Ch: 12 Ginger Dreadnought
Gary and Shai returned home in the late afternoon, discovering that Ivy and Tallum were still banging their emotions out against each other.
In the bathing pool.
Gary and Shai abandoned their home in the late afternoon, because when your house is also a part of you, having friends and family over is a very intimate affair. Perhaps too intimate.
Even in the market square, dancing to merry tunes they were having a very weird day.
“I’m like ten minutes away from dissolving the house and tumbling those two degenerates into the dirt.” Gary complained. “That's our bed! And I can't stop knowing what’s happening! All those questions about size and compatibility are getting answered, Shai!”
“I do be knowing this, fool! An ye vanish that house, ye shall be sleeping alone in it fer a good long while!” She snarled. “Drop me brother an me sister to the earth durin’ an act o shared love…” She paused, considering the ramifications of her tangled relationships. “Never mind that ye filthy beast. Ye do know what I mean!”
“It was simple in the camp. I just disconnected myself from their tent, like I do the bath…” He sighed. “I liked that tea table; now I have to get a new one. They’re all over the place!”
“How do we go telling them of this boy? How shall we tell, that they may nae die o shame?” Shai asked, looking stricken. “Can it be done? Sweet spirits! Nae in the kitchen! That do be a food preparation surface!”
“When I was a boy I would always chuckle when they sent me to the racks to ‘get wood’ now my racks are tainted. Heh… taint…”
Shai struck him softly. “What o ‘rack’? Ye do often snicker at me chest that wise, do not ye fancy ‘racks’ nae more?”
“You make a fine pair of arguments there…” He gave up halfway to a boob joke. “I can't, not with that still going on.”
“Aye, ye do still have a room at the orphanage yes?” She asked.
“Noooo! Alone, in a room with you, while that’s going on? Nope.” He firmly affirmed, most firmly. “That’s not something I want in my head, I have a better Idea!” He pulled her into a second hand shop he knew and began distracting her.
When they left the shop both were dressed in second hand clothes, finery suitable for honest crafters on a date, he led her uptown. “Show me the uplands district Shai!” He twirled her ever present, chiming hips. “Let’s see how the upper crust has fun.”
The uplands district did not, in fact, have fun. There were strict rules about that sort of thing.
Just past the temples of Order and War, through a gate, the streets widened. Fruit and nut trees shaded long parkways and avenues.
Homes of understated elegance stood behind carefully maintained front gardens. People strolled with the casual air of the self absorbed, or bustled quickly and quietly on business.
Shops were few and barely noticeable, a bakery and a jeweler, parfumerie and art galleries were the choices up town. It was only outside the uplands gate that things became interesting.
Gary had heard the uplands gate market was more exciting than the market ward, it was more like a festival. Here were food and game booths, vendors of every description, even some traveling performers. A juggler and a card reading fortune teller.
“Ye still dinnae answer me, how kin we tell them what we did experience, an nay kill them wi shame?” Shai asked, while eyeing the card reader’s tent.
“Easy, we take this horrible secret to our graves.” Gary replied. “I would rather have that conversation in the next life.”
“An we be silent… it shall surely happen again, aye, tis a terrible secret ye would have me bear.” Her smile was cold and cruel. “Ye did push them together, ye do own the home fully, an they know not of my role…” He could see her slipping out of the problem like a sneaky sneak.
“Moreover, tis your craft that put them tae frolicking this very day. Wherein does mine responsibility lie?”
She spun into his arms and smiled, “Ye must entertain me this evening wi yer charms an wit.” She kissed him softly. “Then we shall speak to our friends and kin o things most awkward.”
They perused the stalls and found mostly gambling and games of chance. Neither were much for risking coin on the dice or cards. The card reader looked interesting but just as they decided to head into her tent, the pair sensed a change in the energy at home. “Guilt and embarrassment?” Gary asked.
“Aye, wi a touch of self satisfied ego. The shameless oaf.” She said.
On the walk back, they sensed the furniture being righted and scattered items tidied. They were waiting outside when the disheveled pair tried to slink away.
“Tallum! Ivy!” Gary lilted their names joyfully. “Come inside for tea!” He draped an overly familiar arm over each, which took some effort with the height differences. “Did I ever tell you about that lacquer tea table, It's an antique…”
As the tea cooled on the table of shame, an ashen pair listened to a furiously blushing pair explain. “…so the home is like an extension of our souls, and we are intimately connected to it, very intimately.”
“Aye, that be your tea table now. An ye shall clean me kitchen counters!” Gary placed a restraining hand on hers.
