Ch: 3 Sweet dreams
As he sat down, a pair of comfy bunny slippers appeared in the cubby beside the bench. “Sweet!” He slipped them on and stepped into the house of his dreams.
A modern kitchen of gleaming steel made up the right corner of the main room, a table and four chairs stood nearby.The far corner held a comfy looking reading chair and a large bookshelf containing the few books and the manuscript he had last put into his storage leg.
“Huh, it unpacks for me too?” Apparently so, as the spear was once more a spear and was on a rack over a glowing fireplace surrounded by plush couches.
Over in the kitchen, he started searching the cupboards and pantry: nothing was in there at all. Thinking back, he remembered being able to create temporary items, according to his gift’s description. Glancing back, he saw a full set of cookware and dishes suddenly resting in their places, all very neat.
With a grin he opened the fridge and pulled out a massive corned beef reuben, oddly it was steaming hot from the fridge. “Magic is awesome!” He grunted enthusiastically.
It was perfect, thin sliced, just fatty and juicy enough to make a huge mess… but tasted hollow and flat, as though the sandwich had been washed of all flavor and joy.
Deeply unsatisfied by his magical sandwich, he finished it anyway and continued on to a sliding door to the left.
It was a largely empty room, with sliding panels on one wall that opened onto a pleasant garden. The only furniture in the room was an empty guitar stand in the far corner, it seemed almost woefully empty. “My house is telling me things… And I'm still talking to myself.”
Back in the main room were two doors, one led to a hallway, holding three small bedrooms furnished with simple comfort in mind and lit by colorful paper lanterns.
The final door led to a good sized tiled bathing room, with a stone basin for doing laundry and a curtain draped doorway leading to an outdoor hot spring bath.
The steaming pool was surrounded by smooth stone pavers and accessed by a set of naturalistic stone steps. Lush and vibrant hedges of bamboo and flowering ginger, interspersed with honeysuckle and jasmine vines provided aroma and a sense of privacy that was almost palpable. All in all, it was the most tranquil place he’d found since that musical cavern.
He returned to the foyer and slipped back into his sandals; after he tucked the bunnies in their cubby, he opened the last door.
A short stone staircase led down into the foundation. More paper lanterns sprang to life as he entered a large space scattered with familiar tools. “Now we are talking.” He whispered.
Most of the space was open, with one wall dominated by a wide workbench and a suite of woodworkers tools. From mallets and chisels to a full sized and modern power sanding station.
“What, no CNC machine?” He called into the workshop. Immediately a message sprang up.
Advanced/Semi Autonomous or Fully Autonomous toolsets and devices will require additional development and resources.
Reminder, created items are temporary and rapidly disperse outside dwelling.
“That’s not a no on the CNC machine, is it? No reply came from his mysterious Interface.
Frustrated, but also ecstatic over his wild ability, he mulled over what the house was telling him. Four chairs at the table. Three empty bedrooms, the empty guitar rack. “OK, I get it, I’m starting for town tomorrow.”
Like the spear, he could feel the house inside himself, though he was inside it. A bone deep loneliness filled it to the rafters, carrying the knowledge that his time of isolation had gone on way too long. Mr Halls had been his only real human connection for most of the last year and he had only known him for eight months or so.
With that in mind he conjured a pair of cargo shorts and a t-shirt into a nearby cubby with a thought and got dressed in the foyer.
Determined to get started living, outside he felt a sudden exhilaration. He felt so light and free… and naked.
His newly conjured clothes evaporated into a puff of blueish smoke that smelled like strawberry jam and toast. “Temporary items, gotcha…”
He moaned as his stomach was suddenly gripped in an iron fist. He doubled over and unleashed a vast belch that thundered through the meadow, followed by a monumental fart that did NOT smell like strawberry jam and toast.
He slowly gathered his crudely washed clothing from the shrubs he had draped them over to dry and dressed again feeling wretched and ill. Still damp, he returned to his plan of gathering wild foods to extend his supplies. His positive attitude began to revive as his internals got themselves sorted back out.
With mild surprise, he felt somehow that his items had returned to him when he left the house. That feeling came with the knowledge that he could leave things in the house, dissolve it and re-build it while bringing the items intact.
It was beyond strange to suddenly have these… things, inside himself, yet it felt like a part of him. Just like his new pal Leggy, the not crippled left leg.
