trust me? Just to irritate her, I rubbed the crown of my head against her cheek.
"Cut that out!"
"Hey, who's that?" asked Dusty's voice.
Unnoticed, the horse spirit had ambled over, and now he nosed the other side of Floridiana's head.
"Ugh, don't slobber all over me!" She pushed his head away, but not hard.
Mission accomplished: One mage, thoroughly annoyed.
"Huh, who is that, Rosssie?"
Who is who – oh!
A procession was wending out of the city, humans and spirits clad in the green and gold of the Lychee Grove Earth Court. At their head were Missa and Ancemus, the Lady's foremost mage and top adviser, come to welcome their sovereign. Personally, I found it inappropriate that the Lady of the Lychee Tree hadn't come in person, but things were so topsy-turvy in South Serica that maybe it was simply the way of things.
Those are representatives of the spirit who threatened to take you hostage, but we're all best friends forever now.
Only Floridiana caught my sarcasm.
Bobo and Dusty just looked dazzled by the fancy clothing.
"Do I look all right? Are you sure I look all right?"
"Uh-huh! Uh-huh! You look ssso pretty!"
As I'd expected, Lodia and Bobo got along like a house that had not been set ablaze by exploding crossbow bolts.
My salvation of the city had won me (somewhat cool) official thanks, but my true reward had been Missa welcoming me back into her home, along with Bobo, Floridiana, and Dusty. Well, not literally in Dusty's case, but the horse was enjoying the Kohs' grass when he wasn't poking their neighbors' touch-me-not plants. The way the tiny leaves curled up and wilted fascinated him to no end.
We'd all been invited to a celebratory feast at the Earth Court, and Lodia, naturally, was dithering over what to wear.
"I can't believe the Queen wants to see me! Are you sure she said she wants to see me? Are you sure she wasn't thinking of someone else?" she asked for the ten-thousandth time.
I'd forgotten how tedious the girl could be. Yes. Yes, she did, I repeated for the ten-thousandth time.
It was true: After exchanging meaningless pleasantries with Missa, Jullia had asked out of nowhere, "How fares thy grandchild?"
"Both of them are faring well, Your Majesty. I thank you for my grandchildren's lives." And she'd bowed very deeply.
Jullia had looked flummoxed by the plural. "Both – yes, that is right, she did have a second babe, didn't she? How fares little Lodia?"
I'd told Lodia this story already. Many, many times. But she still refused to believe it.
"The Queen truly remembered my name?" she pressed. "On her own? 'Twasn't because an adviser whispered it to her?"
"Truly!" Bobo reassured her. "Really truly! And then ssshe said, 'I ssshould like to sssee the girl'."
"But did she really mean it? Maybe she was just being polite."
She's the queen, Lodia. She doesn't need to be polite. If she didn't want to see you, she wouldn't have mentioned you at all.
That made Lodia gulp and twist her hands together.
At the other end of the common room table, Floridiana glanced up from one of Missa's magic texts. "Don't worry, Lodia. The queen is simply curious about her old friend's daughter. Just be yourself and everything will be fine."
Her no-nonsense, schoolmistress-ly tone failed to comfort Lodia. "Be myself? Oh, but I never know the right thing to say – what if I mess up and offend her? What if I trip and fall when I greet her? What if – "
"You'll be fine," Floridiana repeated, closing the book with a great deal more gentleness than she ever used on me. "If you're so worried, why don't we rehearse your greetings? I'll play Queen Jullia."
She moved across the room and sat down in the chair that Lodia kept by the window for embroidering. As soon as the mage's hands touched the armrests, her demeanor changed. Her chin lifted at a haughty angle, her body draped against the chairback, and her eyes went distant, focusing somewhere in the middle distance. The transformation was impressive, but –
That's not how Jullia sits. Ignoring Lodia's gasp at my use of the queen's name without any kind of honorific, I corrected Floridiana. She doesn't lounge.
"Like this?" Floridiana's spine snapped straight, no longer touching the chairback at all.
Better.
"All right. Let's rehearse it, Lodia. Start on the other side of the room, by the stairs – yes, that's good. Now approach me. No, don't cringe. Shoulders back, head up. You're the granddaughter of the Lychee Grove Earth Court's most powerful mage and the daughter of the Queen's old friend. Try it again. Yes, that's better…."
As I watched Floridiana coach Lodia, I congratulated myself on introducing the two. I'd known that the mage would be a better mentor to the awkward teenager than I was, just like how she made a better schoolteacher than I did.
I'd been right to bring her to Lychee Grove.
A/N 1: I picture Jullia's robe looking like this. Definitely not something I'd want to wear in hot, humid weather!
A/N 2: Thanks to my awesome Patreon backers, Arif, Autocharth, BananaBobert, Blacklark57, Celia, Charlotte, Hookshyu, Lindsey, Michael, Pizzatiger, TheLunaticCo, and Anonymous!
Against an appropriate backdrop of courtiers and Household Guards, Jullia shone in an embroidered yellow silk robe. It had obviously been modeled after Cassius' Imperial Robe of State, because it featured the same design of five-clawed dragons flying above crashing waves. (The dragons all looked bug eyed, but maybe that was the subject matter.) Fabric like that was meant for cooler, drier northern climes. The woman had to be sweltering under all that brocade, but she acted as cool as if she were picnicking in the Jade Mountains – after Lord Magnissimus breathed on her, no less.
I approved. Here was a ruler who understood the power of clothing to project, well, power.
At the sight of their sovereign, all the commoners dropped to their knees, and the two earls bowed low.
Jullia pointedly directed her gaze at Yellow Flame, and not her renegade uncle. "Cousin. What have you to report?"
Her mages had already enhanced her voice so that it carried all the way to the city.
Straightening, Yellow Flame waved a hand at his own mage, who scurried forth to stamp the earl's throat. When he answered, his voice also rang out across the countryside. "Your Majesty, as instructed, I proceeded here with all haste. Upon my arrival, I discovered the forces of the Earl of Black Crag locked in a pitched battle with those of the Lady of the Lychee Tree."
Tree combat must have been common in the south. The queen gave the ring of lychee trees only a cursory glance.
"As I could not prevail upon him to obey Your Majesty's royal decree to cease and desist, I suggested that we settle the conflict by the time-honored tradition of single combat."
Jullia inclined her head, indicating her royal approval.
Behind her shoulder, Anthea's eyes bored into me. She knew that I appreciated nothing more than a good duel between a champion I'd primed to win and an opponent I'd sabotaged thoroughly. Or between two duelists about whom I cared nothing and whose deaths would provide a brief spell of entertainment.
I gave her a minute shake of my head. This particular duel had not been my doing.
Well, sort of.
"Single…combat, you say." Jullia's voice was delicate. She let her gaze rove over the dining table and the fruits, peels, and pits that littered the grass.
"Yes – "
"It's an outrage!" exploded Black Crag. "Julli– " His niece's cold stare cut him off. "Your Majesty, why do you take the word of this – "
"Uncle. We have not yet requested your side of the story."
Blood rushed to Black Crag's face, turning it as red as a ripe lychee, but he held his tongue.
As for me, I studied the queen with newfound interest. (Okay, fine, it was probably respect.) Her composure was at complete odds with my mental image of her. All along, I'd been picturing an inexperienced young woman, frail and weak and unsure of herself, consumed by grief for her father, swept headlong towards her destruction by currents at court that she could not control or, perhaps, even comprehend.
But of course she couldn't be all that young or inexperienced if she were Lodia's mother's school friend.
It was Katu's fault. Him and his overactive poet's imagination!
Leaving Floridiana's shoulder, I alighted on Anthea's, where my claws snagged and tangled in the filmy silk.
You got Jullia to come in person? I whispered as she winced and craned her neck to inspect the damage.
The raccoon dog spirit wrapped firm fingers around my body, pulled me off her shoulder with one hand, and used the other to work my claws free. "Stop squirming," she hissed. "You're making it worse. But no, I didn't 'get' Jullie to do anything."
Then why's she here?
She eased a loop of thread off a claw. "Because she wants to be."
Because you put it into her head that she needs to see the situation for herself?
Another loop of thread slid off a claw. "I didn't 'put' anything into her head. I'm not you. I told you, I don't get involved in politics."
A likely story.
Tagging along with the queen seems pretty involved to me.
She couldn't shrug because it would damage her gown more, but I heard it in her voice. "I'm just here for moral support."
Yeah, moral support definitely counted as getting involved in court politics. But whatever. It wasn't my problem if Anthea were too dense to see that much. It wasn't like I was her mentor (anymore). Really, all I needed her to do was survive long enough to introduce me to the Kitchen God.
" – did it for you, Jullie!" Black Crag's shout interrupted our conversation. "You have always been too soft on the nobles! They are your vassals! Do you really think an Empress would have allowed her nobles the degree of license that you do?"
Yellow Flame was too much of a courtier to snort, but he did raise both eyebrows.
Jullia's voice remained cool. "Yes, about that, Your Grace."
Clenching his sticky fists, Black Crag growled, "I did it for your sake, Your Majesty."
"And we acknowledge the intent, but we cannot condone the action. You are hereby banished from court. Confine yourself to your estate until further notice. If we hear of further attacks upon our vassals, you will answer to us."
Hang on a sec, is that it? She's sending him home? She's not beheading him or anything?!
What kind of puny punishment was this?!
"Not everyone is like you," Anthea muttered.
After working the final loop of silk free from my claws, she didn't bother setting me down anywhere. She simply opened her fingers. I plummeted several inches before I got my wings coordinated. Then I flew around and dug my claws into her other shoulder.
Hey, if she had to get one side of her gown repaired, I might as well make sure it stayed symmetrical, right?
"Why must you be so perverse?" she hissed. "I'd forgotten how much I didn't miss you."
Awww, so you did miss me? I gotta say, though…I didn't miss you at all.
She gnashed her teeth, got me untangled from the silk, stalked forward, and thrust me at Floridiana.
Startled, the mage jerked her head up. She'd been keeping it lowered, peeking at the queen and earls through messy strands of hair.
"This is yours, I believe." Anthea made me sound like a clod of earth kicked up by her horse's hooves.
"No – " began Floridiana, who had no particular desire to lay claim to me – "I mean, yes, gracious lady. I apologize deeply for my, uh, pet sparrow's…misbehavior. If there is anything I might to make up for it – "
"Just keep it away from me." Dropping me into Floridiana's hand and turning on her heel – which would have worked better on a polished marble floor than on coarse grass – Anthea flounced away.
"Are you okay?" Bobo whispered.
She inspected me all over, but I was fine. Anthea hadn't squeezed me hard enough to crush any internal organs. She knew she needed me to implement that kingdom-wide network of temples to the Kitchen God.
"Ssshould you go into the city to tell the Lady what happened? Ssshe must be very worried – "
No.
My answer came out so sharply that Bobo blinked.
Out of the corner of her mouth, Floridiana asked, "Why not? Thought you were friends."
No. I clenched my beak, remembering the Lady of the Lychee Tree's dispassionate tone as she threatened to take my friends hostage. She proved to be undeserving of trust.
"For real? What'd ssshe do?"
"Yes, for real, what could she do to make her undeserving of your trust?"
What was for real was that I didn't appreciate Floridiana's implication.
She hinted that if I didn't side with her, she would find the three of you and hold you prisoner. It's like she doesn't trust me.
"Really?!" gasped Bobo.
Floridiana, on the other hand, heaved a weary sigh. She didn't act nearly as upset about it as I had been, even though it would have been her neck on the line. "Why does that not surprise me at all…."
Hey! What's that supposed to mean?
"If you haven't figured it out on your own by now, I have better things to do than tell you what you have no intention of learning. Anyway, what's the plan now?"
Awwww, does that mean that you do trust me? Just to irritate her, I rubbed the crown of my head against her cheek.
"Cut that out!"
"Hey, who's that?" asked Dusty's voice.
Unnoticed, the horse spirit had ambled over, and now he nosed the other side of Floridiana's head.
"Ugh, don't slobber all over me!" She pushed his head away, but not hard.
Mission accomplished: One mage, thoroughly annoyed.
"Huh, who is that, Rosssie?"
Who is who – oh!
A procession was wending out of the city, humans and spirits clad in the green and gold of the Lychee Grove Earth Court. At their head were Missa and Ancemus, the Lady's foremost mage and top adviser, come to welcome their sovereign. Personally, I found it inappropriate that the Lady of the Lychee Tree hadn't come in person, but things were so topsy-turvy in South Serica that maybe it was simply the way of things.
Those are representatives of the spirit who threatened to take you hostage, but we're all best friends forever now.
Only Floridiana caught my sarcasm.
Bobo and Dusty just looked dazzled by the fancy clothing.
"Do I look all right? Are you sure I look all right?"
"Uh-huh! Uh-huh! You look ssso pretty!"
As I'd expected, Lodia and Bobo got along like a house that had not been set ablaze by exploding crossbow bolts.
My salvation of the city had won me (somewhat cool) official thanks, but my true reward had been Missa welcoming me back into her home, along with Bobo, Floridiana, and Dusty. Well, not literally in Dusty's case, but the horse was enjoying the Kohs' grass when he wasn't poking their neighbors' touch-me-not plants. The way the tiny leaves curled up and wilted fascinated him to no end.
We'd all been invited to a celebratory feast at the Earth Court, and Lodia, naturally, was dithering over what to wear.
"I can't believe the Queen wants to see me! Are you sure she said she wants to see me? Are you sure she wasn't thinking of someone else?" she asked for the ten-thousandth time.
I'd forgotten how tedious the girl could be. Yes. Yes, she did, I repeated for the ten-thousandth time.
It was true: After exchanging meaningless pleasantries with Missa, Jullia had asked out of nowhere, "How fares thy grandchild?"
"Both of them are faring well, Your Majesty. I thank you for my grandchildren's lives." And she'd bowed very deeply.
Jullia had looked flummoxed by the plural. "Both – yes, that is right, she did have a second babe, didn't she? How fares little Lodia?"
I'd told Lodia this story already. Many, many times. But she still refused to believe it.
"The Queen truly remembered my name?" she pressed. "On her own? 'Twasn't because an adviser whispered it to her?"
"Truly!" Bobo reassured her. "Really truly! And then ssshe said, 'I ssshould like to sssee the girl'."
"But did she really mean it? Maybe she was just being polite."
She's the queen, Lodia. She doesn't need to be polite. If she didn't want to see you, she wouldn't have mentioned you at all.
That made Lodia gulp and twist her hands together.
At the other end of the common room table, Floridiana glanced up from one of Missa's magic texts. "Don't worry, Lodia. The queen is simply curious about her old friend's daughter. Just be yourself and everything will be fine."
Her no-nonsense, schoolmistress-ly tone failed to comfort Lodia. "Be myself? Oh, but I never know the right thing to say – what if I mess up and offend her? What if I trip and fall when I greet her? What if – "
"You'll be fine," Floridiana repeated, closing the book with a great deal more gentleness than she ever used on me. "If you're so worried, why don't we rehearse your greetings? I'll play Queen Jullia."
She moved across the room and sat down in the chair that Lodia kept by the window for embroidering. As soon as the mage's hands touched the armrests, her demeanor changed. Her chin lifted at a haughty angle, her body draped against the chairback, and her eyes went distant, focusing somewhere in the middle distance. The transformation was impressive, but –
That's not how Jullia sits. Ignoring Lodia's gasp at my use of the queen's name without any kind of honorific, I corrected Floridiana. She doesn't lounge.
"Like this?" Floridiana's spine snapped straight, no longer touching the chairback at all.
Better.
"All right. Let's rehearse it, Lodia. Start on the other side of the room, by the stairs – yes, that's good. Now approach me. No, don't cringe. Shoulders back, head up. You're the granddaughter of the Lychee Grove Earth Court's most powerful mage and the daughter of the Queen's old friend. Try it again. Yes, that's better…."
As I watched Floridiana coach Lodia, I congratulated myself on introducing the two. I'd known that the mage would be a better mentor to the awkward teenager than I was, just like how she made a better schoolteacher than I did.
I'd been right to bring her to Lychee Grove.
A/N 1: I picture Jullia's robe looking like this. Definitely not something I'd want to wear in hot, humid weather!