“This is coming from a very sex positive place, a place of love, but yes, you’re cleaning my workbench too, and the router table. You’re a craftsman for Pete’s sake, at least respect the tools.”
A shamefaced Tallum was busy trying to imagine a world where he was not having this conversation, when Ivy called them out. “Wait, you’re scolding us for having sex in your house, because it’s an extension of your soul…?” She demanded hotly. “Tallum dropped a huge shit in your soul first thing this morning and you didn’t mind.”
Tallum threw a betrayed look at Ivy. “You did too! It was that river carp we ate last night, I knew it tasted funny.” He thought for a moment. “Ohh, Yeah! What’s the big deal, Gary?”
“First, thanks for pointing that out Ivy, I hate it. Next, you don't shit all over my soul. It's a toilet, that's how my garden grows.” He pointed to the restroom. “That's not a high energy romp throughout the entire house.”
He calmed himself by visualizing a deep, still pond, and these two drowning in it.
“I love you guys, we love you guys. Don't make us part of a weird thing, now get lost. We are gonna unsummon this whole place and start fresh on the other side of the courtyard.”
#
In the morning Mikkel came by, dropping off their apprentice badges and the take from their evaluation week. After Mikkel’s cut as group leader, it came to two bronze marks and four copper marks.
Split seven ways, with the extra share going to Tawny as the healer… It was pretty good, not let's go shopping money, more like let's pay some bills money.
Gary pulled out his coin pouch to make change for the larger coins and the whole room just stopped.
“You carry that much?” Liam asked.
“Uhhh…” He replied with grace and good form.
“I do be handling my boy’s finances, I have the making of this change.” Shai said crisply, plucking the pouch from his hand and dispatching the coins. She doled them out and then dragged Gary by the ear down into the workshop.
She emptied the wash leather pouch onto the workbench with a clatter. A few dozen iron and copper bits, a few bronze halves and a copper mark tumbled out with two more bronze marks.
Together with what Mikkel brought, it was a bit of coin. All added up, it was probably a quarter of a gold moon and Gary said as much.
“A quarter of a gold moon ye say, tis all. Aye and me papa’s shop and home be worth a gold moon in all!” She fumed “Fer five golden moons, ye could buy a forge in the main market o the capital ye great fool.”
She took all but the copper and iron bits, handing them back in the now much deflated pouch. Stuffing a plump purse into her own clothes, she complained. “I shall feel a marked woman, ere I get this hoard into the bank.”
“I’ll walk you there, I need to do some banking myself.” He said, thinking of the sack of coins in his Pockets! “Where is it in town?”
Shai grinned. “It be in Port Fallon, an four day’s boat ride down river.”
“Ohh, well… give it back, I’ll drop it in with the rest” He said, wanting to get this over with.
“The rest o what? Oh very great fool?” She asked so very sweetly.
“The rest of the giant bag of money that you are going to give me a bunch of crap over, even though there is no bank in this town?” He asked, pulling out the giant bag.
“I get the feeling Z was stupid about money.” He dropped it on the workbench with a dull thud. “I don't care about money. I guess that makes me stupid about money too!” He pushed the bag to her. “I have everything I need right here. Now that I know what death’s head locust and groundworm taste like, I don't need money.”
She laughed and shoved it back at him. “Am I a pack mule tae carry yer great wads o coin? Break yer own back wi that if ye must.”
He fished out the charm bracelet and wrapped it around her wrist. “No fair, if I get stuck with the bag, you carry this.”
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“In truth I would rather ye were the impoverished foundling I were told tae expect.” She said, hugging him close. “He be an ‘orphan and bound fer War’, me kin did say when I did tell them I thought well o ye.” She squeezed him tighter.
“They do forget that I too, were bound fer War and an orphan under the eyes o the gods and law.”
He stowed the money away and pulled her upstairs with a lingering kiss. “Come woman, we are independently wealthy. Let us show the common folk how it's done.” He droned in a fair imitation of the breathy upper crust accent in town.
“I’ll nae be letting ye ferget ye ar frae the crafts ward boy!” She hooted in an exaggerated downmarket brogue.
When they got back upstairs, the group had largely dispersed on their own payday errands. Tawny remained, insisting on apologizing for her part in what Gary kept calling ‘eargate’ for some bizarre reason.
“I am fully aware that I may not be fully aware…” He paused for a disturbingly long time. “...and in control of all my faculties. So lets be up front, you, Shai and Liam are my teammates and friends. That's all I have to say.”
He stood up. “I have a delivery to make and a tea table to shop for, please join us if you wish Tawny, though I think I saw Liam headed for the market.”