With a nice haul of tubers and roots from the waters edge, some familiar, some new and a few mushrooms his power assured him were safe; he headed for the cabin while his house dissolved behind him. Along the way he also gathered a generous quantity of ripe blackberries, now safely tucked away in his storage.
He had a good bit of experience with gathering berries, blackberries in particular. As he shoveled the fruit into his Pockets!, it occurred to him that he had not been pricked by thorns, stained by smashed berries, walked face first into a spider web or any of the other perils that berry pickers face.
He also felt like his haul was really good. He paused to mentally eyeball his internal storage in a way that felt really natural. Which was weird and totaled up the day's take.
It was a lot; cattail, bullrush roots, duckroot and lotus represented Team Tuber.
United Herbs had a deep roster as well, plantain and watercress made up the majority, with wild garlic shoots and a few pot herbs like rosemary and bay laurel leaves filling it out.
The League of Unaligned Fruits and Fruit Related… OK, naming things was getting weird. He had a lot of fruits and berries.
He had another category, A small cannabis plant he’d dug up entirely and stashed away, wondering if he could plant it in his portable backyard. “It’s for science…” He rationalized aloud on the way to the cabin with an idiotic grin on his face.
Back at the cabin he started gathering things together, first all the books and notes in the front room, then everything he could stuff into his storage. Even the firewood and two waterskins he found hanging by the door, which he quickly filled at the spring.
All he left out was the largest stew pot, currently filed and simmering away, a mixing bowl filled with batter and the shovel for cooking johnny cakes. The cot he left in the cavern room, planning to sleep there amidst that ethereal music and leave for “Wheatford” tomorrow morning.
The stew and hoecakes hit him like a sedative. Yawning hugely, he staggered to his cot in the cavern and crashed out. While the music of water on stone carried him away, he dreamed again. The sweet unremembered dreams of deepest slumber.
Unsurprisingly, when sleeping in a musical magic cavern, he woke with no clue of the time. His cot quickly packed away and he ambled out, closing up as he went. He regretted leaving the lava lamp device but it was too big to carry away, of course he also had no idea what it was for.
Munching on the extra johnny cakes from the night before, he locked the front door by the simple advent of removing the handle. Any bozo could fiddle it open empty handed in the dark, but it was the principle of the thing.
He gazed off to the west from the porch, then set off at a brisk march. He felt a strong urge to fall into his interface and do some reading while he marched, but in strange territory he decided to keep his wits about him. Walking in the woods was boring, even while using his gift to identify the local plants and fungi and collecting likely looking samples.
Following the stream, he went down towards a broad valley, a ribbon of darker green indicated a river of good size and the valley floor was a patchwork of fields in the distance.
His Artisan gift had some interesting things to consider once he had stuff to work with, if magic and alchemy are things that exist, he wanted to get a running start on them. That “reagent” tag on many of the samples he had touched was interesting.
Even more interesting he had spotted a hive, swarming with bees a ways off his trail and headed over to try some things.
In a small open space deep in a thicket he fixed his gaze on the beehive, concentrated and a message appeared.
Bee swarm, animal, low intelligence, communal/swarming, mild threat. Non-magical.
He focused on the bees, trying to activate his social power for the first time. With a subtle shift in their flight patterns, he could tell that the bees were no longer interested or threatened by his presence at all. Slowly, he approached the hive, a cluster of waxy combs, just visible inside a decaying log. The swarm shifted to allow him to pass, bees swerving all around as though he were a natural part of their hive.
Gently, he reached in carefully and pulled a good sized chunk free with ease. The bees failed to react at all. In fact, looking at the thick slab of sticky comb in his hands, there were no bees in or on it at all. No crud, dirt, larvae, nothing… just clean wax and honey.
He thought about going in for more, since there was still a large amount visible in the log, but a message brought him up short.
Further exploitation of this resource could threaten the hive’s prosperity, this may trigger aggression. Continue?
Gary closed it out, saluted his bee buddies and continued on his way. Down a quarter mile into the valley his stream joined with another, which led down to a small meadow, far from anything human.
As the sun started going down he stopped in a clearing to summon his home. He sat cross legged on the ground and began to drum on his chest and sing.
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“Dayyy-O, DAAAYYY-O Daylight come and me wann go h’ome”
That was the key, not the lyrics, but drumming and singing or whistling summoned it up in a little under fifteen minutes. He got the impression that an instrument would tighten up that timing significantly. The whole trick seemed to be in the complete immersion in the music, rather than an intellectual exercise.