A/N 2: Thanks to my awesome Patreon backers, Arif, Autocharth, BananaBobert, Blacklark57, Celia, Charlotte, Hookshyu, Lindsey, Michael, Pizzatiger, TheLunaticCo, and Anonymous!
Chapter 112: Gold, Silver, and Gemstones – or Books?
Chapter 112: Gold, Silver, and Gemstones – or Books?
The Lychee Grove Earth Court had the wisdom and discerning taste to adopt my recommendation of firefly performances: That was the first thing I noticed. Firefly spirits were blinking on and off in stylized lychee patterns along the walkways, guiding guests to the main courtyard where the banquet to honor Jullia would be held.
(Technically, it was more what I'd call a "garden party" than a "banquet" proper, but that seemed fitting given that the entire Earth Court was one giant garden.)
Whoever organized the event had also had the wisdom and discerning taste to schedule it for twilight, when the lotuses that bloomed in profusion smelled the sweetest. Round lanterns, painted with sprays of flowers or landscapes or historical scenes, hung from the trees, trailing long silk tassels that swayed in the evening breeze. Small square or lotus-shaped lanterns bobbed on the surface of the water, forming glowing clusters like constellations.
(I spared a moment to wonder how Flicker was doing – but only a moment. He was just doing fine, I was sure, harrying souls on to their next lives.)
I was surveying the scene from Floridiana's shoulder, in my guise as spoiled pet sparrow. Although all the high-ranking Earth Court officials, Anthea, and probably Jullia by now too, since the raccoon dog had never been able to keep her mouth shut, knew what I was, that was still no reason to broadcast it. After all, I didn't want to catch the attention of any bored gods or goddesses, and no one else wanted to be on the receiving end of Heaven's wrath when it decided to punish anyone who'd harbored me.
A carved rosewood chair had been set up, throne-like, in a gazebo for Jullia. Towering overhead was a ginormous eight-sided story lantern that rotated slowly, telling the tale of Lychee Grove's salvation. Three panels showed the city being attacked from all sides by an army of surpassing strength (although it omitted the Black Crag banners, presumably for when the queen's uncle returned to royal good graces). Only two panels depicted the lychee eating contest, with hordes of awed onlookers and the Earl of Yellow Flame looking much more dashing than he did in real life. The final three panels were devoted to the queen's majestic arrival to save the city from certain destruction.
Even if this lantern hadn't been my idea, or even something we used to do at Cassius' court, it was a nice touch. It was good to see that modern-day Sericans could innovate too.
The herald positioned at the edge of the courtyard saw our retinue and banged his staff on the paving stones. "Koh Rohanus, Master of the Mint of Lychee Grove, and his daughter, Miss Koh Lodia!"
Lodia looked sicker than if she'd just been called up for her own beheading.
"Chin up, shoulders back, just like we practiced," Floridiana murmured.
"You've got this!" Bobo added, loud enough for the herald to hear.
The man's face didn't twitch. I was watching.
"Come, Lodia," urged her father and, with a gulp, she shuffled after him. She kept her head up, although I would have bet that she didn't register a thing she saw. Both Kohs dropped to their knees before the queen.
"You may raise your heads," came Jullia's cool voice.
They obeyed, and she regarded Rohanus first. "Master Koh. You look well. It has been a while since I saw you and your late wife, has it not?"
At the mention of her erstwhile friend, a stir ran through the courtiers present.
Rohanus dipped his head. "I am grateful that Your Majesty remembers us."
"And little Lodia. How you have grown. I hear you have cultivated quite the talent for needlework." A hint of warmth entered Jullia's voice as she studied the girl from the top of her silver headdress to the knees of her gown. (Kneeling on the paving stones wasn't doing anything for the silk.)
The length of time that it took Lodia to collect herself enough to respond nearly made my heart stop beating. Then, at last, she stammered, "Than–than–thank you, Your Majesty."
"We, too, enjoy needlework when our duties permit. Let us discuss it later, in a more informal setting."
As another stir ran through the courtiers, Jullia lifted her gaze from the pair and returned to staring into the middle distance, the signal that she was done. The Kohs rose, bowed, and moved to a side, Lodia as floppy as a skein of silk.
Next to me, Floridiana heaved a long sigh of relief, and Bobo grinned her widest snake grin. "Ssshe did it!"
Of course she did. I never doubted her for an instant.
The mage and her horse humphed in unison.
The herald banged his staff on the paving stones again, knocking a few loose. "Mage Floridiana, Headmistress of the East Serican Royal Academy, of the Claymouth Barony of East Serica! His Highness the Valiant Prince of the Victorious Whirlwind, of the Claymouth Barony of East Serica! Bobo, bamboo viper spirit, also of the Claymouth Barony of East Serica!"
As the courtyard exploded into cheers and applause, Dusty tossed his head and swished his tail. He nearly swept the hairs into the herald's face, but for once, Floridiana didn't scold him. Maybe she was a little nervous herself.
We really should have given you a better title, I whispered to Bobo.
"Nope, it's fine!" She sounded cheerful as ever, eyes sparkling as she slithered across the courtyard. "Hey, do you sssee that? They made patterns with the ssstones!"
Indeed, the courtyard was paved with stones of different colors and pieces of porcelain to form a pattern of stylized blossoms. If I had to guess, they were lychee flowers. I'd seen this form of decoration before, of course, but not in Claymouth, meaning that it was completely new to Bobo.
At the foot of the steps leading up into the gazebo, we halted. Floridiana knelt, Dusty carefully lowered himself to his front knees, and Bobo coiled up and curved her long neck down. I stayed perched upright on Floridiana's shoulder. Hey, I hadn't been announced. I was "only" a pet sparrow. And unless Anthea had blabbed, Jullia should have no idea that I was anything more.
From the slight arch of the queen's eyebrows, I inferred that the raccoon dog had indeed blabbed. Sigh.
"Raise your heads," came the cool command.
I could read her royal displeasure, but I couldn't tell if Floridiana were sensitive enough to courtly ways to pick up on it, and Bobo and Dusty certainly didn't notice. But the courtiers' beaming smiles evaporated.
Hmm, maybe I should have bowed.
"Be welcome to our kingdom, travelers," said Jullia, her voice holding about as much hospitality as a pineapple that an imperial courtier displayed on their dining table. "We appreciate the role that you played in deescalating the earlier, unfortunate situation."
Well, that was certainly lukewarm thanks. Had Anthea also blabbed about how lychee-eating contests were not a form of dueling back in the Empire? I supposed that royalty didn't like outsiders making fools of their uncles, even recalcitrant, wayward uncles who were in need of a good beheading.
Floridiana ducked her own head. Sounding as if she were quoting a line from a play, she recited, "It is our honor that we might have been of some service to Your Majesty."
"Now, we wish to reward you for your services," began the queen, just as I had predicted. She had to reward us, if only to assert her status as the giver, rather than receiver, of favors.
One of her retainers stepped forward, bearing a casket draped in crimson silk that was embroidered with a golden dragon. It probably contained crude gemstones and debased coinage, none of which would be particularly valuable.
I nudged Floridiana's neck with my beak. Library. Ask to use her library.
The mage twitched, just a bit, but the queen's eyebrows raised again. "Yes, Mage Floridiana? Is there something you wished to say?"
Intimidated, Floridiana was about to demur, but I poked her harder with my beak.
Normally, I wouldn't have been so persistent over a matter of some books – theoretical academic study wasn't really my thing, I was more of an applied person – but if I were going to set up a kingdom-wide system of temples to the Kitchen God, I needed her to do some research for me. Plus she could update her teaching materials, which would benefit all her students.
Plus it was something that she desperately wanted for herself.
Her dream was within reach. All she had to do was speak up and ask for it.
Think of all the books, I whispered, giving her the final push she needed.
Face taut with the strain of composing her own sentences rather than quoting from old plays, Floridiana stammered, "Ye–es, Your Majesty. If it so please Your Majesty, I was hoping that, perhaps, I might be allowed…access to…the royal…library?"
"The royal library?" From Jullia's tone, I couldn't read her opinion.
"Yes, if it so please Your Majesty." Floridiana swallowed hard. "I am the headmistress of a school – I mean, an academy – but the texts that I have to teach from are outdated, and I was hoping that I might update them."
Some of the courtiers were hiding smiles, as if to say, Running a school! How prosaic! Off on the side, Lodia squeezed her hands in front of her and stared with all her might at Floridiana, willing her stay strong.
As for Anthea, she just looked bored. She wasn't one for much reading either.
"Access to our library. Rather than gold or silver or jewels, that is the reward you desire?"
Not for nothing had Floridiana spent decades as an impoverished traveling mage. At the mention of treasure, her eyes lit up, and I could see her calculating how to get both.
I jabbed her in the neck again. Don't get greedy. Focus. On the books.
South Serican finances were enough of a mess already. There was no point in straining them further to provide her with debased coins that weren't worth melting down for the metal and jewelry that a schoolmistress could never wear, not unless she wanted to make the Baroness very, very jealous. Which would not be good for her or anyone associated with her.
A tiny sigh escaped Floridiana, but she surrendered to my better judgement. "Yes, Your Majesty. For myself and my companions, that would be the best reward in the world."
Jullia's lifted finger signaled the retainer to step back again. "Fiat. Let it be done."
Dusty whickered in distress as his dreams of jeweled breastplates evaporated, but Bobo just gave Floridiana a grin, happy that she'd succeeded.
Ours had been the final audience.
In the gathering dark, firefly spirits swept out swirls of light to escort guests to the long banquet tables, indicating their seats with dramatic starbursts.
Jullia, Anthea, the Earl of Yellow Flame, the Lady of the Lychee Tree, Missa, and assorted dignitaries whom the queen couldn't afford to snub were seated at the head table. Due to Floridiana's, Bobo's, and Dusty's commoner status, we were relegated to the second table, which irked me, but not as much as I would have imagined, because we were seated next to Rohanus and Lodia. Goodness knew the girl needed all the moral support she could get.
Breathe, I advised, hopping down into her lap so she'd use her hands to pet me instead of pick at her nails.
She gulped and ducked her head, but a fingertip traced along my back.
Smiling at the guest across from her, Floridiana murmured, "You can look around the garden too, Lodia. No one's going to get mad if you admire the scenery. They expect it."
Obediently, Lodia lifted her eyes from me to the fireflies over the lake, who were now spelling out riddles involving classical allusions to entertain us while we waited for dinner. As she did so, her line of sight passed the head table. She accidentally met Anthea's eyes, flinched, and ducked her head again.
You don't need to be afraid of her. She was very impressed by your embroidery.
Anthea lifted a languid hand. A servant instantly appeared behind her, and she gave him some instructions without glancing at him.
"Was she? Impressed? Truly?"
Yes.
I was getting really tired of repeating myself, but I forced myself to be patient. Lodia was going to get proof of it soon enough anyway.
"What did she like about it?"
Why don't you ask her yourself?
Right on cue, the servant's voice said behind us, "Miss Koh Lodia, the Lady Anthea requests your presence."
A/N: Thanks to my awesome Patreon backers, Arif, Autocharth, BananaBobert, Blacklark57, Celia, Charlotte, Hookshyu, Lindsey, Michael, Pizzatiger, TheLunaticCo, and Anonymous!
The Lychee Grove Earth Court had the wisdom and discerning taste to adopt my recommendation of firefly performances: That was the first thing I noticed. Firefly spirits were blinking on and off in stylized lychee patterns along the walkways, guiding guests to the main courtyard where the banquet to honor Jullia would be held.
(Technically, it was more what I'd call a "garden party" than a "banquet" proper, but that seemed fitting given that the entire Earth Court was one giant garden.)
Whoever organized the event had also had the wisdom and discerning taste to schedule it for twilight, when the lotuses that bloomed in profusion smelled the sweetest. Round lanterns, painted with sprays of flowers or landscapes or historical scenes, hung from the trees, trailing long silk tassels that swayed in the evening breeze. Small square or lotus-shaped lanterns bobbed on the surface of the water, forming glowing clusters like constellations.
(I spared a moment to wonder how Flicker was doing – but only a moment. He was just doing fine, I was sure, harrying souls on to their next lives.)
I was surveying the scene from Floridiana's shoulder, in my guise as spoiled pet sparrow. Although all the high-ranking Earth Court officials, Anthea, and probably Jullia by now too, since the raccoon dog had never been able to keep her mouth shut, knew what I was, that was still no reason to broadcast it. After all, I didn't want to catch the attention of any bored gods or goddesses, and no one else wanted to be on the receiving end of Heaven's wrath when it decided to punish anyone who'd harbored me.
A carved rosewood chair had been set up, throne-like, in a gazebo for Jullia. Towering overhead was a ginormous eight-sided story lantern that rotated slowly, telling the tale of Lychee Grove's salvation. Three panels showed the city being attacked from all sides by an army of surpassing strength (although it omitted the Black Crag banners, presumably for when the queen's uncle returned to royal good graces). Only two panels depicted the lychee eating contest, with hordes of awed onlookers and the Earl of Yellow Flame looking much more dashing than he did in real life. The final three panels were devoted to the queen's majestic arrival to save the city from certain destruction.
Even if this lantern hadn't been my idea, or even something we used to do at Cassius' court, it was a nice touch. It was good to see that modern-day Sericans could innovate too.
The herald positioned at the edge of the courtyard saw our retinue and banged his staff on the paving stones. "Koh Rohanus, Master of the Mint of Lychee Grove, and his daughter, Miss Koh Lodia!"
Lodia looked sicker than if she'd just been called up for her own beheading.
"Chin up, shoulders back, just like we practiced," Floridiana murmured.
"You've got this!" Bobo added, loud enough for the herald to hear.
The man's face didn't twitch. I was watching.
"Come, Lodia," urged her father and, with a gulp, she shuffled after him. She kept her head up, although I would have bet that she didn't register a thing she saw. Both Kohs dropped to their knees before the queen.
"You may raise your heads," came Jullia's cool voice.
They obeyed, and she regarded Rohanus first. "Master Koh. You look well. It has been a while since I saw you and your late wife, has it not?"
At the mention of her erstwhile friend, a stir ran through the courtiers present.
Rohanus dipped his head. "I am grateful that Your Majesty remembers us."
"And little Lodia. How you have grown. I hear you have cultivated quite the talent for needlework." A hint of warmth entered Jullia's voice as she studied the girl from the top of her silver headdress to the knees of her gown. (Kneeling on the paving stones wasn't doing anything for the silk.)
The length of time that it took Lodia to collect herself enough to respond nearly made my heart stop beating. Then, at last, she stammered, "Than–than–thank you, Your Majesty."
"We, too, enjoy needlework when our duties permit. Let us discuss it later, in a more informal setting."
As another stir ran through the courtiers, Jullia lifted her gaze from the pair and returned to staring into the middle distance, the signal that she was done. The Kohs rose, bowed, and moved to a side, Lodia as floppy as a skein of silk.
Next to me, Floridiana heaved a long sigh of relief, and Bobo grinned her widest snake grin. "Ssshe did it!"
Of course she did. I never doubted her for an instant.
The mage and her horse humphed in unison.
The herald banged his staff on the paving stones again, knocking a few loose. "Mage Floridiana, Headmistress of the East Serican Royal Academy, of the Claymouth Barony of East Serica! His Highness the Valiant Prince of the Victorious Whirlwind, of the Claymouth Barony of East Serica! Bobo, bamboo viper spirit, also of the Claymouth Barony of East Serica!"
As the courtyard exploded into cheers and applause, Dusty tossed his head and swished his tail. He nearly swept the hairs into the herald's face, but for once, Floridiana didn't scold him. Maybe she was a little nervous herself.
We really should have given you a better title, I whispered to Bobo.
"Nope, it's fine!" She sounded cheerful as ever, eyes sparkling as she slithered across the courtyard. "Hey, do you sssee that? They made patterns with the ssstones!"
Indeed, the courtyard was paved with stones of different colors and pieces of porcelain to form a pattern of stylized blossoms. If I had to guess, they were lychee flowers. I'd seen this form of decoration before, of course, but not in Claymouth, meaning that it was completely new to Bobo.
At the foot of the steps leading up into the gazebo, we halted. Floridiana knelt, Dusty carefully lowered himself to his front knees, and Bobo coiled up and curved her long neck down. I stayed perched upright on Floridiana's shoulder. Hey, I hadn't been announced. I was "only" a pet sparrow. And unless Anthea had blabbed, Jullia should have no idea that I was anything more.
