Hunter Or Huntress

Chapter 136: Debrief

It had certainly been quite fun in their "little tent," that wasn't quite so little. They were singing camp songs as they waited out the worst of the storm. Jarix had decided against joining in, but Tiguan had taken great delight in trying to sing along. The dragon really couldn’t sing, so it had taken quite a while before Saph realized he didn’t seem to actually know any of the songs, even some of the simplest and most well-known ones.

‘Where did you grow up?’ Saph pondered, looking at the happy dragon that only tensed when another lightning bolt struck somewhere before getting back to the happy little songs. Ylditz had come over to sit with her, making a noble effort to sing along as well for a bit, even though singing clearly didn’t suit the lieutenant.

“I haven’t seen him this happy in well… since last we came here,” Ylditz chuckled as he stopped singing. “What is it with this place?”

“What can I say? We are pretty great,” Saph smirked before going back to the song. Then a massive crack rang out as lightning struck the keep above them, the glare shining through the dragon’s wings as the kids bolted in horror, hiding wherever they could. Ray let out a squeak as some kids dragged her over backward into cover behind one of Tiguan’s hind legs.

Yldtiz sprang to his feet, going over the wide-eyed Tiguan, who was seemingly stiff with fear. He just stood next to Tiguan’s head and stroked the dragon’s neck soothingly.

“That was a big one,” Jarix replied calmly, raising his head outside to see what happened. “Doesn’t look like it broke anything.”

“Well, that’s good. You okay, Tigs?” Ylditz questioned after giving Tiguan a few seconds to calm down.

“Yup,” the dragon meekly replied, clearly lying.

“Maybe we should head inside. Dinner’s probably gonna be done soon,” Saph tried, looking down and noticing that one of the Deriva kids had hidden under her left wing. She just gave the kid a little pat on the head and a warm smile.

“We are not flying in this weather. We are staying here to ride it out,” Ylditz protested. “Besides, the keep will shield us from any strikes. We’re safe here.” The lieutenant just kept stroking Tiguan, some of the braver kids starting to recover and joining in. After a bit, Ray’s confused head eventually poked up from her involuntary hiding spot, looking around at all of them.

“Should we maybe try another song?"

“Yes! We scare storm away!” Kiran declared, poking up from next to her with a fierce expression on his face. “Stupid storm scare Tigs!”

“I’m okay… It’s just not so nice,” Tiguan replied, looking ready to start shivering as Ray just started another happy song. Saph quickly joined in, putting the kid that had hidden behind her in her lap. Tiguan muttered the lyrics to himself as they went.

It had kept pouring, and the water running in under Tiguan eventually messed with the fire making it sputter a bit. They retreated up onto the dry dragons, trying not to get cold feet. It kept burning, though, through the constant tending of Ylditz and Saph (though she mainly helped keep it going with a little wing flapping while he actually did the work). Eventually, Luke had stuck his head inside, looking quite miserable.

“You people free for dinner, or are you having too much fun out here in the pouring rain?”

“It’s not that bad actually,” Ray had piped up, looking around at the kids, who were all huddled in close with each other. “We could just go fetch some food.”

“You want to bring the food down here… It’s literally just up there,” Luke protested, slack-eared, pointing back up at the keep.

“Makes it easier to carry, come on,” Ray chirped, getting up. Zarko took the excuse to get away from all the kids and joined her. It was pretty clear her patience had been tested a little thus far, so she could probably use a break by now. That left just Saph and Yldtiz to keep track of everyone. It was at times like this she wished Lothal wasn’t spending so much of his time shadowing Dakota and Nunuk. The kid was in for a crash course on being a noble though, couldn’t both do that and help Saph baby sit.

__________________________________________________________________________________

Dinner had ended up being a pretty cozy affair with most of them packed in tight at the tables shoulder to shoulder. Saph and the kids were apparently taking a dragon-tent based camping trip in the middle of a storm, for whatever reason. At least, Jacky had claimed so as they sat down.