Shai and Tawny both flew off to the market ward, to make that place more beautiful, while Gary had to donkey this dumb violin over to the stupid temple of… Nahh, Joy seemed pretty cool, but without Shai nearby he felt less grounded and whole. That was a weakness that needed work.
At the temple to Joy, acolyte Dering was pitiless in her examination of his repairs. “Your master does excellent work.” she said, keeping to the formal routine. “Convey my thanks, apprentice.” As she handed him his violin and bow.
“My master will be gratified.” He said completing the ritual.
“It is even almost in tune!” She said with delight, as the strings sang under her bow. “I shall instruct your master to beat you only lightly, for your impudence.”
Gary knew a challenge to an old fashioned fiddle off, when he heard one. He took his Ironwood instrument and gave it an aggressive chord. “Shall we settle this at sundown then?” He asked.
“Here in the court of Joy under the gaze of the setting sun we shall see.” She said, whirling and stalking away.
By mid morning, the rumor mill had Gary in a duel to the death, with a handsome justiciar of Order, to defend the honor of an acolyte of Joy from his sinful depredations.
Shai and Tawny took glee in relating the most absurd and scandalous variants in detail. They had caught the scent of rumor and followed it right to his door of course. He was a notable local weirdo now, like Shai and all his friends. Even Mikkel and Otho, pillars of the community, were weirdos at heart.
After lunch Gary stood up and went into his workshop saying. “I have a musical duel this evening, against a skilled opponent, I need to prepare.”
Shai called out. “Wait ye fool! That part were true?”
“Of course, her crew, against my crew. Battle of the bands, old school rules. Get ready, tonight's our first show.” He slid the door closed saying, “Band meeting at third bell. Be there.”
Promptly at the first ring of third, the door opened and Gary dragged his Harmonium out on a two wheeled cart with a harness out front. “OhthO!” He yodeled and the mutt came scurrying up to dive into the harness.
“Good boy!” Gary praised as he presented the cart; it was painted a pleasant light blue with green and dark blue waves at the bottom and big colorful stylized flowers scattered around on the paint job. A block of fanciful text on the side said “Mystery Machine” for some reason.
“You like it? Yeah you do!” He decided for them. “I spent a couple days with the cartwrights shop… Three bells til the battle of the bands and we haven't decided on a name. Which is it?”
“Is this one of his fits? Or the usual crazy?” Ivy asked.
“Gary do be a deeply troubled and wounded creature. He do have difficulty wi the real world betimes. We shall humour him an it does no harm.” Shai said firmly.
“Ginger Dreadnaught it is!” He smiled up at his huge friend.
“Tallum, I heard you playing while I was working, sounds good. Follow Ivy and stay on the One. Liam, rhythm Uke, you know how this is going to happen. Shai, tambourine and lucious hips… I can always count on you.” He looked to Tawny. “Where do you want to be?”
She pulled a tambourine from his shop wall and grinned. “Shai will show me how it's done.”
Their little troupe made its noisy way to the temple district, to the court of Joy. Gary directed the unpacking and set up, as the cart became a simple riser for Ivy’s drum kit, with just a little work.
The harmonium, set off behind the drums, hummed softly as Gary put on the silver cuff. It drew a good bit of mana every second, but less than his base regeneration so he could theoretically run this thing forever.
He had tuned everyone up at the shop, it always always pays to tune everybody together. His troops were as ready as they could be.
He was in his icecream white aquatic fantasy. Liam and Tallum were in their feast day best. Shai was in the delicious confection Jennah had created for her… still a solid hit. Ivy, for whatever reason, was wearing an antlered wolf mask and huntsman's leathers behind her drums.
Tawny was also masked and wearing a simple robe over her Healer’s vestments, an obvious fig leaf to indicate Healer’s temple had no part in this battle.
For Joy’s part, they were in their green robes, sleeveless and immaculate. They lounged around on the temple steps. One was squatting down, grilling fish on a portable brazier. He was big, not Tallum big, but a big dude, with a big drum and wide, dramatic sneer on his face as they approached.
A tall thin man with a flute leaned on a pillar looking smug, his thin mustache wiggling in excitement. Slim and blonde, Daniel looked uncomfortable squaring off against Tawny, and musically, he never knew what that weird Gary guy would do. The rest? No challenge there. His harp was ready.
A twinned pair stood nearby, a sister and a brother, both on the small and short side, dark haired and intense. He had a guitar of direct lute lineage, she wielded the family’s heirloom violin, freshly repaired by skilled hands and ready for battle.