From the slight arch of the queen's eyebrows, I inferred that the raccoon dog had indeed blabbed. Sigh.
"Raise your heads," came the cool command.
I could read her royal displeasure, but I couldn't tell if Floridiana were sensitive enough to courtly ways to pick up on it, and Bobo and Dusty certainly didn't notice. But the courtiers' beaming smiles evaporated.
Hmm, maybe I should have bowed.
"Be welcome to our kingdom, travelers," said Jullia, her voice holding about as much hospitality as a pineapple that an imperial courtier displayed on their dining table. "We appreciate the role that you played in deescalating the earlier, unfortunate situation."
Well, that was certainly lukewarm thanks. Had Anthea also blabbed about how lychee-eating contests were not a form of dueling back in the Empire? I supposed that royalty didn't like outsiders making fools of their uncles, even recalcitrant, wayward uncles who were in need of a good beheading.
Floridiana ducked her own head. Sounding as if she were quoting a line from a play, she recited, "It is our honor that we might have been of some service to Your Majesty."
"Now, we wish to reward you for your services," began the queen, just as I had predicted. She had to reward us, if only to assert her status as the giver, rather than receiver, of favors.
One of her retainers stepped forward, bearing a casket draped in crimson silk that was embroidered with a golden dragon. It probably contained crude gemstones and debased coinage, none of which would be particularly valuable.
I nudged Floridiana's neck with my beak. Library. Ask to use her library.
The mage twitched, just a bit, but the queen's eyebrows raised again. "Yes, Mage Floridiana? Is there something you wished to say?"
Intimidated, Floridiana was about to demur, but I poked her harder with my beak.
Normally, I wouldn't have been so persistent over a matter of some books – theoretical academic study wasn't really my thing, I was more of an applied person – but if I were going to set up a kingdom-wide system of temples to the Kitchen God, I needed her to do some research for me. Plus she could update her teaching materials, which would benefit all her students.
Plus it was something that she desperately wanted for herself.
Her dream was within reach. All she had to do was speak up and ask for it.
Think of all the books, I whispered, giving her the final push she needed.
Face taut with the strain of composing her own sentences rather than quoting from old plays, Floridiana stammered, "Ye–es, Your Majesty. If it so please Your Majesty, I was hoping that, perhaps, I might be allowed…access to…the royal…library?"
"The royal library?" From Jullia's tone, I couldn't read her opinion.
"Yes, if it so please Your Majesty." Floridiana swallowed hard. "I am the headmistress of a school – I mean, an academy – but the texts that I have to teach from are outdated, and I was hoping that I might update them."
Some of the courtiers were hiding smiles, as if to say, Running a school! How prosaic! Off on the side, Lodia squeezed her hands in front of her and stared with all her might at Floridiana, willing her stay strong.
As for Anthea, she just looked bored. She wasn't one for much reading either.
"Access to our library. Rather than gold or silver or jewels, that is the reward you desire?"
Not for nothing had Floridiana spent decades as an impoverished traveling mage. At the mention of treasure, her eyes lit up, and I could see her calculating how to get both.
I jabbed her in the neck again. Don't get greedy. Focus. On the books.
South Serican finances were enough of a mess already. There was no point in straining them further to provide her with debased coins that weren't worth melting down for the metal and jewelry that a schoolmistress could never wear, not unless she wanted to make the Baroness very, very jealous. Which would not be good for her or anyone associated with her.
A tiny sigh escaped Floridiana, but she surrendered to my better judgement. "Yes, Your Majesty. For myself and my companions, that would be the best reward in the world."
Jullia's lifted finger signaled the retainer to step back again. "Fiat. Let it be done."
Dusty whickered in distress as his dreams of jeweled breastplates evaporated, but Bobo just gave Floridiana a grin, happy that she'd succeeded.
Ours had been the final audience.
In the gathering dark, firefly spirits swept out swirls of light to escort guests to the long banquet tables, indicating their seats with dramatic starbursts.
Jullia, Anthea, the Earl of Yellow Flame, the Lady of the Lychee Tree, Missa, and assorted dignitaries whom the queen couldn't afford to snub were seated at the head table. Due to Floridiana's, Bobo's, and Dusty's commoner status, we were relegated to the second table, which irked me, but not as much as I would have imagined, because we were seated next to Rohanus and Lodia. Goodness knew the girl needed all the moral support she could get.
Breathe, I advised, hopping down into her lap so she'd use her hands to pet me instead of pick at her nails.
She gulped and ducked her head, but a fingertip traced along my back.
Smiling at the guest across from her, Floridiana murmured, "You can look around the garden too, Lodia. No one's going to get mad if you admire the scenery. They expect it."
Obediently, Lodia lifted her eyes from me to the fireflies over the lake, who were now spelling out riddles involving classical allusions to entertain us while we waited for dinner. As she did so, her line of sight passed the head table. She accidentally met Anthea's eyes, flinched, and ducked her head again.
You don't need to be afraid of her. She was very impressed by your embroidery.
Anthea lifted a languid hand. A servant instantly appeared behind her, and she gave him some instructions without glancing at him.
"Was she? Impressed? Truly?"
Yes.
I was getting really tired of repeating myself, but I forced myself to be patient. Lodia was going to get proof of it soon enough anyway.
"What did she like about it?"
Why don't you ask her yourself?
Right on cue, the servant's voice said behind us, "Miss Koh Lodia, the Lady Anthea requests your presence."
A/N: Thanks to my awesome Patreon backers, Arif, Autocharth, BananaBobert, Blacklark57, Celia, Charlotte, Hookshyu, Lindsey, Michael, Pizzatiger, TheLunaticCo, and Anonymous!
Winged One
Not the Simurgh
- Location
- definitely the ground
- Pronouns
- They/Them/It
I suppose a plant spirit's personal servants would just be literal gardeners.
I suppose a plant spirit's personal servants would just be literal gardeners.
Haha, that's true! They'd probably have fancier titles, though.
Chapter 113: My One True Wish
Chapter 113: My One True Wish
"Me?" Lodia's voice came out as a squeak.
If you didn't know her, you'd have thought that she'd just been informed that, yes, indeed, she really was being summoned for her execution this time.
Anthea really wasn't that scary. At all scary.
The servant inclined his head. "Yes, Miss Koh. If you would follow me, please?"
"But I don't…. I can't…."
Her father gave her a pat on the arm that did nothing to fix her horrified rictus. "Thou wilt do just fine."
"Ssshe sssaid ssshe likes your embroidery, right?" Bobo reminded her. "I'll bet ssshe wants to compliment you!"
If anything, Lodia's expression grew even more petrified, so much so that Dusty pulled his nose out of his bowl to advise, "Just don't slobber on her hair and you'll be fine."
As he dove back into his green mango salad, Floridiana shoved at his withers. "You do realize she's not a horse, right? Humans don't slobber."
Dusty braced his hooves, ignored her, and kept grazing.
"Well," said Rohanus, a humorous smile was playing on his lips, as if he were recalling a fond memory. "Not after they grow up, anyway."
Naturally, none of this was doing a single gods-cursed thing to calm down the girl, and at this rate, she was going to botch her job interview with Anthea and ruin all my plans for her. Although I'd planned to perch here next to Bobo and congratulate myself on the firefly performances, the world never gave me time for myself. Sigh.
But duty (to my own karma total) called.
I fluttered up to Lodia's shoulder, careful not to snag the fabric of her best gown. (After all, I was capable of controlling where my claws went, when I felt like it.) Don't worry. I'll be right here with you.
"Oh, but you…. And she…. Does she know…?" Lodia darted a glance at the servant, anxious about letting slip what I really was.
After that eavesdropping session with the sparrow and butterfly spirits, I could have assured her that whatever the Lychee Grove Earth Court higher-ups knew, their servants did. And indeed, the servant carefully blanked his face.
She knows. Don't worry. Let's not keep her waiting.
Somehow, Lodia managed to get out of her chair without knocking it over, stumble to the head table without tripping over her own slippers, and execute a reasonably steady bow before Anthea. I didn't even have to flap my wings that many times to stay balanced on her shoulder.
"Little Lodia! Look at thee! All grown up! The last time I saw thee, thou wert this big!" Anthea repeated the gesture she'd made earlier, holding her hands about a foot apart to indicate Lodia's size.
The girl, at least, seemed confident that the distance referred to the head-to-toe length of a human infant rather than the width of an adult human torso. In such a faint voice that it nearly vanished into the evening breeze, she murmured, "Thank you for remembering me, my lady."
Speak up. She doesn't bite, I whispered at the same time that Anthea brayed, "Speak up! I don't bite!"
Most of the time, I added into Lodia's ear, just for accuracy's sake.
Accuracy, in this case, didn't comfort her.
"Our mutual friend delivered a sample of thy work to me! A most exquisite mirror cover!" Anthea inspected Lodia from the dangling bits on her silver headdress to the toes of her embroidered slippers. "As it so happens, my Junior Wardrobe Mistress died of a fever last moon – 'tis unfortunate, humans get sick so easily, you all need better constitutions! – and my Head Wardrobe Mistress is in dire need of an assistant." She assessed Lodia's outfit once more. "Yep, thou'lt do. Yep." And she heaved such a smug sigh that you'd think she'd just singlehandedly retaken the Wilds.
Lodia throat worked, but nothing came out except for a choked, "Um…."
"Report here in the morning. Ancemus will tell thee where to go, right, Ancemus, old thing?" Raising her voice in a most undignified manner, the raccoon dog squawked right across the Lady of the Lychee Tree at the adviser.
Gnashing his teeth, Ancemus pretended he hadn't heard her.
Idly, I wondered if he took human form just so he had teeth to gnash when Anthea was around. But no, he spent so much time as a human that it was probably just his preferred form.
Oh, wait. I was here as Lodia's adviser, not as a sightseer.
The position of Junior Wardrobe Mistress was everything that I wanted for her, but she herself seemed so miserable that I started to get cold claws.
In a rush of feathers, I flew from her shoulder to Anthea's, taking no care whatsoever where my talons went. Doesn't she get a say in matters?
"Huh? Of course she does! But whyever would she turn it down?"
Because she might want to, oh, I don't know, stay with her family? Her friends? In a stable place? The court doesn't have a permanent base, does it? It's like a troupe of traveling performers!
"Traveling performers! Pi– " she started to snarl before catching herself. "What the heck art thou calling thyself these days anyway?"
I smirked. Pip.
She rolled her eyes. "Pip. How…common. Regardless, whoever would turn down such an unparalleled opportunity? A position at court as Junior Wardrobe Mistress to the Queen's favorite? People would kill for it!"
Yeah. To escape it.
I was enjoying our back-and-forth, and Anthea's smirk said that she was too, but Lodia didn't know our history. The girl quaked.
Look, just ask her before you decide her entire future for her, why don't you?
"Fine." Anthea wiped the sulkiness off her face and replaced it with a saccharine smile. "Lodia, what say'st thou? Wouldst thou like to join my household as my Junior Wardrobe Mistress?"
"Umm…." Lodia was wringing her hands so hard that her knuckles turned white. "I…I should…maybe…I'd like…."
With a great deal more patience than I'd expected from the raccoon dog, Anthea waited for the girl to eke out a full sentence. After a moment, when none was forthcoming, she prompted, "Wouldst thou like to consult with thy family first?"
Lodia's terrified glance flicked down the table towards her grandmother. Missa was chuckling at a joke that the Earl of Yellow Flame was telling, but she'd been monitoring our conversation. She dipped her chin in a minute nod, giving Lodia permission to decide for herself.
Perhaps not realizing how rude it was, Lodia turned her upper body away from Anthea to look back at her father. Rohanus gave her a warm smile and a nod too. Even though he couldn't have heard the conversation, he seemed to have guessed its gist.
Finally, Lodia peeked at the queen and flinched when she met Jullia's dark, cool eyes. The queen studied her for a moment, then deliberately broke their gaze and addressed a remark to the Lady of the Lychee Tree.
At last, Lodia mumbled something at the dishes on the table. She was so quiet that not even a pangolin spirit could have heard her.
Speak up, I urged. It's okay to tell her that you don't want to –
"Yes."
With visible effort, Lodia met Anthea's eyes for a full second before she dropped her gaze to the dishes again.
"Yes, my lady. I accept."
The banquet held one last surprise for me.
After the servants cleared the tables, they returned with brushes, inksticks, inkstones, and stacks of – paper? Was it really paper? I hopped down from Lodia's shoulder for a closer look.
It was! It was! South Serica had paper! It was even reasonably thin and smooth, like the kind scholars used to use for calligraphy and paintings!
But why had they cut it into odd, non-rectangular shapes – oh! Because these weren't meant to be long scrolls for calligraphy or paintings. These were lanterns! Sky lanterns! And the brushes and the inksticks that the servants were grinding for us – they were for writing our wishes, which would fly up to Heaven on the lanterns!
I'd nearly forgotten this tradition.
It must have died out in East Serica, or at least in the Claymouth Barony, and I'd had precious little inclination to wish for things from Heaven in the past five hundred years.
To want, yes. To demand, yes. To wish for, no.
As the servants laid a folded-up lantern in front of Floridiana, Bobo, Dusty, and me, the mage rubbed the paper with a forefinger. "What is this material? It doesn't feel like parchment, but it's not cloth either – at least, no cloth that I've ever seen."
"'Tis called rice paper," Rohanus explained, "although that's technically a misnomer. 'Tis made from the bark of the paper mulberry tree."
"Paper! You still have paper?! I thought the technology was lost after the fall of the Empire!"
Floridiana's outburst struck all the South Sericans in earshot speechless. Some gaped openly. Others averted their gazes, mortified on behalf of the barbarian who'd never laid eyes on a single sheet of paper before.
At length, Rohanus said diplomatically, "Ah, well, I believe its use is not as widespread as it was during the Empire. 'Tis costly to produce, so its use is restricted to official and religious purposes, such as this."
"What is this? What are we doing?" Bobo put in.
Her tongue flicked out, tasting the air just above the surface of the paper. Lodia winced, perhaps worrying that it would wet and tear the lantern, and the motion drew her father's attention.
"Lodia, wouldst thou like to explain this tradition to our guests?"
Squirming, she tried to escape. "You will do a better job, Father."
Now that she had accepted Anthea's job offer and declared herself ready to step into the wider world, however, he could no longer let her off so easily. "'Twill be good practice, Lodia. Thou wilt need to communicate with others at court."
She looked as if she regretted that decision already.
Ever the schoolmistress, Floridiana prompted Lodia as she would a timid student, "What are these…devices called?"
"They're called sky lanterns."
When no further explanation followed, Floridiana prodded her some more. "Can you explain their purpose?"
"They're for making wishes on. You write what you wish for on the sides. Then you open them up and light them, and they fly up to Heaven."
Dusty snorted in surprise. "You set them on fire? Won't they burn up before they get anywhere?" To demonstrate, he nosed at our lantern.
Don't – I began, but it was too late. The fragile paper ripped.
While Floridiana glared at him and he pretended his nose had been nowhere near the lantern, Bobo tried to smooth it with her tail. "Uh-oh. Is that going to be a problem?"
A nearby servant was already hastening over with a spare lantern.
No, I answered.
"Yes, actually, but we'll get a new one," said Rohanus, giving up on his daughter to explain the sky lantern tradition himself. "After we write our wishes on the sides, we will open up the lanterns. They already have a wire frame built in, see? And we will put a bit of oil-soaked paper at the bottom, here, and light that on fire."
"And that makes the lanterns fly?" Bobo asked, fascinated.
"Yes. You'll see in just a moment. But first, you must write what you wish for on the sides of the lantern."
As he bent back over his and Lodia's lantern, Floridiana dipped the tip of her brush into the inkstone and held it poised over the paper. After a moment, she wrote with firm brushstrokes, Greater knowledge. Success. Prosperity. Fame for the academy. Good health for myself and my friends.
Following her example, Dusty picked up a brush in his mouth. A big drop of ink rolled down its tip and plopped onto the paper, spreading into a dark-grey blot. I seemed to be the only one who cared, though. "What should I wish for? Bobo, what are you wishing for?"