Tom’s head was doing quite a bit better by now, even if the hangover was not all gone. The extra bit of sleep with the nice cool woman had definitely helped. The mood was still good around the keep, nothing like the day before, but still, it wasn’t half bad. There was a hell of a lot of muttering going on around the tables, and a group of people from Deriva having taken over the kid’s table now that they were otherwise preoccupied. Most of the food was leftovers from the feast, so that wasn’t half bad either. Maiko had come looking for Sapphire only to catch her coming up to fetch some more food for their little expedition downstairs. He had followed her down, arms full of food.

“I wonder if Glira and Grevi are gonna be jealous the boys are getting company today?” Jacky questioned, leaning her head on Tom as she chewed.

“I don’t know. I heard Grevi and Glira are staying out in the rain voluntarily?” Essy questioned, taking a bite of her food. “Four dragons out in the rain and the greeting hall is empty.”

“Well, the two of them set up camp, and I don’t think Grevi could handle any more boy’s talk. Fairly sure they were expecting the two drunkards to end up taking over the greeting hall,” Fengi replied with a shrug. “Not like they would want to fly in this weather anyway, and Nunuk would be furious if they scratched up the keep any more than Tiguan managed yesterday.”

“Well, Glira proudly proclaimed that she would be a stout defender of this keep no matter the conditions. Never seen her act this gallantly,” Kulk, Glira’s healer, went as she walked up next to Essy. “Okay if I sit here?”

“Sure,” the huntress replied, scooting over a little to make room.

“If I didn’t know better, Tom, I would say Jacky was about to get competition from a dragon,” Fengi laughed, all the girls except Jacky snickering a bit at that.

“I think she would meet her match” Jacky replied, confident as ever.

Tom just shook his head a little. ‘Girls’ he mused to himself as he savored the precious potato with the best approximation of danish brown sauce he could manage. ‘Not home, but close enough.’

“What’s the matter? Afraid she’ll come snatch you away in the night to slave away making weapons for her?” Jacky continued, breaking out into full-on laughter, poking at the silent Tom.

“It’s certainly a scary proposition,” Tom admitted, taking a drink of water as Jacky’s laughter began anew. ‘Dammit woman.’

“There we go, it’s been a while since we got him properly flustered. You’ve desensitized the poor guy,” Fengi added. Tom looked back to her, a smile growing on his face.

“Careful now. Or I might start giving Unkai ideas for you two to try out.”

At that Fengi seemed to somehow choke a bit on some food, reaching for some water. “Whaaat?... nooo...”

Essy just looked at Tom with a knowing smile. He was certain she knew the whole story, but he had no doubt she would not be telling. “Oh come on. He’s a nice guy, nothing to be ashamed of,” he tried again, looking at her. He had honestly been expecting the two of them to be sitting together right now.

“Tillar is not a half-bad name either. You did always want a family name after all,” Essy added in a kinder tone, looking to Fengi, who was clearly feeling rather cornered right now.

“I know… It sucks to always have to say, ‘Nope… Just Fengi’ to everyone who asks… I hate it,” she replied, clearly finding that part of it more comfortable.

“Fengi. Tillar. I think it works,” Essy said with a soft smile. “The real question is: why is he sitting over there?” She pointed over her shoulder at the guard’s table, and a quick glance confirmed Unkai was getting a similar treatment from all the guards. If his ears were anything to go by, Unkai was looking rather embarrassed too at the moment.

“I… Is no one gonna mention Saph wandering off with Maiko?” Fengi questioned hopefully, eyes darting around the table.

Essy stared at her for a second or two before shrugging going back to her food, Fengi visibly letting out a sigh of relief.

“Well, what is there to say? The two seem to like each other. Maiko is completely infatuated with her. Let’s be honest, who wouldn’t be, and she’s clearly testing him slowly, I don’t really know why. I guess she doesn’t quite trust him yet.”

“I wouldn’t either,” Kulk added as she finished chewing. “That guy is trouble most of the time. Never seen him like this before, though. Still, she’ll do well to test him thoroughly.”

“I smell a good story,” Essy replied, looking at the healer intently.

