“I bought a storefront for the guard,” Harry told Grandmother. The square was incredibly busy and packed with selkie. Todd was negotiating a deal with the Innkeeper for the porcupines. Grandmother was trying to eavesdrop on the conversation, from her table.
Her table was a lot farther from the service counter than before they left. It appeared the entire common room doubled in size in their absence. It reached much farther back into the structure, away from the courtyard. At the same time it also seemed wider, pushing out on either side. Grandmother couldn’t figure out how that one was possible without the shops around the courtyard shrinking… unless the courtyard itself got bigger?
Harry’s arrival broke her concentration. She sipped tea from the glass mug Kai made her, to give herself a moment to reorder her thoughts. The mug was turning violet as she held it.
“Great,” Grandmother said. “You can use the inventory to organize the guard's possessions. I wonder if you can set it up to rent equipment? You could rent out used weapons for people to train with. I suppose you could always sell and buy back at very close to the same price, that would be just like rent.” Harry made a note of the suggestion.
“So it is alright with you?” Harry asked. After he did it, he had second thoughts about how maybe he should have cleared it with Grandmother first. Guards didn’t have storefronts. Technically he was removing the shop from the crafters' use. Harry knew how much Grandmother valued the crafters.
“Sounds like a good idea to me,” Grandmother replied. “You can move all your temporary guard housing from that second apartment you rented to the shop space. You could bed down a lot of people in the store room. You should ask Alex about building you bunk beds.”
“Bunk beds?” Harry asked. He was unfamiliar with that concept.
“The Speedwell has them in all the children's rooms. They are a way to stack two beds,” Grandmother explained. She was holding one hand over the other with a space between them. She moved the bottom hand up to hover over the other hand. “With the heights of the ceilings you might even be able to go three high. They are a variation on shelving. I know all your young guards just sleep on the floor now. Sleeping on a shelf won’t be any harder on them and you can add a pallet to each one to soften it.” Grandmother was drifting from what Harry wanted to ask her, but he was used to that.
“I’ve been using the glass windows in the front to advertise the Challenge day,” Harry said, redirecting the conversation. He asked his warriors and hunters for ideas. Getting a shop was one of them. He used a lot of their ideas to decorate the front of the shop. “We’ve been ‘selling’ escort services and taking the names of challengers. I have a challenge list that gives their tier, color and name and role.”
“Role?” Grandmother asked. Harry was happy to have stumped Grandmother for once.
“It started out as warrior or wizard, but some of the selkie gave different answers. When our human challengers saw some of those answers, they updated their own. We have several groups wanting to try it this time. One of the groups has a member that listed themselves as a healer,” Harry explained. “Now that we are getting close and there are a lot of selkie coming in, we keep getting questions on what the prize is. I was hoping you would lend me your glass armor for display.”
“I’m sorry,” Grandmother replied, “but I have found myself a bit short of coins lately.” Harry was disappointed. He thought maybe she sold the set to the vendor since she didn’t wear any of it. He knew from the few pieces his guards managed to win that the vendor paid a lot of money for it. “I can’t just loan it to you, I am going to have to charge you rent.”
“You still have it?” Harry asked to confirm.
“Yes, of course,” Grandmother replied. “Alex put together a very nice armor rack to display it on. If you rent it I want you to add a tag saying the rack came from his furniture shop.”
“What do you want for the rent?” Harry asked. Grandmother had no idea. She ended up negotiating a flat rate or a percentage of the escort sales, whichever was smaller. It was worded that way so the armor could remain on display in the guard shop between challenges when there would be no income. Harry was surprised at the flat rate cap.
“If it turns out you can afford to pay me more later, we can raise the cap,” Grandmother said, “I am trusting you to be honest on that. I feel like the armor isn’t working any harder when the group gets larger, but your guards will. They deserve the extra coins more. Go get a couple of your young warriors to carry it down.”
Grandmother finished off her tea as she waited for Harry to return. She looked down at her personal mug. Innkeeper always used it to serve Grandmother. Everyone else in the common room was still drinking out of tankards, regardless of what they drank was tea, juice or beer. It made her think of the set of dishes she bought in Seagrass. The complete set was still packed into a couple gathering bags in Grandmother’s room. Her plan was to take them to the upgraded rest as part of the experiment there.
