101. Hearthstone

  [Designation: HEARTHSTONE]

  [Instrument Class: AUXILIARY]

  [Anchored Realm: PRETJORD (+1)]

  [Item Description:

  “When I first came into this world, I had nothing. No friends. No goods to trade with. Not even my Instrument could offer the people of this Realm what a hundred other Wayfarers couldn’t. As I lay amidst the dregs of the Roots, starving, counting the hours until I lost my self to the faceless multitude, I knew I had to change. To become the very thing the world demanded of me.”

  “They say the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach. I had no one to teach me that. I had to learn it myself—grain by grain and bite by bite. But what no one wants to talk about is what to do with that heart once you’ve won it. After all, isn’t a heart—even one that belongs to a king—just another ingredient to be diced and sliced? I might have come from nothing, but now, I have what I need to be everything I ever dreamed of.”

  — Excerpt from a Pretjordian letter, author unknown. Translated to the Common Meruvian Vernacular from the original hieroglyphs, translator unknown.]

  ***

  First, Loha signaled to one of the soldiers who ‘stood guard’ around the dining table. He happened to be one of the few still holding the reins to a tortoise, and he now dragged the shelled beast with him at the queen’s command.

  As the tortoise neared the table, it sniffed the air, making full use of its prominent nostrils. It appeared to be particularly interested in a colorful platter of freshly sliced fruit, and sure enough, it craned its wrinkly neck towards the dish while also stamping its feet. The soldier held his ground and strained to keep his steed in place, all for the benefit of the queen who, calm as you like, leaned over to examine the tortoise.

  Then, right in front of Serac’s disbelieving eyes, Loha reached into the side of the tortoise and opened it like a hatch door.

  There was no other way to describe it. One rectangular portion of the shell had swung open on a hinge (not a metaphor; an actual hinge with plates and pins!), and the Rakshasa queen now peered into the ‘inside’ of the tortoise shell as if to inspect the contents of a pantry. Even the tortoise itself stopped fidgeting on a dime, now standing stock-still with a dour yet perfectly calm demeanor.

  The surprises didn’t end there. Next, Loha raised her left forearm, which hitherto had been hidden from Serac’s view, what with all the food items in the way.

  At the sight of Loha’s arm, Serac couldn’t help but let out a small gasp of horror. Beside her, even the ever unflappable Zacko visibly tensed. But then Serac’s initial shock faded almost instantly, to be replaced by remorse for her own ‘unkind’ reaction.

  If Trippy Version 1 were still here, he might describe Loha’s left forearm as an ‘ungodly amalgam of rock, flames, and what remained of Rakshasa anatomy’. The thing was bulky and unwieldy—a stark contrast to the rest of Loha’s slender body. Unlike Serac’s PULVERIZER, however, it had a vague look of masonry to it, as if someone had painstakingly piled granite blocks atop each other to build something with design and purpose.

  Oh, and the whole thing was presently on fire—positively blazing with the green flames of Zealous magic. It cast not only its wielder’s cinnabar face but the entire dining table in its eerily mesmerizing glow.

  With the casualness of a gunslinger cleaning her six-shooter, Loha reached into the tortoise and pulled out various objects, all of which she promptly threw into the fire of her HEARTHSTONE. Eggs, whole peaches, bundles of wheat, cubes of sugar, and more. Ingredients of all shapes and sizes, but they all disappeared into the flames with flashes of bright green.

  [Auxiliary Technique: ALCHEMY]

  The whole thing must’ve taken… ten seconds? Fifteen tops? Before Serac could even process what she was seeing, Loha swept her left arm—along with its dancing flames—across the table with a dramatic flourish.

  The fire went out. The queen folded her hands beneath the table, with a thin reserved smile back on her face. And with HEARTHSTONE put away, what was left in its place was a brand new plate of peach pie—fresh out of the ‘oven’ and piping hot.

  Serac was left speechless by the display, but Loha didn’t let her off the hook. The queen gestured toward her newest dish with an exaggerated (and at least slightly sarcastic) bow of the head.

  Serac took a slice and ate. The pie was still so hot that it burned the roof of her mouth ([15!]), but the taste was just as heavenly as the first. Only… this time, it failed to fill Serac’s heart with the same fuzzy warmth.

  HEARTHSTONE’s magic was no doubt spectacular, not to mention immensely useful in a place like Pretjord. It also explained how the king and queen had managed to prepare such an extravagant feast with so little help and in such short order. But now that Serac had seen how the sausage was made, the knowledge of it left her cold.

  The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

  She remembered well the care and passion Petter the mackerel had put into his stone-cooked liver. The reverence he held for the ingredient as well as his own tools. The precision and expertise of his process. And the aw-shucks pride he’d melted into the moment a pair of Wayfarers had fallen in love with his food.

  HEARTHSTONE was magic—in the purest, most honest sense of the word. Yet, Serac now understood that Queen Loha’s Auxiliary Technique couldn’t hold a candle to Chef Petey’s brand of ‘alchemy’.

  “Well, Serac?” Loha now spoke, with a smile that barely reached her eyes. “Do I get your seal of approval?”

  Serac chewed in silence for some time, then gave a barely perceptible nod.

  “It’s good,” she said honestly. “Amazing, even. Which makes it all the more a shame that we’re only sharing it between four people.”

  Loha’s lips flattened into a thin line. Beside her, King Tyr leaned in with a slight frown, perhaps wondering if he might’ve misheard.