The bamboo viper had twisted the front half of her body practically into a knot so she could read Floridiana's words. "Can we wisssh for anything? Is it okay to wisssh for anything at all?"
Rohanus finished writing down his own wishes (for good health for his loved ones and good fortune for Lychee Grove). "Yes, anything at all."
Her eyes lit up. Squeezing her brush in her tail, tongue flicking in and out of her mouth with concentration, she laboriously wrote, I wish Stripey is doing well.
After a moment's deliberation, she added, In his new life. After another long, pondering moment, she finished off with, I wish I will see him again.
"Okay! I'm all ssset!"
Together, she and Floridiana had already filled the space on two sides of the lantern, so after the ink dried, Floridiana turned it over. In uneven, childish characters, Dusty scrawled, Good health. Prosperity. Success. Respect.
His head swung around so one eye was staring straight at me.
I shrugged my wings. Respect, huh? Good luck getting anyone besides that herald to address him as "His Highness the Valiant Prince of the Victorious Whirlwind."
"How about you?" Bobo whispered to me. "What do you wisssh for? I can write it for you."
I didn't even need to think about it.
Once everyone had written down their wishes and, in some cases, painted little pictures too, the servants cleared away the tables, opened the lanterns, and lit them. A solemn hush fell over the courtyard, broken only by the rustle of leaves. We stood around our lanterns, waiting for them to fill with hot air. Gradually, they started to bob, to lift off the paving stones, slowly and uncertainly at first, then more steadily. One – two – six – dozens of lanterns floated into the night sky, shining with a soft, golden light. Over the lake they rose, reflected in the dark mirror of its surface like stars.
All of a sudden, I wondered if Flicker and his colleagues were watching, high above us. Were these wishes real, in the same way that oaths were real? Did Heaven assign clerks to record them and file them away in the archives? If so, my wish might not have been the wisest thing to write down, even if it were in Bobo's hand (mouth?) writing.
But it was too late now. It was done and flying up to Heaven, borne on wings of paper and ink – my one true wish.
I want to be a fox again.
A/N: Thanks to my awesome Patreon backers, Arif, Autocharth, BananaBobert, Blacklark57, Celia, Charlotte, Hookshyu, Lindsey, Michael, Pizzatiger, TheLunaticCo, and Anonymous!
"Me?" Lodia's voice came out as a squeak.
If you didn't know her, you'd have thought that she'd just been informed that, yes, indeed, she really was being summoned for her execution this time.
Anthea really wasn't that scary. At all scary.
The servant inclined his head. "Yes, Miss Koh. If you would follow me, please?"
"But I don't…. I can't…."
Her father gave her a pat on the arm that did nothing to fix her horrified rictus. "Thou wilt do just fine."
"Ssshe sssaid ssshe likes your embroidery, right?" Bobo reminded her. "I'll bet ssshe wants to compliment you!"
If anything, Lodia's expression grew even more petrified, so much so that Dusty pulled his nose out of his bowl to advise, "Just don't slobber on her hair and you'll be fine."
As he dove back into his green mango salad, Floridiana shoved at his withers. "You do realize she's not a horse, right? Humans don't slobber."
Dusty braced his hooves, ignored her, and kept grazing.
"Well," said Rohanus, a humorous smile was playing on his lips, as if he were recalling a fond memory. "Not after they grow up, anyway."
Naturally, none of this was doing a single gods-cursed thing to calm down the girl, and at this rate, she was going to botch her job interview with Anthea and ruin all my plans for her. Although I'd planned to perch here next to Bobo and congratulate myself on the firefly performances, the world never gave me time for myself. Sigh.
But duty (to my own karma total) called.
I fluttered up to Lodia's shoulder, careful not to snag the fabric of her best gown. (After all, I was capable of controlling where my claws went, when I felt like it.) Don't worry. I'll be right here with you.
"Oh, but you…. And she…. Does she know…?" Lodia darted a glance at the servant, anxious about letting slip what I really was.
After that eavesdropping session with the sparrow and butterfly spirits, I could have assured her that whatever the Lychee Grove Earth Court higher-ups knew, their servants did. And indeed, the servant carefully blanked his face.
She knows. Don't worry. Let's not keep her waiting.
Somehow, Lodia managed to get out of her chair without knocking it over, stumble to the head table without tripping over her own slippers, and execute a reasonably steady bow before Anthea. I didn't even have to flap my wings that many times to stay balanced on her shoulder.
"Little Lodia! Look at thee! All grown up! The last time I saw thee, thou wert this big!" Anthea repeated the gesture she'd made earlier, holding her hands about a foot apart to indicate Lodia's size.
The girl, at least, seemed confident that the distance referred to the head-to-toe length of a human infant rather than the width of an adult human torso. In such a faint voice that it nearly vanished into the evening breeze, she murmured, "Thank you for remembering me, my lady."
Speak up. She doesn't bite, I whispered at the same time that Anthea brayed, "Speak up! I don't bite!"
Most of the time, I added into Lodia's ear, just for accuracy's sake.
Accuracy, in this case, didn't comfort her.
"Our mutual friend delivered a sample of thy work to me! A most exquisite mirror cover!" Anthea inspected Lodia from the dangling bits on her silver headdress to the toes of her embroidered slippers. "As it so happens, my Junior Wardrobe Mistress died of a fever last moon – 'tis unfortunate, humans get sick so easily, you all need better constitutions! – and my Head Wardrobe Mistress is in dire need of an assistant." She assessed Lodia's outfit once more. "Yep, thou'lt do. Yep." And she heaved such a smug sigh that you'd think she'd just singlehandedly retaken the Wilds.
Lodia throat worked, but nothing came out except for a choked, "Um…."
"Report here in the morning. Ancemus will tell thee where to go, right, Ancemus, old thing?" Raising her voice in a most undignified manner, the raccoon dog squawked right across the Lady of the Lychee Tree at the adviser.
Gnashing his teeth, Ancemus pretended he hadn't heard her.
Idly, I wondered if he took human form just so he had teeth to gnash when Anthea was around. But no, he spent so much time as a human that it was probably just his preferred form.
Oh, wait. I was here as Lodia's adviser, not as a sightseer.
The position of Junior Wardrobe Mistress was everything that I wanted for her, but she herself seemed so miserable that I started to get cold claws.
In a rush of feathers, I flew from her shoulder to Anthea's, taking no care whatsoever where my talons went. Doesn't she get a say in matters?
"Huh? Of course she does! But whyever would she turn it down?"
Because she might want to, oh, I don't know, stay with her family? Her friends? In a stable place? The court doesn't have a permanent base, does it? It's like a troupe of traveling performers!
"Traveling performers! Pi– " she started to snarl before catching herself. "What the heck art thou calling thyself these days anyway?"
I smirked. Pip.
She rolled her eyes. "Pip. How…common. Regardless, whoever would turn down such an unparalleled opportunity? A position at court as Junior Wardrobe Mistress to the Queen's favorite? People would kill for it!"
Yeah. To escape it.
I was enjoying our back-and-forth, and Anthea's smirk said that she was too, but Lodia didn't know our history. The girl quaked.
Look, just ask her before you decide her entire future for her, why don't you?
"Fine." Anthea wiped the sulkiness off her face and replaced it with a saccharine smile. "Lodia, what say'st thou? Wouldst thou like to join my household as my Junior Wardrobe Mistress?"
"Umm…." Lodia was wringing her hands so hard that her knuckles turned white. "I…I should…maybe…I'd like…."
With a great deal more patience than I'd expected from the raccoon dog, Anthea waited for the girl to eke out a full sentence. After a moment, when none was forthcoming, she prompted, "Wouldst thou like to consult with thy family first?"
Lodia's terrified glance flicked down the table towards her grandmother. Missa was chuckling at a joke that the Earl of Yellow Flame was telling, but she'd been monitoring our conversation. She dipped her chin in a minute nod, giving Lodia permission to decide for herself.
Perhaps not realizing how rude it was, Lodia turned her upper body away from Anthea to look back at her father. Rohanus gave her a warm smile and a nod too. Even though he couldn't have heard the conversation, he seemed to have guessed its gist.
Finally, Lodia peeked at the queen and flinched when she met Jullia's dark, cool eyes. The queen studied her for a moment, then deliberately broke their gaze and addressed a remark to the Lady of the Lychee Tree.
At last, Lodia mumbled something at the dishes on the table. She was so quiet that not even a pangolin spirit could have heard her.
Speak up, I urged. It's okay to tell her that you don't want to –
"Yes."
With visible effort, Lodia met Anthea's eyes for a full second before she dropped her gaze to the dishes again.
"Yes, my lady. I accept."
The banquet held one last surprise for me.
After the servants cleared the tables, they returned with brushes, inksticks, inkstones, and stacks of – paper? Was it really paper? I hopped down from Lodia's shoulder for a closer look.
It was! It was! South Serica had paper! It was even reasonably thin and smooth, like the kind scholars used to use for calligraphy and paintings!
But why had they cut it into odd, non-rectangular shapes – oh! Because these weren't meant to be long scrolls for calligraphy or paintings. These were lanterns! Sky lanterns! And the brushes and the inksticks that the servants were grinding for us – they were for writing our wishes, which would fly up to Heaven on the lanterns!
I'd nearly forgotten this tradition.
It must have died out in East Serica, or at least in the Claymouth Barony, and I'd had precious little inclination to wish for things from Heaven in the past five hundred years.
To want, yes. To demand, yes. To wish for, no.
As the servants laid a folded-up lantern in front of Floridiana, Bobo, Dusty, and me, the mage rubbed the paper with a forefinger. "What is this material? It doesn't feel like parchment, but it's not cloth either – at least, no cloth that I've ever seen."
"'Tis called rice paper," Rohanus explained, "although that's technically a misnomer. 'Tis made from the bark of the paper mulberry tree."
"Paper! You still have paper?! I thought the technology was lost after the fall of the Empire!"
Floridiana's outburst struck all the South Sericans in earshot speechless. Some gaped openly. Others averted their gazes, mortified on behalf of the barbarian who'd never laid eyes on a single sheet of paper before.
At length, Rohanus said diplomatically, "Ah, well, I believe its use is not as widespread as it was during the Empire. 'Tis costly to produce, so its use is restricted to official and religious purposes, such as this."
"What is this? What are we doing?" Bobo put in.
Her tongue flicked out, tasting the air just above the surface of the paper. Lodia winced, perhaps worrying that it would wet and tear the lantern, and the motion drew her father's attention.
"Lodia, wouldst thou like to explain this tradition to our guests?"
Squirming, she tried to escape. "You will do a better job, Father."
Now that she had accepted Anthea's job offer and declared herself ready to step into the wider world, however, he could no longer let her off so easily. "'Twill be good practice, Lodia. Thou wilt need to communicate with others at court."
She looked as if she regretted that decision already.
Ever the schoolmistress, Floridiana prompted Lodia as she would a timid student, "What are these…devices called?"
"They're called sky lanterns."
When no further explanation followed, Floridiana prodded her some more. "Can you explain their purpose?"
"They're for making wishes on. You write what you wish for on the sides. Then you open them up and light them, and they fly up to Heaven."
Dusty snorted in surprise. "You set them on fire? Won't they burn up before they get anywhere?" To demonstrate, he nosed at our lantern.
Don't – I began, but it was too late. The fragile paper ripped.
While Floridiana glared at him and he pretended his nose had been nowhere near the lantern, Bobo tried to smooth it with her tail. "Uh-oh. Is that going to be a problem?"
A nearby servant was already hastening over with a spare lantern.
No, I answered.
"Yes, actually, but we'll get a new one," said Rohanus, giving up on his daughter to explain the sky lantern tradition himself. "After we write our wishes on the sides, we will open up the lanterns. They already have a wire frame built in, see? And we will put a bit of oil-soaked paper at the bottom, here, and light that on fire."
"And that makes the lanterns fly?" Bobo asked, fascinated.
"Yes. You'll see in just a moment. But first, you must write what you wish for on the sides of the lantern."
As he bent back over his and Lodia's lantern, Floridiana dipped the tip of her brush into the inkstone and held it poised over the paper. After a moment, she wrote with firm brushstrokes, Greater knowledge. Success. Prosperity. Fame for the academy. Good health for myself and my friends.
Following her example, Dusty picked up a brush in his mouth. A big drop of ink rolled down its tip and plopped onto the paper, spreading into a dark-grey blot. I seemed to be the only one who cared, though. "What should I wish for? Bobo, what are you wishing for?"
The bamboo viper had twisted the front half of her body practically into a knot so she could read Floridiana's words. "Can we wisssh for anything? Is it okay to wisssh for anything at all?"
Rohanus finished writing down his own wishes (for good health for his loved ones and good fortune for Lychee Grove). "Yes, anything at all."
Her eyes lit up. Squeezing her brush in her tail, tongue flicking in and out of her mouth with concentration, she laboriously wrote, I wish Stripey is doing well.
After a moment's deliberation, she added, In his new life. After another long, pondering moment, she finished off with, I wish I will see him again.
"Okay! I'm all ssset!"
Together, she and Floridiana had already filled the space on two sides of the lantern, so after the ink dried, Floridiana turned it over. In uneven, childish characters, Dusty scrawled, Good health. Prosperity. Success. Respect.
His head swung around so one eye was staring straight at me.
I shrugged my wings. Respect, huh? Good luck getting anyone besides that herald to address him as "His Highness the Valiant Prince of the Victorious Whirlwind."
"How about you?" Bobo whispered to me. "What do you wisssh for? I can write it for you."
I didn't even need to think about it.
Once everyone had written down their wishes and, in some cases, painted little pictures too, the servants cleared away the tables, opened the lanterns, and lit them. A solemn hush fell over the courtyard, broken only by the rustle of leaves. We stood around our lanterns, waiting for them to fill with hot air. Gradually, they started to bob, to lift off the paving stones, slowly and uncertainly at first, then more steadily. One – two – six – dozens of lanterns floated into the night sky, shining with a soft, golden light. Over the lake they rose, reflected in the dark mirror of its surface like stars.
All of a sudden, I wondered if Flicker and his colleagues were watching, high above us. Were these wishes real, in the same way that oaths were real? Did Heaven assign clerks to record them and file them away in the archives? If so, my wish might not have been the wisest thing to write down, even if it were in Bobo's hand (mouth?) writing.
But it was too late now. It was done and flying up to Heaven, borne on wings of paper and ink – my one true wish.
I want to be a fox again.
A/N: Thanks to my awesome Patreon backers, Arif, Autocharth, BananaBobert, Blacklark57, Celia, Charlotte, Hookshyu, Lindsey, Michael, Pizzatiger, TheLunaticCo, and Anonymous!
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She just wants to be a fox again so badly....
Chapter 114: The Most Terrifying Wish
Chapter 114: The Most Terrifying Wish
Up in Heaven:
"Hey, Flicker! Flicker Flicker Flicker! People are sending up sky lanterns! You gotta come see them!"
The Star of Reflected Brightness' favorite runner, Sparkle, came tearing into the cafeteria, excited beyond all reason over a not-uncommon occurrence on Earth. The star child was still young, and the sight of human lanterns still novel to her, Flicker supposed, although he had to suppress a groan. After a particularly painful workday (which had involved a surprise inspection, so it was by definition painful), he'd miraculously secured an entire table for himself. Now he was nursing a cup of tea and his usual eyestrain headache.
Sparkle tugged on his arm – luckily not the one with the cup of tea. Laundry day in the dorm wasn't for another two days, and since Flicker had been working overtime last laundry day, he'd missed putting out his robes. This was his last clean set.
"Flickeeeer! You're not excited at all!"
No, no, he really wasn't. Not after centuries of watching paper lanterns float up from below. "Just wait until the next Lantern Festival," he advised. "Then you'll be really excited."
"Oy! Keep it down over there!" growled Wink from across the cafeteria. The other clerk had earned an official reprimand after the inspection for "excessive verbiage on reports leading to unacceptably high consumption of office resources, including but not limited to paper, inksticks, and brushes." The cost would be docked from his next several paychecks, and he was not in a good mood. (Not that he ever was.) "Some of us are trying to rest after work."
Which was precisely what Flicker had been trying to do too.
The star child pouted. "But he's not coming to see the lanterns. They're gonna hit the net soon. I don't want to miss it, but he won't come."
The handful of other clerks in the cafeteria gave her weary smiles.