“Guy is great at getting people to trust him quick; it’s literally his job when we are training. Earn the recruits’ trust then report what they are doing. If they do anything we particularly disapprove of, we deal with it. He once ratted on Morina, that’s one of the reds Jarix trained with, for stealing food from... I think it was some of the city’s winter stocks. Result. She’s still in training while the rest of them are out and about being put through their paces.”

“Jarix ever do anything like that?” Tom questioned, suddenly sounding interested.

“No, he was too lazy for any of the more complicated stuff. Most of his grievances tended to revolve around getting out of work however possible. You would not imagine the number of ways a dragon can pretend to be sick. And surprisingly few people are willing to go near a dragon that’s pretending to have a bad cough, lightning included.”

“Then along came Zarko, and she just didn’t give a shit. They were flying, even if they would light up the sky every now and again. Jarix was a lot less sick after he figured that out.”

“I can believe that,” Essy nodded as Jacky leaned forward.

“What about Glira. She’s acting strange, right?”

“Oh hell yeah, she wants a new toy. She’ll chase that goal till the end of the world now. She will have it. It’s just a question of when,” Kulk replied flatly, looking to Tom. “Don’t worry, she’s not gonna steal it or blackmail you or anything like that… Actually, blackmail might be on the table in the long run.” She corrected with a shrug. “She’ll wait till you’re dead and buy it off the next in line if she has to. For the time being, she’s trying to be ‘worthy of it.’ ”

Tom just chuckled flatly, pondering just how to deal with that situation. Jarix had been much the same if he was being honest, so it wasn’t hard to see where it was coming from, but still. Glira was both quite a lot larger and didn’t strike him as quite so well adjusted as Jarix had at least become. Nor did she strike him as the type to be easily molded, at least not outside of pretending to be whatever she felt would do the trick.

“Oh right, by the way. The major would like to ask you to please just keep this whole ‘work to be worthy’ thing up. She hasn’t been this easy to deal with in years,” Kulk continued after she finished chewing.

“I can do that... Actually, why not make use of it? What do you think we could make her do?” Tom questioned with a devious smile leaning in. This might be a dangerous game, but why not. Glira was the one that couldn’t take a no for an answer after all.

“What do you need? As long as she doesn’t figure out you are deliberately having her do dumb things she’ll do it I think.”

Tom just looked around the table as if searching for ideas, eyes landing on Jacky.

“We could have her fill our pantries for us… pleasure cruise to see the island… A lot of racing. Wait, I could beat Saphire. She’s faster than Jarix, right?”

“Afraid not, nothing can beat the boy for speed or turns. She might outpace him on a long enough distance. But if you want a few tons of supplies moved somewhere in a hurry, she’s your girl.”

“How long would it take for you girls to kill half a ton of prey ?” Tom questioned, looking around at the huntresses at the table.

“What do you mean?”

“We might need a time limit for this little competition of ours.”

“Oh, a competition,” Jacky snickered. “Well, are we hunting rabbits or Tirox? That’s gonna be quite important,” she questioned, looking to him with a kind smile.”

“Hmm… Tirox would just hand the win to Glira. We saw how he struggled to get airborne last time.”

“You had him carry a whole Tirox home for you?” Kulk questioned, tilting her head with a bemused expression.

“Yeah, in the future we might cut it up instead.”

“Not a bad idea. Still, thanks for keeping up his training, I guess,” Kulk went, holding up a curled fist, Tom giving it a tentative bump.

“We could do a trophy hunt instead?” Jacky added after a few seconds of awkward silence.

“Oh, looking to finally fulfill your little promise to get me that trophy?” Tom chuckled.

“Well, would you have been happy with some deer antlers or a feather collection?” she replied with a chuff.

“Probably, if you killed it,” Tom admitted, taking another bite of food.

“Well, I wouldn’t have. Besides, what would that say about me? A Furlong that couldn’t kill more than a damn crown goose?”

“You got a damn medal; you don’t get to talk like that,” Essy corrected with a slight shrug, looking to Dakota, who had come walking over.

“You are turning into quite the warrior. Just like your mother always wanted. You might suck with a sword, but I don’t think it will be long until you best me in the ring,” the gilded huntress replied, giving Jacky a pat on the shoulder.

“Now you’re just trying to make me feel better.”

