Sailing Ether Tides

Sailing Ether Tides

Ch: 29 Home On The Range

On the wide, slow moving Rummel River, three ships plowed upstream in a convoy, led by a tiny skiff that skimmed ahead, guiding the deeper drafted vessels. Rio was at the helm of Missadventure, with Benny and Dannyl playing lookout at the bow.

Moonrise followed after; the low shallow keeled river trader had a mast, flying only the ensign of house Ward, indigo blue field, sprinkled with stars and two stylized moons, shrouded in clouds their forms mingling to suggest a treble clef.

No sails powered her blunt prow through the water, only the silent occult engines in her depths provided motive power, silent and uncanny to the veteran mages on the following vessels.

On the ducal barge and the imperial frigate a small, dedicated cadre of professional Water and Wind mages kept those vessels moving along, filling sails with summoned wind or providing thrust below the surface, depending on their gifts.

The strain of keeping up with the converted river trader was beginning to show on their weathered, seamen’s faces.

The Adventurers on that little blue converted trade boat took it in turns, passing the jewelry among themselves whenever someone got too thoroughly exhausted by the hungry enchantments and spellcraft that powered the small ship. The music ringing out from the vessel at the head of their small convoy echoed off the water, carried by the instruments and ‘speakerboxes’ the industrious weirdos had scattered around the ships.

At least one of the kids was playing some kind of mellow, uplifting, smoothly energetic music at all times, folding the disparate crews and ships into a single, living, breathing organism.

“Honestly, it’s nothing to worry about… Our gifts and family spellcraft allow all willing sentients who embrace the music to share a small measure of their Mana, Stamina and recuperative energies with the group at large…” Amy explained gently to a small group of officers in the uniforms of three duchies and the empire.

“Essentially, we’re all giving a bit of extra energy to the folks with the depleted Mana and Stamina, because our individual energetic fields are slightly merged, and we all naturally seek a stable balanced state. We’re all tangled up in one big, loose knit, mobile ritual array right now.”

“So, a coven of witches is empowering our mages….” The grizzled old imperial, Sir Tanaka mumbled sourly. “I dislike witchcraft… I’ve seen some before, at the battle of Wheatford.”

“Ooo, I thought I recognized you…” Gabbie whispered excitedly. “You were second officer to captain Cheng…”

“Still am, my empress.” He replied awkwardly, while she hugged him. “Captain’s on leave, having a baby.” The blocky officer kept shooting nervous glances at the empress’ left hand, Jocomo, who was standing nearby and watching the radiant, divine empress of uncounted souls hug and giggle over him.

“How extra delightful!” Gabbie sang cheerfully, before twirling back to her husband with a girlish smile of delight on her dark, angular features. “This feels much like your father’s gifts at play…” Gabs cooed softly, when she and Amy were closer together, for a private convo.

“Our instruments and ritual tools all emulate his gifts in some ways, it’s how the enchantments work.” The colorful pirate answered quietly.

“The real magic is how they interact with our gifts and spells, our mingled intent, magic and the natural resonance of music makes it possible… without draining any one person dry.”

“So it’s not really ‘witchcraft’?” The empress asked, while motioning Jocomo to draw closer.

“Oh, no.” Amy smiled with wonder and excitement in her eyes. “It’s totally witchcraft. We’re forming you guys into a coven, linked at the aura by our spells, and sharing your essential life energies with each other in some very profound, if subtle ways…” She winked at the nervous looking assassin on Gabbie’s arm.

“We just skip the sacrificial rites, most of the time...”

In a twirl of bright blue coat tails and dancing feet, the girl was gone, over the side and headed back to Moonrise in her little skiff… Zipping along between the bigger ships with casual ease.

“Let’s go visit the Wards…” Jocomo muttered in a fair imitation of the empress’ own voice… if she were a petulant four year old in desperate need of a nap.

“It’ll be awesome!”

He sassed his wife with a twinkle hidden in his eye, where only she knew to look. He clapped a ringing swat to the pertly rounded imperial bottom, when no one was looking… except Scorpion, who stiffened with outrage, in her hidden position behind a folding screen and a secret drape, woven to match the bulkhead.

‘Sometimes I wonder…’ The woman behind the chitinous insect armor thought to herself. “Isopod never swats my bottom like that…” She muttered involuntarily, sounding a faint bit envious to her own shocked ears.