Once again, as he slipped inside, his storage unpacked and sorted itself out. He took a moment to mentally decide what to carry out tomorrow, leaving his storage mostly empty.
After a day of hiking through the bush on winding game trails he was filthy and ready to bathe, eat and sleep in any order. He started another pot of stew, while putting a number of his tubers in the oven to roast. The oven was already hot, just like the fire laid on the hearth. Both consumed no fuel, but instead fed from a tiny thread of magic running from his ‘Mana pool’.
“Magic house is best house” He declared, as he headed for the bath. The water was perfect, almost too hot in the shower.
After the sandwich debacle he hesitated to conjure a bar of soap, but decided to try anyway. With a thought it blinked into existence; a pale blue bar of ordinary looking soap appeared just out of his line of sight without fanfare. It got him clean, but smelled of nothing at all.
Once scrubbed clean he ambled through the curtain to the bath. It was heavenly, so warm and welcoming, scented of herbs and mineral tang.
Odd that this should have a scent, but the sandwich and soap had none at all. He filed that thought away for later.
Floating in the pool, watching the stars twinkle overhead, Gary’s mind unspooled, total relaxation and the soft light of paper lanterns and stars led him into his own mind.
Since the accident he had been almost in suspended animation, living one day to the next, trying to get through his life. Now, here in this place he felt hopes and dreams long suppressed, start to move and squirm.
He had a home, a workshop, a little money and no one knew anything about him. Maybe there could be a chance at something more than just surviving, something better.
Gary’s life had been furtive, earning his way doing handyman jobs and busking on the street for cash, that dried up quickly though.
A crippled kid with tools or a guitar was an easy target. Landing a few gigs repairing gear for local impoverished bands kept him fed after that.
He had met Mr Halls while scrounging in the dumpster behind the old man’s shop for usable guitar parts. The old coot had been gregarious and charming once they got onto the subject of music and his offer to let Gary work in his shop off the books came as a surprise.
Gary had jumped at the chance to get paid to work in a shop rather than in some smoky, filthy club, getting paid in cold pizza or tacos.
“Ohh man… tacos. I wonder if they have them here?”
Only hunger drove him from the bath, his conjured towel worked admirably, drying without chafing, leaving only the pleasant scent of the bath on wrinkled pink skin. He wrapped himself in a soft cotton robe that appeared just behind the door, hanging on a peg that had only just appeared to hold it.
After dinner, there was a lot left over, as his ravenous appetite seemed to have settled down a bit. He stowed the half full pot in the fridge and created a new empty one in the cupboard.
The tableware, he began washing up out of habit, then decided to pile them in the sink and dismiss them. What little food waste remained, slipped down the drain as the dishes vanished without fanfare. Summoning new ones was as simple as breathing, they even put themselves away.
Late evening sun lanced over the wall into his courtyard garden, as he dug a small hole in a sunny raised bed and tucked in his little pot plant. At a touch its message came up.
Cannabis, herb, low magic, edible, reagent, mildly psychoactive, potency will increase as herb matures. This sample is alive and healthy. Integrate into dwelling? Yes/No
He selected ‘Yes’ and a soft chime sounded in his bones as a new message appeared.
A plant specimen has been integrated into your dwelling, its health and growth will be maintained. You will be notified if attention is required or resources become available.
Intrigued, he drew some other samples from his storage. A couple blackberry seeds, some rushes by the garden pond and wild onions by the wall were each integrated with the same result.
Some bone deep understanding told him that these were now permanent additions to his garden and would come with, when he packed up.
In the kitchen, Gary gazed into a bowl holding his slab of honeycomb. He had honey and wax, but getting them apart was a daunting task. He wanted, needed both. Vaguely he recalled that modern beekeepers used centrifuges to extract honey from the combs.
He knew now that the wood working equipment in the shop was a result of having grown up working with and maintaining those very machines. It was his intimate familiarity that made them possible, which explained a lot about his soap and sandwich problem.
Deciding on a course, Gary conjured a few metal trays and a wire rack just the right size for his slab of comb. Then he summoned a wide, thin blade on a couple wooden handles and heated it on the stove.
With a brisk motion, he scraped the wax cap off the honeycomb, placed the wire rack and a deep metal tray on top, then inverted the whole thing. Heating the blade again he scraped the wax off the top of the cells.