One sighed to no one in particular, "Remember when we got excited over lanterns?"
"Come now, Flicker, you can't blame her for wanting to see them, can you?" another pointed out.
He noted that none of them were offering to drag themselves to their feet and take her lantern-gazing.
Mournfully, he drained the rest of his tea, took the cup over to the window where a surly dishwasher imp snatched it out of his hand, and allowed Sparkle to tug him out of the cafeteria. His colleagues might at least have acknowledged his self-sacrifice, he thought, but of course no one appreciated it.
Since star sprites almost never took the main boulevards, she dragged him along the back paths and out a side gate, where she stopped short. Below, a crowd of star children and imps had already claimed the puffiest clouds. Flicker supposed that the gardeners, cleaning staff, and boatmen of Heaven had to seize their entertainment where they could find it.
"Oh no! They took all the best seats!" Sparkle's tone accused him of causing this tragedy with his dawdling.
"You could have come without me."
Without deigning to comment, the star child hopped from cloud wisp to cloud wisp until she came to one that was large enough to hold both of them. She flopped down on her belly. Flicker followed more with more decorum, hitching up his robes so the hem wouldn't pick up bits of stray cloud – they weren't dirty, per se, but they clung like lint and just would not come off. Clasping his hands in front of him, he stood behind her, just in case.
Sure enough, she dangled the front half of her body over the edge of the cloud and crowed, "We're just in time!"
"Don't fall!" Flicker certainly didn't want to be the one to inform the Star of Reflected Brightness that her favorite runner had tumbled down to Earth and needed special retrieval.
"I'm not going to fall!" But she did scoot back a few inches.
Whooping and cheering began to rise from the spectators on the lowest clouds. "Here they come!" someone shouted.
Through the wispy cloud beneath his feet, Flicker saw glowing yellow spots bob closer and closer, and then a swarm of paper lanterns was rising before his eyes. Star children jumped up and down and waved their arms, trying to grab the lanterns. Imps mocked the wishes and hooted with laughter. As for Flicker, he locked his fingers around the back of Sparkle's collar and held her firmly on the cloud while she stretched out her arms and shrieked with glee.
"Good health for my loved ones. May Heaven protect us. May the Jade Emperor bless us. Success in my son's studies. Gods save the Queen. Good fortune in our business. Prosperity. Good health," she read off. "Huh. They really care a lot about good health, don't they?"
"You would too, if you died as easily as humans do."
"That's so boring. I'd ask for something exciting. Like…." She scrunched up her face in concentration. "Like for New Year's to go on all year!"
That was a terrible thought.
"Only because you're not the one who has to organize all the events," he snapped.
"Or clean up afore and af'er 'em," retorted an imp on a nearby cloud.
"Or pole the boats to take all them gods and goddesses where they want to go," grumbled another.
"Or spend all day and night cookin' up foods that they eat half of and throw away," complained a third.
"Or find the funding to pay for all of that," put in a new voice. A pure, bright white glow lit the night sky. "Offerings just aren't what they used to be, you know."
White Night, Accountant, First-Class, had arrived. He claimed the puffiest cloud as if he owned it. He might, for all Flicker knew.
Everyone yelped, jumped, and bowed low.
The Accountant waved a hand. "At ease. I'm not here for an audit."
"What – what – what brings you here, Your Worship?" quavered an imp.
"The same thing that brought the rest of you here. Lantern viewing."
Huh. So Accountants liked to see the lanterns too? "Is it so that you may gain a sense of what people wish for so as to incorporate the data into your models…?" Flicker asked respectfully.
White Night just tilted his head back to watch the first lanterns strike the net above them. They stuck to the ropes of clouds and winked out. On-duty imps began to pole their boats through the sky, collecting the lanterns for disposal.
A squeal yanked Flicker's attention away from the Accountant back to Sparkle. "Look! Look! That one's different!"
She was pointing to a lantern that was just floating up to his eye level. It was adorned with the standard wishes of "Greater knowledge. Success. Prosperity. Good health for myself and my friends," but as it rotated, it brought two more wishes, both written in the same handwriting, into view.
One said, "I wish Stripey is doing well in his new life. I wish I will see him again."
And the other, which sent such a chill down his spine that it nearly extinguished his glow, said, "I want to be a fox again."
Down on Earth:
"O, joyous morning! O, beauteous mists!"
I could have assured Katu that there was nothing beauteous about these mists, which would only impede visibility and render us vulnerable to ambush, but why waste my breath?
Not trusting me to protect Lodia on the road to Jullia's court, Missa and Rohanus had arranged with the Lady of the Lychee Tree to send a detachment of Earth Court guards – and one overexcited poet.
For whom this was apparently a joyous morning.
"O, rapture unforeseen!"
"I'll show you rapture," muttered the Kohs' cook, Mistress Fan, who'd been pressganged into helping load the carriages and was distinctly un-rapturous about it.
The Kohs were sending Lodia off in style, with trunks of clothing and bedding and assorted pieces she'd embroidered over the years, which might prove useful as bribes. Missa had looked straight at me when she'd said that last part, trusting me to judge when to portion them out. I'd puffed up my feathers and given her a regal nod. I'd see to it that Lodia ingratiated herself with the appropriate courtiers.
"O exultation unforeseen!"
"Katu, please stop," begged a young man who could have been a woodblock print copy of the poet.
Katu, as it turned out, had a twin brother named Kamullus. Blessedly for the family, however, Kamu had no poetic inclinations. Because if he had, the other citizens would have run the Lens out of Lychee Grove by now.
"O, delirious good fortune! O – "
"Yes, yes, lovely." Floridiana cut Katu off. She doublechecked that all our trunks were secured in her wagon – the Lady of the Lychee Tree had rewarded us handsomely for saving her fief – and ran a hand over Dusty's neck. "We're set."
To Missa's tightlipped displeasure, Katu gave his twin a one-armed hug and bounded into Lodia's carriage.
Don't worry, I told Missa. I'll chaperon.
For some reason, my promise didn't reassure Lodia's grandmother all that much, but before I could inquire as to why, Floridiana snapped, "Len Katulus! You will be riding with me, young man. I intend to update my course materials on the Kingdom of South Serica, and I need you to provide me with an overview of its history, politics, geography, and culture."
"Have you come to the right person!" Katu bounded back out of the carriage, rocking it on its wheels, and hopped onto the wagon seat next to Floridiana.
Dusty snorted and swished his tail into the poet's eyes. For once, Floridiana didn't scold him.
"Isssn't it great that ssshe finally found sssomeone to talk to?" Bobo asked as she coiled up in the spot he'd just vacated. To Lodia, she explained, "Ssshe doesssn't really have people to talk to about books and politics and ssstuff in Claymouth. The Baron and his family all read lots, of courssse, but…." And she swayed from side to side in a snake's shrug.
But the commoner headmistress of the local school didn't have nearly as much social status as she needed to be a regular dinner guest at the castle. She didn't even have the social status she needed to tutor the Baron's children.
Lodia folded her hands tidily in her lap. "Katu doesn't really have anyone to talk to in Lychee Grove either. So 'tis good that they have each other."
Depended on your definition of "good," of course.
One joyous, beauteous, rapturous, exultant, and delirious (mostly delirious) week later, we caught up to Jullia's court, which had returned for now to Goldhill, official capital of South Serica. At Anthea's invitation, we settled into one wing of her mansion there. This, too, she had renovated to resemble a hall in Cassius' Back Palace.
While Lodia trembled through her first meeting with Anthea's Wardrobe Mistress, Katu waxed poetic over the décor and the glory of the Serican Empire, Floridiana lamented the absence of a library or even a book room, and the gardeners bemoaned Dusty's tendency to explore the grounds by taking bites of any plant he didn't recognize, a servant escorted me to have tea with Anthea. (It was only supposed to be me, but I dragged Bobo along too.)
"So. How are we setting up this system of temples to the Kitchen God?" Anthea asked.
I'd already given this some thought en route to Goldhill. Currently, Kitchen God worship was decentralized, with each household setting up a mini-altar to him in its kitchen. He was humble (for a god), without any temples that he could call his own. Some might see that very humbleness as what brought him closer to the common people and won their hearts – but not me.
What I saw was a dire lack of pomp that would impress onlookers with his majesty and authority and that would attract lavish offerings in hopes of securing his influence in the Heavenly court.
But that was simple enough to remedy.
We'll start by setting up separate temples to him, outside of people's homes, I told Anthea. We need more control over what people offer him and when. What's a good building we can take over?
"Take over? You mean, like an empty restaurant or warehouse?" Anthea looked like she was drawing a complete blank, as did Bobo.
No, no, no, I'm talking prime real estate here! A prestigious address! We're trying to impress people, not make them think we're here to serve them!
After a too-long moment to mull over my explanation, Anthea flashed us a toothy grin. "Well, the Earl of Black Crag does have a mansion near the palace that he won't be using for a while…."
In Heaven:
Lady Fate was spending a pleasant afternoon playing with Regia, entertaining her cat by casting moon blocks. Out of nowhere, gold light blazed up from all of them. Startled, Regia hissed and shot out of the room.
Lady Fate hissed for a completely different reason.
Somewhere, somehow, someone had just made a decision that was going to alter the course of Serica's future.
A/N: Thanks to my awesome Patreon backers, Autocharth, BananaBobert, Blacklark57, Celia, Charlotte, Hookshyu, Lindsey, Michael, Pizzatiger, TheLunaticCo, and Anonymous!
Up in Heaven:
"Hey, Flicker! Flicker Flicker Flicker! People are sending up sky lanterns! You gotta come see them!"
The Star of Reflected Brightness' favorite runner, Sparkle, came tearing into the cafeteria, excited beyond all reason over a not-uncommon occurrence on Earth. The star child was still young, and the sight of human lanterns still novel to her, Flicker supposed, although he had to suppress a groan. After a particularly painful workday (which had involved a surprise inspection, so it was by definition painful), he'd miraculously secured an entire table for himself. Now he was nursing a cup of tea and his usual eyestrain headache.
Sparkle tugged on his arm – luckily not the one with the cup of tea. Laundry day in the dorm wasn't for another two days, and since Flicker had been working overtime last laundry day, he'd missed putting out his robes. This was his last clean set.
"Flickeeeer! You're not excited at all!"
No, no, he really wasn't. Not after centuries of watching paper lanterns float up from below. "Just wait until the next Lantern Festival," he advised. "Then you'll be really excited."
"Oy! Keep it down over there!" growled Wink from across the cafeteria. The other clerk had earned an official reprimand after the inspection for "excessive verbiage on reports leading to unacceptably high consumption of office resources, including but not limited to paper, inksticks, and brushes." The cost would be docked from his next several paychecks, and he was not in a good mood. (Not that he ever was.) "Some of us are trying to rest after work."
Which was precisely what Flicker had been trying to do too.
The star child pouted. "But he's not coming to see the lanterns. They're gonna hit the net soon. I don't want to miss it, but he won't come."
The handful of other clerks in the cafeteria gave her weary smiles.
One sighed to no one in particular, "Remember when we got excited over lanterns?"
"Come now, Flicker, you can't blame her for wanting to see them, can you?" another pointed out.
He noted that none of them were offering to drag themselves to their feet and take her lantern-gazing.
Mournfully, he drained the rest of his tea, took the cup over to the window where a surly dishwasher imp snatched it out of his hand, and allowed Sparkle to tug him out of the cafeteria. His colleagues might at least have acknowledged his self-sacrifice, he thought, but of course no one appreciated it.
Since star sprites almost never took the main boulevards, she dragged him along the back paths and out a side gate, where she stopped short. Below, a crowd of star children and imps had already claimed the puffiest clouds. Flicker supposed that the gardeners, cleaning staff, and boatmen of Heaven had to seize their entertainment where they could find it.
"Oh no! They took all the best seats!" Sparkle's tone accused him of causing this tragedy with his dawdling.
"You could have come without me."
Without deigning to comment, the star child hopped from cloud wisp to cloud wisp until she came to one that was large enough to hold both of them. She flopped down on her belly. Flicker followed more with more decorum, hitching up his robes so the hem wouldn't pick up bits of stray cloud – they weren't dirty, per se, but they clung like lint and just would not come off. Clasping his hands in front of him, he stood behind her, just in case.
Sure enough, she dangled the front half of her body over the edge of the cloud and crowed, "We're just in time!"
"Don't fall!" Flicker certainly didn't want to be the one to inform the Star of Reflected Brightness that her favorite runner had tumbled down to Earth and needed special retrieval.
"I'm not going to fall!" But she did scoot back a few inches.
Whooping and cheering began to rise from the spectators on the lowest clouds. "Here they come!" someone shouted.
Through the wispy cloud beneath his feet, Flicker saw glowing yellow spots bob closer and closer, and then a swarm of paper lanterns was rising before his eyes. Star children jumped up and down and waved their arms, trying to grab the lanterns. Imps mocked the wishes and hooted with laughter. As for Flicker, he locked his fingers around the back of Sparkle's collar and held her firmly on the cloud while she stretched out her arms and shrieked with glee.
"Good health for my loved ones. May Heaven protect us. May the Jade Emperor bless us. Success in my son's studies. Gods save the Queen. Good fortune in our business. Prosperity. Good health," she read off. "Huh. They really care a lot about good health, don't they?"
"You would too, if you died as easily as humans do."
"That's so boring. I'd ask for something exciting. Like…." She scrunched up her face in concentration. "Like for New Year's to go on all year!"
That was a terrible thought.
"Only because you're not the one who has to organize all the events," he snapped.
"Or clean up afore and af'er 'em," retorted an imp on a nearby cloud.
"Or pole the boats to take all them gods and goddesses where they want to go," grumbled another.
"Or spend all day and night cookin' up foods that they eat half of and throw away," complained a third.
"Or find the funding to pay for all of that," put in a new voice. A pure, bright white glow lit the night sky. "Offerings just aren't what they used to be, you know."
White Night, Accountant, First-Class, had arrived. He claimed the puffiest cloud as if he owned it. He might, for all Flicker knew.
Everyone yelped, jumped, and bowed low.
The Accountant waved a hand. "At ease. I'm not here for an audit."
"What – what – what brings you here, Your Worship?" quavered an imp.
"The same thing that brought the rest of you here. Lantern viewing."
Huh. So Accountants liked to see the lanterns too? "Is it so that you may gain a sense of what people wish for so as to incorporate the data into your models…?" Flicker asked respectfully.
White Night just tilted his head back to watch the first lanterns strike the net above them. They stuck to the ropes of clouds and winked out. On-duty imps began to pole their boats through the sky, collecting the lanterns for disposal.
A squeal yanked Flicker's attention away from the Accountant back to Sparkle. "Look! Look! That one's different!"
She was pointing to a lantern that was just floating up to his eye level. It was adorned with the standard wishes of "Greater knowledge. Success. Prosperity. Good health for myself and my friends," but as it rotated, it brought two more wishes, both written in the same handwriting, into view.
One said, "I wish Stripey is doing well in his new life. I wish I will see him again."
And the other, which sent such a chill down his spine that it nearly extinguished his glow, said, "I want to be a fox again."
Down on Earth:
"O, joyous morning! O, beauteous mists!"
I could have assured Katu that there was nothing beauteous about these mists, which would only impede visibility and render us vulnerable to ambush, but why waste my breath?
Not trusting me to protect Lodia on the road to Jullia's court, Missa and Rohanus had arranged with the Lady of the Lychee Tree to send a detachment of Earth Court guards – and one overexcited poet.
For whom this was apparently a joyous morning.
"O, rapture unforeseen!"
"I'll show you rapture," muttered the Kohs' cook, Mistress Fan, who'd been pressganged into helping load the carriages and was distinctly un-rapturous about it.
The Kohs were sending Lodia off in style, with trunks of clothing and bedding and assorted pieces she'd embroidered over the years, which might prove useful as bribes. Missa had looked straight at me when she'd said that last part, trusting me to judge when to portion them out. I'd puffed up my feathers and given her a regal nod. I'd see to it that Lodia ingratiated herself with the appropriate courtiers.
"O exultation unforeseen!"
"Katu, please stop," begged a young man who could have been a woodblock print copy of the poet.
Katu, as it turned out, had a twin brother named Kamullus. Blessedly for the family, however, Kamu had no poetic inclinations. Because if he had, the other citizens would have run the Lens out of Lychee Grove by now.
