An eruption of laughter surrounded them. The sounds of many cheerful and loud voices, each talking louder to overpower the other, filled the room along with the smells of hot foods and warm drinks. Esper's mouth fell open, her fear now buried under curiosity at the place she found herself in. A motley assortment of patrons filled the many benches and tables, men and women of all shapes and sizes and complexions drank and ate and shouted in merriment. Their candor was a stark contrast to the odd grizzly trophies that hung on the walls. Heads and adornments of creatures the likes of which she had never seen before or even imagined possible.

The room was large and open, but filled with many heavy, dark wooden tables, each occupied by groups of people. No seat was empty, nor any plate, mug or hand. As the crowd noticed Botulf come in, they let out a cheer and a series of whistles.

“Look who came back! I told you!” cried a man to the crowd, of which some pounded on the tables and others now laughed aloud. Botulf’s eye twitched as he knelt down. Esper climbed down off of his back, her fascination wildly overpowering her now.

A voice rang out from the tables. “Hard work being a guardsman, ‘ey Botulf! They got you carrying kids now too?” The crowd laughed, several hitting their mugs together.

Botulf shot an annoyed glare at the man sitting just next to them. He raised his hands in surrender, a large laughing smile shining out from behind his scraggly orange beard.

“Look at you! Hello there little one! How are you?” He leaned down from his seat towards the girl staring up at him.

It was too much. She was somewhat over-stimulated by the situation. She winced. “Your breath smells,” replied the girl to him dryly, only realizing she was being rude after the words had come out.

The man shot back and howled in agony, him and his table erupting in a wave of laughter that spread throughout the room. The high mood had been raised even higher now. He clutched his heart. “You’ll kill me little miss! Ooooh! Look at this little firebrand! Is she yours Botulf?” More laughter.

Botulf sighed and turned to the girl. “Come on girl. Let’s go speak to the owner.” She nodded, still feeling bad about her lack of manners. Mama wouldn’t have approved.

Following the guardsman a step, she quickly turned her head back to the man “I like your beard!”

A large grin spread over the man's face and slammed his fist on the table before pointing to the woman who was sitting across from him “See! Now I’m definitely keeping it!” More laughter. The woman pinched the top of her nose with an expression of deep exasperation, that only fueled the joyous atmosphere around her more.

On the right side of the large room, there was a stone construction of stairs that led up to a higher level above. There was a large wooden bar with stools in front of it lengthwise across the left side of the room, behind it a single doorless doorway. Just before the bar, however, was a large roaring fireplace. Esper looked at the flames that were dancing high and wildly into the air, as if taking part of the debauchery and chaos present here. They looked back to her and nodded. She nodded back in return, it was only polite.

Botulf lifted a wooden plank attached to a hinge to allow them to walk behind the bar. Many bottles and kegs were stowed here. Hundreds of different colors and shapes and each filled with mixtures of equal variety. A slender woman with her flat, shiny brown hair tied back into a loose and low ponytail, was doing her best to fill up various glasses and mugs in a frenzy, running back and forth along the bar. It was warm in this tavern, but not like the outside world. No, this was a deep warmth that came from a place more ethereal and heartfelt. The heat was, in a particular way that people felt, but couldn’t quite form into coherent words, more comfortable and tolerable than the clinging swelter of the outside world down here.

He turned his head and looked around the corner past the door as they walked past the barkeeper. “Deryk, I’ve brought the girl.” Esper turned the corner behind Botulf. The room was filled with kettles and pots. A large stone table in the middle with the wraith of a man standing just behind it, a bloody cleaver in hand. He was wispy and almost as thin as Esper was. His tired eyes, sunken deeply into his head, had dark, almost purple rings beneath them. His face and skin were tattooed and marked from head to toe. He wore a short, midnight blue robe that stopped with an ornate frill near his shins. His mystical gestalt however, was somewhat contrasted by the white chef's apron, adorned with flowers, that he wore bound around his waist.

Esper wasn’t sure if her eyes deceived her or not, but the man moved towards them without walking. His feet, never leaving the ground, rose to their tips and slid towards the door, his body following after in an unnatural fashion. He stopped before Botulf, closely enough to make any concepts of personal space irrelevant. Without a word he bent his upper body sideways, his lower half staying upright with only the tips of his sleek, black shoes touching the ground. His head sideways at an almost perfect ninety-degree angle, he looked at Esper.

His pupils never seemed to contract or dilate, leaving his gray eyes in a constant state of non-changing existence. His skin was perhaps once dark, but had now grown to the palest shade it could, as if he had never once felt the touch of the sun. His lips were dark and his head was covered in a low, black stubble. They stared into each other's eyes for a time. Still with an unnaturally bent sidewards upper body, the man nodded to Esper. She nodded back.

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The man's upper body rose back upright still standing only inches before Botulf’s face. “This is acceptable. You may go.”

“You’ll watch over her then?” asks the guardsman.

“She may work for her keep as per the terms of our arrangement.”

