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Lewis, Baum, and Isekai

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[https://arobertmiller.com/assets/img/scene_break.svg]“Ah, young miss, do come in please.” A female orc, her tusks filed and face cross-crossed with scars cheerfully greeted Gretchen from behind the bar. “Please sit anywhere you’d like and I’ll be right with you.”

The woodsmoke Gretchen had smelled earlier was coming from a massive, roaring hearth at the far end of the tavern. She felt a flush on her face from the near-oppressive level of heat, sweat droplets popping up immediately on her forehead. She surveyed the room then chose a table near the entrance, where she hoped the heat might be tempered somewhat by the door opening.

The tavern appeared quite popular: most of the tables and all of the barstools were occupied. At the table next to Gretchen, a human couple ate while enjoying a comfortable silence. Nearby, a group of four gnomes had stretched blueprints down across their table—the corners held down by pastry plates and beer glasses—while the group leaned in, whispering conspiratorially and pointing enthusiastically at various spots on the blueprints.

“You know, I really do love this city,” she said to Bumblebee, who had flown down to sit cross-legged on the table at the spot across from her. “I know I’d have been long done with my apprenticeship by now if I’d gone to study with another wizard. But they all live in such lonely places. You don’t get this sort of energy, this sort of diversity and vibrance, in a forest.”

“True,” Bumblebee acquiesced with a magnanimous nod of his head. “But the fairy circles are much better in the forest.” He gave Gretchen a sly wink.

“I’ll take your word for it,” she laughed.

“Thank you so much for waiting,” the orc said as she swept over to the table, her smile wide and pleasant over her stubby tusks. “My name is Marigold. Have you dined with us at the Irrelevant Warrior before?”

“First time,” Gretchen answered. “And what a unique name for the tavern. Most businesses in the City either go with some awkward alliteration or a ghastly pun.”

“That’s very observant of you, and thank you for noticing. There’s a funny story behind that name. I’ll not bore you with the long version, but the short of it is that my partner and I used to live a more…martial lifestyle. It’s terribly stereotypical, but we were both orcish mercenaries. I joined up when I was just a kid. Worked my way up the ranks until eventually I was commanding my own small warband.

“One day I was assigned a mission: there’s a dragon that’d gone crazy. Gold sickness had destroyed its mind, the poor wretched thing. It was killing innocents. It didn’t know any better. My band was to team up with another, then go put the poor soul to rest. Well what do you know, Rose was the commander of that band.”

‘’Ggrrrgghhh,” Gretchen’s stomached gurgled audibly. Marigold soldiered on, oblivious.

“And that’s how we met. We followed the dragon back to its empty lair and put it out of its misery. Our bands worked together so effectively during that mission that we started getting paired up more and more often.

“I saved her life a dozen times, and she saved mine a dozen in return. After all that, it just seemed like my life belonged to her, and hers to me. We’ve been together ever since.”

Sensing a lull in the story’s flow, Gretchen tried to speak up, “Lunch—”

“After so many years on the road,” Marigold heedlessly continued, “after so much bloodshed, we both just wanted that part of our lives to be over. For those skills, those people we’d become, to fade away into irrelevance.” She smiled, the skin of her face puckering where the scar tissue was pulled taut. “And that’s how we decided on the name for the tavern. Of course, it took us a few more years of saving before we could afford to move to The Greatest City and open up. But look at us now! We’ve been open three years, and our humble establishment has been awarded the Golden Ladle three times! Can you believe that?”

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“No, I—”

“Oh, but that’s not all. We’re living our dreams, but we’ve big ambitions, Rose and I. We’re both going to GnoU in our spare time. She’s majoring in arcane entrepreneurship. Top of her class, too. She’s the brains behind all the business decisions here. I’m majoring in composition and rhetoric. I hope to some day write a memoir of our adventures. I’ve been told I have a gift for storytelling, you know.”

“You don’t say,” Bumblebee replied dryly.

“Now then,” she said, “can I bring you something to eat? Our special today is called the vagabond special. Potatoes, carrots, and onions roasted with sausage.”

“I could smell that outside,” Gretchen said. “It smelled delicious! Yes, I’ll take that please.”

“Very well miss,” the orc said, then looked to Bumblebee. “And for you, sir?”

“Do you have fresh honey?” he asked.

“Do we ever,” she replied, face glowing with pride. “We’ve an apiary right here on the roof of the tavern. Freshest honey in the City.”

“Perfect. I’ll take a thimb, please.”

“Very well. I’ll have those out to you shortly.” She turned and headed quickly towards the tavern’s kitchen, where Gretchen could see another female orc. She was tall, with two brown braids that hung to the small of her back, and was busy plating food.

“If that was the short version, I wonder what the long version is like,” Bumblebee grumbled. “There’s one thing that’s been bothering me though, about this cat ordeal, one thing I can’t figure out.”

“Go on.”

“Why did the cat enter the tavern?” Bumblebee asked.