He dropped the wax trimmings into the bowl the honeycomb had been in and leaving gravity to do its work, went down into the workshop.
He stripped in the foyer and conjured a pair of boots, jeans, a t-shirt and a leather apron directly onto himself. Long sleeves and sandals were not workshop attire, magical world or no.
He had taken the whole supply of well seasoned firewood in the cabin, but his house didn't use normal fuel. Resolving to find a use for the stuff, he carefully sorted the logs and split quarters by wood species and quality. Sorting was a very simple process with his new gift.
Most remained firmly in the firewood pile, but a few pieces were interesting enough to start playing around with. A few chunks of maple caught his eye first.
Maple, hardwood (curly), non magical, fuel, crafting component, This sample is capable of accepting low level enchantment.
He took them to the bandsaw and began carefully slicing it into shape. In a few minutes he had three hexagonal rods of curly maple each eighteen to twenty five inches long and two inches in diameter. He tucked two away for later.
At the lathe, curls of fragrant wood sailed gracefully to the floor. Before long he began carefully boring holes on the drill press. In just under an hour, as the sun finally left the workroom and paper lanterns sprang up around the room he was satisfied. He touched his nearly finished work and smiled with satisfaction.
Recorder, instrument, Flute class, unranked, can be enchanted up to Iron Rank by a qualified sorcerer. Quality, fine. Unfinished.
Even incomplete and a little loose, he couldn’t resist bringing it to his lips and playing a few bars of an old Irish reel. It would sound better once more firmly sealed and be easier to tune, but the old familiar joy of music filling a home made his throat close a little. This was going to be a very nice flute.
As he headed upstairs he showered briefly in the foyer to get the sawdust off, his clothes he simply unmade.
Clad in only bunny slippers he sat on his stoop. As the sun set, he spotted a faint glimmer of light at the far end of the large valley his temporary home overlooked. He assumed that would be the city of Wheatford.
He sat playing on his flute as darkness fell, watching the stars and distant city lights. Haunting melodies drifting out over the valley while a vast moon of silvery yellow, chased a tiny gray orb through the sky. “Two moons… Typical.” He muttered, before going in to bed.
He spent some effort of will and conjured a soft, luxurious, king size bed into his bedroom, before opening the door and collapsing into it.
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The next morning, while a pot of wild oat porridge simmered on the stove, Gary decanted the tray of honey into a summoned apothecary jar and capped it before banishing all the tools except the bowl that held the comb and wax scrapings.
He conjured a pot and filled it with water on the stove, with the bowl on top. While he ate, the wax melted then congealed and abandoned its remaining scraps of honey.
After breakfast he resummoned his work clothes and went down to work with his bowl of warm beeswax. He also brought a linen shirt that was far too small for him, but unraveled into loose threads very nicely.
In just an hour and a half he finished braiding and winding waxed linen thread onto the male end of his recorder join. A good long buff with more beeswax to make a nice finish and it was ready.
Since his ravenous appetite had settled down, he decided to stay here a day or two to explore a little and maybe learn something about the town, without actually going too close.
He had been traveling slightly downhill since leaving Z’s cabin and the environment was getting more lush. He had some wandering and plant fondling he wanted to do and maybe there were more bees around.
He had a view of the town in the distance and no sign of people around, so this was as good a place as he was likely to find. He locked his house up with a brief effort of will before strolling off into the woods with his flute tucked away against his skin and staff swinging jauntily.
Up a grassy hill and down into a shady vale, he stumbled onto the overgrown foundation of a modest sized house and a few timbers rotting amongst the litter, clearly this had been a farmhouse in the distant past.
The barn was more intact, strangely enough and Gary scrounged up a few odds and ends; a pickaxe head, no handle and a couple brass and bronze fittings from some long rotten bridle.
Up the sunny side of the vale were the real goods, an orchard gone wild. In just a few minutes he gathered a good selection of apples, pears and a few things that looked like a round pineapple his gift identified for him.
Grenadier pear, fruit, low magic. Edible, reagent, component.
Curious, he turned his staff into a knife and cut into it, while thinking how much he was going to use that staff going forward… and how much he was not using that damn sword form. “Stupid Kinksword!” he griped, before trying the fruit.
It was sweet, but not too much, almost melon-like in texture and so delicious. If a fig was as big as a grapefruit, but still as flavorful as any he had tried, it would be close. The taste was almost fig, strawberry and plum but none of those.