Botulf scratched his head and looked down to the girl. Having reached his limit now however, he shrugged and turned to leave “Don’t cause any trouble, girl.”

“I won’t! Thank you!” Shouted Esper after the man who was already out of the kitchen door, his hand waving behind him, his other hand lugging the heavy shield through the bar, surprisingly not knocking any bottles or the barmaid down on the way.

Esper looked back up to the strange, sickly looking man “Are you dying?” she asked.

“Every day a little more,” replied the man plainly, before continuing “Can you cook?”

“I can make porridge.”

“Can you prepare meat?”

“What’s meat?”

“Can you play an instrument?” Esper looked at him in confusion. “I thought I was supposed to work.” They stared at each other for a time.

Breaking the silence, she pointed to his feet “Why are you flying?”

“It beats walking. Come, follow me,” says the man, turning around and waving a long crooked finger, beckoning her to follow. He levitated down around the kitchen towards the other side, towards a large basin entrenched into the stone counter top. A circle was carved into the wall above the empty basin, a series of wavy lines filling it. The man placed a hand on it and whispered “Verwishen,” it lit up, causing a trickle of water to run down along the wall and into the basin.

Esper stared wide eyed at this magical construction, as it quickly turned into a continuous flow that was pouring out of the plain stone wall. It seemed impossible, but there it was.

“I hate washing dishes. My sleeves get wet. You will do it for me,” says the man with no emotion.

“Okay! I can do that!” said Esper with some excitement. “But there aren’t any?” she asked.

The man raised his hand “Wait for it.”

Esper looked around confused, not sure what she was waiting on exactly.

Then she heard the rattle to her left. From the small window, next to the basin counter-top, that led out to the bar where the many voices still rang through. The woman behind the bar was placing mugs and cups onto the edge of the stone window. As soon as she let her hands loose from the dishes that she set down, they carried themselves over to the sink, as if being pushed by waves rising from the stone counter towards the now water filled basin, where they splashed upon sliding in.

“Haaah?!” cried Esper, now wildly curious.

“We just opened about half an hour ago. The first dishes of completed meals always come in after about half an hour, apart from the odd mug or so,” said the man.

The woman leaned through the window and cupping her hand to her mouth she shouted “Two flanks and a stew!” The man nodded to her and she went back to her work, mixing drinks in a frenzy.

“I must prepare the meals now. You better start washing or the sink will overflow.” Without further explanation, he simply turned and levitated away back to the large stone table, where he began to hack some red chunks with the cleaver that he had held onto this entire time.

Esper looked back to the sink, more dishes were on their way from the window, sliding along the smooth surface of the stone counter-top as if being pushed by some invisible force. Somewhat surprised at the speed they were coming in, she dropped the robe-bag and sunk her hands into the cold water and began scrubbing the plates, determined to prove herself. She stopped only in surprise for a moment as she noticed that not all of the mugs were made of wood. Taking one out of the water, she looked at it, it was heavy and made out of a coarse gray metal. How odd. She didn’t have much time to ponder about it though, as a splash of water struck her face, from a plate falling into the basin, the water of which was steadily rising.

With panic, she returned to the work that she apparently now had to do, her mind wondering how she ended up here, when she was still in her home town just a few days ago. So much was happening and so fast she could barely keep up in mind or body. She was tired and hungry. The strange decrepit man behind her began whistling, as he hacked the meat on the table, throwing odd chunks here and there into different pots and pans. Somehow he seemed completely out of place in the warm, bright building yet also entirely in his element as he worked in an unending flow.

Once she had finished the first dishes, she set them to the right side on the counter and watched as they floated away on the stone surface, sliding along the counter until they reached the far end where they stopped all on their own. It was fascinating to watch them, however each time, she was brought back to reality by another splash, the tide of dishes seeming to come faster and more steadily now. With each load, the woman would shout through the window to the man, who would respond with a silent nod or gesture in turn.

Esper’s face and body were wet and she wasn’t sure if it was from the dishwater or from sweat. Deryk would sometimes float over to inspect the dishes that she had washed, but never seemed to find anything to complain about and set them back down. Every time that he would serve out a new meal, he would take from the far end of the counter and fill up the freshly washed plates and bowls with fragrant foods. Meats and stews consisting mostly of many different vibrant shades of greasy brown. Though there was some orange, red or yellow scattered throughout and even a bold hint of green here or there, but most of the food was brown.

Not that it was unappetizing, completely the opposite in fact. These were the kinds of foods meant to be eaten in such an atmosphere, but it did have the effect that the dish water would consistently take on a darker hue, as the richly thick sauces and fats washed away, disappearing into a hole below. However the fresh flow, still streaming down the wall into the basin, always diluted the pool with fresh and clean water. She quickly found herself too busy scrubbing dishes in a frenzy to worry about the things that had brought her here or her hunger or exhaustion. She was just working, completely in a state of absentminded flow, listening in to the many loud conversations and gaffs being had just outside the little window with a smile.

It wasn’t grave digging, but this work was nice too.