“Is that the setup for a joke?” Gretchen laughed cheerfully.

“What? I don’t get it.”

“Nevermind,” she said, shaking her head and sighing. Neither her uncle nor Bumblebee seemed to understand her humor. “Anyway, that’s a good question. Hopefully we’ll be able to ask Marigold.”

“Also, don’t you have a spell that could just take us directly to the cat? Why all this retracing of steps?”

“Obviously I’d have done that if I knew how,” she said heatedly.

“Surely Bartholomew knows how.”

Gretchen stared tiny daggers at her tiny companion. “I’m sure he does. But I wasn’t about to ask him to teach me. You already know what he’d say. And he’d never let me live it down, either.”

“Ahh,” the fairy nodded as if confirming a suspicion. “Human pride. It never fails to amaze me.”

“Let’s just drop it, hmm? Look, the food is coming.”

Marigold came over to the table with a large tray of plates balanced on an upheld hand. She gracefully took one down and placed it in front of Gretchen.

“Here you are, miss.” Steam rose from the dish, inundating Gretchen’s senses with a warm, earthy vegetable aroma coupled with a peppery spice from the sausage.

“And for you, sir,” Marigold said as she set a small silver thimble, filled to the brim with liquid gold, in front of Bumblebee. “I must apologize though. I’m afraid we don’t have any silverware to accommodate you. I have this, though.” She held out a tiny wooden splinter. “I whittled down a toothpick, I hope it might serve?”

“That’s quite gracious of you.” His face shone resplendently with a large smile. “Thank you. It’ll work perfectly.”

Gretchen let out a low whistle as the orc woman walked away. “Now that is service, Bumblebee!”

The fairy was unable to respond, as he was already greedily slurping up the honey. It was, after all, his favorite food, and the reason that (much to his chagrin) he’d been named Bumblebee. He nodded vehemently instead.

Gretchen devoured her meal as well, albeit with a touch more control and dignity than the fairy. Despite the warmth of the tavern, the spicy sausages had their own pleasant heat that prickled at her her tongue and throat with each bite. The spice was offset by the buttery starch of the potatoes and the sweet, brown caramelization on the carrots. It was perfect.

Bumblebee had finished his meal and was reclining back on the tabletop, resting on his elbows. The bare-chested fairy, whose sculpted upper-body musculature was normally reminiscent of a marble statue, now had the swollen belly of a woman desperately in need of a midwife. A tiny burp escaped his lips, the sound pitched high enough to almost be out of the range of Gretchen’s hearing.

The attentive orc restaurateur soon returned. “I trust the meal was to your liking?” she asked.

“Without a doubt,” Gretchen replied. “However, I’ll admit there’s another reason we stopped in today. We’re looking for a cat. A big white, fluffy thing. We believe she came into your tavern a few days ago.”

The orc’s eyes went large and her mouth settled into a grim line. “A cat, you say?”

“Yes.”

Marigold’s eyes shifted warily from side to side, taking in the tavern’s other patrons. “Perhaps you’d like to come back to the kitchen? Rose and I can tell you about this cat.”

Gretchen helped Bumblebee—gorged almost beyond the ability for flight—onto her hat, sure that within a few minutes he’d be napping, then followed Marigold into the back.

Gretchen, already warm, broke into an instant sweat as she crossed the threshold into the kitchen. The cramped room was even hotter than the dining area, the blue-green flames of half a dozen alchemical stoves adding to the molten atmosphere. The tall orc that Gretchen had spied earlier seemed unaffected by the heat, however, and turned with a smile.

“Hi Mari, who’s this?” she asked. Like Marigold, her face and arms were covered in a mesh of overlapping scars and her tusks were ground flat. She was half a head taller than Marigold, and two full heads taller than Gretchen.

“Gretchen Ravensblood. I’ve been tracking a missing cat. I believe she came in here a few days ago.”

“Oh,” Rose said, her face growing serious. “Did you tell her what happened yet, Mari?”

“No, I thought you should. And I didn’t want the other patrons to hear.”

“Clever as always, you are.” She placed an affectionate hand onto Marigold’s muscled shoulder. “It’s funny you should ask after that cat. Damndest thing I ever saw really. But first, please promise you’ll keep this story to yourself? I worry about the reputation of the Irrelevant Warrior should this get out.”

“Of course, you have my word,” Gretchen swore.

“Well, day before yesterday I was back here, preparing for the dinner rush. All the sudden a cat bursts into the kitchen, hackles raised. Spitting and hissing. Angriest thing I ever seen. I was getting ready to chuck a skillet at the beast, chase it out of here. And then suddenly, something else bursts in. A monster such as I’ve never seen before. And I’ve near seen it all, miss.”

“What sort of monster?” Gretchen asked in a timid whisper. This was supposed to be a straightforward lost kitten retrieval: follow the trail, find the cat, home for dinner. She hadn’t signed up for monsters. Uncle Barty was going to kill her.

“Easier if I just show you.”