It was the day before Veish was to go away to the elves. And just 2 days in fact, before Rum expected the return of his first party, who would take him and this time also his little brother Amez, to the deadly dungeon of Jorteg.

Magic was in the air today. Veish had made a breakthrough, a little one. She’d discovered a little of how Person Magic works; her own particular form of it. She’d connected with it, and the tiniest of magics had happened. An ever so slight, but unmistakable, warming of the air around her. As a spell, this result was borderline useless, but Rum remembered her smile. A genuine, excited smile.

Rum, Veish, and White Rose walked into Amez’ bedroom from the backdoor. The latter carried Electroblade as the harness was still to be finished by a leatherworker. Moving around the ginormous Mr. King’s bed they got to the closet, Veish in the lead. In her black pointed hat, and black robe, she turned the handle on the closet, bent for the inside, and reached forward, touching the wood at the back. “Mesh’thoo.” The whole wooden wall pulled at itself and moved away, or, that is: in towards The Dark Closet.

“You’ve already shown me once” Electroblade commented, as White Rose stepped inside behind Rum, “but I’m still not over the fact that you have this place inside your brother’s closet. Does he know?”

As they all arrived on the inside, Rum turned to the mecha-gnome. “No. And I’d prefer to wait and to tell him until a more, hmm... opportune moment.” The wizard stroked his beard out of habit.

“And you’re not some dungeon lord’s servant? Or a dungeon lord yourself?” From her position in White Rose’s arms, Electroblade raised an eyebrow. “Because I must admit, keeping a place like this secret even to your little brother is awfully suspicious.”

“Of course not! And what’s so suspicious about this? It’s just a big empty room.” He gestured around them. And indeed, besides Veish’s bed and the numerous furniture staring at them in silence, it was nothing but a big, empty, deeply dark room – if one also ignored the complete lack of horizons to either the up, the left, the right, or front. For the vastness of the interior implied unusually powerful magic at work, the kinds which no ordinary mage should be capable of. And those sentient furniture? Electroblade had a brewing suspicion that they had something to do with the rumoured theft of talking furniture at Gnomiture. In fact the more Electroblade thought about it, it seemed far too fitting, in terms of circumstances, that this man, with that ridiculous must-be-made-up name of Rum, should be that agent of the dungeon lords, sought after by The Iron City. Still, not everything fit completely. There was that. His personality, for sure, was totally at odds with anything she’d ever witnessed or known from The Desolate Lands. And Electroblade had witnessed and known plenty. She’d seen a dungeon lord, and many dungeon lord subordinates. They’d never behave like this. Being kind, spontaneous, paternal, treating those around him with the respect of an equal, even if there was little equality there to discern. The irreconcilable elements of this situation made Electroblade’s mind turn to mud if she thought too hard about it. She just didn’t get it. And as she looked on, looked at the wizard talk to his furniture friends, talk to his skeleton, talk to Veish who kinda seemed like she could’ve been a dungeon lord subordinate yet didn’t completely feel like one either – in the end, Electroblade just felt like this wasn’t her problem to figure out. Not her call to make. She didn’t feel enough loyalty to The Iron City to care. In the end, Electroblade felt just one thing: she wanted what Rum had asked of her. Namely, to explore the unknown. To be part of this story before her, whatever it was.

These thoughts of having run their course, Electroblade saw Rum return to them, having had a nice chat with a chair, which was always strange enough. “Hey, so” the mage abrutly began, “Eleganto asked for a more privat chat with me. So I was wondering if you 2 minded staying inside here for a bit, while I go to chat with Eleganto in the bedroom outside? Maybe you White Rose ask Veish some advice about how to get through with magic?” The mage looked up and down from skeleton to gnome several times, before resting his eyes on the one that could talk. “Could you help ze out with that, Electroblade?”

The gnome shrugged. “I don’t get this magic stuff much, but anything I can do I’ll try offering.”