“Maybe,” Dakota admitted, a slight smile showing on her face.

“Well, we all know one ring she started winning in,” Pho piped up from further down the table, clearly wanting to be part of the conversation.

“Yeah, someone seems to have solved the cooling problem,” Fengi added, Tom starting to sense that the level of girl talk in the air was about to become uncomfortable.

“At least it was over sooner without all those breaks,” Essy said, seemingly busier with her food. Tom knew better though; no way she could resist a little gossip after all.

“Poor Kokashi,” Tom just stated, not looking at her. “Imagine having to stay up all night listening to someone else have fun,” he continued, sounding a touch unimpressed as Jacky near enough choked on some food. Essy just gave him the stink eye as he smiled at her. “I think those armbands might be useful for more than just fun though.”

“Hell yeah, I want to try them with my armor. I’ll beat the crap out of all of you in the ring,” Jacky boasted, still trying to clear her throat, coughing and spluttering.

“What armbands?” Dakota questioned, head tilting.

“Cooling bands, Tom made a pair. They’re silver too,” she replied proudly, straightening her back.

“Okay, that’s pretty cool,” Fengi admitted, looking to Tom.

Tom just looked at Kulk with a knowing expression, the military healer nodding to him before going back to her food. It had only cost a candy to get her to tell him what she knew of those bands, which had been more than worth it to know that they wouldn’t hurt Jacky unless she forgot to take them off.

“Oh, so that was the gift,” Essy let out before realizing what she just said. “That I heard you might have gotten.”

“Busted,” Fengi just laughed out, as it was now Dakota’s turn to give someone the stink eye.

“We have talked about this, Essy. Privacy is a thing around here.”

“Yeah, remember how we punished Tom for breaking into Saph’s room?... Damn, that was a while ago actually,” Jacky added, trying to copy Dakota in looking damningly at Esmeralda.

“Well, don’t just talk about them, show them?” Fengi let out, looking at Jacky with big puppy eyes.

“I really want to have them polished first. He kinda made them without mom knowing,” Jacky whispered, leaning in.

“Oh come on, I wanna see them,” Fengi tried again, Jacky shaking her head a bit before leaning back and getting up.

“Okay then,” she stated, walking off towards the stairs.

Tom just shrugged as they all took a second to ponder what to talk about next.

“Anywho, anyone heard how Tink’s doing?” Fengi questioned, sitting back down with a content smile.

“In bed now. He’s not doing so hot by the sound of it,” Dakota replied with a grumble.

“Fucking idiot,” Tom replied, shaking his head.

“Now, now, be nice. I think Nunuk did in his ears when he made it to the infirmary, and it’s not like you haven’t done any stupid things while drunk, now have you?” Essy questioned, looking at Tom with a rather damming look. “Or do you only get shouted at if you aren’t human?”

Tom Didn’t respond going for another bite of food finding it empty. ‘god dammit’ he grumbled to himself refusing to look at Essy.

“He messed up while drunk, go easy on him. Think it’ll hurt him?” Essy questioned, her tone growing a bit softer.

“We got no clue really. Should have done more mouse tests, I think. Even if Wiperna shouldn’t know,” Tom relented, turning to look at her. “Not like we would truly know even if we had though.”

“Well, sounds like you got your test then,” Kulk added with a shrug. “It’s normally hard to find people willing to try out stuff that might kill them.”

“I didn’t…”

“I think it’s worst for Junior. He tries so hard to keep his father in check, I doubt he’s happy right now.”

“I mean… no, he wouldn’t be,” Tom admitted, looking down again.

“Well, what are you sitting here for? Shoo,” Essy went, waving him away. “You’re done eating, and you have work to do. We’ll tell Jacky where you went once she comes back.”

“Right,” Tom replied, cursing himself. Poor kid hadn’t done anything wrong, and now his dad was sick. Still, couldn’t be nice… and he had told him to just come tell him if his dad got worse… ‘Goddammit, hung over Tom is an arse,’ Tom went, getting back up. “I’ll be back…”

Tom made his way to the infirmary, pondering how to be nice to Junior without just letting Tink off the hook. The inventor had seemed fine earlier, if still rather drunk but that had only been a few hours ago after all.