"O, delirious good fortune! O – "
"Yes, yes, lovely." Floridiana cut Katu off. She doublechecked that all our trunks were secured in her wagon – the Lady of the Lychee Tree had rewarded us handsomely for saving her fief – and ran a hand over Dusty's neck. "We're set."
To Missa's tightlipped displeasure, Katu gave his twin a one-armed hug and bounded into Lodia's carriage.
Don't worry, I told Missa. I'll chaperon.
For some reason, my promise didn't reassure Lodia's grandmother all that much, but before I could inquire as to why, Floridiana snapped, "Len Katulus! You will be riding with me, young man. I intend to update my course materials on the Kingdom of South Serica, and I need you to provide me with an overview of its history, politics, geography, and culture."
"Have you come to the right person!" Katu bounded back out of the carriage, rocking it on its wheels, and hopped onto the wagon seat next to Floridiana.
Dusty snorted and swished his tail into the poet's eyes. For once, Floridiana didn't scold him.
"Isssn't it great that ssshe finally found sssomeone to talk to?" Bobo asked as she coiled up in the spot he'd just vacated. To Lodia, she explained, "Ssshe doesssn't really have people to talk to about books and politics and ssstuff in Claymouth. The Baron and his family all read lots, of courssse, but…." And she swayed from side to side in a snake's shrug.
But the commoner headmistress of the local school didn't have nearly as much social status as she needed to be a regular dinner guest at the castle. She didn't even have the social status she needed to tutor the Baron's children.
Lodia folded her hands tidily in her lap. "Katu doesn't really have anyone to talk to in Lychee Grove either. So 'tis good that they have each other."
Depended on your definition of "good," of course.
One joyous, beauteous, rapturous, exultant, and delirious (mostly delirious) week later, we caught up to Jullia's court, which had returned for now to Goldhill, official capital of South Serica. At Anthea's invitation, we settled into one wing of her mansion there. This, too, she had renovated to resemble a hall in Cassius' Back Palace.
While Lodia trembled through her first meeting with Anthea's Wardrobe Mistress, Katu waxed poetic over the décor and the glory of the Serican Empire, Floridiana lamented the absence of a library or even a book room, and the gardeners bemoaned Dusty's tendency to explore the grounds by taking bites of any plant he didn't recognize, a servant escorted me to have tea with Anthea. (It was only supposed to be me, but I dragged Bobo along too.)
"So. How are we setting up this system of temples to the Kitchen God?" Anthea asked.
I'd already given this some thought en route to Goldhill. Currently, Kitchen God worship was decentralized, with each household setting up a mini-altar to him in its kitchen. He was humble (for a god), without any temples that he could call his own. Some might see that very humbleness as what brought him closer to the common people and won their hearts – but not me.
What I saw was a dire lack of pomp that would impress onlookers with his majesty and authority and that would attract lavish offerings in hopes of securing his influence in the Heavenly court.
But that was simple enough to remedy.
We'll start by setting up separate temples to him, outside of people's homes, I told Anthea. We need more control over what people offer him and when. What's a good building we can take over?
"Take over? You mean, like an empty restaurant or warehouse?" Anthea looked like she was drawing a complete blank, as did Bobo.
No, no, no, I'm talking prime real estate here! A prestigious address! We're trying to impress people, not make them think we're here to serve them!
After a too-long moment to mull over my explanation, Anthea flashed us a toothy grin. "Well, the Earl of Black Crag does have a mansion near the palace that he won't be using for a while…."
In Heaven:
Lady Fate was spending a pleasant afternoon playing with Regia, entertaining her cat by casting moon blocks. Out of nowhere, gold light blazed up from all of them. Startled, Regia hissed and shot out of the room.
Lady Fate hissed for a completely different reason.
Somewhere, somehow, someone had just made a decision that was going to alter the course of Serica's future.
A/N: Thanks to my awesome Patreon backers, Autocharth, BananaBobert, Blacklark57, Celia, Charlotte, Hookshyu, Lindsey, Michael, Pizzatiger, TheLunaticCo, and Anonymous!
Chapter 115: My (Or, Rather, the Kitchen God's) Head Temple
Chapter 115: My (Or, Rather, the Kitchen God's) Head Temple
Camphorus Unus, Lord of the First Camphor Tree and Hereditary Steward to the Earls of Black Crag, was having a ghastly day.
The sort of ghastly day that he had once – oh, youthful innocence! – associated with watching typhoons wreck his forest, uprooting the young camphor laurels under his and his brothers' protection.
The sort of ghastly day that began with his fretting over an emerging leaf-wilt epidemic, and that ended with soldiers threatening to murder his grove. Camphor, which had always been prized for its uses in medicines and perfumes and insect repellents, could only be extracted by brutally chopping the wood into chips and then steaming them and finally condensing the vapors to crystallize the substance. This forest of camphor laurels had been planted long, long ago at Imperial behest and placed under the Camphorus Brothers' stewardship, and even after the Empire collapsed, they'd retained their position under the new petty monarchs.
Until the day that Black Crag forces overwhelmed the Camphorus Brothers' mosquito spirit guards and surrounded their trees with axes raised. The Earl at the time (not the current one, who was his many-times-great-grandson) had spared the brothers' lives after they surrendered. But he had evicted them from their grove, which was another form of death for tree spirits. Weakened by their exile, they had served in his household for a time, defending it against insects, both spirit and normal, and maintaining his castles. Over the centuries, his brothers had been gifted to or lured away by allied Houses one by one, until only Camphorus Unus remained.
It wasn't a bad life for a tree spirit who'd been cut off from his own tree and his own land. The pain and homesickness had faded, like a cut that scabbed over with resin and wore down in the wind and the rain. He performed his job efficiently and loyally, and if, from time to time, a member of the Black Crag line threatened in a fit of rage to chop down his tree, none of them ever meant it seriously, not even the current Earl. Camphorus Unus had never again faced a threat to his immortal existence.
Until today.
This ghastly day, that began with his exterminating a termite colony in the rafters of His Grace's Goldhill mansion, and that ended with the Queen's favorite barging in unannounced, alongside a horse spirit, a bamboo viper spirit, and a Northern mage, to demand –
"The keys, Unus, the keys! My dear steward, I don't have all day!"
Camphorus Unus was feeling distinctly put upon. "Of course, my lady. I am always happy to be of assistance. But as you can see, this mansion is no fit state for a visit from such an exalted personage as yourself." Under his stewardship, it was, of course, fit to host the Queen herself on a moment's notice, but Camphorus Unus was stalling for time.
The current Earl was young and headstrong and had landed himself in the political equivalent of a firestorm. (Camphorus Unus had warned him not to tangle with tree spirits, but been laughed out of the room.) In the aftermath, Queen Jullia, who was even younger and even more headstrong, had sent the Earl home to the Black Crag fief. It was only a matter of time before cooler heads prevailed upon the two to reconcile, though. Everyone knew that.
So why was his master's niece's pet raccoon dog spirit here, demanding that he turn over the keys to the mansion?
He had to tread carefully. On the one hand, he couldn't disobey the monarch, but on the other, his master was in close physical proximity to his tree.
Spreading his hands in a calming gesture, like branches that shaded picnickers from the midsummer sun, he said, "If you might return a few days hence, I shall arrange for all the necessary preparations – "
"Oh, none of that, Unus! I meant for this to be a surprise visit. 'Twouldn't be much of a surprise now, would it, if thou hadst three days to prepare?"
"Or to send word to your master and to barricade the grounds against us when we return?" interrupted the Northern mage in a most uncouth tone. Her speech suited her appearance: all calloused skin and coarse hair and crude attire. She even had a scrawny sparrow perched on her shoulder, like a mockery of her betters' hunting falcons.
Painstakingly avoiding any acknowledgment of her existence, Camphorus Unus bowed to the raccoon dog spirit. "I beg your pardon, but if Her Majesty is confiscating His Grace's property, may I see a writ with the royal seal first?"
"Confiscating! Whyever would you think that Her Majesty is confiscating this property?" The raccoon dog's eyes went big and round with feigned shock. Then they narrowed with equally feigned suspicion, and she leaned in so close that her perfume clogged his nostrils. "Unless he – or thou – hast done something to deserve a royal confiscation?"
Her words were coy and breathy, but they struck him like a gale. "No! No, of course not, my lady!"
She straightened, shrugged, and held out one slender hand so she could inspect her perfectly painted nails. "Why, then if neither sedition nor treason is being plotted here, whyever would the Queen desire to confiscate this mansion from her beloved uncle?"
If Camphorus Unus could think of at least ten, then the Queen's favorite could surely think of a hundred.
"Don't worry!" The viper bared her fangs in a wide grin that was just as fake as Lady Anthea's shock. "We're jussst borrowing the mansssion! For a ssshort time! Jussst until, oh – actually – I'm not sssure when…."
So their actions hadn't been sanctioned by the Queen after all. They were vultures, here to rip off pieces of the Earl's domain while he was out of favor and defenseless.
Just like his tree.
As if the mage had read his mind, she left off playing with her sparrow and leveled a hard gaze at him. "If you're worried about your tree, don't be. The Queen has transferred stewardship of the camphor forest to the Earl of Yellow Flame as a reward for his loyal services."
Well.
It certainly wasn't in Camphorus Unus' terms of service to defend the Black Crag domain. He was no fighter, as the Earl was fond of pointing out, merely an old tree spirit inherited from his forebears who took care of housekeeping.
Undoing the ring of keys from his belt, Camphorus Unus bowed low and presented them in both hands to Lady Anthea. "I beg your pardon most profoundly for the misunderstanding. If you so desire, it would be my honor to take you on a tour of the grounds."
Finally! I had my own place again, which I could renovate to my own standards. What a relief!
One week after I commandeered the Earl of Black Crag's Goldhill mansion, the basic remodeling was complete, and I moved in with Bobo, Floridiana, and Dusty. I did feel a little bad about abandoning Lodia in Anthea's household – but not enough to stay there with her.
And anyway, she had her childhood friend. Anthea had been quite taken with Katu's poems, especially the one entitled "To Anthea who may command him anything" (because of course she was), and had appointed him her personal poet (because of course she needed one). So long as Katu stopped swooning over the raccoon dog once in a while, he'd encourage Lodia when her lack of self-confidence took over.
And it wasn't as if I didn't see them every couple days anyway. Both were intimately involved in the establishment of the Temple to the Kitchen God. After all, my new High Priest would need ceremonial robes – just as soon as I found the right sap to play the role – and Lodia was going to design and make said costume for me. Also, I was organizing an annual festival dedicated to the Kitchen God, which I would use to extract an extra heap of offerings to him. Any festival worth its salt (or maybe camphor, haha) required songs of fulsome praise, the more nauseating, the better. Who better to compose them than Katu?
"But I don't do religious themes," he protested when I summoned him to commission the song cycle. "I'm a love poet."
That is precisely the emotion I want you to tap into: love. Of the Kitchen God, who protects the home and watches over those on Earth.
"And who ssspies on us and reports on us to the Jade Emperor every year!" Bobo added helpfully (in her mind only).
As she prattled on about smearing the mouths of Kitchen God images with honey to sweeten his reports or to glue them shut so he couldn't say anything at all, ideas began to come to me. Yeeeees…. Yeeeees…. The Kitchen God is a…loving god, but a stern one…who stands between the people on Earth and the Jade Emperor in Heaven. Like a – like an – an intercessor! Yes! That's what he is! An intercessor!
"An inter-ssse-sssor?"
One who intercedes.
My explanation didn't work.
Without tearing her eyes away from her heap of codices and scrolls, Floridiana muttered, "If it's a god who stands between Heaven and Earth that you're looking for, then it's the God of Thieves you want. He Who Stands Midway in the Heavens."
"That's a cool title! There's really a god of thieves?" Excited, Bobo slithered over to peer at open codex in front of Floridiana.
"He's not in here," the mage informed her. "He's not nearly reputable enough to be mentioned in this kind of book."
Oh? And what kind of book is this?
I hadn't bothered to skim the titles of the books that Floridiana was copying out at home and in the royal library. Scholarly work was what I kept her around for.
"This book contains a discussion of the gods and what we know of them. In other words, it is the kind of book you should be researching if you want to forge all the folktales and oral traditions concerning the Kitchen God into a self-consistent theology."
Eh, that was her job, not mine.
Then I'm glad you found it.
"Yes…." From her disgruntled tone, she was less convinced than I was. Maybe religious-text-writing wasn't going as smoothly as she liked.
Meanwhile, Katu had been off center stage for too long. Waving his arms and flapping his sleeves, which were also too long, he wrested our attention away from the books. (In my case, it didn't take much wresting.) "But that doesn't solve my problem! I'm a love poet! Known for my love poems! If I start composing religious song cycles, that's going to – to – "
"Dilute your branding?" finished Floridiana in her most severe, headmistress-y tone.
"Yes! That!"
Since she looked entirely unimpressed by the magnitude of his woes, it fell to me to soothe the artiste. But you're not diluting your branding. These ARE love poems – love poems on a whole different level! They profess your love, not for mortal humans or immortal spirits, but for the DIVINE! They capture the awesome, ineffable might of divine love for mortals and spirits alike! What greater love could exist in this world?!
"Umm…."
I didn't give him time to think of counterarguments.
And think of the audience you will reach! Not just those philistines in Lychee Grove who are so far beneath you that they can't even dream of comprehending your artistic vision! Not just these bored courtiers in Goldhill who jump on every passing trend and fad in hopes of relieving their eternal ennui, but – EVERYONE! Every single household, every single person on Earth who keeps an altar to the Kitchen God above their stove, who prays to him to protect their hearths and homes, who pleads with him to speak well of them – to intercede on their behalf – before the Jade Emperor at the New Year – every last one of them will hear your poems! Sing your songs! Borrow YOUR words to express THEIR devotion to the Divine Intercessor! What greater scope could you hope for? What greater audience could there BE?
Although Katu had started off scowling and plucking at his sleeves, he perked up more and more with every word, and at the end, he pumped a fist in the air. "Yeah! You're right! I never saw it that way! How did I never see it that way before?"
Because he wasn't me, of course.
Inspired by my speech as well, Floridiana had buried her head in her book. She was examining some minute detail to ensure that she gained a perfect understanding of the Kitchen God, I was sure.
As for Bobo, she bumped Katu's arm with her head. "You're going to be famous all over Ssserica!"
Katu drew himself up to his full height, puffed out his chest, and pressed a hand to his breast. "I shall be the one to give voice to the people's mute and muddled yearning for the Kitchen God. I shall be the one to give voice to their ill-formed and inchoate reverence for the deity who watches over us all!"
Flinging back his head, he opened his arms wide and raised them towards Heaven (where, incidentally, the Kitchen God was not at this moment).
"I shall be – the VOICE of the Divine Intercessor!"
Well, it looked like I had just found my High Priest.
A/N: Thanks to my awesome Patreon backers, Autocharth, BananaBobert, Blacklark57, Celia, Charlotte, Hookshyu, Lindsey, Michael, Pizzatiger, TheLunaticCo, and Anonymous!
Camphorus Unus, Lord of the First Camphor Tree and Hereditary Steward to the Earls of Black Crag, was having a ghastly day.
The sort of ghastly day that he had once – oh, youthful innocence! – associated with watching typhoons wreck his forest, uprooting the young camphor laurels under his and his brothers' protection.
The sort of ghastly day that began with his fretting over an emerging leaf-wilt epidemic, and that ended with soldiers threatening to murder his grove. Camphor, which had always been prized for its uses in medicines and perfumes and insect repellents, could only be extracted by brutally chopping the wood into chips and then steaming them and finally condensing the vapors to crystallize the substance. This forest of camphor laurels had been planted long, long ago at Imperial behest and placed under the Camphorus Brothers' stewardship, and even after the Empire collapsed, they'd retained their position under the new petty monarchs.
Until the day that Black Crag forces overwhelmed the Camphorus Brothers' mosquito spirit guards and surrounded their trees with axes raised. The Earl at the time (not the current one, who was his many-times-great-grandson) had spared the brothers' lives after they surrendered. But he had evicted them from their grove, which was another form of death for tree spirits. Weakened by their exile, they had served in his household for a time, defending it against insects, both spirit and normal, and maintaining his castles. Over the centuries, his brothers had been gifted to or lured away by allied Houses one by one, until only Camphorus Unus remained.