“Great! I’ll go get the blackboard and chalk so you can communicate. And, Electroblade, if you don’t get it that’s totally fine. In fact, maybe you could help White Rose ask better questions to Veish?” Rum shrugged himself as he stepped over to The Vum Door, which as always had closed by itself behind them. With a “mesh’thoo” and a brief wait, he stepped through and into the closet proper, before marching across the other room to White Rose’s corner. He picked up zes stuff, and marched back into The Dark Closet. Delivering the items to Electroblade, since White Rose had zes arms full of gnome, he then stepped over to Eleganto.

“Ready to talk?”

“Yes” came the simple and straight reply below the mage.

Rum nodded in affirmation, and picked the chair up with both hands. He didn’t need both his hands, as the chair was light, but like with the gnome, he felt it right to try and show some respect; to carry the chair in a dignified manner. Another “mesh’thoo” a few seconds later, and some careful navigating of the chair’s frame through the closet, and Rum sat Eleganto down on the floor up against the wall, at the side and a little away from the closet. Going back and closing the closet door, he then sat himself down on the Mr. King’s bed, opposite Eleganto, with his hands on his thighs, giving the chair something of an expectant stare.

“So you want to know about the special love between people” Rum opened. “Why?”

“I...” the chair began immediately, but then spent around 3 seconds completing the sentence, “think Veish might like me.” Despite his words, Eleganto did not sound entirely sure of himself. “Like, much more than the others.”

“Why do you think that?” The wizard raised an eyebrow.

“She likes sitting on me. A lot.”

“Well you are a chair...” Rum commented, but Eleganto ignored the remark.

“She likes it when I talk to her. I’m the only one she talks to, almost. And I think I’m the only one who can make her smile.”

“Oh? You make her smile?”

“Yes!” Eleganto answered, suddenly excited. “I can’t see it when she sits on me. But, she’ll sit on me, and I’ll talk a lot to her – or sing, she wants me to sing more often – and while I sing, she’ll make these strange noises, and she’ll only make them with me, and on me. And sometimes she does these rocking motions, like she’s having fun. She also gets kinda sweaty. Really, it’s strange way to do exercise, I think, although I’ve never exercised before so I don’t know how you legies do it.” Eleganto paused for a second to look into the blue, perhaps imagining how leg-people do exercises. “But, then she eventually stands up, and that’s when I can see her face. It’s all red and smiling. She looks so much more happy after I’ve talked and sung to her. And since she spends so much more time with me, more I think than with everyone else here combined, because of that... I think she likes me a lot.” The last sentence came as a whisper.

“U-huh...” Rum’s mouth was open in thought. “That is... probable.”

“And I think I’ve overheard the customers talk of this, back in Gnomiture. I don’t remember what they called it, but it was a kind of special love. Like, something which make people be together a lot but also I think this love makes new gnomes and new humans, but I didn’t quite understand that part, but... do you know what I mean? Can you explain it to me?”

“Uuuuuuh...” Rum put a hand to his beard, and stroked it very, very slowly. “Okay.” He stroked some more, spending time thinking about what to say. “Okay, I believe what you want to know about is a thing we call romantic love.”

“Romantic love.” Eleganto tasted the words. “What is it!?” The chair turned very excited again, so much so that the eyes on its seat got noticeably bigger.

“Hmm...” Rum stroked his beard some more. “I will try and explain it to you. But, please keep in mind that I have not done much of this myself. I have merely observed the ways of the world, where I have seen many things, and many kinds of relationships, however, that is not the same as first-hand experience.”

Eleganto deflated just a little. “I understand. But also understand me, Great Mage, Savior, I know next to nothing. If you’d share your wisdom with me, I would still be greatful, even if what you can offer is incomplete.”

Rum nodded. “Then I’ll give you my best try.” He stroked his beard again, now a little faster, as if his disclaimer gave him the courage to let his mind run free. “I think, first, I should explain to you what Veish has been doing with you.”

