On cue, the knob to the room started turning again. As the door swung open on oiled hinges, a tiger demon stepped through, immediately zeroing in on the cookies and looking at Neppo with annoyance.

“There were four dozen of those, you speedster bush-tail.”

“Hi Jaiko. And nobody ever answered me about that circular. I don’t think we are supposed to be calling him that,” the snake woman said.

“Addendum 5A says you can call him that if he agrees to it. And he lost a bet,” Jaiko said. “And he ate two dozen cookies before the meeting even started so anything’s fair play.”

Lily came to Arthur’s rescue, reading his mind without him saying anything. “Arthur formally requests you stop talking about the cookies. I can see him trembling over there. I think it would be better if you got some decorum or something. The unfamiliarity doesn’t agree with him.”

Arthur nodded slightly. Lily was doing, as far as he was concerned, a tremendous job.

“Well, we have something for that too. He just walks a little slower.” Jaiko peaked out into the hallway. “And there he is. You coming, you ancient?”

“You shouldn’t talk.” A familiar voice rang out in the hallway as the last member shambled into view. “You are my older sister, remember. And who ate all the cookies?”

“Skal!” Arthur yelled. He was glad to see Skal here, but the fisherman was also the straw that broke the nothing-is-normal-here camel’s back. Arthur’s mind was fully rebelling now, and there wasn’t a single normal courtroom aspect of things in the room to drag it back into line.

“Pomm, catch Arthur,” Lily said. To Pomm’s credit, he didn’t hesitate. Right as Arthur would have plopped to the floor, he found himself cradled in giant bear hands. “You should have warned him. He’s delicate.”

“We thought you’d like it. Called him out special,” Pomm said.

“Skal, you are on the council?” Arthur asked. “You never said.”

“Ha!” Stygge barked. “He wouldn’t. We had to force him to be on the council in the first place. He’s the shy one.”

In any other context, Arthur would have called this nonsense. But filled with a room of people who were comfortable stealing meeting cookies, roasting each other, or taking orders from a pre-adolescent owl, it seemed reasonable. This was very much not measuring up to his expectations of what rulers should look like. He almost wondered if this was some kind of joke that he wasn’t in on.

“Everyone stop talking.” Skal put his hand up to his temples. “Arthur, it’s not generally known, and I’d like it to stay not generally known. But I’m part of the council, more or less. Less, these days.” Skal winced as he sat on the couch. “They made me come in. Said they had a surprise. I didn’t know you’d be here, either. I’m sorry I didn’t warn you earlier about your tea.”

“How did they even get you here? I just got the notice yesterday.”

“There are ways. Highest level on the council is… well, it’s high.”

“It’s you, you fish-finder. Why didn’t you tell this boy who you are?” Jaiko said. “Of course he’s going to faint then.”

“Because, Jaiko, I’m retired. I just want to sleep and try not to catch sharks. And drink tea.” Skal rubbed his knee. “Arthur, could you?”

“Way ahead of you.”

Arthur had already begun preparing boba. Using up as much majicka as he could, he juiced it up to help with Skal’s joints, added just the right amount of cream to suit the old man’s preferences, and handed it over. It was the least he could do. Something about an old man wanting warm tea to comfort his old body was just normal enough to snap Arthur back into reality.

“Well, then. Arthur, do you have any questions for Skal before we get started?” Jaiko said. “You are allowed right now, so now’s your big chance.”

Arthur thought about it, then shook his head.

“Skal is Skal,” Arthur said.

“Good. Pour us some tea, then come sit. We can get started.”

The beginning of the meeting began to more or less track what Arthur expected from an official function. Everyone said their name and purpose in the meeting, and the purpose of the meeting, which, as Neppo had said, was just for questions today. And then they got down to brass tacks.

The cookies really are good. That helps too. Arthur glanced at Jaiko as she went through some papers, and maneuvered a stealthy human hand forward to sneak another master-baked treat off the plate. Nobody corrected his greed.

“I already know most of what your skills can do, but can you give a summary for the group? Just generally,” Jaiko asked.

Arthur had been thinking about this a lot, which let him give a pretty succinct answer. It was nice.

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“I just handed Skal some tea. Skal, could you say what it did?”

“It made my joints feel better. Over and beyond what alchemy will do. Small effect,” Skal leaned back into the cushion and sighed, “but it really takes the edge off.”

“I can do the same thing with a lot of drinks. My skills let me make better tea for normal drinking, but they also let me address most medicinal needs. I’m pretty good with simple stuff, these days. Think one or two symptoms. Whole sicknesses are harder, but I can do a little with those too.”

“Not unheard of,” Stygge said. “Unusual for uses that aren’t nourishment in a food class, but I’ve seen stuff like this before.”

“There’s a bit more.” Arthur pulled out the Powerplant Boba and handed it over. “I have this skill that lets me store majicka in the boba pearls. It kind of uses my medicinal brewer skill, but not really. It’s more like I do it kind of the same way.”

“Oh,” Pomm said. “That’s bigger.”

“And this,” Arthur continued on, “is Portable Arthur. Skal, do you still have some of your tea?”

“Yup.” Arthur had poured Skal a big cup, and about half of it was remaining. “It’s pretty good. I missed it while you were gone.”

“You’ve been using the Portable Arthur though, right? Could you show them how it’s done?” Arthur put some already-prepared tea leaves down on the table. “There’s already boiling water.”