Tall and spare, Otho sneered at the young upstarts, holding his shamisen aloft he called out. “Lady Joy hears your call to battle, let none say that Joy’s temple did not ride out against her foes in glorious song! Yea! Lift your voices in praise of her!” He strummed his instrument and it filled the court of Joy like a tidal wave.
His crew joined in, dramatically hitting their marks. They were super tight landing in classic B-boy poses, before kicking off their show. The choreography was a dirty trick!
Gary had his own dirty tricks, but Otho wasn't done yet, he had a power of enticement and suggestion like his own.
Gary felt it sneaking, around tugging at hearts and moving emotions. Otho’s power was subtle and persuasive, it tuned the emotions of its target to the frequency of the mage.
They did a classic bountiful blessings, old school hymn that any tent revival back home would have declared a miracle and commenced baptizing everything in sight for the next month. When they wrapped up, Otho cued the band and Ginger Dreadnaught lit into a simple called dance.
Liam was rather skilled at the square dance style call and response, it was popular with the kids at the orphanage and featured at most festivals.
“UP… Double and back… Round turn and double and back!” Gary let his gift start percolating, Shai felt it, and sent hers out, as she swept into the crowd, leaving Tawny on tambourine.
Ivy got a little more complex on the drums and Tallum got a bass groove thumping in. That was the trick. The drum and bass were his barbed hook. Now to reel them in.
“And slide right… forward… slide left.. Backandsliderightforwardandsliderightadturn”
Generations of called dances, Shai’s mysterious dance gift and Gary’s Entrainment gift dragged the whole town, including their opponents… into a good old fashioned soul train dance line.
‘Upside Down’ by the legendary Diana Ross was the only choice of course.
Liam had learned the lyrics quickly and with Tawny on backing vocals he could not have better support. It wasn’t perfect, Tawny had to feed him a line or two, but he had fun. His uke barely faltered the whole time!
Afterward, Tallum looked like he just won first prize in a grin like an idiot contest and the prize was a lifelike mask of himself grinning like an idiot. “I like bass.”
“Hey Ivy, This big guy likes bass, you should hook up!” Gary shouted up to his masked drummer. He got a drumstick to the stomach for his jokes.
As they packed up, Gary called out; “We didn’t win this time, temple of Joy, but we will be back!”
They strode off into the night, to the good natured hoots and jeers of the crowd. Shai balanced atop the moving cart shaking her fist, swearing righteous vengeance on Joy. A good time was had by all.
“She can really play that fiddle… Gary mumbled in bed that night. “I wonder if I chose the right girl…” Shai tickled him for that one, until he begged for mercy.
He dreamed the hospital dream again, but this time Shai was there, watching with him. Her presence making it much more remote and tolerable.
Not that it mattered… once it started, he was in it until the end. She watched in furious silence, understanding little but unable to speak.
Watching a slideshow of your own descent into crippled poverty and homelessness is not a great time for anyone; watching it with the girl you like is probably not optimal. But at least it wasn’t subtitled.
The bit at the end where he slipped out of medium security juvie by hiding in a laundry bag was kinda cool. She didn’t have to smell it.
When the dream ended he woke, as always and so did Shai. “Be that how the injured and orphans be treated in yer home?” She asked, appalled and furious.
“That was my experience, I don't get to edit it.” He deadpanned.
“What be this Insurance god they do worship, this Hmo of the blue shield?” She demanded. “Ye did say there be no gods in yer world.”
“You understood that?” He asked, stunned.
“Nae, tis a frightful accent yer people have, nae pleasant like yours.”
“Well… HMO is not a god, it's like a healer's guild, you pay them a bunch of money when you are healthy, so they will take care of you when you are sick.”
He stopped and scratched his head. “That doesn’t make any sense…” He shrugged, “That's how it works I guess.”
“Yer home is mad, an Tawny sees this, she shall mother thee onto death.” Shai shuddered. “I’d nae be born in yer home.”
He pulled her close for a soft kiss. “This is home.”
#
Since Shai moved in, they had run and exercised together, sparred together, eaten together and generally been inseparable. Today, Shai was to go before the smith’s guild to formally receive her brown apron. As a true outsider, Gary was not allowed in and had to wait at a cafe nearby, with other nervous family and friends. A few others were being awarded at this meeting as well.
When Shai came out fuming, an hour later, she flopped down beside him and growled. “He did delay the sacred observances. He did delay tae tell me… tae tell me, tae tell ye, tae come see the Craft priest.” She looked furious and outraged.
“He did?” Gary asked. “Is that normal?”