“Yes, please!” Eleganto looked very curious.

"Let me put it like this: I've been to enough bars unrestrained clientel, to guess with considerable probability, what's been going on here." He gave his beard another full stroke. “Eleganto, Veish has been using you to make herself feel good.”

Eleganto raised an eyebrow, or what counted for one. “I know that” it stated.

“Yes, but, this particular way of feeling good, involves a... hmm... a special place on her body. We call it the vulva. I imagine she has been massaging her vulva on your face, and – okay, you need to understand this that when you speak – in particular you – and a person sits on you, that creates a very powerful vibration upwards on that person’s body. And I believe that she has been using your voice, as a way of massaging her vulva.”

“Ah” Eleganto replied. “So people have vulvas.”

“Women – most of them – have vulvas” Rum corrected. “Men like me tend to have something else.”

“Do us furniture have anything?” Eleganto asked the question out loud, not really directing it at Rum, but more like as if asking the universe.

“I think the answer is no, or” Rum stroked his beard, “I would be very surprised if there was anything to speak of. Although I suppose magic might be capable at making anything with enough creativity.”

Eleganto looked at Rum, and into his eyes. The look turned into a stare, and Rum felt like the chair was trying to communicate something.

“Eleganto, you’re not considering asking me to make you a magic sex organ, are you?”

“A what?” Eleganto’s eyebrows both rose up and his eyes widened.

“Forget it” the wizard waved the question off with a hand. “Anyways, you see, this place, the vulva, it’s a very special place to many people. The emotions and feelings associated with using it can be quite powerful.”

“Vulvas are powerful? Alright, noted.” Eleganto made himself sound like a diligent student.

“Yeaaanoo-whatever.” Rum shook his head, more for himself than for Eleganto. “The point is that, for most people, connecting the powerful feelings of the vulva to somebody else, is considered something... how do I put this?” The mage tapped at his own forehead, as if trying to forcibly stir his brain into action. “Okay, there are a lot of complexity involved in the art of the vulva, or at least it may seem like that for somebody who is not in some long-standing business of playing vulvas. So, maybe I should try and explain the basics first. You see, the vulva is sort-of like an instrument. In part a musical instrument, as with it you can make vulvic beings, like most women, produce sweet sounds. The kind of sounds that relaxes the listeners and make us feel in good company, especially when we’re the player. However, not only does the vulva produce music out of vulvic beings, it too can animate them, making of them cute expressions and sensuous motions of desire, things to remind the instrument player of the pleasures they induce; of the good that they make for their other. Really, there’s a lot of fun to be had with vulvas, or at least that’s what my observations tell me, from being near those who practice it. I’ve seen so many different uses, Eleganto, a staggering amount of creative applications – an unlimited potential!” Rum raised his finger to the air. “It’s a real interesting part in the human body. But if the vulva wasn’t curious enough: there is also a second instrument.” Rum leaned forward as if devulging some deep secret. “Vulvic beings are almost always dual equipped with both, and this second one they call the vagina.” He leaned back again. “The sounds made through vagina-play are in my experience somewhat different though. Louder, I’d say, a greater energy, with the animated motions seizing a larger portion of the body in both player and instrument. But that is not to say the divide between vulva-play and vagina-play is necessarily so clear. Really, it varies. Though when a penis-being – the penis being another instrument mostly found in men – when this is used together with the vagina instrument, you also get this interesting situation where the player becomes the instrument, and the instrument becomes the player, and thus they go back and forth, joining together to become this duality of instrument and player, both making sounds and motions for the other to experience, and both playing each other, often to escalate and drive up the energy, up to a crescendo, a peak of musicality and sensuous motion that they call the climax...” With his revelation out, Rum bobbed his head silently at Eleganto. He paused to let the chair absorb the information. When around 8 seconds had passed, he continued. “For now, I think this should suffice for an explanation. Also” the mage straightened his posture, “I am trying to get to this other point, Eleganto. For despite all this great potential a vulvic being has for producing these pleasurable feelings, and making these sweet expressions and sweet moans – still, when it comes to other people, and you are other people, Eleganto, there is a question of seeking consent. Because you may not want to be part of somebody else’s on-going project of vulvic play; the immediate procedures by which a vulvic being – what I assume Veish to be though although I’m yet to see the irrefutable evidence – how she accomplishes her good feelings.”