“Maybe I would… if you didn’t insist on bringing a dagger to bed.” He murmured softly through their coms earrings, sending a flush of professional embarrassment and personal excitement through her bones. “Since we’re discussing this on an open channel, my love.”

He pulled back the false ceiling that hid his position… just enough for her to see him wink at her, in a very sexy breach of protocol.

#

It was late morning, on the edge of early afternoon when his family poured back into the house; sweaty, tired, excited, smellier than expected and absolutely desperate for the baths. Gary looked down at the mountain of cruddy gear and laundry, with a small, satisfied smile on his face.

“This… I can still do.” He sighed happily, as he tucked all of the stuff away and disappeared into his workshop in the basement.

#

“He’s doing the laundry… leave him be Shai, he’s been moody and glum a lot.” Liam muttered quietly in the bath with his wife and the Wards, enjoying a soak by the waterfall.

“He’s always better when he’s working on something.”

“Aye, we both contemplate an empty house, an these rascals take tae the roads and begin their work.” She murmured, eyeing her boys, goofing in the deep end.

“Surely they won’t begin Adventuring so soon. They will be on local nuisances and pests for at least another three or four years…”

Shai’s flat displeased glare brought Tawny up short. “They scheme to roam as far as they might, on each contract, ‘pushing the envelope’...” She whispered darkly. “They do plan tae bring Harry along as their support monkey, til he kin gain a badge of his own.” She sighed, frustrated and helpless in the face of teenage rebellion.

“I was nae to know their plan, but they be dashed bad wi secrets an be poor liars, in all.”

“They will be under the guidance of a journeyman supervisor…” Tawny answered softly. “Surely they won’t get too out of hand…”

She looked at her golden friend in disbelief. “We did hae tae send the older brats fer punishment fer half a year fer their nonsense an bull headedness…” She smiled wryly after a moment.

“Truth to tell, ‘twere mostly Amy, bein headstrong an eager.”

Tawny placed a hand on her big friend’s shoulder, it was a stretch, but it needed doing. The healer spoke gently, backing her words up with a caress.

“She remembers only the adventures and dreamy, song filled nights of your time on the road… the terrors and woe have faded into hazy half dreamt recollections. She wishes so desperately to recreate that wild, free and unrestrained time.”

“Aye, it hae been hard on all of us…” She whispered, gazing over at the workshop door, where her man still labored, down below. “I worry that he do brood an sulk overmuch. Tis much power he had, all lost; now he does hurl himself at his crafts and labors.”

“At least he has that outlet… even if he can only make trinkets and musical instruments, without your help.” Tawny sighed and caressed her holstered wand, carved for her by the mad craftsman before his death and inexplicable malady.

Strange, eye watering runes and hieroglyphs inlaid in shell and precious metals crawled over the slim, round handled rod of haunted plumwood. Her soft chamois leather hideout scabbard lurked inside her robes like a cozy hug, clinging and always present, but never uncomfortable.

The enchantments and spellcraft wrought through that humble object kept it clean, snug, perfectly positioned at all times. The secret trickery and magecraft of her mad friend maintained her entire body at a comfortable temperature in any weather, so long as she wore the thing and was not directly exposed in severe inclement conditions.

The indispensable tool of any mage’s craft, her wand never faltered when discharging her energies, even the most complex and intensive workings. Paired with the holster which alleviated heat and cold and helped replenish her Mana and Stamina, her kit of surgical instruments, spun from his crafts and arts, had been invaluable in her work.

Powering through surgeries of delicate complexity, wielding scalpel and spells, lady Trelawny Kinnis was a legend in her field, with a wide ranging professional correspondence that kept her quite busy…

For now, she held her old friend and provided what comfort she could, as these troubles were beyond her formidable skills.

“If there is a remedy for whatever his condition is, we will find it… even if, especially if, it’s impossible.” Tawny whispered, recalling the same words she had heard from the madman’s lips so many years before.

“I think, once we are all back together, there might be a little more impossibility in him. Healer whispers that it is so… even though she still loathes him.”