Opening the door, Tink was lying in one of the beds with a blanket and some weights keeping him in it. Junior was sitting on a chair by the foot of the bed shooting to his feet as Tom entered.

“No change in… levitation?” Tom went, playing with the word and trying not to sound too serious.

“Not yet,” Tink replied with a shrug, seeming rather unworried, even though it was pretty clear he was rather weak.

“I am sorry I didn’t keep a better eye on him, Sir,” Junior let out, snapping to attention.

“At ease, soldier,” Tom chuckled, shaking his head. “I’m no sir, we aren’t soldiers, and that’s not your fault nor your job,” Tom replied, looking the young man in the eye. ‘At least not officially,’ he thought to himself, putting on a smile. Junior looked unsure what to do, just nodding instead. The kid clearly liked playing soldier after all. Not that that was a surprise, any idiot could tell he went all starry-eyed when he got to talk with any of the officers they had running around… Maybe Tom should humor him or even call a favor or two? It might cheer the kid up after all... That was for later, though, he concluded as he looked to the stricken inventor in the bed.

“So, how are you feeling?”

“Not great if I’m honest… Feel like I’m gonna puke,” the inventor replied, Tom swearing his cheeks seemed a little blue.

“Not surprising, all things considered.”

“I’m sorry…” Tink sighed, leaning his head back into the pillow.

“Good. Means you learned something. Now we just need to make sure you make it. How much did you drink?”

“Only half a cylinder… We tried upping the dose until something happened. Junior has the rest.”

“Right, we’ll consider what that was worth later,” Tom replied, glancing at the kid then back to Tink. “Have you puked?”

“Yeah… about an hour ago, but I drank it last night.”

“It would be in your system by now,” Tom replied, trying not to grimace.

“Yeah, Nunuk told me.”

“Right… Gotta be honest, I have no clue what to do here.”

“I do,” Apuma went, walking in and seeming quite excited. His arms were full of papers, a familiar earring dangling from his ear, Linkosta hot on his heels. “Our dear lady told me you were getting worse and that Tom was unfit to deal with it today. I guess you have gotten better.” The old man questioned with a smile looking at Tom.

“In the future, I would like to be around when you try something like that,” Linkosta added with a smile, her attention focused on the inventor before putting down what looked like alchemical supplies on a table. “There we go.”

“You found something that can help him?” Junior asked hopefully, looking at the supplies.

“The colonel might have… or more likely some scared paper pusher working away down in the vault under her watchful gaze,” Apuma smile at the kid.

“Dad, you are a paper pusher,” Linkosta interjected as she started arranging her supplies.

“Oh shush, I’m your father. Show a little respect,” the old man grumped, though still smiling. “Nunuk told her of the discovery that the oil worked for dragonettes after your little encounter down in the workshop. Sounds like Victoria decided to take an interest in having a look for anything on the subject.”

“And?” Tom questioned, hoping this was good news.

“He’s gonna die,” Linkosta interrupted. “If we don’t give him something to cancel it out.”

Tom looked to Junior, who had gone white as a newborn and was staring wide-eyed at the mage, not saying anything.

“What have I told you about good news first?” Apuma scolded her before looking at Junior. “Got that cylinder still?” Junior just handed it over absent-mindedly, eyes locking on his dad.

“Excellent, apparently this stuff can work both ways,” Apuma went, shaking the little cylinder. Linkosta was already setting up a little work area, scribbling runes on a little blackboard and arranging some odd-looking ingredients. There were some flowers he didn’t recognize, what looked like sulfur, and some very shiny black shards that looked like glass.

“So you are gonna make anti-gravity oil… Wait, no, that doesn’t work…”

“You can figure out the name later. Now the book said this should be easy.”

“You have a book on this”

“No but Victoria does” Apuma clarified tapping the ear ring. “This is exciting, I've never tried something like this before.”

Tom could actually hear Tink and Junior swallow in unison.