“But I do want to be part of that... or, I think I do?” The chair looked up in thought for a moment, then at Rum. “Is there any reason why I shouldn’t want to?”

“Okay, so that’s a really difficult question to answer” Rum forewarned. “But, hmm, let me try and put it like this: it’s important to get the meaning of your participation, with another person, properly understood. Why you?” Rum pointed. “Why this time, this place, instead of another person at another time and another place? A large part of this jam we more generally call sex, is how meaning plays a role in shaping the kinds of feelings we derive from the situation. Strong positive meaning about the other person, a meaning which we have a need for, it can certainly help to produce stronger desire, and will result in stronger feelings. But, what if the meaning that she brings to sex, is not what you may want to be the meaning of it?” Rum paused to let Eleganto consider the question.

For a few seconds, Eleganto stared thinkingly back at Rum. “But what if I don’t know what meaning I want to bring to the situation?”

“Then I suppose you first have to ask yourself if you’re at all okay with her deciding the meaning. But, also, sometimes another person may not be entirely thinking ahead. They may not entirely understand the meaning which they are themselves creating, so, in the end, you must consider that possibility as well. People can make stupid choices, and we have some responsibility not to enable choices that are obviously poorly thought out, or even potentially harmful.”

“Wow” the sound was made in awe, “now I don’t feel sure at all. How do I know if somebody else is thinking poorly?”

“That is a question I most assuredly can’t give you a ready answer to. Everyone’s life is different, and it involves understanding the life of the person you’re with. But, I can say that, at least: don’t give this person’s future self a reason to dislike your present self; don’t make them think that being with you was a bad choice.”

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Eleganto’s mood fell some. “Thanks. That was a lot to take in.” He paused to think some. “So... Veish is doing sex play with me. And I must decide if I should let her?”

“You’ve already let her” Rum stated. “Don’t let my talk about consent weigh you down too much, Eleganto. Sex is wonderful, or so it seems to me. I’ve barely tasted that fruit myself, but as I’ve indicated I’ve been around many people who seem to enjoy it quite a lot. If you like what she does, Eleganto, let her, but you should at least let her know that you want to own the meaning of what you’re doing together as well. Perhaps try and let her know that you know what she is doing. If not by words, then by action. She might be thinking that since you’re a chair from Gnomiture, you will automatically like these kinds of things considering how you functioned in the past. But that might not always be true, even if, by the sounds of it, there is some truth to it now. So, here’s my advice: don’t overthink it Eleganto. Have fun with her, and if you put just a little thought into the meaning of what you’re doing, and what you yourself may want to be the meaning, that’s enough for a start.”

“Ah” Eleganto looked down for a moment, and an information-digesting expression came upon his face.

“Do all the musical numbers together that you’re inclined to” the wizard added for good measure, “sing to her vulva’s satisfaction. If that’s what you will enjoy doing.”

Eleganto’s eyes came back up. “Thank you, Rum. I think I start to understand now this thing you humans do: sex.” He looked down again, and for several contemplative and digestive seconds they were both silent. Then his eyes came back up: “Wait, you never told me what romantic love is? Is that sex?”

“Ah, yes” Rum nodded, “good you reminded me, because no, it’s not the same. They often go hand in hand, for sure, but sex is really just one way to practice romantic love, and sometimes couples of people may not practice it at all, but still have romantic love.”

“So what is that then?” Eleganto seemed excited again. “What is romantic love?”

