…..:::::|. Inside The Tawny Swan .|:::::…..

The lot were tired.

A day well travelled, well worked, and well-feasted.

As The Tawny Swan peeled from the docks, the group heard a drawing whir in the base of the ship. As what could only be described as a harsh shove forward pushed them on, each of the new farers smiled in wonderment. She was powered, The Tawny Swan. 'Kicked' as the rest of the world called it. Gaen a Nce allowed no weyships as they thought ships hovering above the ground were a tactical threat. But the island had no wind-only sail boats itself.

A half-tipsy, half-ill Siin stepped into his cabin.

Sitting on the edge of the tiniest bed she'd ever felt, sat his roommate for the voyage. Halycind watched him groan a bit as his tail took from his pockets three stashed vials and shoved them into his bag. Halycind had always like that. Watching his fifth limb perform acts that must have seemed mundane to him.

“Wonder what a troll fart smells like collected?”

“Why?” She was snatched out of her reverie.

“It would be funny.”

“No, it wouldn't and I don't much like that word or...action.”

“What, and 'toot' is better?” He was squatting flatfooted and easy, packing his highly organized vials. "Come now, Princess."

“Yes. Yes, actually it is.” She watched his tail tuck a vial of teal solution into his satchel as he stood to rub his flat belly.

“Is that more of that grossness?”

“Yes, this is the Adhesive. The second vial series of the Terile Function. I have to take a drop of it everyday for the next fifty-two days. Then I'm on to the Killer-Seal, which I must imbibe every low-rising and two-third's for the following twelve days or else I turn into Marvynn and die.”

She gave him a weird look.

He was stepping over towards her, having finished his housekeeping task, and for a second she wondered what in all Dureyr he was about to do staring at her the way he was.

He was naked, what not for his undershirt and loose-fitting Buraamiran trousers that stopped half knee. They were colourful and the ribbon-drawn trim at the knee was nice. He stopped and stood in front of her; the breath in her lungs halted. The thick tail at his back unfurled out beside him as he stretched long, slinky and tall close over her. She attempted to ignore his closeness; but he smelled clean, like the citrus of his flame. She wanted to lick it, his stretched belly under that shirt. She couldn’t see it but she knew it had to have been well-made. Halycind grew suddenly annoyed with her own unchecked attractions. This was why she needed to be paired with Kodlaa. Her mind wasn’t her own when she was around Siin for too long.

When his stretch was done, what appeared in a fine star-dusted flourish was something red and blooming and fresh near enough to her nose to catch full whiff.

"Thank you for coming to my defense, lady." He dipped into a gracious bow to say.

He'd gifted her a rose, startled her with the magical flourish even, but the gift nonetheless was marvelous. And with quivering fingertips, Halycind took the bestowed flower and smiled up to his eyes outside of herself.

"You'd mentioned smelling but not seeing. So I obliged."

Her insides nearly took her lips to his right then and Halycind had to think about herself for a moment. Her impulses were so unbecoming, she kept thinking. But opportunities to show him how she really felt kept on presenting themselves. Was this how Kodlaa handled her urges? Why were they so beastly in nature? She laughed a bit to get rid of some of her more ravenous thoughts.

"You're far to sly for your own good, caster." She teased with a coy grin.

"Or yours?" He chuckled. "Now..." He slid himself, stretching again, longways down the backside of her onto that horrendously tiny bed and wiggled his way comfortable, half shoving her off.

“Move over, I need to stretch out.”

Halycind rolled her eyes and hopped up, grabbing her things from under him. “I'll move out...so you can stretch over.” She harrumphed.

“Suits me.”

Tossing her things onto the other bed on the other wall, she pursed lips to his closing eyes. But the rose—the rose—she placed on the nightstand between them, out of his reach. “Don’t you dare riffle through my belongs, troublemaker.”

“Your things are yours, Princess.” He stated, cozy on his back, legs crossed, and head on folded arms.

As if to end the conversation, he flopped out his heavy tail across the short bed. The thump of it surged up a primal attraction so sudden Halycind bit her own lip. This Siin was approaching the capability of commanding her gaze without even having to do anything special and it was hard to keep her eyes off of him. She shook her brain and removed herself before any other lascivious thoughts jumped to mind about a man who spent his spare time collecting farts.

...

As she walked, Halycind saw off The Tawny Swan's port, a long familiar curtain of walled docking towers. Where hovering weyships from other countries were halted for inspection at Gaen a Nce's nautical borders. Where seafarers and visitors also waited to transfer travel from their unsanctioned hover-ships to Gaennish powered-ships bobbing in droves on the waters facing the port city of Aoustueilless.

She smiled feeling a certain pride in her rising station on their own powered ship. Not many Agents had ships.

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She found Kodlaa in the galley, amidst six glasses of different ales, holding her seat down and her eyes afixed from the spinning room.

“What're you doing in here?” Kodlaa said shaking her vision straight.

“Siin is being seductive and I don't want or need that trouble.”

“Huh...yes you do. He's a mage, yeah?”

“I don't just like mag—oh, I'm not explaining this again.”

In the galley, a barmaid gave them drinks. She was Speculah. A different sort that Siin. The girls hadn't seen many of her like in Ashok at all. She looked like any regular mortal from Gaen a Nce but her skin was a pale greenish almost like mint, and her eyes were pink in colour. The girls had heard about all types of Blended-men from the elders in Cashtiel but they never said they shimmered.

The girls drank a second round as the Speculah maiden passed them more.

“But you gotta admit, that 'Terrible Funky' is shining him up something nice.” Kodlaa was swaying.

“I dunno, tell you the truth...I think that's all Siin.” Halycind’s truthful words poured a bit from her lips and she noticed she was still tipsy from eating with the Margravess.