“Nae.” She snarled. “Tis nae normal, tis a disrespect tae me, tae me craft, tae me master and tae me lost clan.”
“What’s your answer?” He asked softly. “I’ll back your play.”
She hugged him across the tiny cafe table. “Dinnae go in. I hae given the message as I must; make Theo come tae thee. I do have my apron and there he has no say.”
“Ohh yeah, done baby, that’s what’s going on. How hard should I make it?”
“Damnably hard boy, do make it a terrible trial as I know ye can.” he grinned.
He looked her in the eye, cold as winter in San Francisco bay. “How hard do you want me to go? Do you want tears? Do you want blood?”
“Nae… Tears would do, save they be only his. It do no rise to the letting of blood, though I do like the energy, boy.” She winked.
“On a completely unrelated note, what is your money situation Shai?” Gary asked, standing up and walking over to the craft temple’s offering well across the street. He dropped a pair of coins, one bronze and another copper into the well with a short blessing from his homeland. “Eat shit mother fucker.” Prayed aloud in english.
Shai giggled. “That were petty and small Gary… and ye did drop tae much coin tae the greedy Theo.”
“The copper was for my guilty conscience, the bronze was for Theo. That will be in his personal stash by nightfall. But how is your coin Shai? I have a couple jobs lined up and need a second.”
“Aye, I could do wi some coin; save that my man be rich beyond counting.” She kicked him in the ankle. “Dae ye care oh great foolish one?”
“I have two jobs lined up, you get the money, I try out my prototypes. Deal? It's nothing we haven’t done before. Straight adventure board jobs.” He smiled eagerly.
“What be the jobs, what's the beastie?” She glared suspiciously.
“Trapdoors, two medium sized critters, not far apart, half a day out, we do the job we come back the next day. Easy money. I have a new prototype ring and original recipe as backup.”
“I do hate trapdoors, ye take lead on both and deal.” Shai announced, holding out a hand. He shook, and she tugged him in for a kiss.
He whispered. “This job has a bonus reward. You are going to love it.” Gary got up and went into the cafe. He spoke to the owner and exchanged a few coins. When he came out he told Shai: “I booked the patio here at the cafe two nights from now. Save the date.”
The new ring was perfect, it had a larger radius and it stored the funk in an extra-dimensional space inside a non local bronze disk. It had vast capacity for storage and could be discharged at a safe distance all at once, or slowly, making for a truly versatile tool. The goal was to untether the ring from its physical storage device.
Gary’s work bore fruit, as his ring was performing well beyond his hopes. The dreadful spiders never stood a chance. They ended as quickly and cleanly as possible and were done with, before sundown on the first day.
In bed that night Shai was pensive. “Dae ye worry that I dinae have coin aplenty? I be no pauper, boy.”
“No, no I don’t want you to waste time worrying about money. I came into that by pure good fortune and had no idea of its worth.” He shrugged. “I’ll drop it down a well, if you want.”
“Ye would follow soon after... Perhaps later a rope.” Her smile was warm at least.
After a few minutes of quiet snuggling, Gary made a skylight in the ceiling for some stargazing. At long last, they had a cold, clear, late autumn night sky. “Look Shai, see? Two moons, the big one and the little gray one.”
“It be a reflection in the glass o the skylight.” She said firmly.
“A reflection, strong theory… but there is no glass there and I have reflection problems. Come on, let's go to the garden.” There they were, two moons.
Shai was not pleased, she went into the garden, left the house and went a quarter mile uphill, came back and grumbled. “Two moons indeed… I be going mad.”
She sat back against him, reclining against an apple tree in the garden. “I did have a well ordered life, t’was to be a journeyman, an I did make a couple Contracts. I would see the world an truly journey fer me craft.” She made a blanket appear over them with a thought. “Now ye have turnt me plans on their heads.”
“Travel, adventure, luxurious accommodations and a sexy companion… What more could you ask for?” He cooed in her ear.
“Aye, tis good Liam shall be along. He be devilish handsome, though were I of different proclivities, Tawny be a sight to see.” She settled back imperiously. “Be silent and keep me warm, mayhap Otho the dog should be more comfortable.” She complained, while getting cozy.
While Shai snoozed in his arms, Gary took stock of his radically altered lifestyle. Right up until She danced into his life, he could have and would have cut ties and vanished into the wilderness.
Shai had moved right in and become part of him without even leaving a ripple. She had filled up his house and made it a home just by walking through the door, there was not enough gratitude in the world for that alone.
He drifted off with her hair tickling his nose ever so slightly.
#