Rum began as he often did, by stroking his beard slowly. “Hmm. Again, for my own personal experience, I can draw here but a fleeting moment of my childhood. However, I can say that more than sex, I’ve seen many, very many, relationships of romantic love. I’ve seen it practised by gnomes, dwarves, humans of course, several kinds of elves, goblins, trolls... You have probably too seen lots of it, and that’s why you’re asking, right? You’ve seen how people behave when they are romantically involved, but you’re not a human, dwarf, nor gnome yourself, so you couldn’t entirely tell what was going on. Well, I can’t give you that experience: of a human in-love with another, and whose feelings are reciprocated. But I’ll still try and give you an explanation that even furniture like yourself, recently awoken to autonomous consciousness, should be able to appreciate and learn from.” Rum paused for several seconds, breathing slowly while figuring out in his head how to start on yet another complex question, which he didn’t feel the best at answering. Still I’ll give it my best shot, this person depends on me. He took a final breath, then began: “They speak of love like a deep bond. Like two halves, shaped for their union, coming together and locking in place. That is a beautiful image and thought, is it not? But I think that, like the idea one woman once expressed in my presence: that she would want a man so loyal that he would, if necessary, help her bury and hide any people she killed – I think both those ideas pick but one quality of this special love, and obsess over it to harmful proportions.” Rum stood up, and began strolling around on the floor around the bed. “Someone who has never met anyone like themselves, they want that interpersonal connection, that deep bond, so much so they will live off of imagining it in its most extreme form. The same for the woman who wanted loyalty. I would guess she has not felt much loyalty directed towards her in her life. That people have neglected her, or outright betrayed her, and so she wishes and dreams for the most intense form of that which is missing. For me, this isn’t romantic love, as much as an illness of the mind and heart. For me, rather than two people being made for each other, or them having unquestioning loyalty to each other, to me this special love is rather something which starts with a mere opportunity. That’s what I’ve seen, that’s when romantic love has shown, to me at least, its truest, clearest colors. They call it falling in love, like there is something deeply burried; some deep potential inside of us, that comes out and takes over our normal selves, to wrap us into this other person’s life, and make them a special, one-of-a-kind, part of our world. Eleganto, when you’re in-love with another, you will think of them, you become sensitive to their presence, so much so that when they’re there, you can hardly avoid noticing them. What they do, what they say, how they look. And in this direction you can only pursue a greater intensity, or you will find yourself escaping from it, perhaps because this person was not like you’d hoped. But if you pursue: most of all you will start to care, you will want this other person to be happy. You’ll want their life to be beautiful. You respect them. When once they were but an individual among many, they attain this exceedingly meaningful presence, in that you want to knit your life into this other person’s life, and you want that new joint life to be beautiful, to be good. You want to tend to it and everything in it, to care for it, care about this other person, about yourself also, about what you share together: a home, children, perhaps your ways of life even join together in a project, like a farm, a shop, or like the elves, who get together with their partner to make a great personal work of art over the span of decades if necessary – a literal work of love, it is. So if you ask me what this special love is, the romantic love, I will say how I think it most beautifully can be accomplished, from the start of the opportunity.” Rum raised a finger, eyes into the floor as he spoke. “First: know what I mean by opportunity. The fact that you start to care, is itself beautiful. To care is beautiful, but there may be a limit to how much you can and should care, in balancing your respect for this other person, for their will, their needs, and their desires. So, you have to explore how much you can use your own affection to build something beautiful, no matter its size or extent. Know this: whatever you build while in-love, however tiny, or however totalizing, when you build it with wisdom, it is worth it, and should not be measured against some ideal which exist in your mind. Don’t live and create beauty in your mind – live and create beauty in the world! Second” Rum lowered his arm and finger, only to raise the same arm and finger again, “what are the sorts of things you can build? Think about how we experience the world around us. Is it a safe world? Is it a world of freedom? Is it a world of kindness? Of pleasure, good sensations and good memories? The beautiful world is a world of all of these. It’s a world of symbols, memories, sensations, that reflect back on you their kind intentions, and a competent will, in making for you beauty, pleasures, and the deeds worthy of your admiration and appreciation. So with your affection, and with what you have at your disposal, make these things for you and for this other person. In the end, only the desires of this other person, and the hard physical limitations of the world, will be able to tell you how far your opportunity to create beauty extends. That, Eleganto, is the special love of peoples, as I’ve come to observe it. That is romantic love.”