  “I’ve seen for myself how easy it is for you,” Serac spoke with composure, now that she’d steered the conversation to exactly where she’d wanted, “so I don’t feel bad about asking. Will you make us more food, Mrs Queen? Enough to feed us, your soldiers, and everyone else that’s gathered here to celebrate the occasion?”

  Silence filled the air, one that was shared beyond the confines of the dining table—with the soldiers who stood guard in a circle, and with the Rotgardians who watched from above with [Hungry] eyes. There was no doubt that all within the vicinity had heard Serac’s impudent request.

  Queen Loha’s cinnabar face was an expressionless mask. No smile, no pout, not even so much as a furrowed brow. It was as if she’d shut down completely upon hearing Serac’s words—which wasn’t quite the (non-)reaction the latter had expected.

  In contrast, the queen’s husband was much easier to read. King Tyr’s frown first deepened, but in simple puzzlement rather than indignation. He then looked up and around the circumference of the crater. His shimmering black eyes lit up, as if seeing the civilians there for the first time.

  “By Djoful’s jaws!” the king exclaimed, invoking a slightly modified version of the common Pretjordian swear. “Why, yes, of course; you shouldn’t even need to ask!”

  This too caught Serac a little off guard. She’d expected some push-back, if not from the jolly king then at least from the uptight queen. But King Tyr now jumped to his feet and raised his enormous hands into the dusky-green sky, seeming to fill the entire crater with his considerable presence.

  “Come, my brothers and sisters!” Tyr’s booming voice shook heaven and earth. “Join me at my table and feast to your heart’s content! Tonight, the Roots are come alive once more. Tonight, we are one family, Pretjord strong!”

  Serac held her breath, even as her skin broke out in gooseflesh. She’d managed to hold out until now, but this was the straw that broke the tortoise’s back. She felt herself drawn to the Yaksha king and his kingly words, in a way she could never imagine with the Rakshasa queen.

  But as inspiring (and inviting) as Tyr’s speech was, it took some time for it to translate into action. The Rotgardians above the wall first looked to each other with uncertainty, doing the typical dance of balancing needs and wants against must-nots.

  First one, then two, then three souls tiptoed into the ring. Eventually, the dam did break, and the whole lot of emaciated civilians—including the ones hanging back on the footpath—flooded in to crowd the dining table, to take their king at his word.

  If anything, the soldiers were even slower to act. Though whether their hesitation was born of discipline or fear was impossible for an outsider like Serac to say.

  In the end, however, every soul within smelling range of Loha’s food (wide) and hearing distance of Tyr’s speech (even wider!) gathered to pack the crater. Now this was a proper feast! Serac beamed from ear to ear as she looked about the place, spotting the brooding figure of Captain Sea Bass as she did. The man looked away sheepishly as their eyes met, which only made Serac’s smile wider.

  One brave civilian snapper reached for a slice of the freshly ‘baked’ peach pie, the same plate Serac had eaten from moments earlier. This action drew sharp admonishments from the soldiers nearby and and an encouraging guffaw from King Tyr. The snapper man froze for a second, no doubt confirming his own knowledge of the chain of command, then stuffed the whole slice into his underbitten mouth. His eyes instantly filled with tears, possibly from the burning hot pie, perhaps from overwhelming joy, but most likely from both.

  After that, it didn’t take long for the tense confusion to make way for a festive atmosphere. Civilians and soldiers alike passed pitchers and plates to one another, while also exchanging a joke or a tale along the way. And as night fell upon a come-alive-once-more Rotgard, the air filled with laughter and song from every corner of the dining table.

  Zacko was up to his usual butterflying again, cozying up to the locals with drink in hand. Serac, on the other hand, even with an ascension under her belt, still found herself to be oddly shy in large gatherings. As such, she preferred to keep quiet and watch—and perhaps learn a thing or two while she was at it.

  At least one other soul at the table seemed to be just as reluctant to join the festivities. Loha of the Reticent Tribe maintained her expressionless reticence as she watched the feast unfold. In a stark reversal of her earlier reaction to Serac, the queen did not look particularly happy to see her handiwork being devoured in such great numbers and widespread enthusiasm.

  Serac might’ve found this a little strange… had she herself not begun to understand the woman that was Queen Loha. She now watched with curious eyes and learned with an inquiring mind, as Loha engaged in another furtive exchange with her husband.

  The queen’s expressionless mask now turned up to the shark face of the much larger man beside her. To this, Tyr nodded knowingly, having understood perfectly without the need for verbal communication. This time, however, he stopped short of acquiescing to his wife’s silent ‘demands’. Instead, he put an enormous, placating arm around her and drew her into his chest, where the slender Rakshasa woman promptly disappeared.

  Loha allowed herself to be hugged and consoled, at least for a second or two. And when she extricated herself from her husband’s embrace, she was already back to full business: a thin smile that barely reached her eyes.

  Back to work. After all, these extra mouths wouldn’t feed themselves. An ungodly amalgam of masoned rock, green flames, and Wayfaring magic. HEARTHSTONE’s [Alchemy], here to serve the people at their king’s pleasure.

  What would you call that? Serac suddenly thought to ask, using her inside voice despite the loud, joyous chatters that rang all around.

  “It just goes to show”—Trippy didn’t miss a beat—“that pants or no, in the end, it’s he who wears the crown who has the last say.”

  Patreon |

  STAT SHEETS: