Ch: 223 As Flies To Wanton Boys, Are We To The Gods
After days of snooping, asking questions and generally being persona non grata in town, Hertz finally gave up and wandered down to the stone arched bridge. One way or another, someone was going to explain some things…
After minutes of standing at the foot of the bridge, where there had been a godsdamned hotspring inn standing the evening before, he sighed forlornly. Gone, tile roof, garden baths and all… now it was a green and fertile meadow, ringed with blackberry vines with no inn to be seen.
Down at the waterside, on a simple wooden pier, a huge red haired man sat, dangling a fishing pole over the water. He had a jug tied to a string, bobbing in the water, tethered to the pier and a sturdy kitchen chair with a jolly red pillow on the seat. All in all, he had a very comfy perch on a fine spring morning.
“Goodman, where is the house that was here last night, the house of Gary and Shai Ward…?” He asked from the bank above, standing on the steps down.
“No house here lad, tis a meadow and a clay dig… an a fine fishing hole.” He replied happily. “Mayhap t’was the other bridge…”
“Hmm, perhaps so…” Hertz mumbled and turned around… that was when he looked and saw the upper reaches of the river, beyond the uplands gate, curving up the valley bottom out of sight… There was only one bridge.
“Now look you here, goodman!” Hertz snapped when he turned back around.
The giant man was standing right there behind him as he turned… Hertz stubbornly remained in place, his nose brushing a button on the man’s coat. A distressingly large coat, that went up and up, terminating at a wide collar and a wide, unsmiling face...
“I be master smith Harlan, head priest of Craft in Wheatford, an head o the trade council… Journeyman Hertz.” He rumbled quietly, buzzing the smaller man’s nose with his voice and lapel.
“I care not why ye hae been asking after me daughter an her fool… she will pound ye intae the earth an ye bother her overmuch… But ye hae been asking fer me garandbairns… me wee ones be dearer than gold tae an old smith in his declining years…”
“Is this where you threaten to throw me in the river?” Hertz asked calmly.
“Nae, this be where I suggest ye simply stop sniffin’ after me grandbairns… lest ye actually find them on a day the moontouched boy be nae supervised.” The big man grumbled. “He’ll slay thee in front of all an be executed fer it wi a smile on his face… dinnae think elsewise.”
“I’ve met your mooncalf, he’s no threat beyond an odd trick or two; as I am no threat to those children… I just have a few questions.” The black clad warrior said quietly.
“An ye make me daughter cry, ye’ll be gettin yer answers in Secret’s realm, nae matter how things may end otherwise.” The huge smith rolled past like a freight wagon, not quite knocking him off the stairs, almost.
The giant had left his chair, cushion, pail, fishing pole and cloth covered picnic basket… as well as the jug down on the pier.
“Have some cider, dangle a line in the water, lad. Think on whae none will answer yer questions, nor let ye near those bairns.” He grumbled from the top of the stairs.
“Consider what wee Becky did say… Though her god an mine be at loggerheads, she hae clear eyes tae see.”
The giant vanished over the bridge, no doubt off to bang heavy objects together or something; leaving the young man alone with a pretty sweet morning’s diversion.
“Ahh shit… manipulative weirdos…” He grumbled, while viciously jabbing a barbed hook through a giant skeeter larva from the bait pail. It felt good to stab one of those miserable shits for a change.
The lunch basket shook him to his core… Fried chicken, watercress and wallowbear bacon sandwiches, cold rice pilaf with raisins and dates… the cider was delicious too.
Too late he remembered the eclair… and he spent the afternoon in his quarters, waiting for an explosion that never came. “Maybe it was that fried carp…” He muttered sourly.
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Long, low, with a single mast, a dark blue river boat made her way down the river Belen. She was spangled with stars in strange constellations of white and silver.
Aft, on the superstructure, near the tiller, a thin sickle of silver moon crested a few low hills sketched in shades of rich brown and green. It bore a skull face on the inside curve of the sharp pointed quarter moon.
Secret’s sigil was just spooky enough to be awesome, as far as Gary was concerned.
Her new figurehead was the image of a glorious white stag’s head carved and painted in marvelous detail. Caught in the wide, spreading antlers of the stag sat the moon, radiant in the morning sun; carved and painted from a sphere of pale golden mangrove wood, with exacting precision.
Moonrise slipped down stream through the fading mist, silent and smooth. Shai was at the tiller, carving a wide turn up a tributary river. As they sailed upstream, Tallum and Liam wound the mundane capstan, to slowly crank Gary’s ‘Straight Line, Tacks Real Fine™’ retractable keel system up into a shallow water configuration.
She would be less maneuverable, but they were slowly sailing up a narrow, fast flowing tributary, forward was the maneuver of the day.
“She dinnae move near so briskly as Seahorse, lad of mine… An this hae left us nearly ‘tapped out’ as ye say.” Shai murmured softly.
“Mass babe… Moonrise is heavy timbered and wide, sturdy, safe… She’ll never be fast.” He yawned enormously and leaned back on her knees. “If we ditched the rigging and stripped the superstructure above the waterline… she’d still be slow compared to Seahorse. Esperanza learned the same harsh lesson. She’s a big boat, takes a lot to get her moving. If you wanna move fast…” He shrugged helplessly.
Occasionally, they spotted sections of stone embankment and the remains of washed out locks, along with scattered ruins and other signs of human habitation in the past.
“This be in duke Belen’s territory, but It hae been long since men dwelt here…” She murmured softly, disturbed by the sight.
“I noticed when I landed here… so much empty space, so many abandoned farms and orchards.” Gary was back in his favorite seat, on Shais toe’s, with her free hand caressing his hair or shoulders idly, while she piloted the boat.
They gently let just a trickle of their Mana intermingle and swirl, percolating and refreshing each other, as she steered and he provided the go-go-go. The current was strong in the little river, but the channel was deep enough to navigate.
They pushed past the remains of a good sized stone walled village or town, now mostly overgrown and tumbled. What had been cleared fields were now thickets and canebrakes, with tangled, thorny bushes all around. The farther upriver they surged, the more signs of navigation infrastructure they found.
One lock was even intact, save that the gates were long rotted and washed away by the rushing water. The walls, curbing and pound were still in fine shape, though heavily clogged with reeds and silted up. The old lock was a narrow, deep, stonewalled tempest of fast moving water, as an entire river blasted through, mostly bypassing the old river channel.
In that wide, shallow pool they found their prey. Over beside the miraculously intact stonework, a massive cottagewillow stood. Leaning out at the water’s edge, looming over and dominating a small meadow, blotting out the sun.
They moored as close to the bank as they could, on a stone embankment wall and dropped a wide, reinforced gangway down for Annie to disembark.
In the meadow, Gary and Shai got together and conjured the house, right by the lock, with its rushing torrent blasting through the stone navigation aid.
They did an improvisational rendition of ‘Green River’ to summon their home, with some new additions that made even Liam wonder what was going on..
A tall fence walled off the garden from the river… It was pretty dangerous and there were kids in the house. In the lock, behind a fence and through the workshop, a massive waterwheel dipped into the raging current.
A signboard reading ‘Gary’s Funtime Sawmill In The Woods’ swung from the high shed roof over a shiny new bandsaw three feet wide.
“Oh, gods… we’re really lumbering?” Rolf asked from the deck of Moonrise.
“Yup! Gotta feed the hungry machine of industry!” Gary murmured and ducked off under the willow, while the others got settled. He emerged a minute later with a large white stick insect perched on his shoulder.
“Hey gang, this is Willow, she’s shy around crowds, so let’s say hi one at a time… One at a time kids…” His protests and instructions were useless. Gary came away looking battered, weary and confused, while Willow vanished with the kids, into the house.
“Whatever…” He sighed. “Tomorrow, we’re gonna take down this willow, rough cut it and head for Port Ellis within a day or three… Then we make for port Sunderland across the shallow sea to drop off Nicolai with Esperanza… unless he wants to jump to our crew…” Gary shot a wink and a weary grin at the young sailor, who smiled weakly in return.
“No chance… sorry, but you make me nervous… I don’t really know why?” Nicolai started wondering why he was telling the madman Esperanza had stuck him with, exactly what he shouldn’t be telling a volatile madman.
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The big musician smiled sadly and nodded. “I’m just a guy tryin’ to make it in the world bro… I make a lot of people uncomfortable. You do you man.” He drifted off to the perimeter of the meadow, vanishing into the bushes and undergrowth like a stray dog.
“Did I hurt his feelings or something?” Nicolai asked Dannyl, his closest friend in the weird group.
“Gary? Yeah… he doesn’t mind being weird and different, until somebody reminds him how weird and different he really is.” The ginger artist swatted his seagoing friend on the back.
“He’ll wander around in the woods, sulk and be moody for a while… Then he’ll come back with some slightly magical herb or chunk of unusual wood and be an excitable goofball again.”
The two young men watched and chatted, as Annie and Otho trotted off, following him at a discreet distance.
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He was back, refreshed and more lively after a wander in the outskirts of his territory, touching anything he fancied.
“Bioluminescent magical slime mold!” Gary enthused over his small pail of pale pink, glowing snot.
“I did see the slime mold lad… aye… why dae ye bring stray forest boogers intae me kitchen? Scat! Out wi thee!” Shai had an enormous wispy broom in hand, swatting at her grinning man; who cheerfully dodged, ducked and dove to avoid her flailing, floppy weapon.
She gave him a parting swat with her weapon of dustbunny destruction before he escaped, hastening him out the door.
“Fool man of mine…” She sighed fondly.
Nicolai was in the hammock on Moonrise, enjoying a quiet afternoon, listening to Dannyl and Liam practice their instruments in the garden. That was disrupted when the fool reappeared; fleeing the front door, pursued by his smiling giantess, waving a silly broom at his backside.
“Show Liam yer bucket of nasty ooze, nae me! Fool men and their woodland goop!” She scolded firmly, before sliding the door closed; with a poorly concealed smile on her lips.
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“Had one of these go monster… nasty business.” Khan muttered over the pail of shiny goop. “This is just regular tree snot.”
Luna and Liam both nodded somberly at the poor boy. Becky hugged him around the waist and sighed. “Sometimes a bucket of snot is just nasty.”
Forest Glowooze, slime mold, saprotroph, detritivore, arcanotroph, fungus. Inedible, mildly toxic, reagent, mildly magical. Bioluminescence, magisynthesis, photosynthesis.
He shrugged and tipped his bucket of goo over in an empty patch of damp wood chips and leaf litter under his grape arbor. “Good luck little ooze.”
Nickolai leaned over and whispered to Dannyl. “This is really how things go? Just… this?”
“Nahh, the easygoing and mellow moments are punctuated with absolute terror, bizarre or obscene magical rituals and unexplainable weirdness.”
The handsome ginger artist struck a pose suitable for a heroic portrait and declared boldly: “Adventuring! It’s a lifestyle, not a job!”
“Sometimes I worry that all of you are… that you’ve…” The sailor fumbled to a stop and blushed awkwardly.
“Crazy? Lost our minds?” Dannyl cooed at him, moving closer. “That would be terrifying, to think you were out in the woods all alone with a group of complete weirdos…”
“Dannyl, don’t tease him.” Rolf said firmly. “Becky will be very upset if he runs off into the wilds and gets eaten.”
“Yeah, you’re right, Liam…” The smaller man set his guitar aside for a moment and smiled in a very reassuring way. “Gary used to scare the piss out of me… until I started sparring with him and hanging out. He’s just what you see, at any given moment.”
Liam nodded sagely. “Interact with the man you see… and try to ignore the creepy shadow stuff and weird magic.”
“So… I’ll get used to it? The way he looks at me? It’s like there’s a half dozen people in there, looking out sometimes…” Nick moaned. “Curdles my blood.”
“Ohh, You have a perception gift from the spirit of Light… Don’t you?” Liam asked curiously.
“Yes… I can see through mist and fog… even when they are magical or created by a monster.” He smiled happily. “It was my first gift to become active… I can even see a hint of people’s auras if I concentrate!”
“Ohh!” Both young men murmured together.
“Light has a real problem with Gary… on a fundamental level, so you are going to perceive him in a very negative way…” Liam was stuck, trying to find a way to explain and coming up empty.
“Light hates your friend.” Nick mumbled. “I’m on a voyage with a man feuding with the spirit Light…”
“No, they just can’t get along, cause he’s the only cultist of Secret. Most of Healer’s blessings don’t work on him either… He’s troublesome.” Dannyl’s ruminations were cut off when Becky rang the big dinner bell.
“Early dinner, early to bed, we have lumber to jack tomorrow!”Becky sang out from the main house.
At dinner, Nick sat with Rolf and Dannyl, at a table nearby, doing his best to avoid watching the mad little family and keeping his distance. With a deliberate and careful effort he slowly cut off his gift of perception, reverting to purely normal sight for the first time since he’d first awakened his power.