For many seconds, Eleganto just stood there in place, completely silent, not a word nor a motion, eyes on Rum. “Oh” it said, finally. “You know so much... I knew nothing of this! But” eyes went from Rum and into the ceiling, thoughtful, “now that I know, I feel this strange sense of... purpose? Yet I still know so little. I’m a chair” eyes met the mage’s, “I’ve seen and heard many gnomes, elves, and humans, but not before I came to your closet, Rum, have I started to befriend humans – to know people of flesh and blood. I’ve seen and heard thousands of you, but only now I have the opportunity to get to know you, and that idea – kinda makes me excited. I want to know people, and I think I want to know Veish, most of all, because she’s interested in me. She has to be interested” he looked down again, “with how much time she spends on me.”

Rum nodded.

Eleganto looked up again. “But where to beg–“ he shut up. Rum had thrown a finger against his mouth, his eyes wide all of a sudden. The mage heard footsteps near the door; the door to the workshop.

The handle turned and the door swung open gradually, and there came Amez. Rum’s little brother looked about room. Only giving Rum the briefest of glances, he stepped inside and looked around some more, eyes searching. “Were you talking to someone, big brother?”

“Yes” the mage volunteered, taking on a nonchalant pose leaning on his hands on the bed. “Myself.”

“Yourself?” Amez turned from staring long and hard at the closet, to stare at Rum. “I kinda sensed a second voice in here.”

Rum shrugged. “I sometimes try to sound like a different person when I talk to myself, that way I can pretend I’m not the origin of my own answers.” He smiled. Next to the closet, midway to the now open door to the workshop, Eleganto had his eyes closed, pretending to be dead, or at least none-sentient, Rum recognized with a snap glance. Unfortunately, Amez saw his glance, and the little brother turned to look at the piece of furniture, noticing it now for the first time.

“What is this fancy looking chair in my room?” Amez went up to it, inspecting Eleganto. “What a strange pattern this is on the seat.” Amez stared some more. “Kinda freakish really, almost looks like a face.”

“Yes” Rum nodded, “I got that one as thanks for helping someone out.”

Amez turned, an eyebrow raised. “Are you helping out a cabinetmaker or something? Why is it that you won’t make people pay you money for help, yet you’ll happily take furniture as payment? I do have a spare chair if you need one. You don’t need to barter with people for basic items.”

Rum just slow-blinked along with a shrug. “I don’t ask to be gifted furniture, that’s just what they give me.”

Amez shook his head slowly. He then turned away from the chair, and sat down in it – down on Eleganto’s face. “You know if you need a conversation partner, you can always come with me to the bar after work. We could go now, actually, I just finished for the day.”

Rum straightened his back up from leaning on the bed, and put a hand back on his beard, giving it stroke with his fingers. “I don’t mind conversing with you brother, but, if I were to talk now, well... the subject is a little personal.”

“Oh?”

“Yes” Rum leaned forward. He stroked his forehead, feigning a troubled expression.

“What’s the matter?” Amez looked all ears.

“Well” Rum delivered an unsure smile. “Brother, I’ve not had many romantic experiences in my life. And, I was thinking about it, trying to imagine how it is like. But you, you’ve had many girlfriends. I remember when we were young, you had 3 girlfriends before you became an adult, and one more by the time I left university. I don’t know if anyone else besides Miss Marine has caught your attention while I was gone, but that’s at least 5 girlfriends, if Miss Marine is your girlfriend now. So, I’m just wondering: what is romantic love, to you? What is it like to experience that love, with someone?”

