Doing So Once Per Month At Most Is Recommended By Medical Authorities
The paste concocted for the Popcorn Regularization Ritual sometimes asserted its worse qualities most discourteously by falling off overnight. The result of excessive paste loss might be a new pattern entirely, one appropriate for some other ritual yet to be discovered but not at all helpful for popcorn. Once however the design remained intact for half a day or so, it would become fixed and remain functional even if more of the mixture flaked off or was made a feast by undiscriminating vermin. It was that worry which sent Stadeskosken's Itinerant Ritualist to the park just after dawn for the follow-up examination. Zeal would have led him there earlier, but the sun refused to cooperate with such an unreasonable schedule.
The morning's work required as much thoroughness as the initial creation without any of the hardship. Because the base and the box could be inspected separately, he was able to take the latter outside so long as he looked around for ritual thieves first, which simplified the issue of getting the right light. Fifteen minutes persuaded him nothing had gone wrong with the design, another forty gave his conviction the firmness of concrete, and the last hour provided time to review both parts a few more times. A Ritualist had no excuse not to be assiduous. On that one point, his professors and his employers agreed.
He placed the box on the shelf, patted the otter, and took himself to the nearest bench. “It's a fine morning, Eizesl.”
The oligarch's friend next to him said, “I can't think of anyone who would disagree, Sajaitin.”
“It would sadden me if someone did. The project assigned me is completed and awaits testing, after all, and so I want my good feeling to be widely held.”
“I may know some people interested in that while you rest, Sajaitin.” The messenger strode off and soon returned with a portable stove that looked to be of the size recommended by Stadeskosken's guidelines, a sack, and Poiskops Bodan-Tin. Necessarily the assemblage which surrounded him because of complex societal incentives came also. Among that group was a servant marked by a stole bearing the Bodan-Tin shield, which was rarer.
After a final briefing from the Stadeskosken representative, the servant carried the necessary tools and ingredients into the popcorn closet, for so it would be known forever after. Poiskops announced to his hangers-on that if the trial succeeded, he intended to move the day's tea there, and it would be nice if someone informed his guests. The considerate members of the cloud about him did not push or trample one another in their eagerness to have his will done, but rather slid away in the good order of long practice.
Even before they returned, the sole hired menial emerged from the popcorn station holding a bowl decorated with repeating white and purple diamonds and filled with novelty. “That's what I remember,” Poiskops Bodan-Tin commented as he took the bowl himself. He looked inside and sniffed. “They serve this at the embassy sometimes. I asked why not more, and they told me it was a bit of an effort and a bushel of waste for what they got out of it. How much waste was it?”
The menial produced a towel wrapped around what turned out to be a single kernel, slightly cracked. “Out of all of them, this one did not bloom, Stanops.”
“That's decided for me, then. We will have tea here. Er, but the aficionados will blame us if we try to pretend this isn't a subject for celebration general and open, so we had better fetch the choir and tear up that guest list.”
The words of an oligarch transmuted tea into a festival for any citizen able to reach the park in time. Most laborers repaired to the town at that hour regardless, and consequently most of Koshat Dreivis was so able. Further, most of that most was willing to drop by and chat with the neighbors' neighbors to the accompaniment of a local amateur choir. Some of the attendees even ate popcorn. They thought it was decent.
If the actual guests alone were greeted by Poiskops, no one took it as a snubbing. He deserved his leisure as much as anyone did, from the poor and powerless to the king of Chtrebliseu, whom he would have invited had he been in the area.
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“The timing is too excellent for me to deserve it by my own virtues, supposing there are any of those,” Poiskops told Dirant Rikelta, whom he had led even more aside than the pavilion already was. “One of the delegations I won't mention without peeking around first and checking the bushes sent to tell me a pair of its people will be arriving today. Your sweat wasn't shed to water hopes never to flourish, Sajaitin, because now I'll greet them with the latest and the oldest together and make a real display. They won't throw a party over it, they're serious types always talking about wounds and harm, but the heart is a place where much settles, not just reason. I'll also have a chance to tweak my nephew a little if he asks when this popcorn thing started. I'll tell him he would know if he came around more often. He won't actually ask, but maybe his guest will. Is there any word about whether your graceful flight from Dreivis chilled and calm for fiery Dubwasef may be delayed?”