“Aye, he does still suffer under Eponna’s curse and her blessings. He kinnae go out, save he step in fresh horse shite. Even Magnus an sweet Sandi kinnae help it.” She sighed and shook her head. “Tis fine that he be such a dab hand wi laundry, in all.”

#

Down in the depths of the house, all alone, he relaxed, letting his vast, unruly shadow out to play. His laundry facility, like the rest of the house, was a construct of Will, shadow, light, illusion and his soul’s overflowing spiritual excess.

In many ways, he imagined the house and garden, forcing the world to bend to his will and reshape itself in reality, beneath the subtle illusions and manifested glamour. Replacing his woodshop and luthier’s workbench with a forge and tinker’s tools was no more than a trifle, a flex of his Will in this place.

He could conjure materials and craft them, or summon new made objects into being with a minor expenditure of the Mana he was always overflowing with. The hard limits were his pitifully small Mana pool, and the absolute stricture that no sentient could witness the actual creation or production of an object, whether conjured, or pulled from his storage gift.

The Mana problem was a familiar one, he’d bumped into it again and again when he’d first landed here. He had a terrific, inhuman Mana regeneration rate, frankly it was ridiculously intense. Coupled with that gushing fountain, he possessed a tiny, infinitesimal Mana pool… like, infant sized. Holding a thimble under a waterfall is a stupid idea, don’t try it, you’ll lose your thimble and get all wet, best case.

The turbulence in the Mana and Ether all around him resonated with the sloshy, bubbly puddle of his Mana pool and left him wobbly and dizzy whenever he exceeded his pitiful limits.

The other stricture was even tougher; no intelligent being could gaze into the place where his house came from… and where his storage gift led. The gaze of a sentient, living being would slam closed the occult gate into his private hidey-hole in the deep Ether; so far beyond reality that matters like distance or matter, simply didn’t matter.

There were few limits in this place, where no one else could see; beyond those strictures and the unavoidable rule that he could not create a thing by magic, unless he had the knowledge and skills to create the thing in reality.

Furthermore, anything he conjured or created from nothing would return to nothing, at the edge of his property, typically evaporating into mist and smoke that smelt of fresh strawberry jam and toast.

Gary *never* conjured food or drink in his home; anything made of his shadow stuff that wound up inside a person’s tender guts would turn into an energetic puff of very noxious... stuff, on exiting his property. Shortly thereafter, it would exit the person’s property… energetically.

He mused on old times and pranks gone by, as he worked in the current iteration of his basement sanctum. Huge stone basins filled with pale green, fragrant water bubbled and swirled, carrying mesh laundry bags filled with… laundry. The master of the house stood on the edge with a long barge pole, flipping and dunking his titanic tea bags to ensure even soaking.

Unlike real water, which did little to remove ground in monster grime or sweaty teenager grime for that matter, this was mostly magic, manifested temporarily as water, carrying a blend of real exotic extracts, fragrant herbs, citrus and secret spices.

With a bronze hook on a rope and pulley arrangement, he hosted the finished bags and let the ‘water’ drain away, back into the basin. Once it had dripped and dribbled to his satisfaction, the mad wizard, clad in only cargo shorts and flip flops, banished the illusory water that remained in the bag and clothing, then unzipped the enchanted laundry bag; tumbling out fresh, dry, pleasantly scented, id slightly rumpled garments.

All this was performed in a swaying dance, to the merry tune whistled by a flock of starlings, composed of nothing at all but his own stubbornly haunted shadow. He glared at the shadow birds, flocking in their shadow bushes, all around his workshop. “Nice one, but I think ‘Washing On First Day Morning’ is a bit on the nose.” He scolded his haunts. “Odd that you chose a local number…” He mused softly, as the birds scattered to the corners of the room and vanished.

“Hey, Harry.” He called out merrily, as he banished the laundry facility with a wave, before his son came around the landing. “What’s up?”

“Come upstairs, dad. You’re bumming the rest out.” He mumbled. “They won’t say it cause you’re all…” He waved his hands about wildly, while pulling a crazy face and goggling his eyes.

The big scarred man chuckled as he pulled on a shirt, smiling at his son. “You know how I get…” He shot a glare at his shadow, it started getting frisky when Harry turned away to head upstairs. The big musician collected the huge basket of freshly washed laundry into his gift for storing things. “Go on up, son. I’ll only be a minute.”