Amez took a deep breath, and made an expression like Rum had asked a really difficult question. He breathed out, a long slow exhale. “Pffffooo, that’s difficult to say. I did have another, while you were gone. Her name was Lilio. I think my longest relationship ever was with her. But... what was it like?” Amez leaned back in Eleganto, brought a leg up over his other leg, and looked out across the wall and the ceiling in thought. At a point he scratched the back of his beautiful hair, a bodily feature which Rum toootally didn’t envy. “No, what should I say? It’s great! I really liked her, and she really liked me, until the end when it all kinda changed. But! Before that, it was great. We got along, she would come over to my house and make me breakfast sometimes, I really loved that. I did the same for her, a few times. I also made her a little heart tattoo, you know, on her thigh. It would send a small warmth up her body, whenever I came to her, or she came near me. She’d always feel it, if I was in the next street over, heading towards her. She used it sometimes to search for me, too.”

“That sounds very special.”

“Yeah” Amez smiled, and gave a tiny laugh, “it was, she was quite special.” He looked into the floor. “Romantic love is a longing, I think, to be with the one you fall in love with. That was how it was for us. We longed for each other. You see Lilio didn’t live in Ermos City, she was from the south-east countryside, a cattle farm, so we didn’t always get to see each other. But, I think that made it better almost. Because we never got tired of each other, yet we saw each other often enough that we never got tired of waiting for each other either. It was kinda perfect, you know? I could look forward to her coming into the city, and staying with her uncle here in the beginning – he was an old man, much older than her father – and then she’d come over to be with me after helping him. After a year and a half her uncle died, and for a time I was worried I wouldn’t see her in the city anymore, but then she started coming over to stay with me. Her parents thought we should marry, and, I was seriously contemplating it, actually. But then when she moved in, and, I don’t know, our dynamic changed somewhat. We stopped doing anything special, and it just started to get kinda boring, you know? Like, there was no tension there anymore. She went from being my girlfriend, and suddenly it was more like having a sister or a friend in your house. I mean, we slept together, but we rarely did sex, just wasn’t the mood for it. I focused on work, and she began behaving like me wife. She wanted to help with my job, but I didn’t need any help, and then she wanted to have kids, and I didn’t want to have kids, and she complained that we weren’t married. I guess I just wasn’t ready for all that, I was too young, Rum, too young to have a wife and children, and I’d barely begun my career at that point. I’d finally been able to end my apprenticeship and buy my own locales in a cheaper place than this lot” Amez gestured about at the building they were in. “Sometimes” he gave Rum’s eyes a glance, “it’s like you’re with this other person, but you’re each walking at different speeds, or you’re on the same path but suddenly there’s a split, and you don’t choose the same direction. In that sense, I’m glad I got to have met Lilio, she was very sweet, beautiful, and we had a good time, but it wasn’t meant to be forever. We were headed for different paths, we were geared towards different lives.” He looked down into his hands. “She preferred the home, and her family, I preferred the bar, the people there, they were my family, or... not actual family, not like you Rum” he gave a little gesture at his big brother, “but the people there, some who’ve also been my clients before, and many adventurers, they are the ones I prefer meeting on a daily basis, or weekly basis.”

“But you can’t have a romantic relationship to them, can you?” Rum asked.

“No, not true, Miss Marine I met in a bar. And she likes it there, we out often together.”

“Ah” Rum nodded. “So, for you, romantic love happens in the bar?”

“Well” Amez stroked his beardless chin, “I guess we mostly do that now. She has been to my home once, but it’s still early, we’ve not been going out as romantically involved for very long.”

“And do you yearn for her? Do you long to see her?”