Gradually all the colors dimmed, the shadows became a little deeper and the faint flickering of prismatic colors dancing around his new friends faded away.
Rolf no longer flickered all over with a clear, bright silver flame, no more red sparks went dancing through his aura and shadow. Dannyl’s colorful flock of illusory birds and insects faded from view, the tiny, abstract visions becoming transparent, then vanishing.
With a slow and careful turn of his head, Nick looked over at the man, two women and three kids at the other table and sighed. “No, he’s still creepy… I can see his shadow doing… stuff even with my gift inactive…” He whispered to his tablemates.
“Ignore the shadow thing… we all have to. How about the rest? Still seeing colors?” Dannyl asked eagerly.
“No… the nauseating rainbow is gone… Wait, do you guys all see the shadows too?” Nick asked with a startled look on his face.
“Everyone can… his shadow really does that stuff. Most people won’t notice it, they just come away unnerved and spooked.” Dannyl whispered. “Luna’s perception power makes her sick if she looks at him through it, like fully barfing on the floor.”
Dannyl swatted him on the shoulder and smiled. “Practice not really looking at him, it’s easier that way.”
“Fascinating…” Rolf mumbled, as he scribbled in his notebook. “I get a profound sense of unease from him… it comes in waves, at random times.” The knight murmured. “I assume that is his chaotic nature, interfering in some way with my own gifts.”
“Nope, it’s your own soul, struggling, reaching for what it should have received.” Gary whispered softly, his lips nearly brushing Rolf’s ear.” The stocky blonde youth jumped in startlement, rattling the cutlery and plates on the sturdy pub table. “Joy and Knowledge are very cross with Order, and you are feeling their divine conflict.”
When his heart rate climbed back down, Rolf hissed in Gary’s own ear, since his face was still rudely and weirdly close to Rolf’s. “Gary, you are a creepy, sneaky and upsetting creature. Please stop being spooky.”
“It only feels that way because of the conflict inside you.” The musician pulled a chair out of his own ass and sat down at their table. “Order and War are fine, not my cup of tea but sure, you do you… but those decisions, who to Contract and where, they have repercussions.”
“I don’t think you know me well enough to second guess my Contracts, Gary.” Rolf replied icily, as the table went silent.
Nick shifted back awkwardly, while Dannyl grinned and leaned in closer, enjoying the show.
“Not me Rolf, it’s all inside you… Knowledge and Joy both think you handed parts that should have belonged to them, over to their brothers. Since I am currently…” He paused and looked at the young nobleman helplessly. “You know… I’m ‘hosting’ a number of deities, it’s pretty crowded inside me.”
“So you claim that you are not annoying, obnoxious and sneaky… that it’s me?” Rolf asked dryly
“Nope, I’m all of those things… and subversive, antiauthoritarian, silly and just a bit crazy. That’s my natural state…” He grinned and bounced up and down on his seat for a moment. “So why does your soul respond when I’m near, why does it get all itchy, twitchy and grabby?”
Rolf paled a little as the fool kept chattering. “Are you saying it’s my fault?” He demanded. “Or are you blaming it on the gods themselves?”
“Neither, buddy… The basic problem is simple; entities you are far more compatible with, are inside me looking out at you and seeing Order and War bound up where they don’t belong... That’s why so many Order and War cultists lose their chill around me.” He sighed deeply.
“You have three Contracts with Order… I can feel them… well, two of them. They don’t fit, your Contract with War is in the wrong place, right god, wrong Contract.”
“Gary… You are treading on very personal…” Rolf began, while the fool was rummaging in his backside again. He produced a colorful board with six evenly placed, square depressions carved in it and dumped a bag of wooden pieces onto the table with a wide, silly grin. Each one was a small idol to one of the gods or spirits carved in their icon; balanced scales for Order, Joy’s masks, Beast’s antlered moon and Secret’s skull sickle, Light’s simple sun disk and Healer’s radiant beaming sun, an even dozen pieces. Gary began playing with them idly; dropping their square pedestal bases onto the slots in the board, then removing them, to replace with another.
“This is how you guys treat the Contract system and your souls…” He murmured. “A child is a series of open slots, to insert Contracts in, Order and War aren’t picky, so anyone who can convince a priest to do the ritual for their kid can get off to an early start…” He said mildly.