Onerid had coached Dirant on the likely topics. That was rated number one. “It is because of your open hand in letting us use your boat of great speed that we expect instructions this evening.”
The answer satisfied Poiskops, even if it left Dirant wishing Drastlimez (Intermediate) would hurry up. “He will have the message practically in his hand, then. Tradition holds that when two awaited arrivals come at once, it is because the higher heads looked at a blessing and it doubled itself to please them. Your company might be competent, but it's also lucky, which is better. All the epigrammatists agree on that. Now if only we can get Eizesl Dogai-Brein to increase our company, for the font of cheer is a number that is large.”
“It is his stated plan as of last night to do so, though the future never yields to words alone.” Dirant wondered if he should have spoken about such affairs, but as a Stadeskosken employee, he qualified as both competent and lucky according to the judgment of a major figure in Drastlif's government.
“He said so himself?” Seeing Dirant's nod, Poiskops copied it. “Then he'll come. The Dogai-Breins had to get a steady one sometime. That's a very delicate subject, though.” He continued, his voice jovial and not at all delicate. “The chronicles have them all over. Recently, though, they lost their position on the Permissive Council. Demoting a family usually causes showers crimson and graveyards full, but this wasn't one of those. It was a quieter tragedy. A decline none could deny or arrest but only mourn.” The amount of mourning was evident in his wide smile and the satisfaction with which he sipped his tea. “To us decrepit families with more past than future, the Dogai-Breins remain worthy of the highest respect.”
A suspicion that the oligarch was rewarding the ritual's swift completion with important advice occurred to Dirant, though what steps might be taken to exploit it eluded him. Expand into the bodyguard training sector of the market? Hire Dogai-Breins to increase the prestige of the firm in the Drastlif region? Pay Chisops to add an otter to his arms? Such requests had to go through the Permissive Council, he knew. Stanops Bodan-Tin perhaps intended to communicate his support for such an application, should it be made.
Or else the oligarch was simply talking, or bragging about the continued good fortune of his own family, or showing off his inventory of quotations and allusions that meant as much to an Adaban as goslikenar did to foreigners. Whatever the purpose behind his words, Poiskops Bodan-Tin certainly enjoyed his tea, and for all his confusion, so did the triumphant Ritualist.
The afternoon gave Stadeskosken nothing to do but watch for either missives from the office or villains after their secrets. Dirant tried to stand perfectly still so as not to waste company resources, but he gave up and resolved to consider his time to be his own when Millim Takki Atsa declared her intent to find souvenirs for friends and relatives. He had some of those too after all, and though they deserved nothing, his modest 42 Tit-for-Tat permitted him to give a bit more than he ever got.
Stansolt Gaomat, when invited to take part, warned, “Is it left to me to say that a sub-minister remains content in his position more often than shopping stops at souvenirs?”
Dirant pressed his side of the argument. “It is indisputable evidence of your fundamental kindness that you give that solemn warning, and do not think me ungrateful if I claim to be fully aware of it. My reply is that since a tour of the shops is inevitable, the better part is to face it now while we are free and without diversions more to our taste.” Persuaded by that, Stansolt came along.
Onerid Paspaklest and Ibir Doteniksta did as well, even without hearing that argument. “Standing on the beach and waiting for a boat reminds me of a story told to me as a child,” Onerid told Takki. “It made me very sad.” As for Ibir, Myrmidons always moved in groups when possible.
The shops of Koshat Dreivis exhibited items made with the craftsmanship one expected of Drastlifars, and better could be had through custom orders. Perhaps on some other continent, Geft for instance, goods superior still could be found in every hamlet or hunter's cabin, not for sale but made as a hobby and handed out as gifts, but Egillen's inhabitants largely bought, sold, and enjoyed items of a far lesser quality. Dirant became absorbed in ideas about sponsoring an enclave of Drastlifan artisans in some central location up north such as Fennizen, but before he inadvertently triggered Divine Guidance (Hunch) again, a companion who maintained awareness in all situations made an observation which pulled him out of it.