It wasn't a bad life for a tree spirit who'd been cut off from his own tree and his own land. The pain and homesickness had faded, like a cut that scabbed over with resin and wore down in the wind and the rain. He performed his job efficiently and loyally, and if, from time to time, a member of the Black Crag line threatened in a fit of rage to chop down his tree, none of them ever meant it seriously, not even the current Earl. Camphorus Unus had never again faced a threat to his immortal existence.
Until today.
This ghastly day, that began with his exterminating a termite colony in the rafters of His Grace's Goldhill mansion, and that ended with the Queen's favorite barging in unannounced, alongside a horse spirit, a bamboo viper spirit, and a Northern mage, to demand –
"The keys, Unus, the keys! My dear steward, I don't have all day!"
Camphorus Unus was feeling distinctly put upon. "Of course, my lady. I am always happy to be of assistance. But as you can see, this mansion is no fit state for a visit from such an exalted personage as yourself." Under his stewardship, it was, of course, fit to host the Queen herself on a moment's notice, but Camphorus Unus was stalling for time.
The current Earl was young and headstrong and had landed himself in the political equivalent of a firestorm. (Camphorus Unus had warned him not to tangle with tree spirits, but been laughed out of the room.) In the aftermath, Queen Jullia, who was even younger and even more headstrong, had sent the Earl home to the Black Crag fief. It was only a matter of time before cooler heads prevailed upon the two to reconcile, though. Everyone knew that.
So why was his master's niece's pet raccoon dog spirit here, demanding that he turn over the keys to the mansion?
He had to tread carefully. On the one hand, he couldn't disobey the monarch, but on the other, his master was in close physical proximity to his tree.
Spreading his hands in a calming gesture, like branches that shaded picnickers from the midsummer sun, he said, "If you might return a few days hence, I shall arrange for all the necessary preparations – "
"Oh, none of that, Unus! I meant for this to be a surprise visit. 'Twouldn't be much of a surprise now, would it, if thou hadst three days to prepare?"
"Or to send word to your master and to barricade the grounds against us when we return?" interrupted the Northern mage in a most uncouth tone. Her speech suited her appearance: all calloused skin and coarse hair and crude attire. She even had a scrawny sparrow perched on her shoulder, like a mockery of her betters' hunting falcons.
Painstakingly avoiding any acknowledgment of her existence, Camphorus Unus bowed to the raccoon dog spirit. "I beg your pardon, but if Her Majesty is confiscating His Grace's property, may I see a writ with the royal seal first?"
"Confiscating! Whyever would you think that Her Majesty is confiscating this property?" The raccoon dog's eyes went big and round with feigned shock. Then they narrowed with equally feigned suspicion, and she leaned in so close that her perfume clogged his nostrils. "Unless he – or thou – hast done something to deserve a royal confiscation?"
Her words were coy and breathy, but they struck him like a gale. "No! No, of course not, my lady!"
She straightened, shrugged, and held out one slender hand so she could inspect her perfectly painted nails. "Why, then if neither sedition nor treason is being plotted here, whyever would the Queen desire to confiscate this mansion from her beloved uncle?"
If Camphorus Unus could think of at least ten, then the Queen's favorite could surely think of a hundred.
"Don't worry!" The viper bared her fangs in a wide grin that was just as fake as Lady Anthea's shock. "We're jussst borrowing the mansssion! For a ssshort time! Jussst until, oh – actually – I'm not sssure when…."
So their actions hadn't been sanctioned by the Queen after all. They were vultures, here to rip off pieces of the Earl's domain while he was out of favor and defenseless.
Just like his tree.
As if the mage had read his mind, she left off playing with her sparrow and leveled a hard gaze at him. "If you're worried about your tree, don't be. The Queen has transferred stewardship of the camphor forest to the Earl of Yellow Flame as a reward for his loyal services."
Well.
It certainly wasn't in Camphorus Unus' terms of service to defend the Black Crag domain. He was no fighter, as the Earl was fond of pointing out, merely an old tree spirit inherited from his forebears who took care of housekeeping.
Undoing the ring of keys from his belt, Camphorus Unus bowed low and presented them in both hands to Lady Anthea. "I beg your pardon most profoundly for the misunderstanding. If you so desire, it would be my honor to take you on a tour of the grounds."
Finally! I had my own place again, which I could renovate to my own standards. What a relief!
One week after I commandeered the Earl of Black Crag's Goldhill mansion, the basic remodeling was complete, and I moved in with Bobo, Floridiana, and Dusty. I did feel a little bad about abandoning Lodia in Anthea's household – but not enough to stay there with her.
And anyway, she had her childhood friend. Anthea had been quite taken with Katu's poems, especially the one entitled "To Anthea who may command him anything" (because of course she was), and had appointed him her personal poet (because of course she needed one). So long as Katu stopped swooning over the raccoon dog once in a while, he'd encourage Lodia when her lack of self-confidence took over.
And it wasn't as if I didn't see them every couple days anyway. Both were intimately involved in the establishment of the Temple to the Kitchen God. After all, my new High Priest would need ceremonial robes – just as soon as I found the right sap to play the role – and Lodia was going to design and make said costume for me. Also, I was organizing an annual festival dedicated to the Kitchen God, which I would use to extract an extra heap of offerings to him. Any festival worth its salt (or maybe camphor, haha) required songs of fulsome praise, the more nauseating, the better. Who better to compose them than Katu?
"But I don't do religious themes," he protested when I summoned him to commission the song cycle. "I'm a love poet."
That is precisely the emotion I want you to tap into: love. Of the Kitchen God, who protects the home and watches over those on Earth.
"And who ssspies on us and reports on us to the Jade Emperor every year!" Bobo added helpfully (in her mind only).
As she prattled on about smearing the mouths of Kitchen God images with honey to sweeten his reports or to glue them shut so he couldn't say anything at all, ideas began to come to me. Yeeeees…. Yeeeees…. The Kitchen God is a…loving god, but a stern one…who stands between the people on Earth and the Jade Emperor in Heaven. Like a – like an – an intercessor! Yes! That's what he is! An intercessor!
"An inter-ssse-sssor?"
One who intercedes.
My explanation didn't work.
Without tearing her eyes away from her heap of codices and scrolls, Floridiana muttered, "If it's a god who stands between Heaven and Earth that you're looking for, then it's the God of Thieves you want. He Who Stands Midway in the Heavens."
"That's a cool title! There's really a god of thieves?" Excited, Bobo slithered over to peer at open codex in front of Floridiana.
"He's not in here," the mage informed her. "He's not nearly reputable enough to be mentioned in this kind of book."
Oh? And what kind of book is this?
I hadn't bothered to skim the titles of the books that Floridiana was copying out at home and in the royal library. Scholarly work was what I kept her around for.
"This book contains a discussion of the gods and what we know of them. In other words, it is the kind of book you should be researching if you want to forge all the folktales and oral traditions concerning the Kitchen God into a self-consistent theology."
Eh, that was her job, not mine.
Then I'm glad you found it.
"Yes…." From her disgruntled tone, she was less convinced than I was. Maybe religious-text-writing wasn't going as smoothly as she liked.
Meanwhile, Katu had been off center stage for too long. Waving his arms and flapping his sleeves, which were also too long, he wrested our attention away from the books. (In my case, it didn't take much wresting.) "But that doesn't solve my problem! I'm a love poet! Known for my love poems! If I start composing religious song cycles, that's going to – to – "
"Dilute your branding?" finished Floridiana in her most severe, headmistress-y tone.
"Yes! That!"
Since she looked entirely unimpressed by the magnitude of his woes, it fell to me to soothe the artiste. But you're not diluting your branding. These ARE love poems – love poems on a whole different level! They profess your love, not for mortal humans or immortal spirits, but for the DIVINE! They capture the awesome, ineffable might of divine love for mortals and spirits alike! What greater love could exist in this world?!
"Umm…."
I didn't give him time to think of counterarguments.
And think of the audience you will reach! Not just those philistines in Lychee Grove who are so far beneath you that they can't even dream of comprehending your artistic vision! Not just these bored courtiers in Goldhill who jump on every passing trend and fad in hopes of relieving their eternal ennui, but – EVERYONE! Every single household, every single person on Earth who keeps an altar to the Kitchen God above their stove, who prays to him to protect their hearths and homes, who pleads with him to speak well of them – to intercede on their behalf – before the Jade Emperor at the New Year – every last one of them will hear your poems! Sing your songs! Borrow YOUR words to express THEIR devotion to the Divine Intercessor! What greater scope could you hope for? What greater audience could there BE?
Although Katu had started off scowling and plucking at his sleeves, he perked up more and more with every word, and at the end, he pumped a fist in the air. "Yeah! You're right! I never saw it that way! How did I never see it that way before?"
Because he wasn't me, of course.
Inspired by my speech as well, Floridiana had buried her head in her book. She was examining some minute detail to ensure that she gained a perfect understanding of the Kitchen God, I was sure.
As for Bobo, she bumped Katu's arm with her head. "You're going to be famous all over Ssserica!"
Katu drew himself up to his full height, puffed out his chest, and pressed a hand to his breast. "I shall be the one to give voice to the people's mute and muddled yearning for the Kitchen God. I shall be the one to give voice to their ill-formed and inchoate reverence for the deity who watches over us all!"
Flinging back his head, he opened his arms wide and raised them towards Heaven (where, incidentally, the Kitchen God was not at this moment).
"I shall be – the VOICE of the Divine Intercessor!"
Well, it looked like I had just found my High Priest.
A/N: Thanks to my awesome Patreon backers, Autocharth, BananaBobert, Blacklark57, Celia, Charlotte, Hookshyu, Lindsey, Michael, Pizzatiger, TheLunaticCo, and Anonymous!
Chapter 116: Do the Robes Fit the Priests, or Do the Priests Fit the Robes?
Chapter 116: Do the Robes Fit the Priests, or Do the Priests Fit the Robes?
"I'm sorry? Excuse me? Um, if you're busy, I can come back later…," squeaked a voice from the doorway. Lodia hovered there, torn between coming all the way into the room and fleeing.
Now that I thought about it, she'd been trying to get our attention for a while now – she'd just gotten drowned out by my newly-appointed High Priest's theatrics.
Aforementioned High Priest recognized her voice at once – now that he could hear it. "Loddie! Thou hast come!" He spun around, flinging out his arms like a horizontal pinwheel.
I was going to have fix his carriage before I could exhibit him in public, wasn't I?
It was going to be like my Honeysuckle Croft etiquette class all over again. Only this time, the audience would be more discerning and more appreciative of proper etiquette. Plus I'd adapt it to the times, so no one would accuse Katu of being possessed by a fox demon.
Hey, I could learn from past experiences. When I wanted to.
My costume designer was still lingering in the doorway, clutching a codex to her chest. "Hi Katu. Um, Pip, I sketched out some ideas…for the priests' robes," she specified, as if I would have forgotten, "but…you look busy, so I'll just come back later…." And she started backing away.
No, no, no, now is fine. Bring it over and let's have a look.
Before she could run away from having her work critiqued, I landed on her shoulder to lend her moral support. Floridiana cleared off a patch of space on her desk, and Lodia reluctantly set down the codex. Now that I got a closer look, it was made entirely from paper. The sheets inside were the same, thin rice paper that I'd seen in Lychee Grove, which Rohanus had said was so expensive that its use was restricted to official and religious purposes. The cover was a thicker, textured paper. I ran a wing over it, considering whether the craftsmen had left the texture because they lacked the technical expertise to press it flat, or whether it were meant to be an artistic statement. Since they'd also incorporated pink pressed-and-dried flower petals into the paper itself, I guessed it was the latter.
If the use of paper constituted ostentatious consumption in South Serica, then obviously I had to collect Katu's poems into a paper codex. I could put on display in the main hall of the Temple.
"If I might…Pip?" Lodia hadn't dared lay so much as a finger on the book while I was inspecting it.
Yes, go ahead. I hopped back.
Bobo, Floridiana, Katu, and even Dusty, who'd wandered in after Lodia (from the garden, to judge by the leaves he was chomping on) clustered around us. Lodia turned the cover with trembling hands.
The first page was coated with sketches of Anthea. Her head, from different angles. Her full body, in different poses. Her hands, dripping with rings and bracelets and bangles. The next few pages had sketches of gowns and patterns, with notes on the shades of silk and embroidery stitches.
Anthea must have been taking Lodia's talent – or maybe just her own wardrobe – very seriously indeed, if her Junior Wardrobe Mistress got a whole paper notebook of her own in which to jot down design ideas. Once again, I congratulated myself on how well Lodia's career was going.
If only the direction in which it was going weren't towards beautifying Anthea.
Look at the difference I've made in this young human's life, I consoled myself. Think of all the positive karma I'm earning.
It helped. A little. I still thought Lodia's talent was wasted on the raccoon dog.
Ah, well. Necessary sacrifices.
The others were emitting the appropriate oohs and aahs over the sketches, which had the happy effect of steadying the girl's nerves – but the unhappy effect of causing her to turn the pages more and more slowly.
These aren't priest robes, are they? I asked on purpose to speed her up.
"Oh! Sorry! No, they aren't, those are here…."
Lodia hastily skipped the next several pages – seriously, how many new outfits did Anthea need when she only had one body to hang them on? – until she finally came to a two-page spread of sketches for temple robes.
They were much less inspired than her designs for Anthea. From the overall design, Lodia had based them off paintings of Imperial court scenes. However, the paintings themselves must not have contained much detail, because the robes were disappointingly plain. They had the standard v-neck formed by crossing one side of the robe over the other and tying it in place with a cord or sash. The hem came down a little past knee length, over a pair of baggy trousers. She'd left the main part of the robe blank to indicate a solid color, and shaded in a band at the neckline to indicate a different solid color. The design for the Head Priest was only marginally better, with a floor-length hem and some sort of two-layered cape worn over the robe. Her sketches for the embroidery were boring geometric patterns copied straight out of historical paintings.
There was no spark in these designs. No life.
From the carefully neutral expressions on everyone else's faces and the way no one spoke, they agreed with me. And from the tears that began to well up in Lodia's eyes, she could tell.
She could do better. I knew she could do better. She had already demonstrated that in the first section of her sketchbook, in her designs for Anthea. She just needed to carry that flair over to her designs for the priest robes.
But how to convey that to her without shredding her non-existent self-confidence and then setting the non-existent shreds on non-existent fire?
While I pondered that conundrum, Floridiana took matters into her own hands. "I can see the effect you were going for, Lodia. You were trying to capture the dignity and solemnity of the Imperial court, weren't you?"
The girl bobbed her head, grateful that someone understood her artistic intent. "Yes, yes, that's what I was going for. I thought – because this is a temple – that the priests should look dignified and solemn, and I thought, what do people associate with dignity and solemnity? And it's the Imperial court, so I thought, maybe the robes should look like that…."
I did approve of the sentiment. It was just that copying Cassius' courtiers' dress wholecloth (haha) and bringing it into the modern day didn't feel right. I could picture these stodgy designs on Marcius and his mage scholars, but I could not imagine them on Katu.
Or rather, I could not imagine them looking good on Katu.
Everything about his personality and bearing was wrong. He'd look like a bad actor in a period costume that didn't fit right.
No, as much as it pained me to admit, modern-day Sericans needed modern-day designs.
It's a good idea, I said, filling my voice with as much encouragement as I could. Depending on whom we select as our priests, I can see these looking good on them. But actually, what we decided just before you walked in, was that Katu will be the Head Priest.
"Katu?!"
The love-poet-turned-Head-Priest puffed out his chest. "The one and only."
So, you see, your design would look great on someone older – five hundred years older – but perhaps not on Katu.
In a flash, Lodia's face cleared. "Oh, oh, yes, of course it wouldn't."
Tilting her head back, she ran an assessing gaze over Katu, viewing him not as a potential lover or even a childhood friend, but as the subject of her work. From the wry twist of his lips, he'd noticed that too.
"I see…. I see…. If it's Katu, this design won't work at all, it has to be completely different…. May I borrow your writing supplies?" she asked Floridiana abruptly.
"Yes, of course." Floridiana gestured for Lodia to take her chair.