Like a pineapple it had a scaled rind, studded with tiny seeds which Gary greedily collected; he had been well bitten by the gardening bug.
By noon, as his storage was getting about half full, thinking to gather more on the return loop, he turned toward home. “Home… “ He mumbled. “I have a home.” Emotions were welling inside him in some uncomfortable ways, so Gary pulled the warm flute from inside his shirt.
Prolonged skin contact was the best way to set the rubbed beeswax finish on that sweet little recorder. Raising it to his lips, he tuned up quickly and began an english country dance tune called John Barleycorn. A light and frisky number, that jigged up and down the scale of his flute, using the simple instrument to its fullest.
Gary spent a quiet afternoon roaming not far from his house, touching the foliage and filling the forest with music for the simple joy and release of it. Not long after he began playing, he noticed a magpie watching him from a nearby branch, a magpie that was watching very, very intently.
Shortly, he heard a soft harmony start in, hesitantly at first, then with greater confidence, following his lead with verve. It was the bird, warbling in key and on rhythm, he was pretty good too. From across the glade, a knocking sound rang out.
A woodpecker had perched on a hollow log and was tapping the rhythm in fine form. Not daring to break the spell, he shifted into an irish reel and sped up a little. The birds stayed with him as he walked, the woodpecker even found an opening and went into a brief percussion solo while he harvested a clump of mushrooms.
By the time he was done, the trees around him were, if not filled, at least liberally sprinkled with chirping, clicking, warbling birds. Exhausted, he wound the music down and the birds vanished without fanfare, flying away on their own business. As they left, a message twinkled in his eye.
Gift: Familiar Stranger has fully integrated. New functionalities have emerged;
Entrainment, non hostile entities may be influenced in behavior or action. Gift scales against creature’s will, mind and the nature of the influence. Creatures will be very difficult to induce to act against their own interests. No cost, no cooldown.
Unknown, unknown/null
“Disney princess powers?” He looked down to the flute in his hand, so simple and humble, what else would happen, what more could he expect?
All questions, no answers. He resolved to head into the town proper in two days, two more days wandering and experimenting would be a good compromise.
If he were honest with himself, it was just fear that kept him from going to the city, fear of the unknown, fear of rejection, fear of people and most of all fear and wariness of authorities. If he were even more honest he was being stubborn and muleish.
He had money, he knew he could speak the language. Z had not warned him of any specific threats beyond nobles and gods, what could he do about either of those anyway? Just lay low, take it easy and get what he needed. Information, resources, connections, he had none and needed all of them.
It was time to suck it up. Plus, if he stayed out in the woods there would be no chance of gathering the things needed to build himself a guitar. That was not going to work, that empty stand needed filling.
Maybe he could buy a guitar, but he knew in his soul that he needed to build one and build it right. It had been over four years since that first and last complete build, he was itching to test the skills he had honed on so many repairs, setups and refinishes.
Grandpa would never be able to give him his journeyman’s apron, but maybe he could carry on his family’s legacy here.
That was a thought to get him moving, he almost trotted back home with a new plan in mind. In this world nobody knew him, everything he cared about in the old world was long lost… except poor old Mr Halls.
“Poor Geezer is probably worried sick. It's gonna be even worse when they find the corpse of old me.” This talking to himself thing was a growing concern, talking to people was the only answer.
With a decision made and his course set, Gary turned in. When morning came, he headed down into the valley. Aiming to skirt the patchwork of agricultural lands and pick around the edges of human habitation and maybe even meet a local or two on the way. Twenty minutes on the now familiar game trails led him to a narrow road of packed earth.
Quickly, as he headed down the lane, the scrubby trees and bushes were replaced by tall conifers and then mixed hardwood forest. It was as though he had dropped a mile in altitude in a few thousand yards of slightly inclined road. Closer to the fields, the trees spaced out, becoming an obviously well maintained woodcutter’s forest.
Before long, he was among the fields, startled again at how much difference two good legs and a bit of road could make. People went about their tasks oblivious of him, so he kept walking, looking eagerly to learn all about his new environment.
The people were ethnically diverse and peaceful looking, no weapons were in view and everyone either ignored him or gave a nod or wave as he passed, noticing his gaze on them and assuming him to be an acquaintance.
As he neared the town proper, rising on a hillside a mile or so ahead, the road passed into trees again. Low stakes marked out plots that were loosely planted with mixed fruit trees and garden beds. Among them, people moved in much greater numbers.
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