When he was alone again he bent over and began scolding his shadow in earnest. “You guys need to chill when people are looking… I’m serious, it’s getting really annoying!”

He turned up the number and brightness of the lamps scattered around the usually dim chamber, casting harsh light everywhere, forcing them to focus. “Tighten it up, gang.”

#

They put Bywater Town behind them as the trees closed in around the river. Only the navigation markers indicating deep waters told this stretch out from the true wilderness. Duke Rummel leaned on the rail with Grace, watching the trees scoot by.

“This region has been under my family’s nominal rule for generations, just forgotten and left alone.” He said softly, into his wife’s ear. “I think I like the way things have shaped up around here.”

“Who did you assign this to?” She asked, snuggling closer into his coat, when the improbably tall redwoods shaded the river. “Wasn’t it that big fellow… Penfold?”

“Sir Penryn, baron Penryn now. The man is a mighty warrior… Lucky that he had that shield on our first adventure, the man surely saved my life.” The duke said solemnly.

“Was it perilous, my love?” She asked softly, petting his handsome angular jaw gently.

“It was a close thing… We were riding for the fringe, at the beginning of all this madness, a boar came out of nowhere…” He shook his head soberly, recalling the day.

“Who knew he could use his shield as a wok? The meal we had that day… stir fried pork, fresh country vegetables from the local farms…” He sighed contentedly and rubbed his belly, where no faint hint of flab appeared.

“I bet Jaspreet doesn’t have to put up with this kind of foolishness…” Duchess Grace muttered in obviously feigned displeasure.

#

“Gods, wife! First we sail to Wheatford, then we have to trek into the bloody wilds?” Duke Abed Mubarak grumbled and complained, but he was ready to travel and smiling out the carriage window, as the rolled up Wheatford’s smooth roads.

Duchess Jaspreet ignored him entirely, watching her fourteen year old son, Ishmael, riding one of the Belen war ponies in the guard’s formation. The lad was lightly armored and bore a brace of light lances at his boot, small azure pennants waving from the point of each.

He rode with the confidence of a born horseman and the easy smile of a young man who was comfortable among the warriors that surrounded him.

He took their good natured ribbing and smiled when they called him a ‘greenie’, just like the other uncontracted young Adventurer candidates, even though he was a year short of fifteen. The young boys and girls in the armor and badges of apprentice Adventurers served as grooms and horse handlers for the guard troop, gaining safe field experience.

The guards rode in a loose formation, relaxed and alert, rather than parade ground rigid, as so many nobles expected.

The standard Belen warband was anything but standard. They worked in well coordinated bands of six, made up of irregulars, generally. Most had a heavy armored warrior or two, at least one light armored, mobile warrior with a spear, an archer or crossbowman, a scout or ranger type and either a priest or a lay healer.

Variations on that theme played out in any number of ways, but the pattern of highly independent, mobile and self reliant teams of veteran warriors seemed to work in the dusty, orderly realm.

This troop seemed made up of tribals, in colorful armor with their beaded, braided hair caught up in ornaments of shell and bone. Despite their appearance, the Sparrowhawks were a highly regarded mercenary band, on long term contract with house Belen.

#

Duke Abed sighed hopelessly, as his son and heir went off riding with a pack of mercenary tribals… The lad was incorrigible and it was hopeless to try and get Jaspreet on his side… She was just as bad.

His son would most likely come into camp this evening, filthy, sweaty and no doubt at least a little battered, with some tale of a hideous creature slain! His own heir, out hunting like a savage! It did look fun, though…

After lunch, Adam Belen, the duke’s eldest son and a well respected cleric of Healer, rode up to their carriage before Abed could climb aboard. At his stirrup trotted a tall, elegant gray mare, dappled with golden spots on her rump.

“Would your grace care to join me for a ride?” He asked cheerfully, while nominally supervising the band of half Contracted greenie Adventurers. “I find a bit of fresh air stimulating.”

Duchess Jaspreet winked at the handsome cleric and gave her husband a gentle, encouraging shove. “Go on… you’ve been sulking awfully. I will be riding with Celeste, Jennah and the other ladies this afternoon.”

The covey of noble ladies bustled the duchess off to enjoy more refined travel conversation, in one of the three large, well appointed carriages.