She still might do that. One of the icons she figured out in the south gallery’s interface appeared to be a way to add rooms. With Ellen’s help, she piled up what she thought were all the requirements for a crafting workshop. She selected the room option on the interface. All the crafting equipment became fixed to the ground, but no workshop appeared. Grandmother was not disappointed. The actual rooms never appeared in the upgraded rest until they all left. She was excited to see what they got when they next visited.
There was no reason not to use the dishes now and still carry them away later. She finished her tea, when Harry returned with his two young backs. Honestly at tier four, Harry could carry the armor dummy down the stairs one handed, but that might leave the young people thinking they were unneeded. Grandmother led them up to the queen’s suite.
“I like the silver,” Harry said the instant they walked into the room. Harry probably last saw the suite almost a year ago, but he noticed the change instantly. Grandmother felt even worse about her failure to do so.
“Thanks,” Grandmother responded. “There it is,” she said with a wave to the standing suite of class armor. She opened up the storage chest at the end of the bed and dug out the dish holding gathering bags at the bottom.
The two young warriors grunted as they lifted the heavy stand, with the armor still on it. They swayed a little as they got their holds set.
“Careful now,” Harry said from his supervisory position. “I don’t want Grandmother's armor scratched.”
“No, sir,” one of the warriors responded.
“Yes, sir,” the other said almost at the same instant.
“I don’t think either of them have the tier to damage it,” Grandmother observed after they managed to maneuver the bulky object into the hallway.
“Agility and strength are both important to a fighter,” Harry said, before thanking Grandmother again for the loan and following his guards out. Grandmother laughed, before picking up her bags and following them.
Their progress slowed as they crossed the common room and everyone wanted to get a look at the armor. As soon as Grandmother could, she abandoned the parade and cut over to the service counter. Innkeeper was watching the chaos in her common room with a remarkable amount of calm.
“Innkeeper,” Irene said to the woman, “Can we talk for a moment?”
“Of course,” the older woman said. “Come on back.” Grandmother followed the innkeeper back into the kitchen. The kitchen looked larger to Grandmother. She wasn’t as certain as she was about the common room. She usually never came into the inn’s back rooms. She wanted to make it clear to everyone that Innkeeper owned the inn, not Grandmother. She saw that that line blurred too many times.
Innkeeper led Grandmother over to a large desk that sat next to a set of storage shelves. The storage shelves were the type that the structure provided in shops and apartments. They were about half full. The load wasn’t even. It looked like the shelves recently doubled their size, growing a section of shelving that was completely empty.
Grandmother spotted Todd busy at work cooking. He was surrounded by three helpers who were arranging food on wooden platters. Servers were coming back and forth from the common room carrying food, drinks and dirty tankards and planks. Two very young workers appeared to be pressed into service at a large basin in the back washing the returns.
Grandmother realized this probably wasn’t a good time, but she thought it would only get busier as Challenge day approached. Grandmother sat the bags on the desk and opened the first one. She reached in and pulled out a dinner plate.
“I bought these dishes from Ray-Do-Ti’s pottery shop in Seagrass,” she commented as she handed the plate to Innkeeper. “I’d like for you to use them to serve anyone at my table.”
“Of course,” Innkeeper said without hesitation. She turned the plate over in her hand. There was transparent glaze on the pure white porcelain. Grandmother negotiated that out of the potter. Each dish was also adorned with a small sketch of a fish swimming through seagrass offset in one corner of it. The sketches were in green, but if Grandmother held the dish too long, the fish turned purple. The potter promised he could remove the image if she didn’t like it. She insisted they stay. “This is very nice,” Innkeeper observed.
The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.
Grandmother pulled out another plate. She planned to unpack them all before she left since she wasn’t certain they wouldn’t break if the bag expelled them all together if someone else opened it. She started a stack on the desk and pulled out the next plate.
“I want you to feel free to serve other guests with them if I’m not here,” Grandmother told Innkeeper. “I hope you’ll accept their use as payment for storing them. In fact I’d prefer it if you used them for our visiting dignitaries. Especially if you mention they come from Seagrass.” Grandmother ended up buying twelve. She tried to order ten. Six for the team and two spare incase Kai or Muriel wanted to come back out to the Speedwell sometime. After negotiating with Ray-Do-Ti for a while, Irene discovered the potter must have a way to make six as easily as one, since she wanted virtually the same price. Grandmother could buy eighteen for nearly the same price as ten. She settled on twelve.