"Katu, please stand there."
Showing much more confidence than we were used to seeing out of her, Lodia picked up Floridiana's brush, dipped it into the inkstone, and started to sketch him.
Her new designs, with him as her muse, were much fresher and more original. They still weren't quite up to my standards, but this time she was the one who said so. She left the Temple, lost in thought.
After seeing her concentrated efforts, Katu could only buckle down and get to work composing love poems to the Kitchen God.
It was a most productive day indeed.
Over the next week, Lodia and I went through dozens of rounds of revisions, followed by several rounds in which she sewed mockups of the priest robes using coarse, undyed cotton that we tested out on my household staff. The fit of the robes gave me the most headaches, because the tighter, streamlined shape that worked so well on young humans looked terrible on old humans. Either I was going to have to order robes first and then find priests who would look good in them, or I was going to have to find all my priests first and then have their robes made bespoke.
It was a true conundrum.
"Why can't we ussse ssspirits as priesssts?" Bobo suggested. "Then they can change their body ssshapes to fit the robes."
That would indeed have been the ideal solution. It was with true regret that I shook my head. Unfortunately, they have to be human.
"Why?" asked Dusty, perplexed. "I thought the Kitchen God isn't just a god of humans. Doesn't he watch over spirits too?"
Well, if we wanted to be accurate, the Kitchen God didn't watch over anyone at all, because he was constantly trekking around scrounging up offerings on Earth.
"I don't get it. Hey, Floridiana." Dusty snuffled at the mage's hair, leaving streaks of drool in it.
The mage didn't answer either. She'd been in Honeysuckle Croft when those rock macaque ex-soldiers let slip that Heaven rewarded spirits for doing good for humans, so she knew why my priests had to be humans.
Bobo had also been there and should have known too, except that the bamboo viper was too naïve to have drawn the only possible conclusion: that I was maximizing all of our karma earnings by employing humans in such a capacity that they could maximize their karma earnings by presenting offerings directly to a god.
It was a bit convoluted.
Never mind that, Dusty. For various reasons that are too complicated to go into, the priests all have to be human.
"Oh. Okay." Losing interest, the horse ambled back out into the garden to graze some more.
Baby spirits had such short attention spans. Still, in this case, it was to my advantage, so I didn't complain about it. Much. And only inside my own head. I'd let the gardeners do the audible complaining to Floridiana.
Anyway, we still haven't solved our problem. Do we make the robes to fit the humans, or do we find the humans to fit the robes?
Now that Floridiana had received a fresh reminder of how Temple work benefited her karma total too, she showed renewed interest in helping me. "How many priests are we planning to hire?"
A lot.
"Yes, but how many is 'a lot'? Are we talking five? Ten? Twenty?"
"Twenty priesssts?!" Twenty priests?! Bobo and I yelped at the same time.
"That's ssso many!" That's not nearly enough! we yelped, again at the same time.
While Bobo stopped to blink at me, I went on, That's AT LEAST an order of magnitude fewer than we need!
Floridiana's eyes bulged out of their sockets. "An order of magnitude? Are you talking a hundred priests?"
More! We'll definitely need more! We're going to set up a Temple to the Kitchen God all over Serica, remember? That means we need a temple in every city and town, down to the last rural hamlet. And every temple is going to need a Head Priest and at least two or three regular priests serving under them.
(Because how could you call yourself a Head Priest if you weren't the head of anyone?)
We need a map. Bobo, can you ask Camphorus Unus for a map of Serica, please?
"Yep!"
Before Bobo could go search for the steward, Floridiana put out a hand to block her. (It was purely symbolic. The snake could easily have slithered under it.) "Wait. All of Serica? I thought we were setting up a temple here in Goldhill. And then, if it's successful, slowly expand to the next big city. When did we start talking about all of Serica?"
Sigh. The woman had no vision. It was why she'd stayed a traveling mage for so long, until I found her and turned her into the headmistress of an academy.
The Kitchen God is worshipped all over Serica, isn't he? I reminded her patiently. Of course he needs a Serica-wide Temple.
A/N: Thanks to my awesome Patreon backers, Autocharth, BananaBobert, Blacklark57, Celia, Charlotte, Hookshyu, Lindsey, Michael, Pizzatiger, TheLunaticCo, and Anonymous!
"I'm sorry? Excuse me? Um, if you're busy, I can come back later…," squeaked a voice from the doorway. Lodia hovered there, torn between coming all the way into the room and fleeing.
Now that I thought about it, she'd been trying to get our attention for a while now – she'd just gotten drowned out by my newly-appointed High Priest's theatrics.
Aforementioned High Priest recognized her voice at once – now that he could hear it. "Loddie! Thou hast come!" He spun around, flinging out his arms like a horizontal pinwheel.
I was going to have fix his carriage before I could exhibit him in public, wasn't I?
It was going to be like my Honeysuckle Croft etiquette class all over again. Only this time, the audience would be more discerning and more appreciative of proper etiquette. Plus I'd adapt it to the times, so no one would accuse Katu of being possessed by a fox demon.
Hey, I could learn from past experiences. When I wanted to.
My costume designer was still lingering in the doorway, clutching a codex to her chest. "Hi Katu. Um, Pip, I sketched out some ideas…for the priests' robes," she specified, as if I would have forgotten, "but…you look busy, so I'll just come back later…." And she started backing away.
No, no, no, now is fine. Bring it over and let's have a look.
Before she could run away from having her work critiqued, I landed on her shoulder to lend her moral support. Floridiana cleared off a patch of space on her desk, and Lodia reluctantly set down the codex. Now that I got a closer look, it was made entirely from paper. The sheets inside were the same, thin rice paper that I'd seen in Lychee Grove, which Rohanus had said was so expensive that its use was restricted to official and religious purposes. The cover was a thicker, textured paper. I ran a wing over it, considering whether the craftsmen had left the texture because they lacked the technical expertise to press it flat, or whether it were meant to be an artistic statement. Since they'd also incorporated pink pressed-and-dried flower petals into the paper itself, I guessed it was the latter.
If the use of paper constituted ostentatious consumption in South Serica, then obviously I had to collect Katu's poems into a paper codex. I could put on display in the main hall of the Temple.
"If I might…Pip?" Lodia hadn't dared lay so much as a finger on the book while I was inspecting it.
Yes, go ahead. I hopped back.
Bobo, Floridiana, Katu, and even Dusty, who'd wandered in after Lodia (from the garden, to judge by the leaves he was chomping on) clustered around us. Lodia turned the cover with trembling hands.
The first page was coated with sketches of Anthea. Her head, from different angles. Her full body, in different poses. Her hands, dripping with rings and bracelets and bangles. The next few pages had sketches of gowns and patterns, with notes on the shades of silk and embroidery stitches.
Anthea must have been taking Lodia's talent – or maybe just her own wardrobe – very seriously indeed, if her Junior Wardrobe Mistress got a whole paper notebook of her own in which to jot down design ideas. Once again, I congratulated myself on how well Lodia's career was going.
If only the direction in which it was going weren't towards beautifying Anthea.
Look at the difference I've made in this young human's life, I consoled myself. Think of all the positive karma I'm earning.
It helped. A little. I still thought Lodia's talent was wasted on the raccoon dog.
Ah, well. Necessary sacrifices.
The others were emitting the appropriate oohs and aahs over the sketches, which had the happy effect of steadying the girl's nerves – but the unhappy effect of causing her to turn the pages more and more slowly.
These aren't priest robes, are they? I asked on purpose to speed her up.
"Oh! Sorry! No, they aren't, those are here…."
Lodia hastily skipped the next several pages – seriously, how many new outfits did Anthea need when she only had one body to hang them on? – until she finally came to a two-page spread of sketches for temple robes.
They were much less inspired than her designs for Anthea. From the overall design, Lodia had based them off paintings of Imperial court scenes. However, the paintings themselves must not have contained much detail, because the robes were disappointingly plain. They had the standard v-neck formed by crossing one side of the robe over the other and tying it in place with a cord or sash. The hem came down a little past knee length, over a pair of baggy trousers. She'd left the main part of the robe blank to indicate a solid color, and shaded in a band at the neckline to indicate a different solid color. The design for the Head Priest was only marginally better, with a floor-length hem and some sort of two-layered cape worn over the robe. Her sketches for the embroidery were boring geometric patterns copied straight out of historical paintings.
There was no spark in these designs. No life.
From the carefully neutral expressions on everyone else's faces and the way no one spoke, they agreed with me. And from the tears that began to well up in Lodia's eyes, she could tell.
She could do better. I knew she could do better. She had already demonstrated that in the first section of her sketchbook, in her designs for Anthea. She just needed to carry that flair over to her designs for the priest robes.
But how to convey that to her without shredding her non-existent self-confidence and then setting the non-existent shreds on non-existent fire?
While I pondered that conundrum, Floridiana took matters into her own hands. "I can see the effect you were going for, Lodia. You were trying to capture the dignity and solemnity of the Imperial court, weren't you?"
The girl bobbed her head, grateful that someone understood her artistic intent. "Yes, yes, that's what I was going for. I thought – because this is a temple – that the priests should look dignified and solemn, and I thought, what do people associate with dignity and solemnity? And it's the Imperial court, so I thought, maybe the robes should look like that…."
I did approve of the sentiment. It was just that copying Cassius' courtiers' dress wholecloth (haha) and bringing it into the modern day didn't feel right. I could picture these stodgy designs on Marcius and his mage scholars, but I could not imagine them on Katu.
Or rather, I could not imagine them looking good on Katu.
Everything about his personality and bearing was wrong. He'd look like a bad actor in a period costume that didn't fit right.
No, as much as it pained me to admit, modern-day Sericans needed modern-day designs.
It's a good idea, I said, filling my voice with as much encouragement as I could. Depending on whom we select as our priests, I can see these looking good on them. But actually, what we decided just before you walked in, was that Katu will be the Head Priest.
"Katu?!"
The love-poet-turned-Head-Priest puffed out his chest. "The one and only."
So, you see, your design would look great on someone older – five hundred years older – but perhaps not on Katu.
In a flash, Lodia's face cleared. "Oh, oh, yes, of course it wouldn't."
Tilting her head back, she ran an assessing gaze over Katu, viewing him not as a potential lover or even a childhood friend, but as the subject of her work. From the wry twist of his lips, he'd noticed that too.
"I see…. I see…. If it's Katu, this design won't work at all, it has to be completely different…. May I borrow your writing supplies?" she asked Floridiana abruptly.
"Yes, of course." Floridiana gestured for Lodia to take her chair.
"Katu, please stand there."
Showing much more confidence than we were used to seeing out of her, Lodia picked up Floridiana's brush, dipped it into the inkstone, and started to sketch him.
Her new designs, with him as her muse, were much fresher and more original. They still weren't quite up to my standards, but this time she was the one who said so. She left the Temple, lost in thought.
After seeing her concentrated efforts, Katu could only buckle down and get to work composing love poems to the Kitchen God.
It was a most productive day indeed.
Over the next week, Lodia and I went through dozens of rounds of revisions, followed by several rounds in which she sewed mockups of the priest robes using coarse, undyed cotton that we tested out on my household staff. The fit of the robes gave me the most headaches, because the tighter, streamlined shape that worked so well on young humans looked terrible on old humans. Either I was going to have to order robes first and then find priests who would look good in them, or I was going to have to find all my priests first and then have their robes made bespoke.
It was a true conundrum.
"Why can't we ussse ssspirits as priesssts?" Bobo suggested. "Then they can change their body ssshapes to fit the robes."
That would indeed have been the ideal solution. It was with true regret that I shook my head. Unfortunately, they have to be human.
"Why?" asked Dusty, perplexed. "I thought the Kitchen God isn't just a god of humans. Doesn't he watch over spirits too?"
Well, if we wanted to be accurate, the Kitchen God didn't watch over anyone at all, because he was constantly trekking around scrounging up offerings on Earth.
"I don't get it. Hey, Floridiana." Dusty snuffled at the mage's hair, leaving streaks of drool in it.
The mage didn't answer either. She'd been in Honeysuckle Croft when those rock macaque ex-soldiers let slip that Heaven rewarded spirits for doing good for humans, so she knew why my priests had to be humans.
Bobo had also been there and should have known too, except that the bamboo viper was too naïve to have drawn the only possible conclusion: that I was maximizing all of our karma earnings by employing humans in such a capacity that they could maximize their karma earnings by presenting offerings directly to a god.
It was a bit convoluted.
Never mind that, Dusty. For various reasons that are too complicated to go into, the priests all have to be human.
"Oh. Okay." Losing interest, the horse ambled back out into the garden to graze some more.
Baby spirits had such short attention spans. Still, in this case, it was to my advantage, so I didn't complain about it. Much. And only inside my own head. I'd let the gardeners do the audible complaining to Floridiana.
Anyway, we still haven't solved our problem. Do we make the robes to fit the humans, or do we find the humans to fit the robes?
Now that Floridiana had received a fresh reminder of how Temple work benefited her karma total too, she showed renewed interest in helping me. "How many priests are we planning to hire?"
A lot.
"Yes, but how many is 'a lot'? Are we talking five? Ten? Twenty?"
"Twenty priesssts?!" Twenty priests?! Bobo and I yelped at the same time.
"That's ssso many!" That's not nearly enough! we yelped, again at the same time.
While Bobo stopped to blink at me, I went on, That's AT LEAST an order of magnitude fewer than we need!
Floridiana's eyes bulged out of their sockets. "An order of magnitude? Are you talking a hundred priests?"
More! We'll definitely need more! We're going to set up a Temple to the Kitchen God all over Serica, remember? That means we need a temple in every city and town, down to the last rural hamlet. And every temple is going to need a Head Priest and at least two or three regular priests serving under them.
(Because how could you call yourself a Head Priest if you weren't the head of anyone?)
We need a map. Bobo, can you ask Camphorus Unus for a map of Serica, please?
"Yep!"
Before Bobo could go search for the steward, Floridiana put out a hand to block her. (It was purely symbolic. The snake could easily have slithered under it.) "Wait. All of Serica? I thought we were setting up a temple here in Goldhill. And then, if it's successful, slowly expand to the next big city. When did we start talking about all of Serica?"
Sigh. The woman had no vision. It was why she'd stayed a traveling mage for so long, until I found her and turned her into the headmistress of an academy.
The Kitchen God is worshipped all over Serica, isn't he? I reminded her patiently. Of course he needs a Serica-wide Temple.
A/N: Thanks to my awesome Patreon backers, Autocharth, BananaBobert, Blacklark57, Celia, Charlotte, Hookshyu, Lindsey, Michael, Pizzatiger, TheLunaticCo, and Anonymous!
Haha, that would be too much work for Anthea. It's much easier to let Piri do the work - and take the blame if necessary.
Winged One
Not the Simurgh
- Location
- definitely the ground
- Pronouns
- They/Them/It
This coming from the unholy fusion of Daji and Pop Culture Marie Antoinette? Vixen, you probably had months where you bought that many outfits with other peoples' money, and did you have additional bodies? ...admittedly, I don't actually know.
Yeah, being kind takes a bit of practice, and Piri only recently began doing it occasionally.
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This coming from the unholy fusion of Daji and Pop Culture Marie Antoinette? Vixen, you probably had months where you bought that many outfits with other peoples' money, and did you have additional bodies? ...admittedly, I don't actually know.
Yeah, being kind takes a bit of practice, and Piri only recently began doing it occasionally.
Oh! I love that description of Piri! And no, she only had the one body.... But throwing stones at other people, especially Anthea, is just so tempting.
Yeah, Piri missed kindergarten, where they could have taught her not to be mean to her classmates....
Half Moon
In the end, there is no end.
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Ah, so that's what the possession is for.
Weeell, she could have transformed into other forms if she'd wanted to...but why mess with perfection?
Halloween Surprise
Happy Halloween everyone! Thanks for reading! Piri and Bobo get a surprise when they carve a jack o' lantern:
View: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1LqQyW69U8GZzhP99_0XAV9IAmnXRdGki/view?usp=sharing
Direct link in case you can't see it.
View: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1LqQyW69U8GZzhP99_0XAV9IAmnXRdGki/view?usp=sharing
Direct link in case you can't see it.
Half Moon
In the end, there is no end.
- Pronouns
- She/Her