Skal shrugged, lifted himself off the couch, and made a batch of the tea both without boba, and also with the Powerplant Boba.

“Okay.” Arthur carried the two batches of tea back to the table. “Try all three of these, please.”

Skal passed his cup around for sips while the others poured small glasses of the plain and boba tea he had made.

“Interesting,” Stygge said. “Do you all understand what’s going on here?”

“No,” Pomm grumbled. “But it’s good tea.”

“He’s able to package his class. His entire class. And some of the power he uses to run it. Am I right that the difference with the boba would be greater if someone without an absurdly high level made it?”

“Yeah. And I think crafters are a bit better at making it too,” Arthur said.

“Huh,” Neppo said. “So you can send this anywhere and someone just gets… the value of the tea? It’s weak, right?”

“It’s not just that,” Jaiko said. “He’s sending whatever his class can do. Arthur, if someone had a broken leg, could you help with that?”

“I could. The pain, mostly. Nourishment. Probably a bit of the healing too. I haven’t had to do that much though.”

“And other things? Headaches? Fevers?”

“Oh, yeah. Those for sure.”

Jaiko turned back to Neppo. “He can send one packet of this tea somewhere. Yes, it’s just tea. But it can be used for any purpose he can pull off at the time he makes it. It’s a weaker version, but it would help for edge cases. We lose a lot of people to edge cases.” She sipped her tea again before continuing. “And it’s delicious. Which isn’t exactly a practical consideration, but… it matters.”

A flurry of questions started coming in. Skal mostly kept out of them, although he appeared surprised by some of the answers. Yes, the majicka cost was high. Absurdly high, sometimes. No, it didn’t seem to suffer when Lily helped or when he made it while using alchemical products. No, he hadn’t tried teaching alchemists to do what he was doing. Yes, Arthur said, concerned at the question, he did like frontier life. And no, he didn’t find that the capital was calling to him in a way that made him want to leave home, no matter how many subtle ways they asked.

“That’s enough,” Skal growled. “You all are just being hopeful, but he clearly likes his little settlement. It’s a good one, too. Have you read the reports?”

“I haven’t,” Jaiko said. That seemed enough to indicate nobody else had either.

“Well, it’s beyond the norm. Far beyond. That town won’t fall.”

“Well, not with you there,” Pomm said. “High levels help.”

“I don’t have a thing to do with it. Advice. Only. And fish, but they could do without the fish,” Skal said.

“Don’t say such things, Skal,” Arthur said. “I, for one, deny that I can do without Skal’s fish.”

“Shh, Arthur. He’s helping,” Lily said. “Keep going, Skal.”

“No, I don’t think I will. That’s tomorrow’s work.” Skal stood up, looking approvingly at his own joints as they failed to click or bother him. “I’m using my authority as a council member to stop this meeting. We have enough. Arthur, go get some rest, however you want to do that. I’ll find you later.”

“And tomorrow?”

“Same room,” Skal said. “This is the good one. The big one is cold. And echoes.”

“Yes, yes, by all means. Go,” Jaiko said. “We’ll talk about it amongst ourselves. Tomorrow, we’ll tell you what we believe the options are.”

—

“So how do you think that went?” Arthur said. “I can make the tea, which at least Jaiko knew. And it can be sent anywhere. It seems pretty simple, even if they want a lot of it. I’ll just make a lot of it at home.”

“It’s not that simple,” Lily said.

“How?”

“Well, I can give you majicka, right? My class is rare, but it’s not that rare. And I’m not the best at it. But I do make you better at making tea. You can make more of it if I’m there.”

“And?”

Lily frowned. “What if they had dozens of me? Just dumping majicka into you the entire day. And alchemy pills. And other things. How much tea could you make then?”

Arthur thought about it and didn’t like what he came up with. Lily’s power-injections didn’t fill his majicka up all the way, but they got close. If there were a dozen people like her helping him make tea, he’d make more. And since majicka was the major bottleneck there, he’d make a lot more.

Maybe there was another limiter he hadn’t run into, but if there wasn’t, he might make dozens of times more, every leaf of it important for some outpost somewhere.

“I don’t suppose they’d send all those majicka experts to the frontier,” Arthur said. “There aren’t that many of them, right?”

“Maybe,” Lily said in a way that meant definitely. “But don’t lose hope yet. I get the feeling Skal’s on your side here. That old man… I think he thinks of you as a grandson. Or something.”

That felt good at least. Arthur thought of him as a bit of a grandfather. He was starting to accumulate a lot of family members these days. Multiple fathers. Aunts. Horrifyingly destructive, good-natured red uncles. He had it all.

“I do like him a lot,” Arthur said. “The town is better for him. Do you really think we would have survived without him, by the way?”

“Of course. He barely helped. The fundamentals of the town are good. Spiky always says so, and he’d know.”

“Yeah.” Arthur sighed. It was a really nice town. He’d hate to lose it. “It really is good.”

Lily glanced at him, considered his face for a few moments, then nodded to herself in a way that Arthur recognized as a component of her caretaker mode. Especially on days like today, it was hard to figure out who was raising who. Arthur had learned, over time, to just accept the muddled nature of things. He was her dad-boss-brother, and she was his assistant-sister-counselor-daughter. It was just how things worked.

“Come on,” Lily said. “You’re getting depressed. When a new grandpa can’t help Arthur, there’s only one thing left.”

“And that is?”

“Mizu and me at the same time. Come on, Arthur. We are going out on the town.”