“Wow,” Innkeeper observed, as Grandmother switched to unloading the salad plates, “your bag really is bottomless. Todd told me you have the ultimate stuffer perk.” Grandmother was struck by inspiration and didn’t want to get stuck being called a stuffer for the rest of her life.
“It's called the bottomless bag perk,” Grandmother declared. “What perk do you have?”
“Uh,” Innkeeper murmured, “Food or drink lasts longer if I touch it.” That was interesting, both the perk and the easy way that Innkeeper admitted to it. Grandmother found very few people over the years that had some odd trait they couldn’t explain. Even fewer of them would admit to it. She remembered Todd’s apparent embarrassment when he admitted he could tell if someone was looking at them. Did he think he was just paranoid?
“Like tea stays hot and beer doesn’t go flat?” Grandmother asked. She set out the last luncheon plate and started on the bowls.
“Yeah and meals arrive at the tables hot. Also soup left on a warmer won’t burn and bread doesn’t mold. Meat turns eventually, but it lasts a lot longer than if I don’t touch it,” Innkeeper responded. “Those last three I only noticed after I hit tier four.”
“You're tier four?” Grandmother asked, surprised. She really looked at the Innkeeper and realized the touches of blue in her clothing were dark. “Sorry,” Grandmother spit out. “I should know that. It's just that when I asked Harry about the tier four’s in the square to share the portal duty he didn’t mention you.”
“I told him I didn’t have the time,” Innkeeper replied. “I didn’t mean to insult you or anything.”
“I’m not insulted,” Grandmother replied. “I understand if you don’t have the time. I’d still like to get the transportation system opened for you. I think it is a good precaution for the square if as many of our people who can use it are activated.”
“Alright,” Innkeeper agreed, “but I can’t leave the inn until after Challenge day.”
“I don’t expect you to,” Grandmother agreed. The top of the desk was getting full. She shifted some of the stacks, putting the smaller plates on the larger ones. Innkeeper noticed, and started shifting the stacks to the empty storage shelves. “We’ll arrange some time when things are slower.”
Grandmother unloaded a set of tiny tea cups. She commented to the innkeeper that she only wanted to be served in them if she had guests. “They are way too small,” Grandmother said, “I prefer the larger size of my glass mug.” The bag finally appeared empty.
“What’s in the other one?” Innkeeper asked.
“The serving pieces,” Grandmother explained. “I am not certain what some of them are even for.”
“How much did all this cost?” Innkeeper asked.
“It was very expensive,” Grandmother admitted. “She sells a rougher red clay version much more cheaply. If you buy some for the inn I’d try to negotiate her down based on volume. Buy in sets of six, it’s cheaper that way.”
Grandmother ran her empty bags back up to her room before venturing out into the courtyard. She wanted to see Harry’s guard shop.
The guard shop was on the opposite side of the back door hallway from Alex’s furniture shop. Grandmother found it by the large crowd of mixed humans and selkie looking in through the window at the armor on display. As she swung around the crowd trying to make it to the door she discovered that another new shop was on the other side of it.
It appeared Arnie took her hints about fast bandages, healing spells and regrowing limbs. The shop was also displaying a set of cloth stretchers that could be used to bring a wounded hunter back to the square and could be rolled up to a small size for easy transport when not being used. The advertisement on the window promised the healing services of red, violet, blue, and green healers. It was a good set of magic users. They would be able to heal anyone without causing heal addiction. Grandmother wondered who the violet healer was. There were several violet magic users among the youngest adults in the square. She didn’t think any of them could be tier three yet, so regrowing limbs for a red user might still be beyond Arnie’s hospital.
Grandmother made a note to check with him before leaving for the Speedwell. It took twelve days of casting the tier three heal at least once a day to regrow a limb. A single cast of the tier four or five heal would accomplish the same thing in less time. If anyone with red magic lost a limb at the challenge she would cast a higher tier heal on them before she left. She didn’t want to subvert Arnie’s business. She wouldn’t always be here to provide the service, so Arnie needed to grow up his violet healer. She would let Arnie hire her before she did it, letting him collect the fee.
She finally made her way to the door of the guard shop and slipped inside. She was wearing her hand made, slightly worn leathers and no one was paying any attention to her. She loved it. The room inside was tiny. This was a narrow front wide back space, which Grandmother found odd. She would have expected the opposite since the transportation room was on this side of the back hall.