“Don’t worry you two. I told you. This should be easy”

__________________________________________________________________________________

“You mean to tell me we have been sitting on top of an ancient vault of who knows what for years?” Lady Deriva questioned, not getting up from her chair in the grand hall. After they were done eating and the news from the infirmary seemed to indicate Tink was in fact gonna be fine, they had set up all the chairs to do a little announcement for the sake of the folks from Deriva.

“Indeed,” Nunuk replied from her raised seat. “It’s worse than that I’m afraid. As you heard from Baron, these things, these machines, are apparently more than myth and legend. My beloved husband Apuma even managed to find an old storybook of fairy tales talking of ‘the flying keep.’ It’s just a children’s story, but it may hold more truths than we ever imagined.”

“Now. What we need you to do is simple… Nothing,” Dakota added after Nunuk fell silent. “We need to learn and to understand what we are dealing with here. From what we know, many things are gonna be changing in the coming times. The Inquisition has collected and suppressed this knowledge for centuries. Millennia even. Yet now there are apparently talks of opening their vaults too. Mark my words, change is coming.”

“Is it because of the attacks? There have been more like ours, right?” Luke questioned anxiously as his mother rubbed her chin next to him.

“We believe so. It sounds like they fear a war is coming. One we are not ready for. From what the Investigator said, there are split opinions on the subject within the Inquisition itself. This is why we want you to do nothing. There is nothing special under our keep. You don’t even know that we found some old mine shafts. It’s for your own good.”

“What of your new weapons? We have seen Tom fight, and now you carry some of the same weapons. I know it’s asking a lot here, but...” Luke tried, clearly hopeful.

“We won’t arm you. It would only make you more of a target. Some may even attack you just to get their hands on these weapons if they find out.”

“I agree,” Lady Deriva added, raising her voice only a little. “My home has endured enough. We would only make ourselves a target… We depart tomorrow morning heading for home. You have been kind in the extreme. You will always be welcome in our halls for as long as they stand.”

“You are more than welcome. We will see the end of this messy year. Who knows, in time we might get to properly reap the rewards of all this work. When that time comes, I’m sure there will be a spot at the table for you all,” Nunuk went with a warm smile, leaning back in her chair.

“What have you got in mind?”

“We don’t quite know yet, but I have a feeling we will be expanding in the future. That is to come though. For now, let’s have a relaxing evening, and we will see you on your way tomorrow if the weather is willing.”

“By the gods, they are being formal today for some reason,” Jacky whispered into Tom’s ear.

“Yeah, I’m surprised it’s not being written down,” he replied, looking around, trying to spot Linkosta. Apuma was still with Tink and it would seem so was Linkosta. either that or Tom sucked at finding her.

“... Should we be?”

“Best not to, secrets and all. Bit bummed out Tiguan isn’t staying longer. Such is life though.” Tom shrugged. “I wonder what Dragon camping might be like.

“Sell Glira some bombs and I’m sure she would take you camping,” Jacky snickered.

“Haha, very funny. We do need to know what to do on that front though,” Tom replied, still keeping his voice low. “Let’s start with trying to make some of the new ideas work for Jarix though.”

“Hell yeah. We are gonna need more flash powder though, you know that right?”

“I know. I’ll have to have a chat with the major or Victoria about that. It can’t be long until we get a visit from the Inquisition either, which I’m not looking forward to.”

“Just, you know. Don’t try to fight them,” Jacky replied with an unusual amount of worry in her voice.

“If you’re saying it like that, I guess that really is a bad idea?”

“You were considering that?” she questioned, clearly swallowing.

“No, not really. They might force our hand, but I doubt that would end well.”

“Yeah… It would be a glorious battle though.” Even Jacky’s bravado wasn’t able to hide her discomfort with that idea.

“If you want fame and fortune remember, history is written by the victor. No one would hear the tale of the mighty Jackalope Furlong.”

“Oh please, how could they strike me from the records?” Jacky boasted, puffing out her chest.

“I wouldn’t put it past them,” Tom teased, booping her snoot as Fengi cleared her throat next to them.

“What’s the matter? You fought bravely on the dance floor,” Tom near enough snickered, prompting a glance from Fengi.

“And other places,” Jacky added with a snicker.

“Oh shut up, you two.”