“War will take anyone, but Order prefers a more… rarefied worshiper, nobles and such. Joy, Healer and of course, Secret won’t just Contract anyone, they demand compatibility… so they have way fewer worshipers and cultists. Beast does his own thing, but most people reject him… especially the nobles. That stinks, cause Beast’s awesome, mostly. As for the spirits, most of you guys ignore them entirely.”
He flipped his silly, six colored board over, revealing that the other side had the same six colors, but no holes, slots or depressions. “This is how it really works.” He upended another bag, this one held dozens of figurines, each one a tiny idol as well.
“We’ve got Knowledge, Eponna, Thirp, Cernunnos, Brigid, Morrigan, That Buff Llama, Ipet, Ganesh, Xolo, a ton of others all hanging out, as well as the elemental spirits, all waiting for a Contract…”
He smiled at Rolf in a very disconcerting way. “You can Contract your soul to any of these entities, if they agree and you use a Contract ritual… but that comes with a price, some nasty fine print.” He grinned madly at his confused audience as he set the game pieces upright and organized them.
“You ever wonder why some people develop potently magical and obvious gifts, like familiars or dimensional storage?” He held up a finger to forestall Liam. “Cultivation is important… but the basic gift is what I’m talking about. Khan and Ivy didn’t cultivate their awesome familiars, they just appeared.”
He grinned at Shai, still over at their table with the kids and Becky. “Just like Shai’s dance gift, that became active and magical before she had a contract, it was just subtle and conditional.”
“That was your weird magical influence…” Rolf grumbled, toying with a few of the little pieces.
“Nope, ask Otho… Priest Otho. The dog is busy right now.” Otho’s nose was buried in his own backside, having a good groom at the moment. “She’s been exhibiting her active gift at every party and festival since she was fourteen, but nobody else noticed… cause Shai and her gift vibe.”
“Gods, here he goes again with the ‘vibe’ talk.” Rolf complained.
“That’s cause it all comes down to vibe… If a Contract seats the wrong entity in the wrong place, it creates conflict and stress on the body, mind and soul… Most people can learn to adjust to a little dissonance and be ok with it, but others…” He shot a glance at Liam and smiled.
“Others struggle when the entity is incompatible. Especially if the entity is incompatible with the person and the god or spirit that should have been seated there. That can mess everything up.”
He took the balanced scales of Order and War’s crossed sword and shield, placing them on the board. With a wave of his hand, another Order sigil appeared, landing beside the first. “Not all gods and spiritual beings are compatible with each other, most famously, Healer and War. My buddy Liam is a good example of how your Contract rituals can fuck everything up.”
“Blasphemy…” Rolf mumbled crossly. “Absolute hogwash.”
“Is it though? You belong with Order and War, I can feel that clearly… but you are buzzing and rattling against your own soul in a few places… War should be attached to your Might, not your Will… Order belongs on your Will and Resilience, not Mind and Animus…” Gary was up, circling the young knight and grinning.
“Other beings are knocking on the doors of your soul… you just refuse to let them in.” He leaned close and whispered in his ear. “Eponna is very eager to have a chat with you, so is Ducky.”
The golden skin of Rolf’s handsome face went pale yellow as the madman drifted away, leaving his myriad pieces and game board behind.
“You have way more options than you expect, those choices have been hidden from you, from all of you for far too long.” He waved cherrily at the table and drifted back to his kids.
“He’s completely mad… barking…” Nick mumbled, toying with a hippo headed goddess’s idol.
“That’s Ipet… she’s our friend!” Amy sang happily, clambering onto the seat Gary had just abandoned.
“You know of this strange new god?” Rolf asked gently.
“She’s not new.. She’s old! So old… even older than Wilf!” Amy chirped, helping her little brother up onto the seat with her, the chunky lad nodded firmly and gave a shy smile.
“Wilf thinks that you should listen to Gary… you can sort yours out pretty easy… ‘cept War… He’s mean and stubborn.” She frowned at the look of confused disbelief in Rolf’s eyes.
“I’m being lectured on spiritual matters by children and madmen…” He muttered crossly.
“Rolf, Gary is mad, that’s fair… he’s also an expert in this shit.” Dannyl hugged the two little ones up onto his lap and grinned at Rolf over their heads, while Rio clambered up.
“The kids… I dunno, if Wilf told me the sky was red today, I would be startled if it wasn’t.”
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