The wall separating the showroom from the workshop was placed very close to the front. The service counter was positioned ninety degrees to the front glass wall. It was cut across the center of the showroom, keeping the larger portion out of the reach of the customers. The glass armor was positioned in this restricted space. Harry and his two porters were still positioning the armor.
A very harried looking young woman stood behind the counter. She was taking down peoples names and accepting payments. Grandmother knew the woman was probably a very deadly warrior, considering her association with Harry, but right now she looked every bit the overworked shop clerk.
Grandmother realized a list of challengers was written directly on the shop wall. A structure stylus was capable of writing on almost anything. Their primary purpose was to create enchantments after all. The number of participants on the list was impressive. Grandmother was intrigued to see that the selkie names were written in selkie. She dedicated a large portion of her evenings on the Speedwell learning to read and write it from Sarah and Companion.
“Grandmother,” Harry greeted her. Realizing she’d been found, she turned from the wall to find everyone in the room deferring to her.
“Don’t mind me,” she told them. Harry said something quietly to his warrior clerk, and lifted the divider, inviting Grandmother to come back.
“Let me show you our preparations,” he said.
Grandmother joined Harry behind the counter, pausing a moment to look at the large symbol written on the wall. It was the human number two. About half size and sitting to the right with its centerline up with the bottom of two was the Selkie version. Surrounding that in a ring was written the same value in all seven known structure fonts. The structure symbols were about a quarter the size of the selkie one.
“It’s our countdown,” Harry explained when he saw where Grandmother’s attention was. “It is fancy today because Sarah did it.”
Harry took her through to the back room, where he showed the rope ladders and stretcher/harness they planned to use to drag wounded fighters from the arena. There was an odd cart with a table surface and shelves built into it stored in the back room. It looked like a relative of the bag cart Grandmother’s party used to carry furniture components up to the upgraded rest. Grandmother asked what it was.
“That’s Todd’s food cart. Didn’t he tell you? Maybe he was keeping it for a surprise. I’ve hired him to provide food sales at the arena. I also hired Arnie’s team to provide the emergency healing services.”
“Good,” Grandmother replied. “I’ll leave all the healing to them then. It will be a good training exercise. You should buy the cart from Todd and rent it out to another cook at the next event if he isn’t in the square to run it.”
“I will worry about the next event if I live through this one,” Harry responded.
“Ok,” Grandmother said. “Now tell me everything that has gone wrong so far and I will see if I can help out.”
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The butcher was out of meat. The selkie may prefer porcupine or hall spider, but they would eat any meat. They weren’t much for fruit and although they liked greens, they really hated grain, except when it was made into beer. The result was a meat shortage. No one, human or selkie, really liked the vendor food. No one was going to go hungry, but everyone was getting a little grumpy.
Grandmother thought about going out in the green and killing anything that moved, but that would take time and this was only the first thing on Harry’s list. Instead she went over to the butcher’s. She found the butcher alone in her shop with a very small display of cut meats.
“I have prize meat I’d like you to sell on consignment,” Grandmother offered.
“What is consignment?” the butcher asked.
“Instead of buying from me now, I get a part of the sale price,” Grandmother explained.
“That seems complicated to me. How much do you want?”
“If you sell it as-is, I want half. If you pull it from inventory and cut it up in steaks or chops or whatever, I want a quarter.” The butcher, Tina, Grandmother remembered, thought about that for a long time.
“Ok,” Tina said finally. “Desperate times call for desperate means. Most of my hunters have run off to watch the selkie practice in the yard, so I need something to sell. What have you got? Boar?”
“I’ve got some boar meat,” Grandmother agreed. The stuff tasted nasty so almost everyone had some in their inventory. “I also have rat, squirrel, hall spider, badger, cat, cougar, and bear meat.” Tina’s eyes got larger at each animal name. Grandmother’s inventory included more prize meat than that. Some of it came from the far north where there started being a different set of animals. She didn’t think anyone here would recognize those animal names.
“How much of each?” Tina asked.
“More than you can sell in four days,” Grandmother stated. The butcher smiled. Things were looking up. Grandmother transferred a tiny fraction of the meat in her inventory. She didn’t want to put the hunters out of business. She asked Tina to show her shop records for how much she sold in a single random day the week before and sold her six times that amount.
Grandmother warned Tina that she might not be in the square for the next challenge. Tina should consider keeping the leftover prize meat for it, since prize meat didn’t spoil. Tina looked at her empty displays and agreed that might be a good idea.
Grandmother headed off to the next thing on Harry’s list.