“I don’t know if I yearn at this moment, but, yeah” Amez nodded twice, “I look forward to when I know she’ll be there. It’s better when she’s there.”

“Is romantic love different between the women you’ve had?” Rum leaned forward with his chin on his fist. “Or is something the same each time?”

Amez thought some. “I’d say that, every time, the person I love is someone who makes my day better, by just being there, and being with me. When we laugh together, or she sits close to me and I can hold her, feel her and she leans in on me, yeah, that’s something special. Of course, not every day is the same, but even on the least romantic of days, her presence at least makes a little difference to me. That’s romantic love, brother, the woman will own your heart, you cannot not be affected by it. And even with Miss Marine, I do sometimes miss spending time with her, if she’s not there. That’s the strange thing, when you’re in-love, my brother, even their absense is a presence, only instead of comforting you, their absense hurts, even if just a little.” Amez started looking down and sideways into nothing, perhaps imagining some bygone time or recent moment.

“It sounds to me like you almost just want a girl-friend.” Rum commented in Amez’ silence. “As in, a friend who’s also your woman. For, what’s the difference for you, between a good friend who’s a woman, and a romantic love interest?”

Amez snorted. “That’s obvious, come on, Rum!”

“I don’t know if it’s that obvious” Rum defended his question, “I mean, you said you long for your girlfriend. But can’t you long for a friend also? Can’t you hurt a little inside, when a good friend is not there?”

Amez made an unsure grimace. “Yeeeah, I guess – but it’s not the same! You don’t have sex with your friends!”

“The elves do” Rum retorted. “Our human culture is just geared towards individuality and having sex as independent pairs of people. But surely, if there is a separation between a good friend and a romantic love, it’s not merely in what culture we practice?”

“Aaaah!” Amez made a pained expression of complaint. “You always have to make things so difficult Rum!” The little brother shook his head, and Rum responded with splayed hands and a shrug. “Sure, okay” Amez relented while shaking his head slowly, “maybe you have a point, but it doesn’t feel the same.”

“How so?”

“Because that other person is not just special for being your friend, they simply are special, and that’s it.” He made a horizontal motion with his hands as if settling the question by gesture. “She doesn’t even have to be your friend beforehand, she’s just special because of how she behaves, how she looks, how she smells, how she sounds, it can be many things! But a friend is just someone you’ve come to know, like a colleague. A romantic interest, however, that is someone you want to know.”

“Hmm. That was well put, brother. I’d say, we should talk more often, you are truly intelligent when you want to be.”

Amez laughed. “Ha ha, well, you can get more intelligent conversations from me, if you join me at the bar. I’m dying of thirst here, and opening my mouth to talk just makes me want to drink more.”

“Sure sure, I’ll join you.” Rum smiled and nodded back. “But, could you just go ahead without me, first? I have a few things to sort out here, but I’ll be right after you. Same place as last time, right?”

Amez stood up. “Right. Okay, don’t be slow now!” He pointed to his big brother. “Don’t leave me at the bar all alone, I know how distracted you can get. Be sure to come soon.”

Rum raised his hands in surrender with smile. “I will be sure to be quick.”

Amez left through the workshop door, and as Rum heard him also leave the front door, he walked up to the workshop door to close it, just in case his little brother came back. He turned to the right to look down at Eleganto.

“Now you have 2 answers” he smiled. Eleganto opened his eyes and his wooden face came alive again.

“He’s gone?” The furniture whispered.

“Yes” Rum nodded. “Shall I bring you back in with the others?”

“Yeah, that’ll be fine.”

Rum walked up to the closet door and opened it, then he reached inside and with a “mesh’thoo” got The Vum Door open. Stepping back to Eleganto, he lifted the chair up in the prior dignified position.

“Again, thank you, Great Mage” Eleganto spoke while being carried, “my Savior.”

“No problem, glad to be of help. Though, you can ditch the Savior part. Just call me Rum. I am just... Rum.”