“Well, yes, I’d planned to ride out all along…” The duke mumbled awkwardly.

“My young charges are eager to get a stretch in, so we’ll be ranging ahead a little.” Adam waved to his pack of lightly armored kids, including Ishmael…

Who should have been in the coach with his younger sister…

Who, the duke realized just a little too late was riding at Ishmaiel’s stirrup, on a pony of her own.

“Form up, we’re taking a shift outriding. Look sharp, we have guests.” Adam called to his little cluster of teenagers.

Eight rowdy, rambunctious kids wrestled themselves into something resembling a formation and rode out, following one of the tribals and Adam Belen, with duke Mubarak and his two children riding in the center. The warm sun and wide, smooth roads running through the low, grassy hills created a dreamy atmosphere that soothed the duke’s jangled nerves.

Even on a journey through the hinterlands, an utterly relaxing ride through endless rolling hills helped him forget his troubles. Belen was known for a few things, warriors, wealth, his common origins and his roads… Perhaps those smooth, gently graded highways were a boon to trade, but the lord of Wheatford’s warband’s response times were legendary.

There the duchy of Shiraz came up short, Abed admitted to himself, as the hooves clattered down the hard baked clay. His coast was level and wide, easily accessed by sea and waterways, but much of the interior of the duchy was steep and rugged. The mountainous, expansive lands of central Shiraz produced marvelous vineyards, orchard fruits… and monsters. Among the crags, narrow valleys and stoney peaks, innocuous creatures could, would and had grown monstrous with some regularity.

He sighed, looking out over the vast, dry, but only slightly hilly valley that held Wheatford town. It wasn’t even a city… Port Fallon, a vassal barony on the coast was nearly twice the population, if only a tiny fraction of the acerage. The nearby duchy of Ellis, also vassal to Belen’s house, was far more urbane, populous and influential than the dusty, mercenary town a week’s journey up a wide valley from anything notable.

As if she had read the duke’s mind, their tribal escort chirped happily. “We patrol these roads regularly and sweep for stray problems… Otherwise this place would be a festering wasteland. We scrubbed a swarm of jackal hornets, five miles down that way last week.” She grinned savagely. “That was a hell of a fight, bigger than eagles and fast on the wing...”

“I have a specialist team, just for flying insect swarms and monsters… expensive to maintain but when nothing else will do…” Abed shrugged. “Like keeping a delve team on retainer; it seems expensive, until a dungeon opens its maw in some quiet village and starts spewing out undead.” He grumbled.

“Delvers are all mad… we’re delve certified, my team… but the specialist dirt divers are all insane.” Larksong muttered, glancing up at the vast dome of the bright blue sky, as if to reassure herself that they were above ground.

Duke Mubarak smiled wryly at himself, when he realized he’d been chatting with a commoner… and a tribal at that, for a few miles. Adam Belen had also noticed and was trying to hide a grin, at the embarrassed duke’s expense.

The mortified nobleman glanced over at the coach where Jaspreet was… watching out the window and giggling at the way he began blushing and fidgeting in the saddle.

His companion kept chattering on about the Adventure trade, a matter of interest and import in any domain, so the poor duke had to continue the interaction despite the ghastly informality of her speech and manner.

“...response time is everything, when an F class beast goes monster, a week’s travel time can be the difference between a class D and a serious problem.” She grinned at the duke and leaned back on her saddle roll.

“A little patch of groundworms got out of hand last year, up near Pilkey Vale. It’s a rugged and remote, but pleasant little baronetcy. His lordship hired local amateurs to stomp it, they let one slip away and didn’t follow up…”

“Ohh, bother.” The duke muttered unhappily.

“It slipped into the local cemetery… A week later they had a twelve ton ground dragon munching through the graveyard, exhuming graves and snacking on the dearly departed. By the time the strike team got there, a third of the town’s orchards and all of its revered dead were gone.” She shook her head, rattling beads of turquoise, antler and bone. “Odd to store your dead up like that, but whatever…”

Trotting through the uplands of the Belen domain continued to be relaxing, with smallholders and little hamlets scattered all about, reeking of homey, comfortable charm…

“Bloody Wheatford…” The duke sighed sadly, as his tense shoulders relaxed in time to the steps of his delightfully frisky mount.

#