“Lap your spittle why don't ya.”

“Huh?”

“You got it bad. You’re droolin’.”

“No, I just don't think his looks have anything to do with the Terile Function.” Halycind didn't want to further express her earlier thoughts from seeing him in the cabin. “I'd like to know what's in that shite, though.”

“'Fraid it's gonna make him nuts?”

“Ynggrloch is already nuts.”

“Hey, you think that's why Percival made him go trough?”

“Yes. Are you sheets already?”

“Seems...What's in this stuff?”

“Me don't know. Tastes good, though.”

"Hey you, pretty pixie!" The barmaiden sauntered to the girls eyeing the one who beckoned her. The hair on top of her head was of the brightest lavender either Halycind or Kodlaa had ever laid eyes on. Her Re-Colour must have been hugely expensive to permanently change the whole of her tawny colour to lavender. "What the pehn is this stuff anyway? Gosh, you're pretty." Kodlaa wobbled and spilled brassy words now that the Speculah was closer.

"Thank you, Ser." She was gracious but she wasn't seemingly wanting to capitalize on Kodlaa's advancement. In her grace she went to pour more of her glowing stock for the two hunters.

"It is called 'Casena'. Made from the eternal bloom of the Caecia flower. Casena is also known as the King's Draught, for it costs almost a fortnight's wage. However, Agents drink it down like water, for you all are on a King's walking coin.”

"Oo, pretty and smart. You got Opal tea, too?"

"My Ser knows of her Speki drinks."

"I know a lot of drinks but I also like learning. You got any?"

"I do not house Opal Tea on the ship here...It needs to remain at a specific temperature...In the dark...At an elevation of one-hundred and eleven meters above the ground."

"Uh, wow. Specific. Thanks fer the schoolin’."

"Thank your Ser for asking."

This girl had no wings either and as she turned to stuff their plates and snatch a stein, they saw nublets at her back where four wings should have grown. She must have kept them clipped.

"How come you clip your wings? I bet their pretty too." Kodlaa was drunk but she was tracing the girls back, as she poured their glasses, as if she weren't.

"I've – uh – worked on ships my whole life." Her nublets wiggled a bit. Seemed a fair notion, seeing as how ships were normally fashioned with horribly confined quarters. "They sort of get in the way." She said standing to height and staring at Kodlaa.

"Oh, I’m horribly sorr—I’m being a total lecher. I'm sorry, my hands got away from me."

"Quite alright...just don't go forgettin' again. Hm?"

"Yes, ma'am."

Kodlaa's drunk glare wobbled over toward her pack-sister, pursing lips. "I think I like pixies...a lot."

"You like everything...a lot."

"Quit'cher crittin', I'm not that bad." She took a sip and took one last good eye of the barmaid. "Maybe."

"Get a grip, dog."

"Woooo, why we being so harsh?" Her face came in a bit closer to Halycind's. "You mad you can't gab your boy down? Like I can."

"I don't need to come on to him." She was averting Kodlaa's gaze; suddenly remembering the rose, gifted. She'd take the petals and base them in oils and her own stasis liquids to make a scent from them. Rose scent hadn’t at all been her favourite but the gift was a treasure to her now. Though, she wasn't telling Kodlaa any of that or she’d never heard the end of it.

"Oh, so it's like that, is it? A sure thing?"

Halycind thought soberly for a second and wondered if anyone would entice Siin. Had anyone done it already? Like Kodlaa tended to come on to creatures she was attracted to or Ednna coming on to the engaged Percival at dinner? She suddenly hated that whole notion. She didn't want anyone else to come on to Siin.

"Whuuuuh – you got stabby eyes."

"Huh?" Halycind looked about at the moment and then to her friend. She took a swig of the Casena to clear her thinking.

"Wooo, I'm smelling a strong fancy from you, girl."

"Shut up, Kodlaa." Halycind took a very large swig from her stein, messily.

“A wolvkin with a Zhuer tail. That's what the kid'd be.” Kodlaa sloshed her own stein full of the glowing draught and almost hit her forehead on the rim.

“Hush it, animal. I’m not having children.”

“Liar! All the litter you talked about back home! Oh, you’re so eager to have his babies you don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“You keep quiet...no children with Siin...nooo.”

A drunken strike of thought caught Kodlaa as she gulped. “Nonono, you hafta call him...aBn now, so he's...he's aBn Ynggr now. Children...with aBn Ynggr, now.”

“I been eager now!” Halycind roared.

The barmaid looked up from drying a glass to watch the girls waste away in drunkenness so quickly.

“See, I told you! You gonna kiss tha' Winecaster Siin?”

“Kiss whuh? What winekisser? Why’s he kissing my wine?” Halycind asked the near empty glass in front of her eyes now.

“Who’s—a – who’s hind?” Kodlaa’s face shoved itself to the bottom of the glass Halycind held to her own face as if to peer through it to view her friend. “Why's he kissing your hind?”

“Oh, you’re so cessy! No body kisses hinds!”

Kodlaa cried wildly waving her arms and near falling from her stool. “Ooooh, this is why you'll never have a boyfriend.”

“Wha', 'cause I not...been eager now...to kiss hinds?!”

“Pfft...you're so funny.” Kodlaa banged out a laugh on the table.

The girls downed two more glasses before considering their states and called the maiden for more.

As to not persuade their drunkenness much further, the barmaid poured them a somewhat modified serving.

However, the two friends spent the next few moments making a terrible clamor in their mirth chasing hallucinations and urinating a wee bit in their fits of laughter. Before too long, they both fell to the floor of the galley from a new kind of drunkenness.